Into the Yellow and Other Stories

Canadians of my generation often think that the short story is our national art form. So I have read a great many short story anthologies and collections. Nevertheless, I have to say that Into the Yellow by British author Barbara Davies is simply one of the best of its kind. While I certainly admire that the author deliberately challenges herself in each piece by attempting subjects and backdrops that are completely original, what makes this collection great is that she then has the skill to make the trip into the unknown such a pleasure for the reader. The variety and range is stunning; but the humour, the quality of the writing, the depth of the characters and research, well, as you can tell, they blew me away. She creates a society of evolved chameleons and you care about the individuals and their conflicts? A werewolf hunter tracking her own kind races through thrills with wit, and your only complaint is that it wasn't much, much longer? As she skips seemingly effortlessly through flawlessly dated historical periods to well-rounded fantasy environments, no one could deny that this is imaginative writing of the first rank.