Name: By Light We Knew Our Names
Rating: 3.5 (6 reviews)
ISBN: 9781936873623

Anne Valente

Thirteen stories exploring the thin borders between wonder and loss and magic and grief

By Light We Knew Our Names

Colton Ray

The standout stories for me were the title story and "Until Our Shadows Claim Us," an eerie story about small-town childhoods haunted by a phantom kidnapper. Many of the stories were forgettable to me, but there are lots of beautiful moments sprinkled throughout, enough to make this a worthwhile read.

Janice Hopper

This book of stories starts out with some absolutely lovely magical realism sorts of stories. I'm kinda glad that those stories were at the beginning of the book, because there's some harder stuff a little further in. I found the contrast a little jarring, frankly. 

But as I look back over the stories in the book, I realize the darkness was pretty much there from the beginning. Everyone is vulnerable in some way. Some vulnerabilities are exploited more ruthlessly than others.

Every story is a little jewel though, I think. Some are prettier than others, easier to look at, easier to read. Some are hard and uncomfortable and sad and rage-inducing.

But they're good. You should read them.

Stories:
a birthday present
Amelia Earhart & women & bears
Kids singing for sick mom
mysterious grandparents and bad relationships
divorce and tea
growing up w/Vietnam and the 1965 World's Fair

-then BOOM-
abused young women and their rage
etc.

Jade Flynn

A heartbreakingly gentle way of writing. The stories I loved (five and four stars) blew me away. It was worth reading just for those. Did enjoy the magical realism stories more than the realist ones. 

***** - Latchkey, Dear Amelia, Not For Ghosts or Daffodils. 
**** - Terrible Angels, Minivan, Until Our Shadow's Claim Us, Mollusk, Membrane, Human Heart. 
*** - By Light We Knew Our Names. 
** -  To A Place Where We Take Flight, A Taste of Tea, If Everything Fell Silent, Even Sirens. 
* -  Everything That Was Ours, A Very Compassionate Baby.

Laura

By Light We Knew Our Names is a collection of short stories, which I've been in the mood for lately. I was attracted to it because I loved the cover and I've been in the mood for a little magical realism lately, and I find that collections of short stories are the best if I want my thirst for magical realism sated. While I often find full-length magical realism novels hard to get through- which is why I've avoided books like One Hundred Years of Solitude or Like Water For Chocolate- short stories are an easy to read taste of magic, which is what drew me to this collection.

And it's a good solid collection. I mean, it is definitely a debut collection, with the messages behind each story a bit more sledgehammer in approach than I would have liked them being. The meanings behind each story were fairly obvious, which is nice but it is a little atypical of the genre. To me, the biggest appeal of magical realism is how much the mystical aspects cloak the meaning of the story, forcing the reader to come to his own conclusions about what the author thinks vs what the reader thinks the story means. In this, the meanings were fairly obvious, and all of them had to do with the same two subjects- loss and growing up- played over and over again. 

But Valente is a really talented writer. I especially loved the stories where she wrote in first person plural- Dear Amelia, Until Our Shadows Claim Us, and a bit of Everything That Was Ours. Besides those stories, I also really liked Latchkey, Terrible Angels, Minivan, and If Everything Fell Silent, Even Sirens. But my absolute favorite story in the collection was Not For Ghosts or Daffodils. I just loved the language and the characters in that story. I also need to mention that the last story, Mollusk, Membrane, Human Heart has such a gut wrenching conclusion that it was almost hard for me to read. 

There were a few misses, though. I found the title story, By Light We Knew Our Names, to be the biggest one. It was a cool idea, but wasn't that great in execution, and it was hard for me to like any of the characters. A Very Compassionate Baby was another miss- it made me think of that Edward Gorey short story about the horrible baby, though. Other than that, there were a few stories that didn't really do much for me, like To A Place Where We Take Flight, which I wanted to like more than I did, as well as A Taste of Tea, which had the same problem. 

Continue reading this review on my blog here: https://bookwormbasics.blogspot.com/2...

By Light We Knew Our Names

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