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I'm in the middle of reading Maps in a Mirror (OSC's collection of short stories). Just thought I'd ask the others of you that have read that collection, which short story was your favorite?
I'm reading one each night before going to sleep. Last night, I read "In the Doghouse" and was just roaring with laughter. It's amazing how versatile a writer OSC is.
Sorry if this question has been posed before -- this side doesn't get many "new" threads, so thought I'd start one.
I am surprised that Card has not reprinted it in any of his smaller, more up-to-date collections, or put it on audiotape.
Posts: 74 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I cannot say that I enjoyed it, but Eumenities in a Fifth Floor Lavatory has haunted me ever since I first read it.
I think that I liked Lost Boys the best. I loved the short story so much that I never read the novel (as if that made any sense). I've owned it for years, but just haven't gotten around to reading it...
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I can agree that "Eumenities" would be haunting. But not nearly so much so as the one that gave me nightmares -- I don't have the book with me right now, so can't remember the title, but the story in which the man has to die over and over and over again as they try to get him to say that communism is wonderful, etc., and he remembers each death until he finally gets hardened to the whole process. Man -- that one kept me from reading anything else for a few days -- how many sick ways can OSC think of for someone to die? It hurt just to read it.
Don't think I've got to Saving Grace yet. Just finished Unaccompanied Sonata
You don't need to read the stories in order, you know!
A short story collection is like an encyclopedia, or a dictionary, or a phone book. You use it in the order that you please.
Posts: 74 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Yeah, but I figured I would just go in order so that I don't forget which ones I've read, and which I haven't. But actually I did skip ahead last night --- because my son had borrowed the book to read during the day, and I didn't notice my bookmark was moved until later.... <grin>
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The one about the alien Robert Redford and the dogs (whose title absolutely escapes me as I read it about five years ago) changed forever the way I look at my dog. I asked her if it was true, but she just looked at me and didn't answer...which of course was entirely inconclusive.
...
And no, I'm not kidding. I really can't look at dogs the same. Posts: 2762 | Registered: Sep 1999
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OK, wasn't sure it was the same one. I read all of those stories exactly once, in the same week, several years ago. They tend to mix together. I've noticed that since OSC's short fiction is all so disturbing, I occasionally feel compelled to tell someone one of the stories (helps purge the weirdness). 'So then there was this dog, and it didn't have opposable thumbs...' No one ever seems to understand! Posts: 2762 | Registered: Sep 1999
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Hmmm...A Thousand Deaths, Fat Farm, and Eye for Eye are my favorites. I think Eye would be excellent with a more detailed storyline in novel form (hint).
Posts: 36 | Registered: Nov 2003
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I loved Unaccompanied Sonata, the one about the Old woman and the dragon, and that was once in an issue of the Ensign about the little girl who wanted to be a writer...that makes me cry.
Posts: 4089 | Registered: Apr 2003
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Maps in a Mirror is my all-time favorite collection of short fiction by a single author. "Unaccompanied Sonata" is my personal favorite, but not far behind is "Holy." I always figured OSC must have written it on a dare - try to write a powerful and moving story about smearing feces on a rock.
Grandma, an audiotape performance of several of the stories in Maps in a Mirror was released a couple years back. The collection also includes "The Elephants on Posnan," a very good story that as far as I know has never been printed in the English language.
Posts: 17 | Registered: Dec 2003
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Yes, V Aaron, I mention both audiotape sets in my book [ORSON SCOTT CARD: Writer of the Terrible Choice]"The Elephants of Posnam and Other Stories" and "Angles and Other Stories." But, to the best of my recollection (I don't have the tapes to hand, at the moment) neither one included the story "Saving Grace". If either one did, my face is red! Posts: 74 | Registered: Oct 2003
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"Unaccompanied Sonata" is what got me started as an OSC fan. As a musician, I think it should be required reading for every musician of any stripe.
I will say, however, that I was profoundly disturbed by "Kingsmeat." Not that it's bad...just deeply disturbing.
Interestingly enough, though, "In the Doghouse" makes me very sad.
Posts: 4077 | Registered: Jun 2003
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It is because "Kingsmeat" is so disturbing that it is probably my favorite short story, or at least one of them. Every time I read it I get the same shock and disbelief, and every time I read the last sentence I get a shiver down my spine. Even though I can practically quote it.
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I think my favorite is the Porcelain Salamander. This choice isn't due to a disturbing memory, but one of emotions from a sweet story of love and loss.
A Thousand Deaths is the only story I have memory of causing a negative physical reaction (I realized I hadn't been breathing for a bit after reading the first death.)
Honorable mentions are A Plague of Butterflies and Fatfarm. (that haven't already been mentioned that is.)
Posts: 2 | Registered: Dec 2003
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the porcelain salamander is the first orson scott card story i ever heard. i was about ten or twelve years old, and it remains my favorite to this day.
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Oh I loved Unaccompanied Sonota. It just moved me, and confused me, and it just made me think a lot, and I like things that are though-provoking like that. It was beautiful. I need to read more of them. I think sometime I'll check it out of the library.
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Jun 2002
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I feel very good about the fact that there are about ten copies of Maps in a Mirror at my local bookstore just waiting to be read by new fans at a newly affordable price.
I can't even choose a single favorite story. Posts: 1595 | Registered: Feb 2003
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(Zotto, doesn't everyone wish that their local bookstore was Powell's?? We Portlanders ROCK!)
I just bought my new beautiful copy today with a gift certificate. It was so exciting. I had been planning to use this gift certificate on something frivolous for ME (instead of textbooks or supplies) and I wanted to choose just the right thing. I had several things in my hand to choose from, including a copy of the Silmarillion and the Count of Monte Cristo. But when I rounded the corner and saw this big beautiful book (that I had forgotten I wanted) I literally gasped, dropped everything else and grabbed it. And it was only $1.95 more than my gift certificate. So happiness reigns.
And now to find a place for it on my bookshelf. Hmmmm *ponders*
Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
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I also loved "Homeless in Hell". It reminded me of "The Great Divorce" by C. S. Lewis.
I remember hearing/reading over a decade ago that OSC was going to write a book "Confessions of a Guardian Angel", written in the same vein as "The Screwtape Letters" by C. S. Lewis. I guess that never happened. Has anybody else heard of this? did Card abandon that idea, or has it just not happened yet? I would love to read a book like that from him.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Here's the note on it from the bibliography:
quote:"Notes from a Guardian Angel" serialized in 7th East Press, Provo, Utah, during much of 82; the paper was forced out of business before the serial was completed
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