(no subject)

[skygiants]

I quite enjoyed the Flora Segunda books when I read them over a decade ago, but I don't really want to reread the whole trilogy at this time. I have trilogies that I haven't actually yet finished reading that I ought to be reading instead!

Unfortunately I did just pick up [from the library sale] and read Ysabeau Wilce's short story collection set in the same universe, Prophecies, Libels and Dreams. genarti, who happened to read this short story book before me despite having no context for Califa whatsoever, assures me that it's an enjoyable experience regardless of whether you've read the Flora Segunda books. For me, a person who did read the Flora Segunda books and has a vague memory of the fact that most of what I cared about was the Dramatic Parental Backstory of which the short stories fill in some brief and tantalizing snippets, it was simultaneously an enjoyable experience and an exercise in frustration. I don't think the novels ever fill in more than tantalizing snippets either, but they're different tantalizing snippets and I want to know what they were!

...this post therefore is mostly to say that if you have read the Flora Segunda books and you recall anything about the Dramatic Parental Backstory, please save me from myself by infodumping anything that you remember into the comments before I turn back to the trilogy that I don't have time to read.

If you haven't read the Flora Segunda books: genarti says these short stories may be an enjoyable experience for you! The world is a highly fun and highly arch magical California; the prose walks the narrow and tottering tightrope of 'funny and charming' above the vast abyss of 'unbearably twee' (and occasionally falls in and has to pull itself out again); the snotty academic footnotes at the end of each short story explaining how the thing described in them almost certainly didn't happen are for me a real highlight of the ride. I especially liked the one about the thirst zombie (although I felt so, so sad for his pet armadillo) and the one about Tiny Doom going on a wig-stealing rampage. I have some very mixed feelings about the one about the chupacabra.

Comments

[skygiants]

a.) it's a Tall Tale set in the US army during the US-Apache conflict & very, very uncritically pastiching that style b.) & it's all just a setup to a mediocre punchline [& c.) wikipedia which I am consulting just now tells me that the chupacabra folklore originated in the NINETIES? I had no idea it was that modern!]

[sovay]

a.) it's a Tall Tale set in the US army during the US-Apache conflict & very, very uncritically pastiching that style

Huh. Aside from the obvious issues, I thought the Califa timeline split off from ours before then.

b.) & it's all just a setup to a mediocre punchline

. . . fatal in and of itself.

[& c.) wikipedia which I am consulting just now tells me that the chupacabra folklore originated in the NINETIES? I had no idea it was that modern!]

I thought it was from the eighties! Damn.

[skygiants]

It's the only one of the shorts set in our timeline rather than Califa's, and the thoroughly Califan framing narrative has several arch comments about speculative fiction as a result, which one the one hand is fun for the conceit but on the other hand I truly would rather just be reading more about Califa.

[sovay]

It's the only one of the shorts set in our timeline rather than Califa's, and the thoroughly Califan framing narrative has several arch comments about speculative fiction as a result, which one the one hand is fun for the conceit but on the other hand I truly would rather just be reading more about Califa.

What a weird place to dip into our timeline!

[genarti]

Because I haven't read the other books, I just assumed that it was part of the Califa timeline, and that for some reason Wilce had seen fit to AU-recreate the US-Apache conflict, with the snarky frame story commentary about its speculative nature referring to the chupacabra thing. All of which seemed unnecessary, but the kind of unnecessary that people doing alt-real world places sometimes do. Having it be the only story in which this conflict even exists, as a kind of alt-alt-history thing, is much weirder! And makes the uncritical pastiche even more awkward.

I almost wonder if she wrote that story separately, found it on her hands and at loose ends, and decided to pad out the collection by shoehorning it into the Califa setting? But that's pure guesswork.