Stranger Things Happen | Page 5

the excellences of a book in hopes of enticing readers between its covers. But I do not follow that custom when I say that Stranger Things Happen is one of the very best books I have ever read. These stories will amaze, provoke, and intrigue. Best of all, they will delight. Kelly Link is terrific! This is not blurbese. It is the living truth. -Fred Chappell, author of Family Gathering
Finally, Kelly Link's wonderful stories have been collected. -Ellen Datlow, editor of SCI FICTION
Kelly Link's stories . . . will sit in my library on that very short shelf of books I read again and again. For those who think Fantasy tired, Stranger Things Happen is a wake-up call.-Jeffrey Ford, author of The Beyond
Link's writing is gorgeous, mischievous, sexy and unsettling. -Nalo Hopkinson, author of The Salt Roads
Kelly Link is a brilliant writer. Her stories seem to come right out of your own dreams, the nice ones and the nightmares both. These stories will burrow right into your subconscious and stay with you forever. -Tim Powers, author of Declare
Of all the books you'll read this year, this is the one you'll remember. Kelly Link's stories are like gorgeous tattoos; they get under your skin. Buy this book, read it, read it again, congratulate yourself, and then start buying Stranger Things Happen for your friends.-Sarah Smith, author of A Citizen of the Country
If Kelly Link is not the "future of horror," a ridiculous phrase, she ought to be. To have a future at all, horror in general, by which I might as well mean fiction in general, requires precisely her freshness, courage, intelligence, and resistance to received forms and values. Kelly Link seems always to speak from a deep, deeply personal, and unexpected standpoint. Story by story, she is creating new worlds, new frameworks for perception, right in front of our eyes. I think she is the most impressive writer of her generation. -Peter Straub, author of Magic Terror
Kelly Link makes spells, not stories. Her vision is always compassionate, and frequently very funny-but don't let that fool you. This book, like all real magic, is terribly dangerous. You open it at your peril. -Sean Stewart, author of Perfect Circle
STRANGER THINGS HAPPEN
KELLY LINK
Small Beer Press Northampton, MA
This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are either fictitious or used fictitiously. Copyright (c) 2001 by Kelly Link. All rights reserved. Small Beer Press 176 Prospect Avenue Northampton, MA 01060 www.smallbeerpress.com [email protected] www.kellylink.net Cataloging-in-Publication Data (Provided by Quality Books, Inc.) Link, Kelly. Stranger things happen / Kelly Link. -- 1st ed. p.cm. LCCN 2001087879 ISBN 1-931520-00-3 1. Fantastic fiction. 1. Title. PS3562.I5177S77 2001 6 QBI01-700342 Electronic edition A Jelly Ink book. Jelly Ink is an imprint of Small Beer Press. Text originally set in Centaur 12/14.4. Cover painting by Shelley Jackson.
CONTENTS Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose Water Off a Black Dog's Back The Specialist's Hat Flying Lessons Travels with the Snow Queen Vanishing Act Survivor's Ball, or, The Donner Party Shoe and Marriage Most of My Friends Are Two-Thirds Water Louise's Ghost The Girl Detective
For Susie Link and Jenna A. Felice
CARNATION, LILY, LILY, ROSE Dear that not Mary (if that is your name), I bet you'll be pretty surprised to hear from me. It really is me, by the way, although I have to confess at the moment only can I not seem to keep your name straight in my head, Laura? Susie? Odile? but I seem to have forgotten my own name. I plan to keep trying different combinations: Joe loves Lola, Willy loves Suki, Henry loves you, sweetie, Georgia?, honeypie, darling. Do any of these seem right to you?
All last week I felt like something was going to happen, a sort of bees and ants feeling. Something was going to happen. I taught my classes and came home and went to bed, all week waiting for the thing that was going to happen, and then on Friday I died.
One of the things I seem to have misplaced is how, or maybe I mean why. It's like the names. I know that we lived together in a house on a hill in a small comfortable city for nine years, that we didn't have kids-except once, almost-and that you're a terrible cook, oh my darling, Coraline? Coralee? and so was I, and we ate out whenever we could afford to. I taught at a good university, Princeton? Berkeley? Notre Dame? I was a good teacher, and my students liked me. But I can't remember the name of the street we lived on, or the author of the last book I read, or your last name which was also my name, or how I died. It's funny, Sarah? but the only two names I know for sure are real are Looly