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Contributor News
Nancy Christie’s fourth short story collection, The Language of Love and Other Stories (Unsolicited Press), is now available for preorder, with a release date of February 4. For more information, visit her website: www.nancychristie.com.
Book Review
Short Story Six Pack: A Collection of High Fantasy Tales #1
by David Carl
REVIEWED BY FRANK T. SIKORA
REIMAGINING CLASSIC fairy tales and tropes challenges readers and authors. Readers often approach these stories with a heavy dose of skepticism, daring the authors to surprise them with an original take or voice. What more can we learn about Cinderella? Little Red Riding Hood? Shadowsoul? Are there emotional depths to an orc or wizard that haven’t been explored? Dangerous journeys not taken? Battles not engaged?
I appreciated David Carl’s playful and irreverent take on these well-worn fables and familiar characters. He enthusiastically brings a modern voice to the tales, infusing them with a snarky cynicism — a one-man chorus throwing barbs at the characters from the side. Yet, this attitude occasionally feels repetitious and distracting, suffocating the character’s voice for the author’s.
Each tale starts promisingly. In “Cinderayla,” the title character interrupts the author’s narrative and hijacks the tale, forcing her perspective onto the author. Inventively, the author and Cinderayla battle each other for control of the story and outcome. Unfortunately, Carl’s writing lacks discipline, too often leaving the reader confused as to who is telling the tale.
“The Three Castle Orcs” introduces three orc brothers with comical flair and humorous wordplay. Carl paints the youngest as frugal, the middle brother as indecisive, and the oldest as independent — and each cognitively limited, but as rendered, the brothers entertain and invoke empathy. The engaging start falters as the tale progresses; however, the second act is too brief, and Carl rushes the ending — a familiar practice.
Carl’s imaginative storytelling is bold and detailed. That said, the stories feel one draft short or in need of a sharper editor. They require more air; more room to expand. Interesting plot developments fail to coalesce. Character arcs falter. Carl deflates the final acts, quickly summarizing the results like a box score. Furthermore, his proclivity for passive sentence structure and clichéd similes, particularly in the first three fables, tangle the narrative thread.
The second half of the collection reads better. The stories have more momentum. Sentences are active and varied. Descriptions are richer and precise.
“Elements” is my favourite story. A bold, active opening paragraph plunges the reader into the conflict. A battle is lost, and Thoria must be saved. For 90 percent of the story, Merwyn the “mad” wizard and the narrator regather Thoria’s defeated fighting forces. Merwyn’s genius reinvents the four elemental schools of warfare. Carl’s detailed description of the preparations carries the day. Tension slowly mounts. Preparations build. Plans finalize. It’s an old tale deftly delivered.
Then, the battle. Poof! Another synopsis. The final act demands a lengthy tension-soaked engagement. Will the undermanned yet clever forces of Thoria prevail? Will new heroes emerge? Will Merywn prove brilliant or merely mad? Instead, the ending abruptly runs aground, stifling the plot and character development.
Carl has the imagination to compete in the crowded, intense realm of high fantasy. There is joy and humour in his work. He understands the genre and appears well-versed in its lore. But he needs to allow the stories and the characters who inhabit them the freedom to expand and explore, to rise and fall, with fewer interruptions — and let them fulfill their promise.
***

Frank lives in Waterford, Wisconsin with his wife, Holly, an English teacher. His work has been published online and in print in Canada and the U.S. Every once in a while one of his flash fiction pieces will win an award, which his wife will acknowledge with a smile and a comment, such as, “It still needs a middle, sweetheart.”