From the Bookshelf of Beyond Reality…

In the Night Garden (The Orphan's Tales, #1)

Catherynne M. Valente,

Michael Kaluta (Illustrations)

Start date: May 1, 2017

Finish date: May 31, 2017

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What Members Thought

Jan 07, 2011 carol. rated it it was amazing

Shelves: awards-of-all-sorts, favorites, short-story-collections, fantasy, to-buy

Book as arabesque.

Short story leads to short story, each providing background and impetus for the next, characters answering questions to what led them to that intersection. It's a beautiful technique that comes back around to many of the original story characters.

The trouble for me is that the short story makes it easy to put down and go do something else, as it's often a natural break in the plot and action, so it took me far too long to finish. More clues or story in the background setting ...more

64 likes · Like · see review

Jul 31, 2019 Bradley rated it it was amazing

Shelves: worldbuilding-sf, 2019-shelf, fantasy

Reading this book has left me practically speechless. Almost anything I could say about it will fall flat in the sheer enormity of the experience.

So what DID I experience?

Scheherazade.

Dark fables incorporating wide mythologies reminiscent of all the best obscure fairy tales twisted in wonderfully unique ways, couched as stories within stories, adding tiny slivers of fate within each until it brings us back, wholly, to our Scheherazade, our poor orphan telling her story from the words tattooed o ...more

37 likes · Like · see review