Review of Jeffrey Ford, “The Bookcase Expedition”, Robots vs Fairies, edited by Dominik Parisien and Navah Wolfe (Gallery / Saga Press, 2018): 169-181 — Purchase Here. Reviewed by Susan T. (Read the review of the anthology.)
The narrator of the story watches fairies climb a bookcase in his office for purposes unknown, slowly working out more about them as they climb. It was surprisingly dull! I was curious about the fairies, but the narrative voice left me cold. I think the story is supposed to be a meta-text, where the story that the protagonist is finishing when the fairies distract him is The Bookcase Expedition itself, but there wasn’t really enough of that to carry my interest. I would much rather the story have been straight fantasy, focusing on the fairies themselves, because as written it bored me.
SFF Reviews 