Kij Johnson

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book. I bought this on ebook for my Kindle

Thoughts: I did not realize that this was a retelling of Lovecraft's "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath" until I had already started reading this book. I plan to read the original Lovecraft story shortly. This was a decently done fantasy adventure story about a professor, Vellitt Boe, who goes on a journey to retrieve a student who has run off with a waking world man. Boe has worked tirelessly to provide the women of the dream world with an opportunity to attend college and losing a student to the waking world could result in the closure of the school.

I really enjoy Boe's journey through the strange dream lands and the intriguing characters she meets along the way. There is a heavy theme throughout of women not being as prevalent or worthwhile as men in the dream world and Boe fights these prejudices on her journeys. It was imaginative and well done and I enjoyed both Vellitt Boe as a character and the intriguing worlds she journeyed through.

I think I originally put this on my wishlist to read because it was a fantasy adventure featuring an older protagonist. The fact that Vellitt Boe is in her 40's is addressed throughout. I like that the author discusses both how traveling is harder at that age but also how much more life experience Boe has, so she makes better decisions and has better resources. This does a great job of explaining the benefits and detriments of getting older.

My Summary (4/5): Overall I really enjoyed this. I enjoyed the characters and the amazing worlds we venture through. Watching Vellitt Boe get to see the waking world and experience it for the first time was amazing as well. I would definitely recommend this if you enjoy fantasy adventure/questing types of stories. I will be reading the Lovecraft novella that this story is based off shortly and can comment on that how it compares to this after I do that. I will definitely be keeping an eye out to see what books Kij Johnson writes next.… (meer)

Kij Johnson is a writer I don't know as well as I might like. That is to say, I read and enjoyed The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe, and I think I have read some of her short fiction, but what I know of her makes me think I would like her a lot. So I was glad to get the opportunity to pick up a copy of The Privilege of the Happy Ending from Small Beer Press, which collects a bunch of her short fiction from the past decade.

Almost all the stories here focus on animals, and many of the stories use what we would recognize as postmodern or self-reflexive techniques. So, they may be a bit of an acquired taste for some readers—but for me, it is the kind of taste I have indeed acquired. I liked "Tool-Using Mimics," which offers a number of different explanations for a photograph of a girl with octopus tentacles; "Five Sphinxes and 56 Answers," which focuses on deconstructing the story of the sphinx as well as a young girl obsessed with the sphinx; and all three of the "Certain Lorebooks for Apartment Dwellers," which chronicle magical symbols, strange beasts, and bizarre dreams while also telling in brief snippets stories about relationships. I will say that Johnson has her go-to techniques in her stories, and for me this meant that when some concept or idea or trope turned up two times in rapid succession, it made me like the weaker implementation of it less than I might have had I read it in isolation. For example, I didn't really get into "Butterflies of Eastern Texas." The upside of a single-author collection is seeing how a writer develops a theme; the downside, I suppose, is that you might get tired of it.

There are only a couple stories I didn't get on with. "Coyote Invents the Land of the Dead" took me three tries to get through, and I never did figure out what was going on. "The Ghastly Spectre of Toad Hall" is a The Wind in the Willows sequel; I have only the vaguest memories of that book, which didn't help, but its anthropomorphic animals are an ill fit among the strange and uncanny animals of the rest of the collection. It might be good, but this is the wrong context for it.

I was glad for the chance to reread "The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe," and I found even more to enjoy in its depiction of middle age than I did the first time. Of all the stories in the book, this one engenders thoughts of a sequel: what would it be like for someone from a dreamworld to go on a quest in our world? But perhaps that's better left imagined. (This novella on its own makes the book good value for money; Tor.com sells it on its own for $15 in hard copy, but you can buy this whole collection for $17!) I particularly liked the volume's final story, "The Privilege of the Happy Ending," which is about a girl and her talking chicken trying to survive an infestation of weird, bizarre animals. As the title points out, it demonstrates how happy endings are privileges, by sometimes choosing to tell you what happens to side characters, and sometimes not. Not all stories have happy endings, but how happy an ending is depends on where you stop and who you care about.

So while I wish this was both a little less repetitive (surely Johnson has something to say about topics other than animals?) and a little more cohesive ("Toad Hall" is an odd fit, but to be honest, so is "Vellitt Boe"), it's a good way to be exposed to a master of the craft of short fiction. Most of the stories can be found online... but though you could do that, will you? Read them in this book. As for myself, I will be seeking out her earlier At the Mouth of the River of Bees now.… (meer)

As always with short story collections - there are some stand out stories. However, all these stories are intriguing. The author, Kij Johnson, follows themes of being single - dealing with Boyfriends/Girlfriends, not connecting to other people. These stories are introspective, often short, with a theme repeating.

The two standout stories for me are the "Dream-Quest of Vallitt Boe" and "Coyote Invents the Land of the Dead". Both are about the lands that are only accessible at certain times, in Vallitt Boe, its by sleep, and in Coyote, its about death.

The writing is well done, but often oblique. I'm glad I read these stories, but at times, I felt that they were too moody, with not enough substance.… (meer)