Honeymoons in Temporary Locations

by Ashley Shelby

Eclectic, experimental, and wildly imaginative climate fictions from a familiar world hauntingly transformed Climate disaster-induced fugue states, mutinous polar bears, support groups for recently displaced millionaires, men who hear trees, and women who lose their wives on environmental refugee resettlement trips. In these dispatches from a weirding world, the absurd and fantastic are increasingly indistinguishable from reality. Exploring this liminal moment, Ashley Shelby's collection of climate fictions imagines a near future that is both unnervingly familiar and subversively strange. Set in the same post-climate-impact era, these stories range from playfully satirical to poignantly humane, bending traditional narrative forms and coming together into a brilliant and unusual contemplation of our changing world. Featuring the Hugo-nominated novelette "Muri," Honeymoons in Temporary Locations processes the unthinkable through riotous inventions like guided tours of submerged cities, Craigslist ads placed by climate refugees, and cynical pharmaceutical efforts to market a drug to treat solastalgia, the existential distress caused by environmental change. Shelby reengineers the dystopic bleakness that characterizes so much climate fiction by embracing an eclectic experimentalism leavened with humor, irony, and the inevitable bathos that characterizes the human experience. Unexpected and clever, this innovative collection confirms her status as a visionary writer whose work expands the forms, attitudes, and possibilities of climate fiction.

Genres: Short Stories, Science Fiction, Fiction, Dystopia

152 pages, Hardcover

Published May 21, 2024

About the author

Ashley Shelby is novelist, short story writer, and former environmental journalist. She is the author of Honeymoons in Temporary Locations (2024), South Pole Station (2017), and Red River Rising: The Anatomy of a Flood and the Survival of an American City (2004).

Reviews

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of linked short stories that is very heavily themed around climate change. Ashley Shelby brings to life a post-Impact world – Impact being, as one character describes it, ‘the direct result of preventable climate change caused by man’. As the narrative progresses, further in-world concepts are introduced: solastalgia is a mental health condition caused by the strain of dealing with climate change, while Climafeel is a drug that treats it (essentially by removing empathy and inducing psychopathy).

There’s a lot to like about the innovative and playful style here: Honeymoons is told through a variety of formats, from oral histories to newsletters, Craigslist ads and a café menu. Opening story ‘Muri’, about a polar bear mutiny on board a cargo ship, is excellent. ‘The Sickness’ tells a potent, moving story, and short pieces like ‘Climafeel In-House Marketing Brief’ pack a punch. But I did feel, at points, that the intense focus on one theme was a disadvantage. ‘Incident on Yellowstone Trail’ is a podcast transcript, recounting the death of a tree like it’s a murder case. While effective in terms of style, I’m not quite sure it works in the way the author intended. It’s meant (I think) to satirise tacky true crime podcasts, but the tone is so overblown, you could easily think climate activists were the ones being mocked.

Not every voice worked for me (I also found the narrator of the title story exhausting). That aside, the sheer variety of formats keeps Honeymoons constantly engaging, and when Shelby hits her stride – as in ‘Muri’, which is just flat-out excellent storytelling – the book proves she’s capable of writing stories that stand strong on their own, even stripped of their message.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Five stars are only for effort. Literary quality, as always, determined by the reader.

[Andy Weston · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection is dominated by the first story. At long short story or short novella length, Muri is the reimagining of Melville’s Benito Cereno as a piece of climate fiction, and with a much darker tinge to it, so much that it becomes a horror story.
The few remaining polar bears are being transported to the Antarctic as the various governments try to patch up their errors, or alleviate their guilt.
The action takes place on the icebreaking ship, Procession, upon which the sleuth of Baffin Bay bears has been loaded. Previous such journeys have ended badly with crews mysteriously losing their sanity.
Shelby’s writing is excellent, both in the passages involving the events that take place, and in her descriptions of the environment. It makes me wonder that this could have been stretched into a full novella.

There’s a degree of satire in Muri, but the rest of the stories, which vary greatly in length, are heavily satirical and written largely as humour. As clever as they were in places, I couldn’t warm to the style of humour.

Shelby is an upcoming American writer with obvious potential. These stories first appeared in various magazines over the last eight years. I would encourage her to listen to the darker side if her personality in the future; she does after all quote Poe as being a serious influence on her writing.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first “multimedia” book I’ve ever been able to finish they have just never clicked with me. I think the different forms of storytelling built out the world in a way that just short stories would not have. Climate fiction actually scares me so there’s that.

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

First time reading climate apocalypse fiction and I don’t like it at all…

[Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe 4.5 stars.

I loved Shelby’s essay on LitHub abut solastalgia and was super excited when my local library finally got a copy. It’s an interesting read for sure. I’m not sure the mix of magical realism and played straight satire blended well for me, but may work for others. The combination that was (horrifyingly) perfect? How Shelby articulated the toxic union between the climate apocalypse and the ways oligarchy leaches humanity from us all. So apt, especially now.

[Logan Kedzie · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's like Jeff VanderMeer's How to Blow Up a Pipeline.

This book is a short story collection, including a segment in a scrapbook format, all that connect in one way or another to climate change.

"Muri", the opening story, is the strongest of the bunch. It is the most formally interesting and the one that has the sharpest point to it. It is also pretty damn weird.

"'Incident on Yellowstone Trail'" is the standout, envisioning climate disasters as through podcasting tropes.

My favorite though is the titular story, a short story version of a bourgeois novel caught up in climate migration.

There are two problems, one that I do not really know what to do with. The first is that these stories do not belong in a collection together. They are by the same author and have connecting facts and events, but the tonal shifts here are disorienting, case in point being the first two stories and the leap from moody magical realism where a character outright states the message to satirical black comedy and all subtext (if that). I actually think that "Ersatz Cafe" is probably funnier and more meaningful if read outside of the context of the other stories. More particularly, the framing devices as regards most specifically the latter half of the book, as sort of background materials to a disorder and then clinical trials around a drug to treat that disorder, uniformly weaken the stories there, two of which ("They Don't Tell You Where to Put the Pain" and "Your Ghost Remains Upright") are both quality, albeit (you will notice the theme here) for totally different reasons.

The more difficult problem is the invocation of Solastalgia. Solistalgia is a concept created by Glenn Albrecht and described on wikipedia (please don't judge) as the lived experience of negatively perceived environmental change. I do not know how else to put it but that it's a real thing currently being studied, that may be more formally recognized and even if not, sadly, will become more prevalent as a thing that people have to deal with.

The book hypothesizes a more formal recognition of the problem, and specifically drug companies trying to get business with medicating it (what is being tried in the aforementioned trials). And as a bit of snark here but I have to call out the contradiction of representing drug companies as transparently greedy but then having it the other way with a malign treatment center where the 'throw away your pills' mentality is shown as perverse. The points are reconcilable, but, again, you will notice a theme here. But it goes beyond that, creating specific psychological manifestations and mania associated with the disorder.

Look, I specifically do not know the literature here on the topic, but this feels sketchy to me. Like if I were to write a story about how all everyone with Level 2 Autism started coming down with pica, synesthesia, and flatulence, you might question my choices, even if I had some thematic purpose around the treatment of disability that I was looking to invoke through it. It gets particularly ahead of its skis in the sense that if "Muri" is based on an event that is actually happening, and there are no hints there not to take it at face value, then what exactly is this as a disorder? There is not a formal reason for it, either, except as a tail wagging the dog sense to justify grouping the final package of short stories. Which all work on their own as sort of disordered thinking under the results of climate change, no arc conceit necessary.

Other than the tragedy of our reality, I suppose.

My thanks to Ashley Shelby, for writing the book, and to the publisher, University of Minnesota Press, for making the ARC available to me.

[Jordan (Forever Lost in Literature) · Rating 5 out of 5]

*4.75

Find this review at Forever Lost in Literature!

Honeymoons in Temporary Locations by Ashley Shelby is a striking collection of climate fiction that delves into climate disasters and their aftermath, exploring how humanity navigates crises in a drastically changed world. I really liked this one, especially with its focus on a future where climate change has continued on its catastrophic course, leaving us with a world that feels both familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.

The collection kicks off with two short stories and then adopts a 'mixed media' approach and incorporates documents, transcripts, advertisements, and more. This creative structure offers a multifaceted glimpse into the state of things in this speculative future while also providing a deeper connection to its characters and themes.

The opening story, "Muri," was a standout and easily my favorite. Without spoiling too much, it follows a man aboard a ship tasked with relocating polar bears from the Arctic to the Antarctic in a desperate bid to save the species. The isolation of such voyages takes its toll, and the men are warned before departure: if the polar bears start talking, no they didn't, it's just hallucinations. I found this to be a genuinely entertaining story that felt both ominous and gripping. "Muri" offers a lot of thought-provoking ideas and commentary on many climate-related themes, but what stood out to me the most was the commentary on humanity's misguided attempts to "fix" problems with quick solutions that often do more harm than good, which felt almost scarily relevant.

The "found document" sections are particularly creative. These include ads, menus, and other artifacts from a climate-ravaged world. One menu imagines dishes inspired by climate change, mixing humor and bleak reality in a really effective manner. Another standout is an ad for a "climate cruise" offering tours of once-famous cities now submerged beneath water. These elements all provide a stark look at what the future could hold while also creating a stronger sense of immersion into this world for readers.

A recurring thread throughout the collection is the condition of solastalgia--a term for the emotional distress caused by environmental change--and its varied manifestations. We see it woven into advertisements, personal experiences, and narratives, which brings all of these stories together with a sense of loss and adaptation to a new world.

This collection offers a lot of variety and some areas will work well for others, while some may not. I personally loved "Muri" the most because it fell most into line with my typical taste. Some of the other stories didn't work as well for me, but I still felt they had great merit. There’s so much to explore in this collection, and I truly enjoyed the journey. Each piece examines different facets of humanity’s reaction to climate-related disasters, from resilience and denial to innovation and exploitation.

One of the greatest strength of this book is simply Shelby's prose. Her writing is rich and evocative and truly showed careful thought and deliberation with each sentence. It's worth noting that Honeymoons in Temporary Locations would certainly fall into the "literary fiction" category so everyone's reception of this book will likely differ, but my own opinion is that this one is well worth the read. It's also only about 150 pages, so it shouldn't take you too long, either.

Overall, I've given Honeymoons in Temporary Locations 4.75 stars! A must read for any fans of climate fiction, or simply anyone looking for something creative and well-written.

*I received a copy of Honeymoons in Temporary Locations in exchange for an honest review. This has no effect on my rating.*

[Dede (Deirdre) W. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Catching up on my reviews today. I received this as a galley (a physical one). It's the first galley I've read in my life! People have told me to get on Netgalley but I don't really understand how it works. Glad I was able to get my hands on a physical galley though.

So this one is a very short book, only about 150 pages. For anyone going in thinking it's supposed to read like a novel or even a typical short story collection, you might be a little discombobulated. It's not a novel or a normal short story collection. It's a world. Or an experience. This is a book about climate change.

We start with crazy story about a ship taken over by animals (I won't spoil what happens) that reads like it's from another century, right into a first-person story by a woman trying to unravel a mystery about where her wife went during their migrant relocation trip. Then we have "documents" like a menu from the "Ersatz Cafe," a franchise doing swift business in the wake of a lot of agricultural collapses, a podcast transcript about a "climate crime" that sounds hilariously like Crime Junkie, a satirical take on a wealth management investment email, an internal marketing thing about a drug that supposedly cures solastalgia, which in this world is like an infectious disease except it's not contagious in the usual way, and a journal article about solastalgia. Then we get four more traditional short stories about fascinating individuals who are in the trial for the drug I mentioned earlier. I really liked how, by the end, all the stories and "stories" shared references. A character goes to the Ersatz Cafe before we encounter the menu. The mutiny in the first story is basically a meme or has gone viral by the time we get to another story. I thought that was very interesting.

I am open to all kinds of fiction so I personally liked the eclectic approach the author took. But I can see this book having maybe more resonance with Gen Z than older folks like me. I say that because my teenage grandson found this in my living room and took it home. He read it in one night even though he's a reluctant reader. He said it reflected a lot of the worries his generation is feeling about climate change, that the way it was written was in a way and with a storytelling approach that made sense to him. He thought the podcast transcript was hilarious and got a huge kick out of the investment newsletter. The fragmentary nature of the book, which he's comfortable with, came together as a whole for him, as it did for me. He said the older generations don't understand how much his generation worries about climate change and how angry they are about the fact that older people don't seem to care what happens to them and told me he liked this book because "this is basically how young people see the world right now."

Anyway, I just share that because I thought it was interesting that the book hit my grandson differently than it hit me, even though we both liked it a lot. I will say, if you aren't into non-traditional narrative approaches, this probably isn't for you, but maybe give the book to a young person in your life and see if they liked it. For the rest of us, I think this will be the kind of book where you either get it or you don't. I'm glad there are authors who are still courageous enough to take risks!

[Jacqueline Nyathi · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the opening story of this anthology of interconnected tales, the brilliant Muri, there are talking bears. The world has effectively ended (“Impact”). There’s a “sulphate aerosol veil” over the Poles; geoengineering has happened. And there’s a project to relocate polar bears from the Arctic, which is now practically non-existent, to the Antarctic, to buy the bears a little more time. However, these particular bears of this story are not, to say the least, on board with the plan—and so they take over the ship they’re on.

The anthology is profoundly emotionally intelligent, exploring deeply and extrapolating into an alarmingly near future the impact on the human psyche of ecological catastrophe. Honeymoons in Temporary Locations, the only other formal “story” apart from Muri, features climate refugees who are forcibly (by their situation) moved to safer areas of the country (the US); this story is interesting in itself, about, possibly, mental breakdown; but also, its atmosphere is one of loss and despair, of anger and powerlessness, of a time when people are waiting for the world—or humanity—to end.

In the archive section of the book, Documents (recovered), there are post-climate breakdown cruises to see nearly submerged cities like Miami, Boston, and Savannah. People lead with their carbon compliance status when meeting new people. What might mental illness look like for people who love(d) the earth? The focus of many of the stories in the collection (in many forms, including also archived materials and clinical histories) is solastalgia, a term coined by Glenn Albrecht in the 2005 article Solastalgia: a new concept in human health and identity, and that’s defined by the NIH as the distress that is produced by environmental change impacting on people while they are directly connected to their home environment. Could there be pharmacological solutions? And then, what might billionaires, with their bunkers, do? Would they create support groups? Capitalise somehow on the situation? (You know they would.) My favourite theme is the recurring Ersatz Cafe: what might be on the menu of a post-Impact cafe? Shelby imagines some really smart things.

I found this collection a thoughtful exploration of a future that has us further along the same trajectory on which we are currently, but that considers our planet’s more than human aspects. What would our co-inhabitants on Earth say to us as the world dies? What would the effect be on us—and that of the knowledge of the end of humanity? Shelby’s collection of imaginaries is something I’ll keep going back to.

Many thanks to NetGalley and to the University of Minnesota Press for access to an early DRC.

[Stella Jorette · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honeymoons in Temporary Locations is a collection of short story works that explores the grief humans experience as the natural world changes around them, the homesickness for vanished places.

This near-future “post-impact” world is explored in a variety of formats including, short stories, vignettes, Craigslist posts, brochures, advertisements, podcast transcripts, and governmental questionnaires.

In this world, grief caused by environmental destruction is categorized as a mental health condition. Characters succumb to or battle against their diagnosis in a variety of bizarre but poignant scenarios while others attempt to leverage their suffering, still angling for personal gain despite the game-over conditions.

Meanwhile, the malaise of modern life and the anxieties of late-stage capitalism give way to “reality-based fear”. Climate migrants battle with government bureaucracies, the wealthy stock bunkers and abandoned missile silos with luxury goods, and the elderly quietly check out.

Lovely turns of phrase and evocative imagery embellish this wise and beautifully written book. The author carefully crafts this post-impact world's political, biologic, and social situation, suggesting a fair bit of research went into the text. While this book contains some dark humor-much targeting the medical industry and governmental bodies, the overall tone is that of profound loss.

Readers interested in climate change and literary speculative fiction may be intrigued by this collection. Those who enjoyed Sequoia Nagamatsu’s How High We Go in the Dark” or the short stories of Ted Chiang might appreciate this collection.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title may hint at rom-com, but "Honeymoons in Temporary Locations" is refreshingly anything but, tackling subjects rather more weighty than screwball romance or relationship dilemmas. The emergence of climate fiction is relatively recent, and for me, more relatable reading than post-apocalypse fiction, because Ashley Shelby's future is one we can nearly glimpse from here (and in fact even smell, as I write this under skies thick with Canadian wildfire smoke). We know what's coming - or chose not to know - and most of us understand one certain thing: the future will be 'different'. Many of the scenarios Shelby lays out seem entirely plausible. Her characters read real and flawed and often hopeful. The thing here is the pitch perfect writing and the humor which makes the medicine go down. One of my fav bits is from the Ersatz Cafe 'coffee' drinks menu: "...we roast tender first-year burdock roots for ten hours to draw out their dramatic flavor. Our burdock is raised by carbon felons in the Manhattan Comprehensive Sanction Center's community garden and comes to your cups with a dollop of social responsibility."
Shelby is a seriously excellent writer who comes into her own with these stories.

[Primo S. · Rating 4 out of 5]

My full review of Honeymoons in Temporary Locations.

This is a short story collection about solastalgia, a type of grief caused by changes in the natural world (which are mostly caused by climate change). It's a fascinating concept that the author delved really deep into in these short stories, some of which are written in really unique styles that are closer to things you'd find in an epistolary novel than normal short stories, making them feel unique. the stories themselves can vary a bit in quality but that's just how most short story collections are. There's enough cohesion shared by them all because of the uniting concept (solastalgia) and so even if there are very few (if any) connections in terms of the plot and characters, these stories still feel like they belong together. It's a good work of speculative fiction that feels both realistic and imaginative in the best possible ways.

[AndiReads · Rating 5 out of 5]

Buckle Up!
This sharply written book will get under your skin quickly. This collection of climate disaster stories is a series of absurd stories. Or are they? I think that is what I liked most. All of the stories varied widely in style and content but all were absurd..to a point. I think even talking bears, screaming trees (!), camps for troubled boys and women who lose their wives on environmental refugee resettlement trips will test you, scar you and never leave you. Shelby has written a series of stories that are absurd but also easily believable - and that is the rub.

Honeymoons in Temporary Locations is a textured, complex and brain-blowing collection that you will never forget. This will be an award winner! #minnestoapress #honeymoonsintemporarylocations #ashleyshelby

[Ink · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honeymoons in Temporary Locations by Ashley Shelby is a compelling collection of interconnected short stories that reflect our world, wher we have come from and where we are going. Usually in speculative fiction/ Dystopic fiction, I refer to plausbility and being a book of our times and that is exactly what this is. Climate, dystopia, social issues. A book that can almost be perceived as a record of experience as well as speculation about the future in a witty, cerebral fiction

Fascinating, entertaining and very enjoyable. A quick read, but a read of great substance

Thank you to Netgalley, University of Minnesota Press | Univ Of Minnesota Press and Ashley Shelby for this compelling ARC. My review is left voluntarily and all opinions are my own

[Lauren Kamrin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved reading! Was engaging from the first page to the last.

I found the book to be intriguing. The different styles of writing kept me engaged and interested. I found myself laughing out loud at times and other times felt a deep sense of worry for our world and the environmental impacts we’re facing.

This was written in a different style from any other book I’ve read and I can say I really enjoyed the changes from chapter to chapter. I also loved that it was a quick 2-3 day read.

[Graisi · Rating 1 out of 5]

Thank you University of Minnesota Press, Ashley Shelby and Netgalley for this free ARC in exchange for a review.

I couldn't connect with any of the characters or find any reasons to care about the stories in this. There's supposed to be humour in this, but it isn't funny.

[Caroline · Rating 5 out of 5]

A tough and timely read as Hurricane Helene just wrecked havoc on North Carolina, but thankfully some moments of humor lighten it up.

[Allison · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5-- rounded up

[Shirley de Bruyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was blown away by these stories. Particularly the Café menu, which made me laugh out loud. These stories were painfully honest, almost too close to reality, and brilliantly creative.