Now that the holidays are over I am hoping to not only get back on my regular reviewing schedule but to make up the two missed reviews in the coming months. If I am lucky, this will happen. If I am unlucky my health will continue to drive me to distraction.

All I can say is I'll try.

Also, I am taking a slight detour from my normal fare of stories published in the big magazines. I came across this story in an anthology and it was too good not to share.

"Iphigenia in Aulis" by Mike Carey
AN APPLE FOR THE CREATURE: ALL-NEW TALES OF UNNATURAL EDUCATION edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner and published Sept 2012 by Penguin

It is no secret that I read a lot and that as a writer I often like to examine the work of other authors to find ways to improve my own writing. That's even a big part of the motivation behind these reviews. However, every once in awhile something will come along that knocks me completely out of critical mode and straight into slack-jawed wonder. These stories are the ones that both inspire and depress me because they exemplify the power of fiction and remind me how very far I have to go with my own writing. The short story "Blood Music" by Greg Bear is one of these. "Iphigenia in Aulis" is another.

Carey deftly weaves together strong writing, characterization, and details with a though-provoking world and complicated situations. If there were not enough he also adds the parallel of the mythology referenced in the title to enhance the entire conflict. By the end of reading all of the elements have built to a crescendo that is almost unbearably sad and yet strikingly poignant.

While the idea of Iphigenia is important you do not need to know the myth to read this story. In fact, you don't need to know much of anything going in. Just trust that the author will give you the clues you need.

The protagonist is a child who does not understand the details of her situation. This throws the reader into the deep end and adds a palpable sense of unease right from the start. The thing is her situation seems cold and almost abusive for a child and yet she accepts it with such matter-of-factness. This is simply her life, has always been her life.

As the story grows she begins to gather information that helps put her world in context. Because as a reader we have information she doesn't, including the rather meta knowledge that her world exists in an anthology about supernatural creatures, the reader is able to piece together the situation slightly faster than the character herself. This causes even further dread and dissonance.

As this learning process is a large part of the magic of the story I am going to be deliberately vague in regards to the plot. However, what I can say is that Carey deftly weaves together social commentary on large current issues and on education with an exploration of human nature, acceptance, and sacrifice.

There were some minor flaws perhaps in the building and to me the ending was perhaps not as strong as I expected. However, it took my three weeks of considering the story to decide that and it is entirely possible that my feelings on the ending have more to do with the crash of a well-built emotional crescendo and subsequent shock setting in than a fault in the text.

Regardless of any possible small issues it is a thought-provoking and deeply moving story which I highly recommend. This is a story that will stay with you.