Yellowcake

Publishers Weekly

Lanagan follows White Time, Black Juice, and Red Spikes with a fourth short story collection, featuring 10 singular tales, nearly all of which were previously published in the U.S. and abroad. She opens with the visceral “The Point of Roses,” in which a boy’s psychic ability to guess what something is—a rose, an ashtray, a toy—has astonishing consequences: “A sweet-scented shock hit Billy, a velvety punch. Down the slope he tumbled, alone in a storm of blooms.” In “An Honest Day’s Work,” a disabled boy gets a chance to be useful when the local equivalent of shipbreakers bring an aircraft carrier–sized alien down out of the “ether” to be stripped for food and spare parts. “Night of the Firstlings” is an eccentric and at times terrifying retelling of the plagues of Egypt, while the collection’s new story, “Into the Clouds on High,” recalls the author’s recent The Brides of Rollrock Island, with a woman caught between the pull of her family and that of her supernatural nature. Haunt-ing, gorgeous, and sometimes painful, Lanagan’s stories are unlike anything else in fantasy literature. Ages 14–up. Agent: Jill Grinberg Literary Management. (May)

Kirkus Reviews

Lanagan unravels familiar myths and fairy tales, weaving them into unique, sharply resonant forms in this characteristically stunning collection. Reading Lanagan, like learning a language by total immersion, involves a leap of faith. Each tale conjures a world with unique laws and lawbreakers. Rather than being coddled by comforting dollops of exposition, readers dive into the murky unknown. Spellbound, they reach the end, astonished at how far from shore they've traveled. The most powerful of these tales reworks Hans Christian Andersen's "The Tinderbox," drawing on its creepy, amoral ambiance to explore the spoils and costs of war. "Rapunzel" morphs into a sunnier tale but with an eldritch feel. Supported by his loving wife and apprentice-daughter, Charon ferries dead souls across the Styx. However strange the details (a sentient building lumbers into the sea; a fascinator plies his trade), the stories rest on bedrock human emotions. Characters act out of fear, anger, love--to stop the pain, to make sense of the senseless, to protect family. The shipbreaking underclass who take apart horrifying vessels are decent folk at heart. In a tale exploring the paradoxical complexities of loss, a mother floats away from the family desperate to keep her. Traveling such elusive terrain requires an oblique approach, and Lanagan, like Emily Dickinson, tells it "slant." Familiar roots and accessible themes make this strong collection a good introduction to Lanagan's mind-bending work. (author's note) (Fantasy/short stories. 14 & up)

From the Publisher

Starred Review, Publishers Weekly, February 25, 2013:
“Haunting, gorgeous, and sometimes painful, Lanagan’s stories are unlike anything else in fantasy literature.”

Starred Review, Kirkus Reviews, April 1, 2013:
"Lanagan unravels familiar myths and fairy tales, weaving them into unique, sharply resonant forms in this characteristically stunning collection...Familiar roots and accessible themes make this strong collection a good introduction to Lanagan’s mind-bending work."

Booklist, February 15, 2013:
"Lanagan's literary chops are nearly unrivaled in YA lit, and any release from her will draw excitement, scrutiny, and awards consideration."

The Horn Book, May/June 2013:
"These imaginative works demand much of their readers, occasionally providing catharsis and unfailingly provoking thought and discussion."

VOYA
"Exquisite. Lanagan's prose is challenging and rewarding in equal measure, creating resonances that most writers can only dream of; and her characters and situations seethe with emotional power."

School Library Journal

Gr 9 Up—Ten tales examine unexpected occurrences of magic in everyday lives. Most of the stories appeared in various anthologies published between 2006 and 2011, but they have not been available to American readers until now. Additionally, while this collection was released in Australia in 2011, one story ("Heads") has been swapped for another ("Catastrophic Disruption of the Head") in the U.S. release. Ranging in length from 10 to 34 pages, some of these literary fantasies are wholly original (a boy's mother prepares to ascend to a higher calling, circus oddities find someone else to stare at and speculate about, a shopping mall sheds its parasitic humans) and some are inspired by other tales (Passover and Exodus, Rapunzel, Charon and the River Styx). But in all of Lanagan's worlds, the familiar becomes unfamiliar and then wondrous. Each story is tightly crafted, dropping readers into a culture without much preface, letting the events spin out and the characters be forever changed, and leaving those turning the pages haunted afterward. Less-sophisticated readers might be frustrated by the density of these selections and their focus on character rather than plot, but for those willing to invest, the payoff is powerful. This is meaty fare, layered with meaning and thick with a richness of imagination. Yellowcake is as much about the telling as it is about the tales.—Gretchen Kolderup, New York Public Library