Part of the appeal almost certainly comes from the unusual format – an extended and often snarky discussion on a website devoted to explicating lyrics of old ballads. This idea is reinforced by the most celebrated story in the collection, “Where Oaken Hearts Do Gather”, which scored a rare trifecta winning Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Awards (as well as a Eugie Award and a World Fantasy nomination). Both “Two Truths and a Lie” and “Science Facts!” also feature characters more or less literally taking root, suggesting that stories, like the rhizomes that Pinsker alludes to in both tales, may be connected in hidden ways. Another story with a classic Twilight Zone vibe concerns a group of campers who return from a hike to find they’ve been gone for years and long considered missing – only this one is told by a character in another story, “Science Facts!” (original to this collection), which is about – well, a group of campers, who are unnerved by such tales told by the clueless drama teacher recruited at the last minute to be one of their counselors. While the story joins the small but interesting tradition of fiction about what we might call crypto-TV – other examples come to mind from Elizabeth Hand, Kelly Link, and Daniel Pinkwater – it opens up in unexpected ways that have nothing to do with nostalgia. In fact, it’s almost misleading to claim there are only twelve stories here, since the lead story alone, the Hugo and Nebula winner “Two Truths and a Lie”, embeds whole shards of other tales: the habitual fabrications of the protagonist Stella, the shadowy backstory of the hoarder whose massively cluttered house she agrees to help clean out, most of all the cryptic tales told by the creepy Stella appeared on as a child. Lost Places, Sarah Pinsker ( Small Beer 978-1-61873-199-9, $17.00, 288pp, tp) May 2023.Īs with Valente, much of the appeal of Sarah Pinsker’s stories, 12 of which are collected in Lost Places, is her contagious enthusiasm for story in all its forms – not just short stories, fables, and fairy tales, but tacky old kids’ TV shows, improvised campfire tales, urban legends, mysterious ancient ballads, fading memories, even compulsive lying.

Sarah pinsker song for a new day