Elements: A Collection of Speculative Fiction

by Suzanne Church

Award winning author Suzanne Church’s cast of distinct characters asks “What if?” in this collection of science fiction, fantasy, and horror short fiction.

Can humanity survive an ice age? Will the storm man steal Wanda’s baby? When will Bob and Sebbee escape the relentless march of the Lost Circle? What is the cause of the taint in Faya’s courted ice? If you can’t escape hell, can you at least afford a trip on a teleporting couch?

Church infuses emotion into every tale. Whether quirky or horrific, the prose deftly snatches the reader onto a whirlwind expedition of laughter and sorrow..

This collection includes 21 stories and an introduction by award winning author, editor, and poet, Sandra Kasturi.

Genres: Short Stories, Science Fiction, Horror, Canada, Fantasy

248 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 30, 2014

About the author

Suzanne Church grew up in Toronto, moved to Waterloo to pursue mathematics, and never left town. Her award-winning fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld, Cicada, On Spec, and her 2014 collection Elements. Her favourite place to write is a lakefront cabin, but she'll settle for any coffee shop with WiFi and an electrical outlet. Soul Larcenist, book one in the Dagger of Sacrados trilogy set in Ed Greenwood’s Hellmaw Universe, is now available in multiple formats from onderlibrum.com

Reviews

[Michael Martineck · Rating 5 out of 5]

And this title was just right. I had read a bevy of Suzanne Church’s stories before and became a bigger and bigger fan with each one. When I heard the title of her collection would be “Elements” I humphed. It seemed too simple to me. Her stories cover horror, fantasy, science fiction (in a myriad of sub-genres) – with poignancy, bending tension and welcome dose of humor. They are, none of them, simple. After reading the bundle, I’ve changed my humph to a nod. All the elements of great story telling are here and working wonders. Families, fear, love, death – the fundamentals of being human drive Suzanne’s stories even when the characters are not human’s at all. The combinations make the collection fun, exciting and tearful. One of my criticisms of many things I read is their lopsidedness. So dreary, so flighty, so thick with drama – that they become immersions in one emotion. The balance in this collection is refreshing in its perfection. Not too hot, not too cold. Just right.

[Robert Bose · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic set of stories. I especially enjoyed the 'Teleporting Couch Universe' trio. I'd love to read more set in that one!

[Becky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this short story collection. I've definitely realized that I react much more favorably to genre short stories than realistic fiction short stories, a more pronounced preference than the same comparison for novels. Imaginative and generally satisfying.

[Derek Newman-Stille · Rating 5 out of 5]

In her short story collection Elements: A Collection of Speculative Fiction Suzanne Church treks across stars, across time, beyond the human experience, into the magical, the mystical, the dark, infusing pages with otherworldly imagination that invite us to be fellow travellers into the unknown. She crosses genre boundaries, infusing each with new life brought trough experiences submerging in the others. Her work touches the barriers between horror, science fiction, and fantasy, playing with reader expectations and expanding the scope of the reader’s imagination.

Elements IS fundamentally elemental, not just because some of her characters play with weather (the elements) and with the elements of fire and water, or even because some of her androids are named after elements from the Periodic Table, but because there is something both incredibly large and incredibly intimate about her work because whether it be about aliens, androids, sentient coffee cups, future warriors, or magic users, her work fundamentally explores RELATIONSHIPS, those strange, impossible, and yet oh so familiar things – and relationships are things that we share, whether they be romantic, familial, friendly, or interspecies. Suzanne builds bridges across species, planets, dimensions, and states of being in order to capture that moment when Others touch, when a sharing of experience occurs, and a fuzziness develops between the Self and the Other.

Not all of the relationships in Elements is positive, because relationships hurt, relationships can damage us. This is, by far, not a romantic collection, but is rather about the interactions between people, the ways in which we understand and relate to each other… and not all of the ways we relate to each other is positive. Her stories deal with issues like domestic violence, sexual abuse, war, imbalances of power, abandonment, and situations where the only safe relationship can be created after an escape from home… but they also forge improbable connections, friendships between unlikely allies, allegiances between seeming enemies, a push beyond fear to allow for connections between people who fundamentally see each other as opposites.

Relationships are part of how we understand the world, how we interpret it, creating understanding and interpretation through dialogue, through the experience of sharing ideas with each other, but they are also painful, sharpened by feelings of abandonment, differences in viewpoints, codependency, contexts of pain, confusion, misinterpretations, and an Us against Them mentality. Suzanne Church explores all of these, pushing the extents of human relationships to the edge, and perhaps even peaking beyond the human, displacing our centrality in our view of the world.

To explore reviews of some of the individual stories in this collection, visit:

http://speculatingcanada.wordpress.co...

http://speculatingcanada.wordpress.co...

http://speculatingcanada.wordpress.co...

and for a discussion of this collection with Suzanne Church, visit our interview at http://speculatingcanada.wordpress.co...

[Steven Cole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Full disclosure: I received a copy of this from tor.com for free, which is always a good price. Perhaps it made me like the book more. (Though I doubt it.)

This is a masterful collection of short, speculative fiction. Masterful. And I do mean short. Many of these stories are less than twenty pages long (one is only 117 words). If other writers are to be believed (and I certainly believe them), stories of this length are extremely hard to get right.

Church gets it right.

These stories are all set in various odd situations or environments, and have extremely high emotional impact. I was left reeling, pondering, and rethinking over and over again.

And I've got to say: I really like the length of story presented here. It's ideal for the just-before-bedtime time frame, when I've got a bit of time before my eyes roll up in my head. These stories can actually be finished during that time. Wonderful.

Pay attention to Suzanne Church. There's some serious talent there. 5 of 5 stars.

(I was going to write separate reviews for each story, a goal which lasted all of two stories. They follow...)

Coolies: A fantastic short work that was terse yet extremely evocative, about a group of soldiers whose job it is to harvest organs from fallen combatants in the hope of patching up those who survive. Thought-provoking. The amount of story (not just plot) that got crammed into those 12 pages was astounding. This is exactly the kind of short fiction I love. 5 of 5.

The Wind and the Sky: A post-apocalyptic tale of an emotional android longing to bring the wonders of modernity to the just-barely civilized humans still living on the earth. This was cute, but failed to really grab me. 3 of 5.

[Stuart Lutzenhiser · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've always enjoyed being a member of a book discussion group just because of this kind of book. That is a book that I enjoyed and discovering and author I didn't know that I wouldn't have been likely to have found on my own. This is a collection of some twenty stories. Most of them stand-alone stories, although three of them are linked in a common world. Like most short story collections that I've read, I've enjoyed some of them, others I haven't - but that's how it is. There is a story of a girl who is being bullied at school who gets some unexpected help, and a story of a medical aid worker in a terrible epidemic of blindness, and then a few creepy stories of ghosts. A bit of something for most everyone. if you enjoy discovering new authors, then I would recommend this collection of stories.

[Steve Stanton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This debut collection of short speculative fiction shows the incredible versatility of an emerging Canadian author. Suzanne Church uses a sparse, conversational style to engage empathy from the reader, and delivers a wide range of innovation across the speculative genres—from zany, ridiculous romps of fantasy to dark, Kafkaesque science fiction. Many of the stories deal with broken relationships, lost possibilities and interpersonal pain, and some tales are gritty and poignant. Suzanne Church is an award-winning author in her specialty, and offers up a smorgasbord of twenty-one stories spanning over a decade of literary experimentation.

[Kim Killian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed Suzanne Church’s Elements: A Collection of Speculative Fiction yet; I haven’t quite finished the book for I know when I read those last few stories, my journey will end.

Elements by Suzanne Church is a delightful read, its short stories cover the gamut of speculative fiction and covers each style, giving the reader a little bit of everything. A great introduction to the genre from a writer we’ll all be seeing more of.

[Vanessa Ricci-Thode · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best anthology I've read in a very long time. Maybe ever. Haunting and hopefully and even full of whimsy and dark humour. "The Tear Closet" is quite possibly the best short story I've ever read. Church's unique voice is gripping and often wry and teasing, providing brilliant juxtaposition to the darkness the pages contain. If you love speculative fiction, do yourself a favour and read this one.

[Lou Sytsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent collection of short stories.

Very imaginative and unique too. Which is always welcome.

Stories range from self aware personal items, indoctrinated gene mutation that turns us into rats and cockroaches, plus ravenous soul sucking ghosts afraid of facing the after-after life. Not to mention couches that are used as teleporters!

An enthusiastic recommendation. Can't wait to read more from the author!

[Catherine Warren · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a horror fan, this collection of short stories satisfies the appetite while leaving the reader something to ponder! Highly recommended! If you want something to keep you up at night, this is it!

[Mandy Eve-Barnett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Suzanne creates such believable characters and circumstances in all of these short stories with real skill. Several stories would easily become full length novels.

[Sraedi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I generally don't enjoy short story books so this was a pleasant surprise. I have already recommended it to a friend and look forward to Church's future works.

[Edwin Downward · Rating 4 out of 5]

As with all anthologies this one has a few ups and downs.

Honourable mention goes to: The Tear Closet and Muffy and the Belfrey.