Melancholy of Mechagirl

by Catherynne M. Valente

Science fiction and fantasy stories about Japan by the multiple-award winning author and New York Times best seller Catherynne M. Valente. A collection of some of Catherynne Valente's most admired stories, including the Hugo Award-nominated novella "Silently and Very Fast" and the Locus Award finalist "13 Ways of Looking at Space/Time," with a brand-new long story to anchor the collection.

Contents:
The Melancholy of Mechagirl (2011) poem
Ink, Water, Milk (2013)
Fifteen Panels Depicting the Sadness of the Baku and the Jotai (2010)
Ghosts of Gunkanjima (2005)
Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time (2010)
One Breath, One Stroke (2012)
Story No. 6 (2013)
Fade to White (2012)
The Emperor of Tsukayama Park (2005) poem
Killswitch (2007)
Memoirs of a Girl Who Failed to Be Born from a Peach (2005) poem
The Girl with Two Skins (2008) poem
Silently and Very Fast (2011)

Genres: Short Stories, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Poetry, Fiction, Japan, Anthologies

219 pages, Paperback

First published July 14, 2013

About the author

Catherynne M. Valente was born on Cinco de Mayo, 1979 in Seattle, WA, but grew up in in the wheatgrass paradise of Northern California. She graduated from high school at age 15, going on to UC San Diego and Edinburgh University, receiving her B.A. in Classics with an emphasis in Ancient Greek Linguistics. She then drifted away from her M.A. program and into a long residence in the concrete and camphor wilds of Japan.

She currently lives in Maine with her partner, two dogs, and three cats, having drifted back to America and the mythic frontier of the Midwest.

Reviews

[Bradley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of Cat Valente's short fiction and a novella was probably one of the biggest pleasant surprises I've had all month. I've been catching up with her works and I'm generally not a huge, huge fan of short fiction, but this one kinda rather blew me away.

They've all got a theme of Japanese, either explicit or implicit, and it's not that surprising since Valente lived on a base in Japan and can draw from a lot of experiences and interests. This, if nothing else, could have been enough to catch me, but her prose is, as always, gorgeous and dense and so good as to be shocking.

There's a lot of really excellent poetry in here, but it's her SF poetry that really revs my engines. Melancholy of Mechagirl was good and very disturbing, but I think I liked the Girl with Two Skins better.

Ink, Water, Milk was a short that was disturbing and dreamlike and oppressive. Maybe not my favorite but the prose was a delicious swirl. The same thing can be said about Fifteen Panels Depicting the Sadness of the Baku and the Jotai, only more so.

The Ghosts of Gunkanjima was very much a windy story of ghosts. Short and clever.

My second favorite story, easily one I'll remember for years, is Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time. It's heavy on the science, almost all physics, but every short-short was couched in a creation myth subverted heavily by the real science. I chortled and had wicked delight with all. This is why Cat is called a master of MythoPunk. Way-clever and cool shit. :)

One breath, One Stroke was okay but it relies on our understanding of Shinto (of which I'm woefully unprepared), but Story No. 6 was a great ghost story of a Kami who haunts old celluloid. It was delicious as hell and reminded me wonderfully of Radiance.

"Fade to White" was also very amusing for what was ostensibly a post-apocalyptic story all about the cultural changes of an early 60's America forced to go into heavy-procreation mode because of all the radiation sickness.

I was heavily amused by the short story "Killswitch" about a game and its peculiarities and the obsessions of all its fans and just how tragic it could be.

The last novella was probably the most fascinating, most SF, and most interesting in the core of what it means to be human, have a family, and grow... all the while taking on the forms of old myths, legends, and stories. No matter how I look at "Silently and Very Fast", I'm shocked with the accomplishment, the prose, the characters, and the structure. Blown away. From Inanna and Ereshkigal, I was caught and swept away with the discussions of a girl and her house computer, their growth, all the way to exploring the stars. :)

[Gabrielle (Reading Rampage) · Rating 5 out of 5]

4 and a half, rounded up.

Sometimes, I just need to read something beautiful. It doesn't matter if it's happy-beautiful or sad-beautiful: it just has to move me, remind me that not everything is bleak and harsh. I usually get that craving after one too many dystopian novels...

In the realm of beautiful prose, Catherynne Valente is in a league of her own. Even when her plots meander and fizzle out, even when her characters make no sense, her words are still magical, rich and intoxicating. Valente's luscious prose is assembled here in a collection inspired by Japan, its culture and mythology - as well as the few years she lived there. The stories and poems blend folklore, sci-fi, fantasy and dreams, drawing the reader in a surreal and enchanting place. Some of these stories have autobiographical elements, and they are achingly personal thoughts on loneliness and heartbreak. As much as she must have loved some aspects of living in Japan, her stay in that country obviously left her with a bittersweet aftertaste and come complicated memories.

The flowing and ornate aesthetic of these stories perfectly capture (I think) the images and feelings I associate with Japan – though I am not familiar enough with the culture and some of the references to fully get it. Those stories are not just beautifully written, they are also thought-provoking, and I felt them linger on my brain. Dreaming AIs, arranged marriages, a completely re-imagined version of various creation myths...

This is a little book for those who like to get lost in beautiful words and let them swirl inside their heads, like wine in a glass.

[Ｆｒａｎｋｈ · Rating 3 out of 5]

As soon as I started perusing through the vivacious prose of this surprisingly delightful anthology of some of the most unusual cosmic folklore and tales I have ever encountered, Catherynne M. Valente was more than effective with the spell that she cast on me which at times feels like a precision instrument probing at the areas of my imagination that are better left untapped. It was an exhausting reading experience that kept me on my toes and amused me to no end.

Valente's literary machinations began with the titular poem which briskly established that this is going to be metaphysical examination of post-modern themes about Japanese folklore and obscure nerd culture. The Melancholy of Mechagirl in its entirety is a searing, uninhibited sensual experience. The prose makes love to you with unbridled energy and elusive mystic but the more you try to hold onto any logical semblance in each story, the more frustrated and unsatisfied you get. But that's the appeal of Valente's anthology, for sure. The constant personifications within the pages are staggering in quality; Valente enlivens dead things as if they have been breathing alongside us all this time and we just never notice. Much like the ancient people carve and interpret their deities with human qualities, Valente would usually imbue such careful passions into the most mundane objects with some of the most decadent symbolic meanings imagined.

Some of the most mind-boggling stories written in the most indulgent and luscious prose that ever existed are "Ink, Water, Milk", "Fifteen Panels that Depict the Sadness of the Baku and Jotai", "Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time" and One Breath, One Stroke". They are focused on Japanese mythologies with a contemporary science-fiction spin. Fifteen Panels was a personal favorite because I was entertained with the autobiographical accounts of the Baku, a supernatural being who devours dreams and nightmares found in the Japanese lore. Thirteen Ways reads as collective anecdotes pertaining to the origin of the world based on different cultural accounts across the globe. Valente has a knack for vivid and pensive landscapes as well as uncomfortable illusions and musings infused in the characters that are barely human in scope.

The more self-contained stories have to be "Ghosts in Gunkanjima", "Story No. 6", "Killswitch", and "Fade to White". The first three are urban legends respectively about a haunted factory, a recurring phantom appearing in movies and an apocalyptic video game that might have been a gateway to the underworld itself. The last one is my most favorite of the anthology and deals with the advertising trends that gloss over the terrors of the second World War between the Americans and Japanese, and how a falsified image of home and perfection are the only modes of comfort and denial with the inevitable possibility of nuclear annihilation.

The three other poems in the volume (The Emperor of Tsukiyama Park, Memoirs of a Girl who failed to be born from a peach, and The Girl with Two Skins) are ludicrous but intelligently executed if not curiously witty. They definitely require a more vocal recitation by yourself if not multiple readings. The only stories which really puzzled me yet also annoyed me were "One Breath, One Stroke" and the novella at the end entitled "Silently but Very Fast".

It's safe to say that Valente's prose is much stronger and better appreciated when it has a lingering brevity as oppose to unstoppable verbosity since the latter characteristic certainly dissuades readers from fully engaging in the narrative, and if that happens, the quality then suffers and dwindles. Valente could be quite relentless with her self-indulgent imagery and in those two pieces, I was vaguely turned off from enjoying the tales she's trying to weave and unravel.

Still, this was entertaining and touching in many other areas and you should not miss out on what The Melancholy of Mechagirl has to offer.


RECOMMENED: 7/10
* A sizzling and absurd collection populated by the funkiest and saddest bunch of characters and themes in speculative fiction ever. The stories are all bundled up in shockingly engrossing prose packages that will chill the fertile areas of the mind.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

On the cover of The Melancholy of Mechagirl, Lev Grossman asserts that Catherynne M. Valente "is the Bradbury of her generation." Hyperbole aside, I think Grossman may actually have that backward—Ray Bradbury may have been the Valente of his more awkward, less-enlightened time.

If your only exposure to Valente's writing is 2018's hilarious Eurovision-in-Spaaace novel Space Opera, though... this is not that.

The title carries some clues.

*

Great misery is not the only path to great writing, no matter what all those documentaries and biographies imply. Misery is no guarantee of readability, either, however cathartic the writing may be for the writer. But being miserable is most certainly an effective spur, sometimes.

One begins to suspect early on that Valente's stories and poems with (it says here) Japanese themes are more autobiographical—or more intensely semi-autobiographical—than other writers' fictional revelations. When she refers to "the science-fiction writer" in "Thirteen Ways of Looking at Spacetime," despite that story's framing as a series of creation myths, we know it's personal.

That story also contains one of the collection's vanishingly few solecisms:

{...}after she had written a book about methane-insectoid cities floating in the brume of a pink gas giant that no one liked very much.
—"Thirteen Ways of Looking at Spacetime," p.63

I suspect it was the book, not the pink planet, that was unpopular.

But that passage stood out to me precisely because it was so unusual. Valente's prose more often lilts and flows, its currents complex and precisely-directed. She approaches English like a garden of precious stones and mysterious shells, lifting up each word to see whatever's underneath, confronting us with observations as piercing as this one:

"He who gets the cake cannot be friends with the girl who gets the crumbs."
—"Fade to White," p.108

*

In her Afterword to the collection called, appropriately enough, The Melancholy of Mechagirl, Catherynne M. Valente shares some of the experiences that formed her, and that in turn helped her construct these luminous, dreamlike stories and poems. And in that Afterword, Valente also says—twice—

I have tried to err on the side of love.
—Afterword, p.215

She's right—it's worth repeating.

*

The Melancholy of Mechagirl is a short book, made even shorter for me by the fact that I skipped the longest story in it—having just read "Silently and Very Fast" in Neil Clarke's anthology More Human Than Human the week before. I called the novella, "Long and dreamlike, feverish and baroque, this is a poignant story of a crime against nature. So to speak."

Which, in retrospect, is not a bad way to sum up the whole of The Melancholy of Mechagirl.

[Nicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Melancholy of Mechagirl is a selection of Valente’s stories and poetry. As usual with Valente, I have the problem that I love her writing, but not always the substance. The poetry was too busy being strings of pretty words that I didn’t really get the sense out of it; some of the short stories felt so ornate they felt like they were more for show than to really be handled. I know this is my preference here — other people dig through Valente’s prose happily — and I even like it because of that ornateness, in some ways. If I want to see someone being magical with words, I’ll open up one of Valente’s books and find it.

That’s not to say that she’s bad at characters and plot, per se. These stories often draw on folklore, particularly Japanese folklore, and collected like this it’s also apparent that they’re deeply rooted in Valente’s own life, as well. Her time in Japan affected her deeply, and every story holds its footprints. Some of these are really cleverly done, and for plot, ‘Silently and Very Fast’ is great. I love her story of an AI slowly learning about the world, the family and the AI wrapped around each other. Elefsis works as a character, and that ending works really well.

Finally, the title definitely captures the predominant feeling of this collection. ‘Melancholy.’ That’s not to say it’s depressing to read, but it definitely feels written in the minor key (if you’ll let me mix my metaphors).

[Vehka Kurjenmiekka · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me almost five and half years to finish this book, and there were times I thought I'd never do it. Sometimes Valente's prose is so heavy with techno-babble it is very difficult to soldier through it.

And then, just when you are about to give up, you read a short story so amazing it makes everything worthwhile. For me "Killswitch" was one of those in the story, and "Ghosts of Gunkanjima" too. The last story, "Silently and Very Fast", was very engaging, but the ending felt a bit too easy for me (after reading a story that took over 30% of the whole collection, that is).

To summarize: some of the stories were very difficult to read in a frustrating way, the others were very rewarding, and in the end it was definitely worth returning to again and again.

[Margaret · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection by Valente is like her previous writing with vivid, unique metaphors and complex relationships, but different in its deeply personal, sometimes semi-autobiographical nature. Some of the stories at times feel uncomfortably close, in the way when someone is telling you something heartbreaking about themselves, but you can do nothing to comfort or change their past. I applaud Valente for being able to so beautifully explore her past while still creating stories that explore the ideas of otherness and need to be loved, as my favorite fantasy and science fictional stories do. I loved those stories.

Not all of the pieces in the collection are references to Valente's life in Japan (which she discusses in her afterward). I had previously read "Silently and Very Fast" and enjoyed the second read even more. It was my first time reading "Fade to White" and I was absolutely blown away by it. The story was unlike anything I'd read by Valente before. I also wonder if she would/is considering continuing it into something longer? I would love to see the rest of Sylvie's, Martin's, and Clarke's life!

I have never been to Japan before, and have only read maybe a dozen novels from Japanese writers. Nevertheless, I really connected with the pieces. I have no favorite from the collection, for each piece felt unique and lovely in their own right ("Ink, Water, Milk" was awesome, though). This collection was more "melancholic" than her novels (which always to me have a hopeful caste to them despite their often lonely characters), but also introduced me to some of the most unique perspectives I've ever encountered. I'm looking forward to reading her next collection of short stories, "The Bread we eat in Dreams."

[Caitlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

"But perhaps I see, very, very occasionally, incompletely and always dimly, by the light of the wish-fulfilling jewel in Jizo's tutelary hand, through, with difficulty, with error, with aching, with determination, to the truth of things. Or at least to a better lie. Everything has a dual nature."

The Melancholy of Mechagirl is a collection of Catherynne M. Valente’s short fiction influenced by her time in Japan. Containing both poetry and various lengths of short stories, this collection plays both on the rhythms of Japanese as well as Western life, the myths and legends of Japan and the strangeness of being a foreigner in that land.

Valente lived in Japan while she was married to a man in the Navy and her stories hold the same frustrations and loneliness of a Western woman in a place she doesn’t understand and feels isolated from. Many of the stories are dark, some disturbing, but many play with myths in a way that Valente is very good at. In particular, “Story No. 6” and “Silently and Very Fast” (which won both the Hugo and the Nebula awards for Best Novella in 2011) are standout stories which kept me enthralled. I didn’t love every bit of the collection but I became a big fan of Valente after reading this, I’m impressed at how well she brings myths to life in past, present and future Japan.

Detailed reviews below:

The Melancholy of Mechagirl - 3 out of 5
A poem written from the perspective of a girl who is as much machine as human.
I cannot claim to understand much of what happens in this poem but Valente uses language so beautifully that I didn’t mind too much.

Ink, Water, Milk - 4 out of 5
Three stories are told simultaneously about a paper scroll left in an abandoned factory, the philosophical musings of minor gods and a dissatisfied young Navy wife struggling to adapt to life in Japan. Told in alternating sections, they are slowly tied together.
While the start of this story felt a little jarring, Valente allows you to see how the stories tie together as it progresses. I couldn’t help but feel caught by the strange mythology of it.

Fifteen Panels Depicting the Sadness of the Baku and the Jotai - 4 out of 5
A Baku, a creature who feeds on the dreams of the living, reflects on his lost love, a Jotai screen which kept company with a lonely Navy wife.
This story is mystical and disturbing, in a way that I haven’t felt in awhile. I’m not sure I could say I enjoyed it but it certainly felt like the scarier, more disturbing myths that you don’t see much of anymore.

Ghosts of Gunkanjima - 4 out of 5
Ghosts on the abandoned island of Gunkanjima reflect helplessly on the deaths which trapped them there.
Another story that isn’t an easy read but still captures the imagination. The turmoil of the spirits and what happened to them is simultaneously disturbing and compelling.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time - 1 out of 5
The birth of the universe is described with thirteen different amalgamations of myth and Valente’s life.
This was weird and too dominated by math and science for me. It’s definitely more in the hard science fiction realm of Valente’s writing, which just isn’t my cup of tea.

One Breath, One Stroke - 4 out of 5
A calligrapher lives in the House of Second-Hand Carnelian which sits half in the human world and half in the unhuman world. When the calligrapher is in the human world, he is a man named Ko and when he’s in the unhuman world, he is a brush named Yuu. Each tries to find out more about the other as they guard this gateway house.
Valente seems to be at her best (for me) when playing with mythical structure. I’m not super familiar with Japanese myths but the introduction of the animals and creatures of the House of Second-Hand Carnelian was fascinating.

Story No. 6 - 5 out of 5
A Kami shifts through old Japanese films (only those on film, not DVDs or VHS tapes), disturbing those who happen to catch sight of her.
This is Valente at her best. It’s creepy, magical and breathes life into myth in the present day, incorporating a level of magic realism that enthralled me.

Fade to White - 3 out of 5
Several teenagers face the ritual of coming of age in a post-apocalyptic Fallout-style America.
This was an interesting 1950’s style reimagining of America if nuclear war had happened. It’s heavy satire and dark, interesting if not my favorite of the collection.

The Emperor of Tsukayama Park - 3 out of 5
A poem about misunderstanding the name of a park and the feeling of being foreign and and foolish.
I’ve never been terribly into poetry, but Valente captures the feeling of isolation and shame well.

Killswitch - 4 out of 5
A horror/survival videogame named Killswitch drives players to discover all of its secrets, plagued by the knowledge that it is playable only once, with a number of choices and puzzles to complete.
The most interesting part of this story is the implication of the pressure players would feel if they had only one chance to play a game, particularly given that they have a choice at the beginning of the easy human character or the impossibly difficult demonic one. It’s a story of impossible choices and feels like a story that could be in the news.

Memoirs of a Girl Who Failed to be Born from a Peach - 3 out of 5
A poem which plays both on a miscarriage and the legend of Momotaro for a story of someone who never had the chance to live.
This is the shortest poem in the collection and a bit brutal. I liked the way it mixed Momotaro in with an American experience and life in Los Angeles.

The Girl with Two Skins - 2 out of 5
A fox creature is a bound to a woman when its hidden treasure is discovered and is convinced to become a woman itself, even as it struggles against this change.
There are definitely points in this collection in which I feel my ignorance of Japanese myth and legend and this poem was very much one of them. The feeling of not being good enough and trying to be something one isn’t come through well but I spent much of the poem struggling to understand what was going on.

Silently and Very Fast - 5 out of 5
An artificial intelligence develops with an isolated family of engineers on a Japanese island and struggles to define itself in relation to its family.
This is easily my favorite of what I’ve read from Valente. The idea of the line between man and machine is one of my favorite concepts in science fiction (though not that far from reality these days) and this story does such an excellent job of showing the progression of the AI from simple adaptive house technology to a machine capable of many things, perhaps even enough emotion to pass the Turing test.

[Cassi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stunning imagery, complex and wild characters. Beautiful.

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an attractive collection of short fiction and poetry inspired by what the back cover calls ‘Japanese themes’. It caught my eye in Waterstones partly for its pretty cover and partly because the author’s name rung a number of bells in my brain as being somebody I ought to be interested in. Having read it, I’m still not entirely sure what ‘Japanese themes’ means (perhaps ‘inspired by an American woman’s approach to Japanese history and culture’ would be more appropriate?) but whatever. Some of the stories here are drenched in those things; others not so much. All are worth reading for various reasons.

The author’s writing is defined by what I would call a maximalist style. This is to say that it absolutely rejects the common notion of ‘good’ prose fiction as being pared-down, emotionally detached, journalistic and apolitical. The writing here is rich in its descriptions and wildly imaginative, haunting some hinterland between magic realism and science fiction in its visionary qualities. It’s emotional, but it never forsakes history and politics for the sake of sentiment.

It doesn’t always work. ‘It must be hard to edit this stuff’ is what I kept thinking through many passages which were simply too much for my poor brain to follow; but in many respects I’m glad that the publishers of this text chose to allow the book to be put out like this at all. It’s not the kind of book you’d go to for smooth writing of crafted, varnished perfection; it’s more like the product of a brilliant and somewhat unhinged imagination.

To be honest, it engenders in me a sense of profound inadequacy as a writer: the feeling that my own dreams have never had quite the same immediacy since I was a child; that at some point in my adolescence, my imagination was cauterised in such a way that I can no longer access the same ideas which used to come so easily. Sometimes I feel so desperately like I want to write like this, but it feels like I have no such experience to draw upon, no such stories to tell — or if I do, I can’t access them. And that makes me a bit sad.

[S.P. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a collection of short stories, and Valente often revisits her time and loneliness in Japan, as well as her love for Japan. The stories, each with their own perspective and unique charms, flow effortlessly from the page, each with their own different, yet similar, tale, and triggering memories of other experiences already played.

It is, as the title might hint, at times melancholic, but in the beautiful sense of the word. The mixture of fiction, autobiographical, cyberpunk, folklore, fairy tales and surreal situations - sometimes all in the same sentence, is arresting and fascinating. It blew me away.

[p. · Rating 5 out of 5]

it is clear that valente has garnered well-deserved attention and acknowledgement among her peers. but i feel like her talent far outweighs her presence in the cultural conversation and it is a great shame.

her writing is atmospheric and haunting, with the quality of a fairy tale and - yes - infused with a certain sense of melancholy that permeates this collection and makes its way to the reader's heart. valente has an uncanny ability for creating vivid imagery and for moving profoundly her audience.

but even if stripped of that, 'the melancholy of mechagirl' is a fascinating collection of poems and short stories.

on one hand, its semi-autobiographical nature allows for an exploration of personhood that feels very intimate. when valente interacts with japanese culture she does not do that through an exotic and impersonal foreign lens. rather, she describes a dialogue between herself and a culture that she is foreign to (rather than it being foreign to her); the interaction feel tangible and its participants - vivid and real and fully realised. it is a reality that has clearly been lived in.

on the other hand, there are themes and motives that will later be infused into valente's subsequent works. her specific style of exploration of matters of power and marriage and self-actualisation has already taken shape in the works exhibited here.

each short story and poem included within the collection is stunning. 'the melancholy of mechagirl' and 'the girl with two skins' are deeply intriguing, while others like like 'one breath one stroke' read like fairy tales. 'killswitch', of course, has a cult following online (which is, ironically, how i ended up finally picking this up - though nothing i heard did this justice). 'fade to white' was also very strong and perhaps an ancestor of 'comfort me with apples'.

one cannot recommend how much each of the stories included here must be read. however, the indisputable highlight of the collection is 'silently and very fast' which is an excellent sci-fi story that stays on one's mind for a long time.

[Mandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Melancholy of Mechagirl is a reader's religious artifact, inside and out. The stunning cover created by Yuko Shimizu is a gorgeous, elegant mix of contemporary and traditional style and subject matter - her signature style, if you will. Even better, the value of The Melancholy of Mechagirl perceived at first glance is just the tip of the iceberg. The story behind Shimizu's growth as a woman and artist is so interesting in comparison to Valente's own, that once you've made the connection, you can see why Shimizu's art is so fitting to ensconce Valente's. Read here for the quick breakdown, though I highly recommend reading through Mechagirl and visiting Shimizu's website to link the pieces together for yourself: To summarize: Yuko Shimizu was born and raised in Japan, tried her best to conform to practicality in culture and values, but eventually realized that her passion for art outweighed that and moved to NYC to fulfill her dream of becoming an illustrator (and a very formidable one, at that). Valente, a US citizen, found herself thrust into an unfamiliar Japanese culture as a US Navy wife, where extended isolation in a foreign country profoundly changed her as a person and her experiences there are imprinted on most everything she writes. Both women blend Japanese and Western cultures in unique, wonderful ways as artists. Such duality is not only present between these two, but within the concept of the collection, as well as each piece. I'm not surprised to see a Valente book laden with such richness in meaning on the exterior as well.

Having read nearly all of Valente's work, I must say that this is not a bad place to start, but I would still recommend beginning with In the Night Garden. I tried my best to savour each story and poem, to make this ration last. As there are 13 unique pieces in this collection to review, I only briefly want to touch upon my favourites.



The Melancholy of Mechagirl: I'm not typically drawn to poetry, but this poem had such unique imagery that I've had to come back to it and read it a few more times to ruminate on what I like so much about it. I think that my enjoyment hinges on the employment of scientific terms and that those terms don't make the poem feel sterile.



Ghosts of Gunkanjima: I would say this story is best read in the dark, with a flashlight. If you've looked at your share of creepy abandoned city photos online, you've got a lot of grain for the brain-mill to grind. This story is haunting, in the best kind of way.



One Breath, One Stroke: My favourite short story of the lot. It is told in 3-4 sentence paragraphs, each labelled 1 through 51 in ascending order. An interesting thought from the title is that a calligrapher only makes one brush stroke per breath. Perhaps each paragraph is an author's proverbial "brush stroke" and should only be read in one breath? or each paragraph considered as one brush stroke of effort towards a whole? And if "It takes a calligrapher one hundred years to draw one breath" does that mean this story has taken five-thousand-one-hundred years to tell, from start to finish?



Story No. 6: A very cool concept, as a story and perpetuated into its own legend. Of course, there are many layers to peel back here, but to do so is most enjoyable.



Fade to White: A really fantastic dystopian tale which cleverly draws in elements of our recent past and criticisms of our present, with speculations on our future. The building feelings of suspense, horror, and revulsion are totally satisfied in the denouement. It is easy to get so wrapped up in this tale. Valente's writing is so powerful.



The Emperor of Tsukayama Park is a poetic tale which I think we can all relate to in the very best and worst of ways. It's entirely great as a stand-alone piece and as a perfect example of the writing style I adore. Mistaking the meaning of a word for something more profound, more meaningful than its actual definition is embarrassing enough when only you know about the error; the feeling of looking like such a fool, so entrenched in misunderstanding to the person who enlightens you: doubly so. Even worse, the mysticism and fantasy imagined around that word just kind of deflates with the reality of the error.



Silently and Very Fast:Not only is this a great sci-fi story, I feel like this story is an interesting metaphor about writing. Is Elefsis the writer and the Uoya-Agostino clan the stories a writer dreams up? Or is the Uoya-Agostino clan the iterations of a writer, who uses Elefsis (a metaphor for creativity, perhaps) as a grounding point for the stories she creates? At any rate, I would say the blue crystal is a symbol which stands for the point in the relationship between Elefsis and Uoya-Agostino where the mutual trust allows the story takes on a life of its own. Such food for thought. I like the idea of Elefsis being an author/machine, who learns to be human through the stories they write, which in turn are worlds and lives of their own, each unique and requiring trust to properly come to life and create a believable landscape.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Strange and unlike almost anything I have ever read. Some of the most achingly beautiful prose about a variety of themes including Japanese culture/history, mythology, folklore, technology, and whether “life” is too narrow a concept in modern times.
Not for everyone, but definitely for me. I loved this odd, magical, wonderful collection.
5 eager stars here.

[Peter Hollo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best things I've read in ages. Even the poems - I'm not usually into poems, especially sf/fantasy poems - are beautiful little pieces.
The prose, too, is poetic. Whether mythical fantasy, urban fantasy or even science fiction, the words and paragraphs and sub-stories are a delicacy to savour.
Many of the stories are semi-autobiographical (as made clear by both Teruyuki Hashimoto's introduction and Valente's own afterword), and the most touching is "Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time", which embeds the inception of authorhood in interlinked mythologies and space operas.

But after all the other dazzling stories, the highlight is left for last. The three part novella "Silently and Very Fast" (named from the last line of W.H. Auden's poem "The Fall of Rome") is one of the most mind-blowing, inspiring and beautiful pieces of science fiction I've read in a long time. It's definitely, in my opinion, hard science fiction - a thoughtful and knowledgeable exploration of what personhood or identity is, what artificial intelligence could be, and what love is. It's also fantasy, and it's prose poetry. Despite there being no plot or clear driver moving the narrative forward, I found it gripping throughout. It's a masterpiece.

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a strangely beautiful, haunting, magical book. I don't even know how to review it, because words wouldn't do it justice. If you're a fan of the magical fantasy writing that is extremely bizarre in a good way, I highly recommend this book. It combines these elements with a closer look at Japan through an outsider's lens. Often times, books like this exoticize the country, but each short story and poem contained in this volume highlights Japan's beauty without emphasizing the 'otherness' which is a tired stereotype. I would definitely say this is one of my favorite books I've read this year and some of the best science fiction I've ever read. I don't really even have a favorite, because they're all fascinating im their own ways. Wow. 4.75/5 stars.

[Dean Parker · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not like it. It's my bad, though; it was just too beautiful for me to appreciate. For once, I feel compelled to qualify my dislike. The words fell around my brain softly like the first snow at midnight; quiet and awesome; it was a light snow; you could hardly feel it; yet, in the dark it felt like a really slow rain; yet, it felt important and ethereal, but beyond my comprehension; very gossamer; yet substantial like a haiku, but maybe more.

[Sian Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

Valente is a virtuoso writer. Her prose reads like poetry, the best kind, that is aloft and grounded at the same time. She captures emotional meaning by indirect and sinuous routes, mixing the technological and the mythological in splendid and surprising combination, and she winds narrative through the whole glorious intricacy. I love this work so very much.

[Kara · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me forever to read this, but not because it was bad. I wanted to savor it.

[EGO000 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really wish there was a N/A category, because I can't really rate the book properly. It's a combination of highly raw scientific and highly abstract spiritual concepts plenty of which I can't fully make sense of without research. Hence, the book definitely calls for a re-read sometime in the future when I would hopefully have more time to allocate for it. For now I am giving it a tentative 4 as a rating,
since I believe you have to be a certain rare type of genius to unite such conflicting notions and make them work together in a vast array of short stories.

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A psychedelic literary trip down sci fi lane from enthralling story to the next, with Japan and Pure Land influences that remind fondly of the hubs and the late MIL..

[I'm EEPY · Rating 5 out of 5]

a love letter to folklore and mythology and sci-fi and things i will never understand personally.

[Lena · Rating 2 out of 5]

Book club pick. This would have been one star if not for the stories called Fade to White and Killswitch. The rest of the book made no sense to me.

[Cyboruga · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would give anything to have 10% of the way with words that Valente has, she's truly an incredible wordsmith that makes me feel so much and so, so deeply

[Selena · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really liked the concept but there were descriptions of sex that were just too visceral and uncomfortable for me at the time. That's how they are probably supposed to make the reader feel but in this moment I just wasn't into it. That's not even a huge or significant part of the book as a whole, but it did make me lose interest at this time. Might pick up again one day when that doesn't bother me anymore.

[Karissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have had this book for a while to read, it’s a collection of short stories by Valente and has some excellent and some good stories in it. I have read most of Valente’s novels and really enjoy her prose-like and sometimes ambiguous writing style.

This book is a collection of thirteen stories. Most of the stories are somewhat science fiction in theme and have a very Japanese feel to them (they deal with Japanese mythology or culture).

There were a few stories I absolutely loved, some I liked, and a couple that were a bit too far out there even for me. Valente’s writing style is absolutely beautiful and sparkling, but it is also something best read in small doses (like eatingn a rich chocolate). You do have to concentrate as you read and really pay attention because some things can be a bit ambiguous and have multiple meanings.

I’ll go through my favorites first. I really enjoyed Ink, Water, Milk that tells the story of scroll and a paintbrush and a woman lonely and alone in Japan. This story starts out as three stories that all tie together in the end. I also loved The Ghosts of Gunkanjima; which gives a little history lesson about Battleship island and tells a story about the wind on the abandoned island...it was absolutely beautiful and melancholy and interesting.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at SpaceTime was probably the most ironic and funny story of the bunch. I enjoyed the way Valente blended creation mythology with scientific terminology in this story….it was very cleverly done. One Breath One Stroke was my absolute favorite of the whole bunch and is about a man who lives in a house where he is human in one half of the house and a paintbrush in the other half. This was just such a bizarre, creative, and magical story that I absolutely loved it...just wonderful imagery throughout.

Fade to White was a well done, yet absolutely hopeless feeling, post-apocalyptic story about two young people who each desperately want opposite places in this futuristic society and neither of them gets what they want. It turned a lot of standard societal perceptions topsy-turvy and was easy to read and engage with.

Now onto the stories I didn’t enjoy as much. Killswitch was an easy read about an ironic sort of video game, but ultimately seemed a bit shallow and unfinished. Story No 6 was about a goddess hiding in films and was very forgettable. Silently and Very Fast, was by far the longest story and the hardest to read of the bunch. I had trouble figuring out what was going on here and really struggled to stay engaged with the story.

All the poetry in between the stories was well done and beautifully written. Of the poems I think my favorite was The Melancholy of Mechagirl; a poem from the perspective of a female robot.

I also really enjoyed the Afterword in which Valente explains the situation she was in when she wrote these stories and her own struggles with being a stranger in a strange land. This is definitely an adult book, most of the stories have at least some reference to sex. Just FYI.

Overall I really enjoyed this collection of science fiction short stories blended with Japanese mythology. It’s a unique blend of sci-fi and mythology and Valente’s writing style is rich, prose-like and beautiful. Like with the majority of anthologies there are some absolutely spectacular stories in here and some not so spectacular ones. If you are new to Valente I would recommend reading her The Girl Who/Fairyland series first, that series has Valente’s beautiful writing style but is a bit more accessible than her more ambiguous works like this one.

[Piyali Mukherjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Firstly, Catherynne Valente writes with a cultural and mythological sensitivity that I aspire to write with someday. As her own afterword says, she writes about a culture that neither birthed her not she felt invited to, but instead sat down to tea with her. Through this, her mythological stories, patterns and replications are exquisite.

Her novella "Silent and Very Fast" is included in this, and has been lauded several times. But that's not even close to my two favorite stories. "Thirteen Ways of Looking At The Universe" was a profound meta-narrative merging both the repeated birth of the universe through Biblical, Japanese, Aztec and Apache mythology with the story of a young girl who becomes a science fiction writer.

My second favorite story is "Fade To White". A story told entirely through copywriting notes about a post World War 2 dystopia where white men are cultivated for the spawning of the new American wives after a radioactive Cold War. Tying in the 1950s with the rich, earnest copywriting brought the whole dystopia and it's social fabric (Mccarthy-ism) immediately to the fore.

My final favorite is actually the author's own afterword. She does not write from far apart, trying to tell me a story she cannot relate to. Instead she invites me into the youth, overwhelming loneliness and exclusion of a young American Navy wife who's husband leaves her stranded in an outside culture shortly after their wedding.

What I'm saying is, I found a new favorite author and the way she moved me, the way she gave me several quiet moments on the bathroom floor after I finished reading her stories has made this entire journey worth it. She made the dreamworld real in a Jungian, creative sense. She borrowed from the symbolic language of myths and dreams to tell us these shockingly intimate and vivid stories. And she did so with so much feeling. So much feeling.

[Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I cannot write a true review of this book because I really was that generic 23-year old anime-loving Murasaki Shikibu-reading soon-to-be-English teacher. Obviously. I only lasted two years before I gave up and left Japan.

I shouldn't say 'gave up' but it was my home-that-could-never-be-home and a culture that no matter how hard I studied my kanji or read my myths and manga full of youkai and kitsune or listened to my loud Japanese rock music or ate my fill of deliciously exotic foods I could never ever fit in. My gaijin card made sure to squash any expectations that this country could embrace me as anything other than what I was: foreign. I made friends with expats and locals and tried my hardest to enjoy all that Japan had to offer but, like Cat, it was a surreal whirlwind of love and despair ricocheting back and forth never quite resigned to the fact that Japan's dual nature meant that I would never have solid footing on solid ground.

Yes, many of us throw on our pop-bottle glasses filled with Western assumptions about what Japan is and is not. The Western image of Japan is very powerful and quite pervasive in such a way that years later I still feel nostalgic about such random things: interestingly flavored "foreign" foods (wasabi Kit-kats anyone? Yogurt-flavored Pepsi?) or the din of metal balls plinking as I passed by pachinko parlors late at night, advertisements about new GAINAX or Ghibli or Sailormoon, hunting in Osaka's Amemura for the elusive New Years fukubukuro grab bags from my favorite clothing brands.

I was lucky in some ways, I suppose. I had been to Japan a couple of times before and I had studied the language for years: I thought I knew what I was getting into. And I did. Sort of. But not really.

And I feel that this collection of Japan-themed stories is Cat's homage to Japan and her way of managing her memories. She is no longer that girl as I am no longer that girl but we bring back our own baggage and sometimes it takes years to sort through it all, if we ever do. I cannot put words into another mouth but my own and I do not have a way with words like Cat does but I can say that I very much appreciated this book because I felt myself reexamine my baggage, my scars, my Western expectations and come out on the other end knowing that the scared-but-excited girl that ran away to Japan is still hiding inside me somewhere. She molded and shaped me into the person that I am today.

Like Cat, I sat down and had tea with Japan on occasion and found its warm but sometimes bitter matcha a bit much before I could take a bite of something sweet to temper the flavor. And after that first bite coated the inside of my mouth with azuki bean paste I find myself smiling regardless because life will always have that duality of sweet and bitter moments. I can come to terms with that.

[Colton · Rating 2 out of 5]

My favorite was “Fifteen Panels Depicting the Sadness of the Baku and the Jotai,” it had similarities toward “The Tale of the Hungry Lord.”

“You can only truly love someone who can destroy you” (29).

“After that, Marya Morevna understood that she belonged to her secret and it belonged to her. They had struck a bloody bargain between them. Keep me and obey me, the secret said to her, for I am your husband and I can destroy you.” -(page 28 of Deathless, by Catherynne M. Valente)

But then I read “Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time.” I found the synthesis of religion and science in “I.” amusing. While reading, I thought that how I felt while reading the writing of Catherynne M. Valente must be how others feel when they read my writing. This caused me to become quite angry, and was a catalyst for another extended bout of introspection, which I could not share because of the realization I had from this comparison. Others would understand me even less if I shared my thoughts and feelings through words, and would become even more frustrated at my existence than they already are. I am sad that I can never be such a good writer. So many words related to these will not be expressed due to the reaction of others. I can not even say how that makes me feel. Others might appreciate the clarity, but it is not worth the pain.

The descriptions of mass and entropy in “V.” reminded me of the recurring nightmare that I have had for all of my life (since learning of Eve inflicting her curse upon all females), concerning the remaining representatives of the human race on a journey through the astral plane in an attempt to either prevent the destruction of the universe or survive it, all the while considering its possible futility. To think that we might be able to feel the reverberations of such an event is to experience thought.

“Fade To White” made me think of my own incipience. This and other stories by Catherynne M. Valente have made me realize even more how relatively unsexual my life is and has been, compared to others that I share this same world with. It makes me feel insufficient. Which reminds me of the possible invalidation of these feelings, from the acknowledgment of the existence of others who might have this same thing in common with me. Which makes me feel even more insufficient, because I am neither a poet nor a musician. She has a point, though. Making one emote from any expression of sex is justified in being a motive in itself- within reason, but does not necessarily make a person actually think about it. Anyone who expresses sex in any form other than seduction has a point. Sex is a thing.

[༺Kiki༻ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone should read "Ghosts of Gunkanjima". From 1939 to 1945 Japan forcefully recruited Korean and Chinese laborers to work in the coal mines at Gunkanjima. Many laborers died on the island from head injuries, crushing, drowning, malnutrition, and suicide. This story is a beautiful and utterly heartbreaking tribute to all who suffered there.

If you liked this book, you might also enjoy:

✱ The Habitation of the Blessed
✱ The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye
✱ At the Mouth of the River of Bees: Stories

If you liked "The Girl with Two Skins", you might also enjoy "Fox Magic" from At the Mouth of the River of Bees.

If you liked "Ghosts of Gunkanjima", you might also enjoy "The Literomancer" from The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories.

★★★★☆ The Melancholy of Mechagirl
★★★★★ Ink, Water, Milk
★★★★★ Fifteen Panels Depicting the Sadness of the Baku and the Jotai
★★★★★ Ghosts of Gunkanjima
★★★★★ Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time
★★★★★ One Breath, One Stroke
★★★★☆ Story No. 6
★★★★☆ Fade to White
★★★★☆ The Emperor of Tsukayama Park
★★★★☆ Killswitch
★★★★★ Memoirs of a Girl Who Failed to Be Born From a Peach
★★★★★ The Girl With Two Skins
★★★★★ Silently and Very Fast