Burning Girls and Other Stories

 

Burning Girls and Other Stories is a collection of short fiction, vignettes, and thought experiments by Veronica Schanoes. Due out 2nd March 2021 from Macmillan on their Tor / Forge imprint, it's 336 pages and will be available in hardcover and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

One reason I prefer collections and anthologies is that short fiction is really challenging.  It's spare and the author doesn't have a wealth of wordage to develop characters or the plotting.  Well written short fiction is a delight. I also love collections because if one story doesn't really grab me, there's another story just a few pages away. 

The author has an interesting and unflinching voice in many of these stories. There's a strongly folkloric quality (in the old-world bloody and sometimes brutal way that folklore had before it was sanitized by the Brothers Grimm and Mother Goose). Some were very strange, or uncomfortable to read, and several were very very good. The standouts for me personally were the titular Burning Girls, Phosphorous, and Rats (an homage to two departed cultural icons - no spoilers).

This is a very well written but uncomfortable read. There's very little smiley cuddly happiness here.

Four strong stars. 

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.