Listen by Karin Tidbeck
My rating: 3/5 cats
WELCOME TO DECEMBER PROJECT!
boilerplate mission statement intro:
for the past two years, i’ve set december’s project aside to do my own version of a short story advent calendar. it’s not a true advent calendar since i choose all the stories myself, but what it lacks in the ‘element of surprise’ department it more than makes up for in hassle, as i try to cram even MORE reading into a life already overcrammed with impossible personal goals (live up to your potential! find meaningful work! learn to knit!) merry merry wheee!
since i am already well behind in my *regular* reviewing, when it comes to these stories, whatever i poop out as far as reflections or impressions are going to be superficial and perfunctory at best. please do not weep for the great big hole my absented, much-vaunted critical insights are gonna leave in these daily review-spaces (and your hearts); i’ll try to drop shiny insights elsewhere in other reviews, and here, i will at least drop links to where you can read the stories yourselves for free, which – let’s be honest – is gonna serve you better anyway.
HAPPY READING, BOOKNERDS!
links to all stories read in previous years’ calendars can be found at the end of these reviews, in case you are a person who likes to read stories for free:
2016: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show…
2017: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show…
scroll down for links to this year’s stories which i will update as we go, and if you have any suggestions, send ’em my way! the only rules are: it must be available free online (links greatly appreciated), and it must be here on gr as its own thing so i can review it. thank you in advance!
DECEMBER 29
“I left for a reason. I don’t want to go back there. They treated me like dirt. I was heavy and in pain. I can be light here.”
“We can cure you.”
“I don’t need curing,” Aino said. “It’s just the wrong place.”
this is the sequel to tidbeck’s other free tor short, Sing. and for those of you wondering what happened to petr kozlov at the end of that story, wonder no more! or, continue to wonder until you read this one – i’m not giving away the goods.
there are barely any birds in this one, despite what the ‘cover’ image would have you believe, except a rehash of ‘what happens to kids on kiruna,’ and in that rehash they are called ‘insects,’ which confused me because, while i am no zoologist, that
is a bird.
but i’m probably just misremembering the details of Sing; there’s probably some sort of hitchhiking insect involved in the bird-throating process that is instrumental to the… linguistic transition. is that what we’re calling it?
ANYWAY – i thought this story was okay. it introduces new characters and new conflicts and new… discomforts specific to people and their environments and people and their challenges w/r/t communication, interacting socially and other assorted mental and physical idiosyncrasies. i would rather have had the story just focus on petr and aino instead of dropping their follow-up into a whole other set of new circumstances to process, but i would also rather have ten million dollars and i’m used to not getting what i want. so there you have it.
read it for yourself here:
https://www.tor.com/2016/03/09/listen…
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