Description: Roam through the captivating stories of World Fantasy and Mythopoeic Award winner Theodora Goss (the Athena Club trilogy). This themed collection of imaginary places, with three new stories, recalls Susanna Clarke's alternate Europe and the surreal metafictions of Jorge Luis Borges.
[STARRED REVIEW] "Each story in Goss's perfectly titled collection features stamps from fantastical worlds." --Library Journal The infamous girl monsters of nineteenth-century fiction gather in London and form their own club. In the imaginary country of Thüle, characters from folklore band together to fight a dictator. An intrepid girl reporter finds the hidden land of Oz--and joins its invasion of our world. The author writes the autobiography of her alternative life and a science fiction love letter to Budapest. The White Witch conquers England with snow and silence. Deeply influenced by the author's Hungarian childhood during the regime of the Soviet Union, each of these intricate stories engages with storytelling and identity, including Goss's own.Review Quotes: Literary Hub Notable Small Press Books
[STARRED REVIEW] "Each story in Goss's (The Collected Enchantments) perfectly titled collection features stamps from fantastical worlds they passed through on the way to readers. They may have paused in literary realms such as Oz, Narnia, or Camelot. Others spent time with Mary Shelley, Edgar Rice Burroughs, or Jorge Luis Borges. The rest may display their travels less flamboyantly, but they perhaps skirted lands created by Robin McKinley, Patricia A. McKillip, or Ursula K. Le Guin. Though many of the stories focus on academia or research, this is fully entangled with their emotional cores. For instance, 'Beautiful Boys' is a research project into aliens that also explores the dangerous allure of doomed relationships, and 'Come See the Living Dryad' haunts archives and medical colleges solving a cold case involving a sideshow dryad while examining family ties, privilege, and disability. While 'England Under the White Witch' brings magic, wolves, and eternal winter to Europe, other stories, such as 'Dora/Dóra, ' are more quietly speculative, in this case following a girl who corresponds with the self she left behind when she immigrated to the U.S."--Library Journal [STARRED REVIEW] "Alluring, unforgettable... Letters from an Imaginary Country is an invigorating short story collection that fleshes out forgotten characters and gives form to abandoned dreams."
--Foreword "Across the collection, Goss blends fantastical premises with meditations on history, identity, and the art of storytelling, often drawing from her own Hungarian childhood. There is a distinctive undercurrent of wonder and menace to the tales, each one told with lush prose and sly wit."
--Publishers Weekly "In the tradition of great modern fantasists like Angela Carter and Marina Warner, Theodora Goss's sublime tales are modern classics-beautiful, sly, sensual and deeply moving."
--Elizabeth Hand, winner of the Mythopoeic and World Fantasy Awards "Wildly imaginative, gloriously sneaky, delicious tales of monsters and the terrible and beautiful sublimity of the imagination."
--Cory Doctorow, author of Walkaway "One of the most voraciously, delightfully readable books I've ever read and it's one of the most writerly books, too...it's flashy, it's writerly, it's clever as hell."
--Medium "In addition to Goss's clearly passionate engagement with the books and places she loves, her voice remains entirely her own, ranging from clear-eyed lyricism to mordant wit."
--Locus "These love letters to storytelling are sharp-witted and illuminating."
--David Ebenbach, author of How to Mars "The elegance of Goss's work has never ceased to amaze me."
--Catherynne M. Valente, winner of the Mythopoeic, Locus, Hugo, Otherwise and Theodore Sturgeon Awards "Through prose and poetry, Goss shines her unique light into the fairytale forest--and many bright eyes gleam back."
--Margo Lanagan, winner of the Aurealis, Ditmar and World Fantasy Awards "Literary, lyrical, lovely. An elegant waltz through history and literature, with a fantastical turn."
--Marie Brennan, author of The Memoirs of Lady Trent series "Goss's formidable powers as an observer and storyteller are showcased in these beautiful stories."
--Fran Wilde, Nebula-winning author of A Catalog of Storms "In these lyrical stories from the past fifteen years, ones that turn Victorian fantasy on its head and make you wonder what the present is actually about."
--Literary Hub "Expansive, generous storytelling."
--Shiny New Books "An analytical treasure trove that I'm going to take my time unpacking, because my god, it's so rich."
--Reactor "As a collection, I've not read anything half so fascinating."
--The Nameless Zine "Hugely entertaining stories, frequently packed with literary and cultural references, that are simultaneously passionate, precise examinations of the so-called real world through fantasy and science fiction."
--Almost Wisdom