Fragile Things

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Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the fantastical stuff with its focus on the magic of youth and mystery of the unknown. One aspect of Gaiman’s writing both sublime and frustrating is his unwillingness to spell everything out. Pages from a Journal Found in a Shoebox Left in a Greyhound Bus Somewhere Between Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Louisville, Kentucky" (3. In stories such as Feeders and Eaters, we never learn the grisly details of exactly why the man has fallen in on himself, but there is enough horrific background to allow for creativity to connect the last few dots. Stories, like people and butterflies and songbirds' eggs and human hearts and dreams, are also fragile things, made up of nothing stronger or more lasting than twenty-six letters and a handful of punctuation marks.

A re-read of A Study in Emerald proved highly enlightening as I was able to observe and analyse the technique used by Gaiman in creating the story.The short story is unforgiving; you don't have time for slow bits, or parts that sound like you've read them already somewhere before. He shows how that pure, innocent period of growth is essential before they reach the pornography and violence that befalls adulthood. I am still trying to figure out what happened to the anthropology professor so maybe that's why I could not get into this story. On the other hand, something like “Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Secret House of the Night of Dread Desire” frustrates me, because I feel like I’m almost-but-not-quite getting it.

The Facts in the Case of the Departure of Miss Finch' reminds me far too much of The Night Circus, and not in a way that benefits the short story. Strange Little Girls" (2 stars)- Just seemed to be listing different attributes certain women take on. Also, Gaiman is so brilliant and creative but he's also sometimes gruesome and occasionally really off-putting.Such marvelous creations and more—including a short story set in the world of The Matrix, and others set in the worlds of gothic fiction and children's fiction—can be found in this extraordinary collection, which showcases Gaiman's storytelling brilliance as well as his terrifyingly entertaining dark sense of humor.

Occasionally he does lovely things with words and had fabulous ideas, and I hear he's a very nice guy. I like his ability to effortlessly maneuver his readers right into the position we need to be in for maximum effect, and when we get there, he flips everything, so we're left wondering just what happened and how we got where we are when obviously we were just on our way to somewhere else.There were award-winning stories here, too, such as A Study In Emerald which won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story and Sunbird, which received for its author the Locus Award. The four stories not included in the British edition are included in the British edition of Smoke and Mirrors.