...the Soul of Wit - Short reviews

I'm having a good reading month, so here are the new short reviews a little earlier than usual. Enjoy!

Nails and Eyes by Kaori Fujino

Three little stories. None of them really scary but none of them really non-eerie either – this is what Kaori Fujino puts up for us readers in her first English collection Nails and Eyes.

Starting with a creepy kid story (and boy, she is creepy) which flows into fine body horror; we then find two much shorter, and maybe a little less striking tales, plotwise. An elderly woman who suffers memory loss after a stroke and needs to stay at the hospital is curious but also irritated about one of her fellow patients, much younger than the others and different in every other sense too. And finally a childhood urban legend traumatizing a little boy, a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Always striking in this short read are the characters Fujino draws; interesting to follow, easy to understand and each with their own, distinct inner life.

It was really a too much of a bite-sized collection and I wish there were more of these stories, so I would definitely read more by the author if more of her stories were published in English.

The Secret Life of Insects and Other Stories by Bernardo Esquinca

Right on time for Halloween AND the día de muertos did I open this bag of horror goodies! It turns out it's a mixed bag, it's how life sometimes goes - I was expecting something rather different, but, sometimes it's a mixed bag you get.

It's not that I'm lazy as a reader or see myself above the task of letting my fantasy wander and complete the written story in front of me, but an open ending in horror is something that's effective when used sparsely and although I didn't count, I think every other story in The Secret Life of Insects had an open end, exhausting this narrative device for me. The introduction by Marianna Enriquez clarifies that Esquinca has a penchant for the genres true crime/detective, which would explain him wanting to give the reader an inquisitive role, still, it was too much for me and honestly leaves the impression that the author can't write good endings. Which is, in fact, perfectly fine. For instance I am a fan of an author who has a collection of two Lovecraftian novellas, both of which are truly, amazingly written. You feel like the writing goes into your blood, they're so good, but both have endings that disappoint. There's no shame in it, but when in a collection of many more stories this happens repeatedly, it catches the attention.

Even though towards the end I found the themes repetitive and the characters a little non-distinct, like the narrator often being involved in an advanture either with his cousin/s or brother (I grew up with a ton of cousins too, so I can picture where that comes from), there were two stories I immensely enjoyed, here they are:

The Paradoxical Man in which a man having nightmares tries to get to the root of the issue and finds out an astonishing truth about himself. A very delightful, Lovecraftian piece of writing with one of the best (semi-open) endings I have come across. I love creativity like that!

Come to Me is my favorite in this collection - a "be careful what you wish for" kind of story, following a very likable main character who wanted nothing but eternal love, leading to a surprising outcome and a chuckle. While writing this, I realize now that I prefer Esquinca's more humorous stories.

There's enough range for other readers, though, from the zombie epidemic to (my beloved) tentacles to a flabbergasting story about Senor Ligotti as a landlord harassing his tenants - I wonder how Thomas Ligotti reacted to that story!

Definitely worth a read, and, as I said, it's just that my personal expectations were different from this book, I was anticipating to be knocked off my socks and that didn't happen, although it was a fun read.

Beş Sevim Apartmanı: Rüya Tabirli Cinperi Yalanları by Mine Söğüt

Alright, this is an exception, I will not start reviewing books unavailable in any language all you guys can read, but I liked this book so very much, and it is, at the end of the day, one of the books that I've read, so I'll just shortly pitch it here.

We're following the five inhabitants of an apartment building in Istanbul, who have all been brought there from a psychiatric clinic by a psychiatrist. They were patients in said clinic because they claimed to be haunted by demons/ djinns and it is the goal of the psychiatrist, who lives in the basement of the same building, to disprove the existence of djinns due to some childhood trauma. And there are two stories per inhabitant - one a lied, fantasy story involving/invented by djinns and fairies and one which is the harsh reality. 

All of us who grew up in Turkey are probably traumatized by some djinn story one way or the other, I was terrified of them. I remember my mom taking me to some hodja, witch doctor or our overly religious neighbor looking for a remedy for them allegedly haunting me, because I was a very dreamy and distracted child and unable to properly concentrate - and she's a German native and a high school teacher letting this kind of hysteria get to her!! Mine Söğüt dives deep here and gives a full explanation, religiously and socially where the phenomenon djinn comes from, said witch doctors profiting from it and the marks it leaves on us. I really loved it and wish more people can read it someday.

Nothing's Worse Than a Clown Gone Bad by Ponk Vonsydow

Well, there is something worse than a clown gone bad, and that’s untapped potential in a book about clowns gone bad.

On a conceptual level absolutely brilliant, this book has originality, creativity, and is set in one of the best universes built, consistent, coherent and hilarious. Unfortunately, there’s an equal amount of careless writing, typos and bad jokes to make you roll your eyes. I also thought there is too much material for one book, you could easily cut this into a series. A good editor can work wonders here, as, despite a typo on almost each page, I see this book as an uncut gem.

I absolutely enjoyed the character of God, who as an old anarchist, a weed smoking hippie with no sense of business at all and thus unable to manage the universe he built and needs a helping hand from his son Jesus who is a little more business savvy. The adventures of this father-son duo are just one aspect of this crazy work; humanity turning into clowns after the second coming of Jesus, who is disgusted by all humans except for one clown he sees on TV visiting sick children in the hospital, the bigger forces (than GOD!) in the universe, the Weirdos, the All-Knowing Owl, the planet of The Jesus Freaks, and The Powers That Be playing their games and shaping the fate of “Like Everything”. Then there’s also everything happening on Earth, with the Clown Supremacists lead by Sicko and Satano and the resistance of the Mimes… Phew, so much good stuff in here, almost too much.

I still did enjoy reading this satire and I’d recommend it if you’re in for the laughs and the originality and you can turn a blind eye to careless writing. I like this level of crazy clown creativity.

Enter the Body by Joy McCullough

In Joy McCullough’s Enter the Body, the young heroines of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedies, - Juliet from Romeo and Juliet, King Lear’s youngest daughter Cordelia, Prince Hamlet’s lover Ophelia, and the raped, mutilated and betrayed Lavinia from The Bard’s most unpopular play, Titus Andronicus -, barely twelve to sixteen year old kids, gather in a secret room beneath a stage and chat up about their fates; complain about their fathers who reject them, send them away or simply kill them as soon as the girls refuse to serve their purposes; pine for their lovers who failed them and share their dreams and hopes, and the endings they would wish for each other and themselves.

This was oddly touching, I have to admit I cried on more than one occasion, especially over Lavinia… Certainly this will be staged itself at some point, and it should.