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Gift of the Winter King and other stories
Eleven stories from acclaimed SF and fantasy author Naomi Kritzer, four of them previously unpublished.
Contents:
- Brother Mac, You Are Healed!: I'll pay you a hundred bucks if you can raise this computer from the dead.
- St. Ailbe's Hall: There was a Siberian husky in the last pew of the church, holding a hymnal and singing.
- Gift of the Winter King: The Winter King came to bring order.
- Magefire: The first thing I noticed about Mira was the candle she was holding.
- Masks: On Mascherata, I could be who I was, without fear.
- Kin: Mages don't have babies; you're a mage. You'll get used to the idea.
- The Price: I am a murderer, but I don't remember who I murdered, or why.
- In the Witch's Garden: There are no other Gerdas here. We don't need numbers.
- Darknight: Don't scream; if you do, they'll all scream.
- The Manual: Jesus: A dynamic speaker, someone who might have been to Franklin Covey training.
- Kitchen Magic, With Recipes: Light candles, call the quarters, and preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Contents:
- Brother Mac, You Are Healed!: I'll pay you a hundred bucks if you can raise this computer from the dead.
- St. Ailbe's Hall: There was a Siberian husky in the last pew of the church, holding a hymnal and singing.
- Gift of the Winter King: The Winter King came to bring order.
- Magefire: The first thing I noticed about Mira was the candle she was holding.
- Masks: On Mascherata, I could be who I was, without fear.
- Kin: Mages don't have babies; you're a mage. You'll get used to the idea.
- The Price: I am a murderer, but I don't remember who I murdered, or why.
- In the Witch's Garden: There are no other Gerdas here. We don't need numbers.
- Darknight: Don't scream; if you do, they'll all scream.
- The Manual: Jesus: A dynamic speaker, someone who might have been to Franklin Covey training.
- Kitchen Magic, With Recipes: Light candles, call the quarters, and preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
195 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 14, 2011
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66 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
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July 15, 2016Made me cry twice.
May 24, 2017
There's nothing quite like that moment when you discover an author who you've never read before - and who turns out to be rather brilliant.
This was the first time I'd read anything by Naomi Kritzer - yes, yes, I'm late to the parade, I know, she did after all win the Hugo Award for best short story in 2016. Still, this was my first time reading her work. And it felt magical.
There's a delightful clarity in her writing. It's not overly weighed down with flowery description or laboured in any way. She just tells the tale, with a light, masterly touch.
The opening story is a great example - of a young woman who discovers the unusual ability to bring computers back from the dead. If I could borrow her for that dead laptop over there, I'd be happy to slip some money her way... but it's a fun tale, deftly handled and with a twist at the end that suddenly makes you sit up with an ooooh.
A couple of the stories riff off her work in her novels Fires of the Faithful and Turning the Storm. I've not read those - so a little of the impact of the stories here was perhaps lost on me, though the story Magefire stands on its own merit while having the feel of a marvellous Easter egg for readers of the novels.
There are a couple of pieces that didn't quite land with me - such as The Price and The Manual, but the latter particularly plays around with form in a way that might not have resonated with me but such experimentation is heartily to be encouraged.
There were two standout stories for me. In The Witch's Garden is a story in a fractured world filled with people with fractured minds, whose memories and minds have been tinkered with. There are artificially enhanced animals, and the story itself is a twisted version of the Snow Queen fairy tale, wrapped up with slavery and sadness, despair and, ultimately, hope. It's a thought provoking piece, and haunting.
As good as that is, it's surpassed by St Ailbe's Hall. Again, the artificially enhanced animals feature here - but more prominently, with an animal capable of walking and talking and having been rescued from its owners who used it for menial chores. The question at the heart of this story is what if that animal were to show up at church and ask to worship alongside the others in there who call themselves Christian. Faith is an issue that recurs in this collection - the title story also dwelling on the subject - but St Ailbe's Hall is a powerful tale told without preaching and exploring the issue of belief. It's worth the price of admission on its own.
All told, the collection is a solid four stars - but if you are a fan of Kritzer's novels, the tie-in value for some of the stories will add an extra star for you.
This was the first time I'd read anything by Naomi Kritzer - yes, yes, I'm late to the parade, I know, she did after all win the Hugo Award for best short story in 2016. Still, this was my first time reading her work. And it felt magical.
There's a delightful clarity in her writing. It's not overly weighed down with flowery description or laboured in any way. She just tells the tale, with a light, masterly touch.
The opening story is a great example - of a young woman who discovers the unusual ability to bring computers back from the dead. If I could borrow her for that dead laptop over there, I'd be happy to slip some money her way... but it's a fun tale, deftly handled and with a twist at the end that suddenly makes you sit up with an ooooh.
A couple of the stories riff off her work in her novels Fires of the Faithful and Turning the Storm. I've not read those - so a little of the impact of the stories here was perhaps lost on me, though the story Magefire stands on its own merit while having the feel of a marvellous Easter egg for readers of the novels.
There are a couple of pieces that didn't quite land with me - such as The Price and The Manual, but the latter particularly plays around with form in a way that might not have resonated with me but such experimentation is heartily to be encouraged.
There were two standout stories for me. In The Witch's Garden is a story in a fractured world filled with people with fractured minds, whose memories and minds have been tinkered with. There are artificially enhanced animals, and the story itself is a twisted version of the Snow Queen fairy tale, wrapped up with slavery and sadness, despair and, ultimately, hope. It's a thought provoking piece, and haunting.
As good as that is, it's surpassed by St Ailbe's Hall. Again, the artificially enhanced animals feature here - but more prominently, with an animal capable of walking and talking and having been rescued from its owners who used it for menial chores. The question at the heart of this story is what if that animal were to show up at church and ask to worship alongside the others in there who call themselves Christian. Faith is an issue that recurs in this collection - the title story also dwelling on the subject - but St Ailbe's Hall is a powerful tale told without preaching and exploring the issue of belief. It's worth the price of admission on its own.
All told, the collection is a solid four stars - but if you are a fan of Kritzer's novels, the tie-in value for some of the stories will add an extra star for you.
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November 2, 2018Picked up in part because it was going for pennies, but also because I loved her 'Cat Pictures Please', the Hugo-winning, Puppy-irking story in which the Internet wakes up...but is quite genial, really, and would much rather help humanity out than try to destroy us, especially if we keep supplying it with pictures of small fluffy animals. That turned out to be a poor guide to what was on offer here, though, with only one story along similar lines – the account of someone who, at first taking the piss, ends up becoming a pretty accomplished faith healer for broken tech goods. OK, there's also the squib with the Holy Trinity reimagined as a tech firm... Otherwise, though, the collection tends more towards outright fantasy, in particular stories set in a world where Kritzer has already written a few novels, and if I'm honest it's not a setting that would in itself have grabbed me. Not through any particular failing, just because there's so much fantasy these days, so many warring mages and oppressive faiths, and it takes something extra-special to pull me in that direction. But having encountered these glimpses of it by accident, I enjoyed them. And I have enormous respect for her having written a tubthumping story about witchcraft, baking and custody battles, realising it was founded on a legal nonsense, and then refusing to sell it because that sort of error infuriates her and she couldn't bring herself to inflict the same woe on others. Here, where each story has a prefatory note in which such caveats can be included, she's happy to share it, and with that proviso in place, I was happy to read it. And even happier to read its beautiful new coda.
January 23, 2020
Probably 3 1/2 stars, enjoyable but not quite as magical as her Cat Stories collection or her novel, Catfishing on CatNet.
August 9, 2017
This short fiction collection contains some of Naomi Kritzer’s short stories from 2011 or before. Unfortunately, I think I prefer her more recent short fiction. That said, I enjoyed seeing her progress as an author.
A lot of the stories in the collection involve religion in some way, a theme she also explored in her lesbian YA fantasy novel Fires of the Faithful. This isn’t to say that the stories are didactic or preachy — they never are. Instead, they just sort of explore issues of faith and religion. The stories vary from a narrator who’s a Catholic priest to a narrator who’s a modern day pagan. One story, “The Manual,” is a script that re-imagines God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as a software engineer, manual writer, and human resources representative. In the titular story, “Gift of the Winter King,” a Christian missionary comes to a culture in the far north (is this after some apocalyptic event?) who worship the Winter King, a god of winter. The narrator is a girl of this culture who gets the missionary to teach her how to read and write. “Brother Mac, You Are Healed” is a very short story (flash fiction?) about a girl who discovers she can faith heal computers. It may have been one of my favorite of the collection — that concept is just wonderful!
If I had to chose one favorite story, I’d go with “St. Ailbe’s Hall,” which you can also read on Strange Horizon. This story posits a near future where genetic engineering has made genetically modified dogs common. More intelligent than regular dogs, these creatures preform various menial jobs from nannies to street sweepers. However, they don’t have any more rights than animals. Thus, when a dog wishes to join the Catholic church, it causes a huge fuss.
One of the other best stories of the collection is “In the Witch’s Garden,” a retelling of “The Snow Queen” by Hans Christian Anderson. It’s set in a dystopic future and follows a witch who adopts a little girl who leaves home looking for her friend. I enjoyed the setting a lot (the settlements of scientists who wear all white were particularly interesting) and would actually be interested in reading more stories set there. There were also a few plot twists that I didn’t see coming.
Three stories in the collection connect in some way to Fires of the Faithful. “Magefire” is the short story that turned into the novel. While I’m glad she decided to expand it, I think it works relatively well on its own. “Masks” follows the backstory of a minor character from the book (the protagonist’s music teach). He’s a gay man living secretly in a homophobic culture, and he’s finding out that his lover has some dark secrets. “Kin” takes place in the same world, although I didn’t recognize any of the characters. The protagonist is a mage who adopts a baby, even though she’s on the front lines of a war.
Other stories include “The Price,” a strange little tale about a murderer who can’t remember who she murdered; “Kitchen Magic, With Recipes,” the story of a lesbian witch trying to get her daughter back (the recipes she bakes as spells are included), and “Darknight,” which was really not very good. To be fair, it was written when Kritzer was a teenager. Hey, it shows how much she’s improved since then! And most of my problems with the story are noted by Kritzer herself in the afterwords.
While this collection wasn’t bad, I still feel like her best stories aren’t a part of this collection. If you’re looking to try out her short fiction, I’d suggest starting with “Cat Pictures Please,” the story of an AI who loves looking at cat pictures on the internet.
Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
A lot of the stories in the collection involve religion in some way, a theme she also explored in her lesbian YA fantasy novel Fires of the Faithful. This isn’t to say that the stories are didactic or preachy — they never are. Instead, they just sort of explore issues of faith and religion. The stories vary from a narrator who’s a Catholic priest to a narrator who’s a modern day pagan. One story, “The Manual,” is a script that re-imagines God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as a software engineer, manual writer, and human resources representative. In the titular story, “Gift of the Winter King,” a Christian missionary comes to a culture in the far north (is this after some apocalyptic event?) who worship the Winter King, a god of winter. The narrator is a girl of this culture who gets the missionary to teach her how to read and write. “Brother Mac, You Are Healed” is a very short story (flash fiction?) about a girl who discovers she can faith heal computers. It may have been one of my favorite of the collection — that concept is just wonderful!
If I had to chose one favorite story, I’d go with “St. Ailbe’s Hall,” which you can also read on Strange Horizon. This story posits a near future where genetic engineering has made genetically modified dogs common. More intelligent than regular dogs, these creatures preform various menial jobs from nannies to street sweepers. However, they don’t have any more rights than animals. Thus, when a dog wishes to join the Catholic church, it causes a huge fuss.
One of the other best stories of the collection is “In the Witch’s Garden,” a retelling of “The Snow Queen” by Hans Christian Anderson. It’s set in a dystopic future and follows a witch who adopts a little girl who leaves home looking for her friend. I enjoyed the setting a lot (the settlements of scientists who wear all white were particularly interesting) and would actually be interested in reading more stories set there. There were also a few plot twists that I didn’t see coming.
Three stories in the collection connect in some way to Fires of the Faithful. “Magefire” is the short story that turned into the novel. While I’m glad she decided to expand it, I think it works relatively well on its own. “Masks” follows the backstory of a minor character from the book (the protagonist’s music teach). He’s a gay man living secretly in a homophobic culture, and he’s finding out that his lover has some dark secrets. “Kin” takes place in the same world, although I didn’t recognize any of the characters. The protagonist is a mage who adopts a baby, even though she’s on the front lines of a war.
Other stories include “The Price,” a strange little tale about a murderer who can’t remember who she murdered; “Kitchen Magic, With Recipes,” the story of a lesbian witch trying to get her daughter back (the recipes she bakes as spells are included), and “Darknight,” which was really not very good. To be fair, it was written when Kritzer was a teenager. Hey, it shows how much she’s improved since then! And most of my problems with the story are noted by Kritzer herself in the afterwords.
While this collection wasn’t bad, I still feel like her best stories aren’t a part of this collection. If you’re looking to try out her short fiction, I’d suggest starting with “Cat Pictures Please,” the story of an AI who loves looking at cat pictures on the internet.
Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
April 15, 2020
What a great time!
I do greatly enjoy short fiction and Ms. Kroger has certainly delivered in spades. The only reason this e book got 4.5 stars is becuse there is no table of contents. The stories were all crisp and engaging, the intros were actually almost my favorite part because they felt so personal. My favorite? The Manual, then magic with recipes. Thank you Ms. Kroger for a good afternoon and an entertaining evening!
I do greatly enjoy short fiction and Ms. Kroger has certainly delivered in spades. The only reason this e book got 4.5 stars is becuse there is no table of contents. The stories were all crisp and engaging, the intros were actually almost my favorite part because they felt so personal. My favorite? The Manual, then magic with recipes. Thank you Ms. Kroger for a good afternoon and an entertaining evening!
January 24, 2026
Collections of short stories are never 5 stars. There are usually some brilliant stories, and some only okay or not good. Since five of the eleven stories are good to brilliant (and the other six are only okay or "definitely not for me") I'm giving this collection a mid rating of 3 1/2 stars.
My 5 favorites are:
Brother Mac, You are healed!
⭐⭐⭐⭐
St. Ailbe's Hall
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Magefire
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Kin
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
In the Witch's Garden
⭐⭐⭐⭐
My 5 favorites are:
Brother Mac, You are healed!
⭐⭐⭐⭐
St. Ailbe's Hall
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Magefire
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Kin
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
In the Witch's Garden
⭐⭐⭐⭐
December 11, 2017
I bought this collection because I really liked Kritzer's Seastead stories, but I didn't connect with these pieces in the same way. I liked "In the Witch's Garden" and "Kitchen Magic, with Recipes." I skipped a few, and sped-read others. I always want a book to grab me and not let me go, but that just didn't happen here.
November 26, 2022
A collection of her early stories. All are very good, except one early story which is only fairly good. A lot of humour and compassion and originality. Mostly fantasy, some SF. Three stories are set in the world of her first novel which makes me interested to read that.
September 15, 2020
3.5/5.0
September 20, 2016
I loved them, every one
I can't write well today but by tomorrow I'll have forgotten. Unusually, I liked every story, even the self maligned "Darknight" from when she was 15.
These are not simple stories. Some, like "St. Ailbe's Hall" and "Giftt of the Winterking" address religious practices and human reality. "Kin," "Kitchen Magic, with Recipes" and "In the Witches Garden" deal with family made, not born. Some are wrenching. Two, "Brother Mac" and "The Manual", will appeal to those who have slogged the trenches of the computer industry.
I'm usually glad of a short story collection because the format dictates that the tales are worked, reworked and polished. It gives me time in between to contemplate and savor each one (and run errands). These did not disappoint.
I can't write well today but by tomorrow I'll have forgotten. Unusually, I liked every story, even the self maligned "Darknight" from when she was 15.
These are not simple stories. Some, like "St. Ailbe's Hall" and "Giftt of the Winterking" address religious practices and human reality. "Kin," "Kitchen Magic, with Recipes" and "In the Witches Garden" deal with family made, not born. Some are wrenching. Two, "Brother Mac" and "The Manual", will appeal to those who have slogged the trenches of the computer industry.
I'm usually glad of a short story collection because the format dictates that the tales are worked, reworked and polished. It gives me time in between to contemplate and savor each one (and run errands). These did not disappoint.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews