Tag: catherynne valente

Six-Gun Snow White by Catherynne M. Valente

Six-Gun Snow White by Catherynne M. Valente

“I gradually understood the truth of my situation: I was a secret.” pg 14, ebook.

Catherynne Valente has penned a bewildering and ultimately disappointing western-tinged fairy tale retelling in Six-Gun Snow White. Her reimagining of the classic story has Snow White as an unloved daughter of a mine speculator and an abused, indigenous mother. When her mother ends her own life, Snow White’s father marries a mysterious woman from back East, the evil stepmother of fairytale infamy, whom the narrator calls Mrs. H.

“She named me a thing I could aspire to but never become, the one thing I was not and could never be: Snow White.” pg 27, ebook

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The disappointing part of the story is not the set up or general idea of Snow White as a western, both of which I thought were excellent. The trouble arrives in the magical portions of the story which are, in my opinion, not well written. They felt disjointed and tacked on.

It’s curious to me that I didn’t like this story because Valente is one of my favorite authors. There is no one like her when it comes to an interwoven story or mysterious magic. Maybe my issue with this tale is that it’s so short Valente didn’t have a chance to work her usual story telling magic? Perhaps.

The ending was an enormous let down as well.

Not recommended.

Thanks for reading!

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making is a modern take on more traditional fairy tales wherein a child finds a way to another world and comes back changed.

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I first read the title of this book in Catherynne Valente‘s much more adult novel, Palimpsest. I think it was mentioned as sitting on someone’s book shelf. I remember thinking how I wish I could read that book too. Imagine my surprise to discover it was actually a book in the real world. Of course, I had to pick it up.

“You seem an ill-tempered and irascible enough child,” said the Green Wind. “How would you like to come away with me and ride upon the Leopard of Little Breezes and be delivered to the great sea, which borders Fairyland?” pg 2

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How could any heroine refuse an invitation like that?

The main character of this tale, a girl with the curious name of September, has read enough books to know a once-in-a-lifetime chance when she sees it. Though she doubts, at first, that she is the appropriate girl for the adventure.

“In stories, when someone appears in a poof of green clouds and asks a girl to go away on an adventure, it’s because she’s special, because she’s smart and strong and can solve riddles and fight with swords and give really good speeches, and… I don’t know that I’m any of those things.” pg 14

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Part of Valente’s fairytale, like most good fairytales, is how September realizes how special she actually is — one of the conclusions heroes tend to arrive at during their various journeys.

September’s journey is a danger-filled jaunt through a land under the thumb of a smartly-hatted villain named the Marquess. September meets curious characters along the way including a trio of witches, a wyvern who claims his father is a library, and a boy from under the ocean with dark eyes and a secret.

The story contains plenty of winks and nods to anyone who loves reading: “Stories have a way of changing faces. They are unruly things, undisciplined, given to delinquency and the throwing of erasers. This is why we must close them up into thick, solid books, so they cannot get out and cause trouble.” pg 36

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And: “She sounds like someone who spends a lot of time in libraries, which are the best sorts of people.” pg 55

They are the best sorts, aren’t they.

Recommended for young adults, the young-at-heart, or anyone who enjoys quirky portal fantasy reads. I thought this book was charming.

Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente

Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente

Sex and sleep with a marked individual is the way to the city of Palimpsest, a mystical and deadly place that exists beyond the borders of our world.

The first time you cross over, your spirit is bound with four other travelers. For what purpose, no one knows.

“Where you go in Palimpsest, you are bound to these strangers who happened onto Orlande’s salon just when you did, and you will go nowhere, eat no capon or dormouse, drink no oversweet port that they do not also taste, and they will visit no whore that you do not also feel beneath you, and until that ink washes from your feet… you cannot breathe but that they breathe also.” pgs 4-5, ebook.

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A visit to the city leaves a visible mark on your skin, a map of the location you visited. You cannot travel beyond the borders of where you have already been, unless you sleep with someone who has a different map.

“It’s like a ticket. And once you’ve bought your ticket, and been to the circus, ridden the little red train, then you can sort of see other people who’ve done it, too. They walk a certain way. Smell a certain way. Their whole body becomes like an accent.” pg 42, ebook.

Palimpsest is so beyond belief, some people who have been there can’t believe it is more than a dream, at first.

“But it’s a dream,” Oleg insists. “It was fun. We won’t even remember it in the morning.” “You don’t know anything, Oleg,” sighs Gabriel. pg 73, ebook.

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But, no one has ever woken up from a dream covered in blood.

Palimpsest showcases Catherynne Valente’s mammoth imagination and descriptive powers. The pieces of the city she allows readers to glimpse draw you in and make you want to see more.

Each location is unique, has its own backstory and feel. It’s an extraordinary work of urban fantasy.

The gates of sleep are two, a gate of ivory and a gate of horn. He had been horrified as a child, picturing a great door of tangled antlers and tusks. Surely that was the gate of Palimpsest.” pg 144, ebook.

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It’s disturbing to read the main characters become more and more desperate to re-enter Palimpsest.

The way they seek out sex with strangers reminded me of a drug addict’s desperate search. The cost of entering the city is too high.

It ruins peoples’ lives.

I read Palimpsest years ago and couldn’t finish it then because the narration made me feel sick.

I think the trouble was that I used to put myself into the stories I read, imagining myself as the hero, villain, every part.

I’ve ceased doing that, at the cost of some grand adventures. But, in hindsight, it also allows me to navigate my way through stories I would not have been able to touch back then.

Because of its content, I’d recommend Palimpsest only for mature readers and fans of urban fiction. It’s a strange trip, but full of wonders if you can endure the cost to get there.

Thanks for reading!