Curious, Healing

Books about healing, business, and fun

fiction

“The Armless Maiden” edited by Terri Windling

by Leave a Comment

Subtitle: And Other Tales for Childhood’s Survivors

This is an anthology of fairy tales retold for adults, with the scary bits left in, and also the bits about resilience and survival. Yes, her father cut off her arms, but then the armless maiden rescues herself and her child through quick wits as well as magic.

The stories vary widely from beautifully retold tales, to heart-wrenching realities, to clunky pieces using child abuse for cheap drama. I imagine each reader would put different stories in the three categories.

Some of my favorites are:

  • “The Session” by Steven Gould, where an adult Sleeping Beauty has a therapy session about who, exactly, gave her that poisoned apple.
  • “Knives” by Munro Sickafoose, where a girl is isolated in a tower by her beloved father, and has to learn about the outside world after he dies.
  • Terri Windling’s “The Green Children” about a young girl whose mother killed her abuser, and Terri Windling’s essay about her real mother, who didn’t.
  • “The Little Dirty Girl” by Joanna Russ rings true about what’s needed for healing.

This is a book to read slowly, with time for emotional processing, and plenty of permission to skip the stories that don’t resonate for you, or that resonate too much.

Available at biblio.com.

“A Drunken Dream and other stories” by Moto Hagio

by Leave a Comment

Subtitle: 10 Stories of the Human Heart

Recommended to me by: laughingrat.dreamwidth.org

Moto Hagio is one of the most renowned Japanese artists of shojo manga, high-quality comics for teen girls. She was one of only a few women in the genre in the seventies, and she continues creating art today.

This is a chronological collection spanning 1977-2007. The elegant art conveys emotion and movement with fine pen strokes. With a light touch and few words, the stories address the emotional nuances of abandonment, nonconformity, abortion, conjoined twins, abusive mothers, dead mothers, loving mothers, love through time, gossip, friendship, and marriage.

The words are translated into English, but the pages and the panels run right-to-left, and the sounds emanating from the art are unfamiliar. Instead of “BAM!” and “lub-dub” we see “P-P-PAM” and “TMP!” Each panel invites careful attention, revealing more layers at each reading.

I highly recommend this collection.

Available at bookshop.org.

“The City and the City” by China Mieville

by 2 Comments

Recommended to me by: jesse-the-k

Starting out, this books feels like a lovely magical little airship, lifting off into possibilities. By the end, the airship is limply deflated on the ground.

Detective novels aren’t my favorite genre so I haven’t read that many, but I don’t think it’s usual for clues to be Obviously Laid Out for the reader, but missed entirely by the super-competent detective. I could see plot holes being backfilled in the editing phase, too. Someone carefully Leaves the Keys in the Ignition so our hero can grab the car later.

The book might be an allegory about gender. Or not. I still rolled my eyes at the terrified women rescued by male actors. There is a competent female sidekick detective, and a female professor (with last name Nancy to make sure we notice), but the action centers on men from beginning to end.

I also noticed that the back cover has a large image of the author’s face with five o’clock shadow, presumably so we’ll know that China is male.

Interesting, but not my genre.

Available at bookshop.org.

“The Jade Peony” by Wayson Choy

by Leave a Comment

Recommended to me by: atdelphi

This novel is an intricate work of art, assembled from one precise detail after another, illuminating the lives of a Chinese family of immigrants to Vancouver, B.C. in the 1930s and early 40s.

The story is told in three sections, from the viewpoints of three children. First the girl, then the second-oldest adopted boy, then the youngest boy. Entwined with their intensely pursued hobbies and heartbreaking losses, we learn about the adults around them, especially the women.

Matter-of-factly, Choy focuses his story on those with less privilege instead of those with more. Poor Chinese immigrants rather than established Canadian citizens. Children rather than adults, but not the special First Son. Women of different ages. A disabled, disfigured man.

The characters are vulnerable, grumpy, and real, bearing pain as best they can, sharing what they have to give each other joy. While reading, I felt as if I sat down to dinner with them, hearing about their lives close up.

Read this book!

Available at biblio.com.

“The Female Man” by Joanna Russ

by Leave a Comment

Recommended to me by: wordweaverlynn

Joanna Russ died recently, and many people have been posting tributes to her visionary feminist writing. I had heard of her, but not read her books. Someone linked to her short story When It Changed (full version at the link) and I wanted to read more.

Reading “The Female Man” is a bumpy ride. One always starts a book disoriented, looking for cues about what governs the setting and characters. All the way through, I was still looking for cues, still waiting to get oriented.

I loved the descriptions of Whileaway, a planet with only women. I could quibble with some of the authorial choices (everyone has babies around age 30, all children are taken from their mothers at age 5), but the relief of a society without patriarchy overrides all that.

I winced at the descriptions of the world of typical (middle class, white) women in the 1960’s. Again, I could quibble with some of the details, but there is too much painful truth there, and too much of it is still true.

“But I don’t like it,” she said simply. You’re not supposed to do that. On Whileaway, perhaps, but not here. […]

He takes her hand and closes her fingers around the glass, shaking his forefinger at her playfully: “Come on now, I can’t believe that; you made me get it for you—”

The third setting, a dystopia divided into Manland and Womanland, left me cold. I nearly stopped reading because of the sudden violence and contempt for gender-variance.

The book starts with a quote from “The Politics of Experience” about the layers of invalidation involved in the dynamics between men and women. With courage and clarity, this book cuts through all that. “Here is my truth! Here is my experience!”   I can see how it would be a lifeline to women drowning in invalidation.

Available at bookshop.org.

“The Golden Key” by George MacDonald

by 2 Comments

Illustrated by: Maurice Sendak

Recommended to me by: rushthatspeaks

In the afterword, written December 1966, W. H. Auden says, “To me, George MacDonald’s most extraordinary, and precious, gift is his ability, in all his stories, to create an atmosphere of goodness about which there is nothing phony or moralistic.”

My experience of this brief book was the opposite. I saw goodness equated with whiteness several times, and also with beauty. I saw a moralistic and wholly unnecessary aside about cleanliness.

In the (lovely) illustrations, the girl is always leaning on someone or being led or rescued, where the boy is alone or leading or standing sturdily as he talks with someone. The only exception is the last image, where she sits waiting and he approaches.

For all of that it is a whimsical, lilting story, quickly read, with deeper themes of long seeking, endurance, and transformation.

Available at bookshop.org.