Wandering the Sky Naked

The Daughters of the Moon  by Italo Calvino

 Tuesday’s Tale of Magical Realism,  June 25, 2019

Nude women, New York City, and the moon. If you love magical realism that holds deep edges of fantasy folk tales, this is your story. Author Italo Calvino asks the question, can the moon die? What if the moon orbited  close to Earth? What if the moon was full of eyes and shimmering colors? This 1968 short story is unusual and unforgettable. Calvino was a passionate believer that art could unite the self and heal. His writing just explodes in this rather vigorous and imaginative ride.

“The moon is old, Qfwfq agreed, pitted with holes, worn out. Rolling naked through the skies, it erodes and loses its flesh like a bone that’s been gnawed. This is not the first time that such a thing has happened. I remember moons that were even older and more battered than this one; I’ve seen loads of these moons, seen them being born and running across the sky and dying out, one punctured by hail from shooting stars, another exploding from all its craters, and yet another oozing drops of topaz-colored sweat that evaporated immediately, then being covered by greenish clouds and reduced to a dried-up, spongy shell.”

 

 

The ending, what happens in time, will grab and hold a long time. A beauty!

 

Read the story at the New Yorker Magazine:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/02/23/the-daughters-of-the-moon

Listen to the audio here: https://www.wnyc.org/story/adee7d1df5ac724bab592aa2/

 

 

Italo Calvino was an Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels. His best known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy, the Cosmicomics collection of short stories, and the novels Invisible Cities and If on a winter’s night a traveler.

“It is not the voice that commands the story; it is the ear.”

 

 

 

 

Don’t forget to view the INDEX above of more free reading at Reading Fiction Blog. This is a compendium of over 200 short stories by more than 100 famous storytellers of mystery, suspense, supernatural, ghost stories, ‘quiet horror,’ crime, sci-fi, and mainstream fiction.

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 Other Reading Web Sites to Visit

Kirkus Mystery & Thrillers Reviews

Books & Such    Bibliophilica   NewYorkerFictionOnline

 Lovecraft Ezine   Parlor of Horror

HorrorNews.net   Fangoria.com   

Slattery’s Art of Horror Magazine   Chuck Windig’s Terrible Minds

HorrorAddicts.net     Horror Novel Reviews    HorrorSociety.com     

Monster Librarian      HorrorTalk.com 

 Rob Around Books      The Story Reading Ape Blog

For Authors/Writers:  The Writer Unboxed

 

Fabulism: The New Wave in Fiction

What is this new “fabulist fiction” everybody is talking about? There is a wave of fabulist fiction going on.  As a reader you might think it’s a blend of magical realism/fantasy/supernatural stories. Fabulist fiction seems to blur these boundaries with fantastic events in realistic settings, flavored with exotic themes and blends of folklore or mythology.

In the milieu of fabulism, anything can happen–the unreal, the surreal, the unexplained. Some readers call it slipstream or the new weird, or what is most popular “the modern fable.”

[Image by Arthur Rackham, public domain]

Examples? Traditionally, we could think  Alice in Wonderland— yeah, that would fit fabulism. Kafka’s Metamorphosis where the narrator is transformed into a beetle.  Author Italo Calvino was known as the contemporary “fabulist” for his dazzling allegorical stories. Calvino’s Invisible Cities is a mix of history, fable, and fantasy.

I’ve dabbled in this genre with my newly released  short story Magic of the Loons. This story is set in modern day with real people pursuing their passions, taking risks, when powerful elements beyond the ordinary take command. The story was originally published in Dark Gothic Resurrected Magazine last year. You can find it on Amazon.com for 99 cents. A quick 30-minute read, perfect for a solitary lunchtime read or with that leisurely cup of morning coffee.

Please note that I am looking for reviews. If you read Magic of the Loons and like it, I hope you’ll post a short review on Amazon and/or on Goodreads.

Here’s what the Bram Stoker award-winning author Lucy Taylor has to say about Magic of the Loons.

“Magic of the Loons” by Paula Cappa is a lyrical gem of a story, a love triangle set against the haunting atmosphere of a lake that is home to a raft of loons.  With lush prose and an evocative setting, Cappa interweaves temptress Kai’s seductive and sensuous nature and the fate of the two men who have fallen under her mysterious spell.”

Readers here know Lucy Taylor from one of her short stories (link) posted at Tales of Terror Blog Feb 18 2014 Women In Horror Month. The short story is  Walled, published at Nightmare Magazine.

Do you have any thoughts on this genre of fabulism? Have you been reading any fabulism? Any titles you’d like to add here for the readers? Please feel free to comment!

What mysteries lie in loon magic?

 

99 cents on Amazon.com

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