Ligatures

by Sara Rich

Stanza Thompson knows how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but she can't read the signs of the times. Not, at least, until the witching hour. Stanza is a young American scholar working in Belgium when her husband, Pierre, is killed in a tragic bicycle accident. Devastated by her soul mate's death, she moves back to her family home in rural Kansas. In her five-year absence, Stanza's homeland - and especially her hometown - has become darkly twisted, creating something dangerously inhospitable to outsiders. As rebellious as she is brilliant, Stanza is a stranger in the university where she teaches, even in the town where she was born and raised. With ghosts and feral hounds as companions, she stumbles upon a carving in the woods that harkens back to Ozark magic, promising to single out and kill a witch. This discovery sends Stanza on a tornadic quest into regional folklore, a string of historical murders, and the occult - and ultimately, into the mysteries of her own bloody heritage and fey destiny. Composed of idiosyncratic characters and idiomatic prose, Ligatures combines elements of the weird, Southern Gothic, and magical realism to create a world that is familiar and terrifying at once. Between the suspense and the quality of writing, you won't be able to put down this spellbinding first novel, even long after it's finished. Reviewers have called Ligatures "perceptive" with a "dimensional and complicated" protagonist that "brings to mind the early work of Barbara Kingsolver and Margaret Atwood."

226 pages, Paperback

First published October 14, 2013

About the author

Sara Rich grew up in rural Kansas, where she started writing short stories and poetry at the age of six. Nowadays, she writes weird and allohistorical fiction and has authored and illustrated childrens' books in English and Dutch (under the pseudonym Ann Henri). Her nonfiction works and illustrations have been published in numerous magazines and scholarly journals. Sara's dark fiction shorts have been featured by publishers of literary journals and anthologies based in the UK, Belgium, the US, and Cyprus. She earned a BFA in Studio Art from the University of Kansas (2003), an MA in Art History from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (2008), and a PhD in Ancient Near Eastern Studies at the University of Leuven in Belgium (2013). After living in Belgium and the UK for 8 years, she has returned to the US and now teaches at Appalachian State University in North Carolina.

Reviews

[Amira · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to the author Sara Rich for sending me an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

When I started reading this book I realized that it wasn't like anything I have ever read before. Both the setting and the language of the novel makes it so unique. It is a very dark story that engrosses the reader very quickly. Sometimes that can be really scary because I remember having vivid nightmares after going to sleep reading this book. Also, the novel has a lot of twists which makes it really hard to predict what is going to happen next or where the story is going. Even the ending was quite surprising for me. Overall, Ligatures is a magnificent read for the fans of fantasy fiction. I can't wait to read more books by Sara Rich!

[Lord Beardsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been hell-bent for a few years about how there should be a recognized Midwestern Gothic (a la Southern Gothic) genre, and Ligatures adds to that argument. Her depiction of rural Kansas shortly after a right-wing coup has taken over the United States is dead-on and terrifyingly close to current reality. Beautiful prose winds its way through this narrative of loss, grieving, and mysticism that brings to mind the early work of Barbara Kingsolver and Margaret Atwood.

[Suba Wijesinghe · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Your Heart Shall Wither And Die, The Gods And I Have Willed It.”

A paperback Copy won through GOODREADS GIVEAWAY! Special Thanks goes to author Sara Rich who shipped the book quickly with an extra gift [Ink Drawing Paperback]; And to the Goodreads Crew who organize this giveaway.

Wicked! Extraordinary! I am still transmitting myself from confusion to conclusion………………….

”Love is never really what we make it out to be in our minds. Get past the desire, see it for what it was, what it is, and you get past the rest.”

ADVICE:
IF YOU INTEND TO READ NICE, SMOOTH & EASY-GOING READING; STRICTLY ADVISED NOT TO READ LIGATURES………….

Well, this wasn’t the story what I expected to be. This wasn’t the end what I intended to be… Story was totally far beyond than that.

It’s dark, way too dark to say dark. I am utterly shocked and bewildered.

Stanza Thompson, heroine in our story; her fate guided her again to the rural Kansas (her homeland) after the tragic death of her husband. But the town wasn’t the same as the one she used to know before she left the town 5 years ago. Everything changed and Stanza’s life too……
In the story, author was using an unique, successful and flowing writing style. Those words are beautiful….. As well as those flowing words were lot helpful to me while reading this COMPLEX, HEAVY & PECULIAR story. Well, I believe that unique writing style author used was definitely helpful to simplify the story a bit. Story was more challenging; had lot of plot twists and turns. And of course, an unpredictable one. I couldn’t even think about what will happen to next. And believe me, end of the story was almost a GREAT….GREAT…………GREAT…………… TRAGEDY.

Over all, the story was dark and powerful. Also Remarkable and weird. I did enjoy the story but, I still have no idea about whether I like or dislike the story. OR maybe LOVE??? STUCK!!!!!! [Confusion to Conclusion].

[Underground Book Reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ligatures is for readers who appreciate beautiful language and enjoy a story that both entertains and stimulates thought. It is on the dark side, and is not a simple “feel good” read. Instead, it is a novel with depth and complexity and power. Sara Rich is absolutely an author to watch.

...read the full review at UndergroundBookReviews(dot)org!

[Maria Haskins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first encountered Sara Rich through her short fiction, specifically her fabulously strange and chilling short story 'Hel 266'. 'Ligatures' reminds me in some ways of that short story, twisting together complex relationships, history, science, religion, and slow-creeping horror into a tale that worms its way underneath your skin as you read it.

'Ligatures' is set in something close to our present day, in a time when the US has been taken over by racist, xenophobic, science-hating, religious extremists (a turn of events that seems frighteningly possible right now). The story follows Stanza, as she returns home to Kansas after losing her Belgian husband in an accident, and from the moment she returns home, the tale spins ever tighter, burrowing deep into Stanza's own family history, the history of the place she grew up, and revealing hidden secrets from her own past and bloodline.

This is a slow-burn of a story, and Rich's prose kept me hooked from the first page to the last. Witchcraft, Ozark history, and crimes and sins from the past bleed into the story, and as the tale gets darker, I found it increasingly difficult to put this book down.

A dark, unsettling read with real literary merit.

[Kathleen · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was enjoyable for about the first 3/4, but the last 1/4 and the ending are bad. Not bad in that I just don't like where the plot went, but bad as in it doesn't tie up ANY of the many interesting threads introduced in the plot. It's a shock ending for the sake of shock ending, and really seems quite tacked on as if the author just got bored and said, "Nope, I guess I'm done." Not recommended.