The Fabric Over the Moon by Ferran Plana
Publisher: Self-Published
Genre: Sci-Fi/Fantasy, Mystery/Suspense/Thriller, Romance, Paranormal, Contemporary, Action/Adventure, Historical
Rating: 3 Stars
Reviewed by AstilbeStories come alive at night.
They are whispered around dying campfires, by quiet bedsides, under deformed old trees.
They might get interrupted by the howling wind, inaudible gasps, or nervous comments, only to be continued fervently once the dust settles again.
Why did the girl visit the eerie village? What did the gypsy’s words mean? Can the discovery of a new flower change the world?
Stories are supposed to end but they never do.
They leave you wondering and longing for more. They live on in your mind, in corners with cobwebs and memories you’ve been suppressing, in recurring daydreams you have while waiting in long lines. They fester and thrive there. They spiral and soar. You wish they would die but they cannot anymore.
Once you blow breath into a story, it instantly becomes yours…
Why stick to one genre when there are so many other interesting ones to explore, too?
A string of mysterious deaths in a monastery made the main character in “Winter” wonder what was really going on. I was immediately drawn into the mystery of why they’d lost so many members over that winter, especially since this was so unusual for them. The twist ending made me grin. It wasn’t something I saw coming, but it added a delightful spin to the quiet life the characters typically lead.
Some portions of this collection were hard for me to understand, and I’m saying that as someone who loves short stories and flash fiction. There were multiple times when they abruptly ended and I wasn’t entirely sure I fully understood what they were trying to communicate. “Shane” was one such example of this. It followed the adventures of someone named Shane who helped two pigs travel through the woods at night to deliver an important message. As much as I liked the characters, I was confused by how quickly it ended and how many loose ends were left dangling in the final scene.
There was a dreamlike quality to “Locked” that worked beautifully with the tale it told about someone living in the distant future who wondered what Earth was like before the environment became dangerous for humans. I can’t disclose why it was dangerous for spoiler reasons, but I can say that I was surprised by each new revelation about how humanity survived this disaster and how they’d adapted to it over time. This was something that would have made an excellent novel, but it also worked just as well in the handful of pages the author decided to write about.
The Fabric Over the Moon was a thought-provoking read.
