✍ Scribed by Rosenbaum, Benjamin
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Plausible-fabulist Rosenbaum's debut collection of 17 short stories is inconsistent, but it includes some speculative gems. The thought-provoking Start the Clock takes place in a near future where a virus has stopped the human aging process, forcing millions of people to live forever as preadolescents. The title story is an absurdist masterwork about a man in search of a woman who has been turned into yellow gumballs, abducted and hidden away in a lair guarded by a giant roach. Most notable is World Fantasy Award–finalist A Siege of Cranes, which blends elements of horror, epic fantasy and religious mythology in the tale of a desperate man seeking a nightmarish enemy that has destroyed his village and killed his wife and child. Featuring outlandish and striking imagery throughout—a woman in love with an elephant, an orange that ruled the world—this collection is a surrealistic wonderland. (Aug.)
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"Featuring outlandish and striking imagery throughout—a woman in love with an elephant, an orange that ruled the world—this collection is a surrealistic wonderland."
—Publishers Weekly
“Urbane without being arch, sweet without being maudlin, mysterious without being cryptic.”—Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing
A dazzling, postmodern debut collection of pulp and surreal fictions: a writer of alternate histories defends his patron’s zeppelin against assassins and pirates; a woman transforms into hundreds of gumballs; an emancipated children’s collective goes house hunting.
Benjamin Rosenbaum ’s stories have appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction and McSweeney’s , been translated into fourteen languages, and listed in The Best American Short Stories 2006. Shortlisted for the Hugo and Nebula awards, Rosenbaum’s work has been reprinted in Harper’s and The Year’s Best Science Fiction. He lives in Switzerland with his family.
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A dazzling, postmodern debut collection of pulp and surreal fictions: a writer of alternate histories defends his patron’s zeppelin against assassins and pirates; a woman transforms into hundreds of gumballs; an emancipated children’s collective goes house hunting.
A dazzling, postmodern debut collection of pulp and surreal fictions: a writer of alternate histories defends his patron's zeppelin against assassins and pirates; a woman transforms into hundreds of gumballs; an emancipated children's collective goes house hunting.</div>