What better to fill in my days than to follow up Daughter of Regals and Other Tales with Reave the Just and Other Tales? And in keeping with my last topic, what was your favourite story this time around?
I found it harder to choose a favourite as no one story lept out at me as being better than the others. I think it's because SRD improved as a writer in the years between the two books.
I even liked The Djinn Who Watches Over the Accursed and What Makes Us Human, despite the fact that he wrote them out of necessity or ego and not love.
In the end though, The Killing Stroke was my favourite. What was yours?
Other Favourite Short Story
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variol son
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Other Favourite Short Story
You do not hear, and so you cannot be redeemed.
In the name of their ancient pride and humiliation, they had made commitments with no possible outcome except bereavement.
He knew only that they had never striven to reject the boundaries of themselves.
In the name of their ancient pride and humiliation, they had made commitments with no possible outcome except bereavement.
He knew only that they had never striven to reject the boundaries of themselves.
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I'm Murrin
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I really loved The Woman Who Loved Pigs. It's a very old-fashioned kind of fairy story that takes a good hard look at what it really means to become a changed person--especially if one thinks of it in terms of Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty. You take a young woman, trap her in a set of rotten circumstances, and then save her from them by waking her up, by transforming her from an ash-girl into a well-dressed, well-educated lady.
What's so wonderful is that in The Woman Who Loved Pigs, SRD turns the fairy-tale convention on its ear, and gives us a story where that awakening, that transformation, isn't necessarily the salvation it might seem to be--a story where awakening and transformation may not be salvation at all.
What's so wonderful is that in The Woman Who Loved Pigs, SRD turns the fairy-tale convention on its ear, and gives us a story where that awakening, that transformation, isn't necessarily the salvation it might seem to be--a story where awakening and transformation may not be salvation at all.
Halfway down the stairs Is the stair where I sit. There isn't any other stair quite like it. I'm not at the bottom, I'm not at the top; So this is the stair where I always stop.
The Killing Stroke is clearly winning out on this poll, and I could have easily chosen it as my favorite as well. But, there's just something about The Woman Who Loved Pigs that makes it my favorite.
I just love SRD's play with the theme of possession. It's something that's important in the Chronicles, and here he devotes an entire story to the idea.
And I just love the slow transformation of this poor woman. For me as a reader, there was so much visualization going on while reading this, I was simply amazed. It was like I was this poor woman "seeing" all the things the pig was filling her mind with. But what I truly love about this fact for me is that SRD has said many times that he is not a visual writer. He focuses on words that convey emotions and motivations. Rather, he doesn't "see" first, but only as a secondary aspect of his having written words. This story really stands out to me for that reason.
Hail, SRD.
I just love SRD's play with the theme of possession. It's something that's important in the Chronicles, and here he devotes an entire story to the idea.
And I just love the slow transformation of this poor woman. For me as a reader, there was so much visualization going on while reading this, I was simply amazed. It was like I was this poor woman "seeing" all the things the pig was filling her mind with. But what I truly love about this fact for me is that SRD has said many times that he is not a visual writer. He focuses on words that convey emotions and motivations. Rather, he doesn't "see" first, but only as a secondary aspect of his having written words. This story really stands out to me for that reason.
Hail, SRD.
For me, the tie was between Penance and The Killing Stroke. I really liked the paradoxes, story development, and emotional tension in Penance. And as a judoka, I couldn't help but like The Killing Stroke, with its variety of martial arts.
I voted for Penance because I read it first, and so have liked it longer.
I voted for Penance because I read it first, and so have liked it longer.
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Workshop Creation
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Zarathustra
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Just looked for your post and couldn't find anything in FR - did you post on this topic?Zarathustra wrote:Has anyone else noticed the similarities between The Woman Who Loved Pigs and Fatal Revenant??? I'm finishing the story now. When I do, I'll post in the FR forum. It's really amazing, all the parallels.