Name: Bi's review of Passing Strange by Ellen Klages
Item: Passing Strange
Rating: 3
Author: Bi

Ellen Klages

San Francisco in 1940 is a haven for the unconventional. Tourists flock to the cities within the city: the Magic City of the World’s Fair on an island created of artifice and illusion; the forbidden city of Chinatown, a separate, alien world of exotic food and nightclubs that offer “authentic” experiences, straight from the pages of the pulps; and the twilight world of forbidden love, where outcasts from conventional society can meet. Six women find their lives as tangled with each other’s as they are with the city they call home. They discover love and danger on the borders where magic, science, and art intersect. Inspired by the pulps, film noir, and screwball comedy, Passing Strange is a story as unusual and complex as San Francisco itself from World Fantasy Award winning author Ellen Klages.

Passing Strange

Isabella

Inspired by the pulps, film noir, and screwball comedy, Passing Strange is a story as unusual and complex as San Francisco itself from World Fantasy Award winning author Ellen Klages, and a finalist for the 2017 Nebula Award for Best Novella San Francisco in 1940 is a haven for the unconventional. Tourists flock to the cities within the city: the Magic City of the World’s Fair on an island created of artifice and illusion; the forbidden city of Chinatown, a separate, alien world of exotic food and nightclubs that offer “authentic” experiences, straight from the pages of the pulps; and the twilight world of forbidden love, where outcasts from conventional society can meet. Six women find their lives as tangled with each other’s as they are with the city they call home. They discover love and danger on the borders where magic, science, and art intersect. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

3.5 stars

I really enjoyed this story but there were a couple of small things that bothered me and had me bump the rating down. Firstly, I can't say I particularly enjoyed the references to real life people that much. I know the story is mostly historical and the setting is historically accurate for the most part but the discussion of some high-profile historical figures and how it was handled took me out of the story a bit. 

Secondly - and this is a small thing -I felt that some sections of the book, particularly towards the middle of the story, were so unnecessarily dialogue heavy that it messed with the flow of the story a bit too much for my liking.

The other thing I felt a bit frustrated with is that for 2/3rds of the book, up until after the climax pretty much, the fantasy elements were barely mentioned and when they were mentioned they seemed to be mostly used as magical deus ex machina. For most of the book, I was reading it and wishing there were no fantasy elements in it whatsoever and I would have liked it more. Towards the end of the story I finally understood what role the fantasy elements had to play and though I really loved that plot-twist, I can't help but feel that I wanted it to have been somewhat teased earlier on in the story and for that kind of magic to play at least a small part somehow earlier on in the story or at least for some vague foreshadowing to take place so everything tied together more nicely. 

All things considered though, the story was still beautiful and not at all what I had expected from the summary. I really liked all the characters and love how they each got to feature in the story. I thought the non-linear structure was also clever and it worked really well for this story. Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by how the story unfolded for the most part and I enjoyed reading this.

Elinor

i WISH i could have liked this book more

tw's for this book: homophobia, racism, homophobic slurs, racist slurs, very real experiences of lesbians in the 40's

so ok there were so many passages that i LOVED and the story itself was great! i love historical fiction and i think the author did a great job of capturing that 1940's feel. BUT the element of magic i didnt really like. it only came 3 times in the book and felt like it was only useful for the ending. it would have been much better if the magic had been extended upon. i think something that would have improved the book would have been if we had gotten more insight into franny, helen, babs and polly's lives! 

i would have given this book 2 stars but the beautiful passages and descriptions were deserving of an extra star. i did enjoy parts of it but i wish that the other characters lives would have been expanded upon! like helen's life and experiences with racism and franny and babs lives with homophpbia and polly's life as a young intelligent woman in university!! 

i wanted this book to be so good but i wish it had a bit more of expansion in some elements. i love that haskel and emily got a happy ending and it wasn't another bury your gays trope but i also didnt like the whole Len thing.

but the things that i DID like was the amazing writing of some scenes. i felt like i was there! like the mona's club scenes, every time haskel was drawing, haskel and emily talking. just mwah amazing. but yet again i wish the other characters would have been expanded on and that we could have seen more of their separate lives and how they intertwined with eachother, like following one character personally for a few chapters and then theyd have an interaction with the other character and we'd get to follow them.

otherwise i thought this book was ok

Maggie Gordon

Passing Strange far exceeded my expectations. I'm not usually a fan of historical stories, and magic realism is often a miss for me. Then I picked up this novella and was enthralled! It's a story about ladies who love ladies in a time when that's not something that is tolerated. But it's not a story that engages in "bury your gays". Sure, characters die, but after a long and well-enjoyed life. This narrative is all about falling in love and doing what you need to do to stay with the one you adore, even if that involves a bit of odd magic. Truly delightful read!

Toni Turner

4.5 stars, rounded up. With how often I think about this book, I feel guilty taking off that 1/2 star. FIVE STARS!

My god, this is beautiful!! I'm not even totally sure I know what to say about it, except I loved it SO much. I did want a tiny bit more background on a couple things, as the book is pretty short and I think could have been expanded a bit, but the story and framing were so well done!!

I wish Klages wrote more like this, I looked at her other books and it looks like mostly middle grade fiction. MORE MAGICAL REALISM W/ LESBIANS PLEASE!!

Reread 1/31/19 - just as beautiful as last time. I needed a pick-me-up and this book did the trick.

Isabella &
Passing Strange by Ellen Klages

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