Krait reviews Positive Lightning by Laurie Salzler

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Positive Lightning –- After first reading the title, I had to start with researching what the heck “positive lightning” actually is. Was it just a play on words? In short, no – positive lightning is a rare phenomenon where an extraordinarily powerful lightning strike runs from cloud to ground (rather than the other way around), and they can hit more than ten miles away from the storm itself, where they’re least expected. It’s not an inapt metaphor for this sweet contemporary story, where romance blooms between Faith, who lost her sight after an accident, and Kate, the dog trainer training up her potential guide dog.

Overall, I enjoyed Positive Lightning. It’s an uncomplicated fluffy romance where problems appear only in the presence of terrible ex-partners. (Though what terrible exes they are! By the end, they could really be the first entries in the Compendium of Terrible Exes).

The book starts with Kate in a long-term relationship, but it’s already crashing and burning by the time the readers arrive. Kate doesn’t make the best first impression – she’s clueless about her (soon-to-be) ex-girlfriend’s extracurricular activities and very confused about her own feelings – but she becomes much more likeable once we see her away from her home environment. Once she starts interacting in earnest with her dogs and her horse, her personality and joy around animals really gets a chance to bloom.

Faith, on the other hand, is introduced as capable and good-humored and her character is rounded out nicely throughout the book. Salzler does a beautiful job integrating Faith’s assistive devices seamlessly into her morning routine. When writing in Faith’s perspective, the surroundings are just as vibrant as from Kate’s sighted perspective, through deft use of sound, smell, and texture descriptions. I also really appreciated how Faith is always portrayed as an accomplished, competent adult who works within the bounds of her disability, and anyone who tries to pity her is rightly trounced by the narrative.

However, I did have a few quibbles with the book. The writing could really use a bit more editing. It’s all done in very simple sentences and the book has a bad habit of telling, not showing. There’s a possible plot hole where it’s suggested that Faith made Kate’s job take the dog training job through some sort of monetary pressure, but later, she’s described as having had a fairly low-paying job and living “comfortably but not extravagantly” off a pension and settlement from the state. However, my main problem was that the book lacked a central conflict. There were exciting moments, of course, but the only obstacles to be overcome were brief and in-the-moment. Salzler side-stepped the traditional Big Misunderstanding about halfway through (and I just about cheered), but it meant that there was never any real doubt that Faith and Kate would happily get together. And there are really no other problems for them to overcome.

I also honestly expected from the blurb and premise that Positive Lightning would have more actual dog training and dog presence in it. We meet Juneau (Faith’s soon-to-be guide dog) as a puppy, and there are a few instances of Kate training her there, but that aspect of the story falls by the wayside about halfway through. Neither of the dogs – Dakota and Juneau – ever act up or misbehave or do anything wrong. Dakota is a perfectly trained older dog and Juneau is a mild-tempered puppy wonder. I would’ve really liked to see more of the dogs, because they were quite charming, and more of Kate’s dog training.

But despite those critiques, I did genuinely enjoy Positive Lightning. If you’re looking for a sweet, unchallenging romance set in a town full of lesbians (and I believe more books are going to be set there) without a hint of prejudice, or a book with a positive depiction of a disabled heroine, Positive Lightning is an excellent choice.

Krait reviews Love in the Time of Global Warming by Francesca Lia Block

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Love in the Time of Global Warming follows Penelope – Pen – through a modern dystopian retelling of The Illiad. After a catastrophic earthquake (appropriately named the Ground Shaker) destroys her happy teenage life, Pen embarks on a dark myth-steeped adventure to find her missing parents and brother. Along the way, she encounters monsters, both literal and figurative, puzzles, and three other queer teens. However, despite the premise, the focus in Love is on storytelling and narrative, not on dystopian details. Pen tells stories and weaves narratives out of dreams, visions, and reality. There are some gritty details – searching for water or fuel, struggling to find food – but the book tends to skim over details that don’t further a metaphor or theme. The result is a dreamy experience, but Love lacks a certain level of grounding that I would have liked to see. The action scenes are never visceral and action was sometimes subsumed by vague prose.

Pen herself is a fascinating character, a bisexual teenage girl who speaks and dreams in art and literary allusions. (Several times, I found myself researching the unfamiliar paintings she references). She reveals her longstanding unreciprocated crush on one of her best friends in flashbacks and dreams, and while her sexuality is not the main focus of the book, her attraction to women and the female figure do often feature in her reactions. Her main love interest – Hex – is transgender and the first of three queer teenagers she meets. Their growing relationship is heartfelt, lovely, and slow enough to never upstage the pace of their grand quest.

Francesca Lia Block writes Love in the Time of Global Warming with floating and lush prose, rich with imagery and monsters pulled both from Homer (the Lotus-Eaters, the Sirens, and more) and traditional fairy-tales. Butterflies and small acts of courage are both oft reoccurring themes. If you enjoy gorgeous wordplay, art and literary allusions, I can definitely recommend Love in the Time of Global Warming.

Krait reviews Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History edited by Rose Fox and Daniel José Older

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Long Hidden features 27 stories, focusing on (as the editors put it) “stories from the margins of speculative history, each taking place between 1400 and the early 1900s and putting a speculative twist—an element of science fiction, fantasy, horror, or the unclassifiably strange—on real past events.” The anthology features many people and women of color, trans* characters, lesbians, and stories from all over the world.

My love affair with speculative fiction started after a childhood spent devouring sci-fi and fantasy books left me with the realization that very few stories actually featured people I might know or people I could be. With that in mind, I had very high hopes going into Long Hidden and I’m pleased to say that were not in vain.

Anthologies can often be hit-or-miss when it comes to story quality, but Long Hidden is nicely consistent. A few stories – “Angela and the Scar;” “It’s War;” “Medu” – didn’t have quite as strong a narrative or quite as engrossing characters, but they still entertained. “Angela and the Scar” and “It’s War” both occur during fascinating events and encouraged me to brush up on my history, but the character arcs and the magic conceit just didn’t hook me. I found Medu’s snake-haired women to be an interesting concept and the story starts strong, but the conflict and the resolution fall flat.

It’s really only in comparison to the brightest stars of the anthology that these stories fizzle.

But oh, those stars. Meg Jayanth’s “Each Part Without Mercy” follows a dreamer with gorgeous imagery and lovely prose. “Marigolds,” from L.S. Johnson, is deliciously disturbing and tells of blood-magic in a French Revolutionary Parisian brothel. “Marigolds” left me with a few shudder-worthy images but a surprisingly uplifting ending. Jamey Hatley’s “Collected Likenesses” is thought-provoking, with fascinating magic and heart-rendingly real characters. A young black woman in 1913 Harlem struggles with dangerous memories and magic passed down from her grandmother (and even farther back). Kima Jones’ “Nine” features Tanner, a possibly genderqueer woman of color, who runs a small motel with her lovers, several other women. All escaped the remains of slavery back east, and they provide a safe stopping point in Arizona for others doing the same. And finally, several days after I’ve finished the book, I’m still thinking about “Lone Women,” by Victor LaValle. I would absolutely read a novel featuring Adelaide (the protagonist), her sister, and the community of strong single women out on the Montana frontier. There’s just enough horror and magic to put an interesting twist on the story of a frontiers-woman, and I’d love to see that story expanded.

It’s difficult to discuss some of the stories without spoiling some essential element, the hidden magic in the characters or their surroundings, so the ones I’ve mentioned are just the tip of the iceberg. The plots run the gamut from romance, crises of faith, self-discovery, to overcoming the terrible odds and obstacles thrown at you by life. But all of the stories have some element of magic or fantasy or horror, and all tell the narratives of people typically ignored by fiction.

In short, I loved Long Hidden, and would absolutely read another anthology along the same theme. However, I’ll warn readers: many of these stories are dark, and not just those that feature horror elements. Violence against women, rape, violent racism, and other trigger-worthy events are touched on more than once, though never shown in detail. Not all of the stories have happy endings – but I think they’re still well worth your time.

[Editor’s note: This book was published through a kickstarter campaign, but will be available more broadly in May]