Medusa's Ankles
Selected Stories
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A ravishing, luminous selection of short stories from the prize-winning imagination of A. S. Byatt, "a storyteller who could keep a sultan on the edge of his throne for a thousand and one nights" (The New York Times Book Review). With an introduction by David Mitchell, best-selling author of Cloud Atlas
Mirrors shatter at the hairdresser's when a middle-aged client explodes in rage. Snow dusts the warm body of a princess, honing it into something sharp and frosted. Summer sunshine flickers on the face of a smiling child who may or may not be real.
Medusa's Ankles celebrates the very best of A. S. Byatt's short fiction, carefully selected from a lifetime of writing. Peopled by artists, poets, and fabulous creatures, the stories blaze with creativity and color. From ancient myth to a British candy factory, from a Chinese restaurant to a Mediterranean swimming pool, from a Turkish bazaar to a fairy-tale palace, Byatt transports her readers beyond the veneer of the ordinary—even beyond the gloss of the fantastical—to places rich and strange and wholly unforgettable.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
These stories by Booker winner Byatt (Possession), three of which are previously uncollected, offer a scintillating look at three decades of the author's work. Her stories transcend genre and stylistic limits, traversing through landscapes fantastical and real, as they bewitch, unnerve, and comfort the reader. "The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye" blends the natural and supernatural worlds when a scholar falls in love with a djinn she released from a mysterious bottle from an Istanbul bazaar. "Dolls' Eyes" oscillates between the real and unreal too, as it follows a schoolteacher with a large collection of dolls, some of which are alive. In a similar vein, "The Lucid Dreamer" presents a man for whom real life and dreams begin to mesh as he struggles to regain his ability to dream while processing the loss of his beloved. Grief resurfaces as a theme in "A Stone Woman," which blends fantasy and Scandinavian myth with the story of a woman who turns to stone after her mother's death. "Racine and the Tablecloth" is equally effective in the realist mode, detailing the power dynamics between a student and the vulturine headmistress at an all-girls' boarding school. Each story showcases Byatt's exquisite prose and her wide-ranging mastery of the short story form. For the uninitiated, this makes for a perfect entry point.
