'A collection of short stories from the award-winning author of The Rift and The Dollmaker, Nina Allan. This compilation brings together rarely seen tales spanning the vast breadth of Allan's writing career for the first time. It also includes a brand-new introduction and one never-before-published story. Locus has described Nina as 'a subversive writer... playing with both the familiar protocols of genre and with the nature of the reading experience itself.' This is a stunning collection from one of the most astute and innovative voices writing today.'
Before this short story collection the only work of Nina Allan that I'd read was The Silver Wind; a book that in a lot of ways felt like an anthology due to the way it was structured. Despite this only being the second book of Allan's that I'd picked up it was immediate to me very early on that this was her work, as I've found that this author has a very definitive sense of style to her work that makes it instantly recognisable as hers.
The stories presented in this collection span the entirety of her career, and in the introduction to the book Allan talks about how she came to choose the pieces she did. These stories are presented in a chronological order, and it allows a unique look at how the authors work has evolved over the years. This was something that I saw myself whilst reading the book, as I found that the first two stories here were the weakest, but that once we reached the third one I found a story that was much more in the style I recognised from her other book; and this was when I began to enjoy the book even more.
The first story in the book is 'Amethyst', and focuses on a friendship between two teenagers who grow up in a small town that features in a song by a popular singer. One of the two of them seems to become obsessed that part of their town was used in the song, and begins to act stranger over time; causing her friend to drift away from her. Over the course of the story questions are raised as to if strange things are happening, but we never really get a firm answer on this. Whilst this is something that Allan does a lot in her work, there was something about this particular story that failed to grab me in ways others have, and it felt very much like she was still in the process of finding her voice as an author.
'Heroes' is similar in a lot of regards. This story follows Finlay, a young boy who strikes up an unlikely friendship with an old man who raises racing pigeons. When Finlay is left to take care of the mans house and his pigeons whilst he's away racing he discovers a strange artefact inside the house. Sadly, this is never really explored in any great depth, and despite the final moments of the story hinting that something more than normal is going on it's never explained. Like 'Amethyst', this lack of clarity was a frustrating part of an otherwise engaging narrative.
'A Thread of Truth' was there the book really warmed on me, however. This story was the most unusual by being the least unusual. The other stories in the book all seemed to have a little something strange, otherworldly, or supernatural happening in them; this story, was just the story of a regular man who ended up discovering a love for spiders. The story covers his time at university, where he realises that his chosen career could be undone by his arachnophobia. He decides to try to conquer his fear, and even ends up on a spider spotting retreat; and it's here that he not only discovers that he loves spiders, but comes to discover the love of his life. This story is very normal, and other than a creepy ghost story told part way through it feels a lot like normal life. That being said, the characters were so engaging, and the narrative so well written I couldn't help but love reading it.
'Flying in the Face of God' is a story set at some point in the future, and follows a person who knows a 'flyer', a person who travels into space, though at great physical cost. The story doesn't focus on the space travel side of things, nor does it really explain who the fliers are or why this process kills them; instead, it focuses on people. The story looks at those left behind by the fliers, whose lives they have touched, and who they change because of their fates.
'Microcosmos' is set in a world where the weather seems to have changed drastically. The temperatures are higher, the water is depleted, and the sun is harsher. Much like in the previous story there's no real reason given for this, and the narrative instead follows a young girl as she travels with her family to meet a relative named Ballantine. once at his home we get vague hints at things that may have happened, and may yet come to pass, but because it's told from the perspective of a child most of it remains unclear, and it feels like we're looking in at part of a much bigger story; one that we're not meant to understand.
'Fairy Skulls' is possibly my favourite story in the book, and tells of a young woman who inherits some money from her aunt, as well as golden bracelet with what she claims are fairy skulls attached to it. After being convinced to buy a run down cottage in the countryside that she can do up the woman soon begins to suspect that fairy folk might be sneaking into her home to try and get the skulls back. This is one of the more lighthearted stories in the book, and it feels like there's a lot of hope for the future and promise of good things to come by the end. I think it also benefited by being the story that didn't hide much. It was clear that this was a story about faeries, and it allowed itself to have a lot of fun with the concept.
'The Science of Chance' was an intriguing story set in a Russia with an alternate history. Set decades after a disaster that left many people dead an investigator has to try to get to the bottom of a mystery as a young girl appears in a train station one day, mute and alone. Over the course of her investigation the woman is shocked when evidence points towards the fact that this child might have been transported forward in time from the disaster years ago. This was a fun story, and the time travel element was brilliantly incorporated. It's also one of the stories where the ambiguous nature of the ending was a definite benefit.
'Marielena' is a similar story in the sense that it deals with time travel. But like with other Allan stories it focuses on a regular person on the outside of the real story. In 'Marielena' we follow Noah, an asylum seeker trying to get by in the UK whilst waiting for his application to go through. Over the course of the story he befriends and helps a homeless woman. It's whilst going through her things that he discovers that she has identification documents listing dates in the future, leading him to wonder if she might have travelled back in time, or if her claims might be delusion. It's an interesting story, and one where I ended up wanting more so that we could find out what was going on.
'The Art of Space Travel', the story after which this collection is named, follows a young woman working in an airport hotel, a hotel where two astronauts will be staying before travelling across the world to join their team on a mission setting out to Mars. The woman is only somewhat interested in the astronauts, more concerned with her mothers failing health and her interest in discovering who her father is; but over the course of the story she begins to suspect that her father might be connected to the mission to Mars. It's an interesting story, and I loved the focus on human lives and regular wants and troubles like family. It made a point of how regular life often goes on even when world changing events are happening.
'Neptune's Trident' is a story that seems to take place in a future following some kind of disaster or upheaval, and follows Caitlin as she scavenges for things washed up on the beach to sell and trade for basics to get by. In this new world there are 'flukes', people who seem to be hosts to some kind of entities or creatures that change people over time. Over the course of the story we see very different reactions to this, from those who wish to help the flukes, to allow them to live, and those who see them as an invasion and worthy of death. It's a chilling story in places, and I loved the way it examined how different people can come to vastly different conclusions on the same topics.
'Four Abstracts' is like 'A Thread of Truth' in a lot of ways. There's not a huge amount in this story that jumps out as unusual or otherworldly; plus there's a connection to spiders once again. The story is about Rebecca, an artist who is already dead once the story begins. Through flashbacks from her friends, as well as the things her loved ones do after she goes we get an insight into this odd woman, a woman who believed herself to be cursed. It's a strangely effecting story, and one where I liked the narrative structure and the way it slowly revealed more about the characters.
'The Common Tongue, the Present Tense, the Known' is a follow up to 'Microcosmos', as we once again focus on Melanie, the protagonist of that story. The story picks up with Melanie later in life, in a world still dealing with climate change, and shows her friendship with Noemi, a scavenger. One of the things that jumped out at me about this story was that as well as being a sequel, it felt very similar to 'Neptune's Trident' in a lot of ways too, and it was clear why these three stories were all included in the book; the fact that they all share a lot of the same themes.
'The Gift of Angels: an Introduction' is another story that has a lot less science fiction elements involved, and is more of a literary piece. The story focuses on a writer who goes on holiday to Paris. The story was engaging, despite it not normally being the kind of thing that I go for, and the characters and their journeys over the course of the story were more than enough to keep me engaged to the point where I was a little sad when it came to an end.
The final story in the collection is 'A Princess of Mars: Svetlana Belkina and Tarkovsky's Lost Movie Aelita'. This is actually a brand new story for this collection, never appearing anywhere else before. The story centres on an investigation into an abandonned adaptation of a science fiction story, and it feels like non-fiction in some ways. It would be easy to see it as an account from someone talking about a real film project. It was an intruging piece, and one that was interesting to leave the collection on.
Whilst many of the stories in this collection feel disconnected, clearly taking place in different times, different worlds all together, there are several themes that echo across multiple stories. But the one thing that is constant throughout is the strange,and delicately beautiful way that Nina Allan writes stories. Even those that focus the most on things like space or time travel the stories never really focus on these things, instead putting people at the heart of the tales. Allan weaves the fantastical in with the common place in such subtle ways that it feels like reality intersecting with the extraordinary.
I wish I was able to describe the way I feel about Allan's writing, but I think that any words I put together to do so will fail to capture the nature of it. She writes in a way that so wonderfully and obviously hers, a style and a grace that no one else would be able to mimic. These stories don't just feel like something she's written, but something she's put a little piece of her soul into. They feel like small insights into a complex and layered person. The only thing I can say is, I think everyone should at least try a Nina Allan story, that her wonderful and unique way of writing will be an experience you don't want to miss, even if it's not something you come to love.
The Art of Space Travel and Other Stories is one of the more unique anthology collections I've read. It has a style all to itself, and covers a huge range of themes and genres whilst still feeling like its all part of the same whole. A truly singular reading experience.
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