Literary Horror discussion
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The Avian Hourglass
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March 2025 monthly read: Lindsey Drager's The Avian Hourglass
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It does sound really good thank u for the suggestion
Ordered a physical copy... Might be late to the "party" but this looks like a great pick!
Vanessa's copy is on its way. I'm happy to hold off on comments for a few days.
Looks interesting. Order a copy (sale on Amzn rn:))
My copy has finally arrived. I'll probably start tomorrow.
My copy arrived Monday and I started it yesterday---immediately drew me in. I'm not sure I've ever read a book where the chapters count down... It immediately gives a sense of dire momentum.
Marc wrote: "My copy arrived Monday and I started it yesterday---immediately drew me in. I'm not sure I've ever read a book where the chapters count down... It immediately gives a sense of dire momentum."The counting down combined with them each being so short was not good for getting me to stop reading. I intended to read about 1/3rd and come comment, but I ended up putting it down right before the main character goes to take the test again at around 45%.
I'm really enjoying the metafictional aspects, but I usually do.
It might entirely be my ignorance of physics and astronomy, but the constant mentions of random scientific and mathematical terms has been really adding to the surrealism. Even though I'm assuming everything the narrator mentions is real, it mostly comes across as nonsense to me.
Vanessa wrote: "Even though I'm assuming everything the narrator mentions is real, it mostly comes across as nonsense to me."It's been decades since my physics classes, but the terms that I recognized seemed ok to me. I didn't bother to look up anything though (I'm usually pretty obsessive about looking things up).
Drager's last two novels (The Archive of Alternate Endings and The Lost Daughter Collective) work with overlapping themes: the nature of stories, natural phenomena, queer family interactions etc. I've enjoyed the swirling constellations of ideas that engage with each other in unusual ways. There are always flawed human characters struggling with various dilemmas that I empathize with.
I enjoyed hanging out with the triplets, watching the progress of Uri's play, and rooting for the narrator to ace her exam. But after about 60 short sections, I was hankering for more narrative heft.
Then we have the Event! The painful encounter is handled in her usual quiet and ambiguous way.
The Girl in the Glass Vessel was supposedly a kid's story? Whew. (I see references to a "Girl in Glass Jar" story on the internet, but it's quite different.)
Bill wrote: It's been decades since my physics classes, but the terms that I recognized seemed ok to me. I didn't bother to look up anything though (I'm usually pretty obsessive about looking things up)."I was required to take two science courses in college. I took Chemistry for Dummies and an astronomy course that it was expected for everyone to fail and bring their grade up with extra credit. I got a C- on the first exam and that was worthy of an "Excellent! :)"
I finished it yesterday, and I really enjoyed it. Us reading it this month was serendipitous. It spoke to many things that I had been thinking about.
I'm going to stick with dividing the story in half between pre-test and post-test. The way it's structured makes it tricky to talk about.
Pre-test
(view spoiler)
Post-test
(view spoiler)
It's interesting that the countdown and the short chapters added a kind of dread and momentum (at least, for Vanessa and me), but the narrative almost worked against this in the end in terms of being quite measured and subtle in many ways. I think Bill mentioned wanting more "heft," which seems like a good word for it. This was more like a slow burn that I simultaneously enjoyed but felt like I also just wanted a little bit more...I was thrilled to be introduced to Drager's writing and had trouble putting this one down. I found myself returning to this one line many times (during and after reading the book):
"I just don't know if representing the world in three dimensions makes any sense at all anymore."
I'm not sure I'll stop hearing the Ghost of Birds speak to me, but this feels more like a new friend and less like an auditory impairment.
Odd book. But I really enjoyed it. Thanks, it was a great suggestion.
Time to come out of hibernation and organize for our first summer monthly read. Please post nominations:https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
I also just started Joel Lane's The Terrible Changes; this was previously only available in an exorbitant limited edition, but now reissued by the good folks at Influx Press. If anyone is interested in a buddy read, let me know!
Literary Horror
Books mentioned in this topic
The Terrible Changes (other topics)The Archive of Alternate Endings (other topics)
The Lost Daughter Collective (other topics)
The Avian Hourglass (other topics)
This was not a nominee for our March poll. However, the only two voters were myself and Vanessa, and we're deadlocked. We happened to both be interested in this. So I'm exercising my moderator's prerogative, with the consent of both voters involved, and making this our March monthly read.
A couple reviews:
https://www.sinisterwisdom.org/node/803
https://coloradoreview.colostate.edu/...
The Avian Hourglass is available both on paper and as an e-book.
Some of us have already started:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Please post comments to this thread, not the other one.