Old Friends

Browsing at Powell's, I looked as I always do for short stories by Joan Aiken. A small, forlorn hope still lives that I will find one of the two collections I checked out from our public library over and over again as a child. One was Not What You Expected and the other was The Faithless Lollybird (who could resist that title?) Even though I have looked repeatedly and never ever found a copy of anything remotely resembling those two books, I still look every time I am there. And this time--success! Of a sort. It's not either of those two but a new compilation of her stories from all across her career. I opened up Shadows & Moonshine and what story was in there? A Harp of Fishbones, that's what. One of the few stories I remembered very clearly. There are only five stories from my (as I like to think of them) books and two of the stories I especially remember are not there but those five are enough to make me very happy. And all the other stories have the same fairy tale quality I remember where almost anything could happen. Strange. Wonderful. Satisfying. Go on out there and read some short stories. Visit your library if you can't find any in a store.

Shadows & Moonshine, by Joan Aiken, 978-1-56792-346-9