The Very Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan Read online

  Praise for The Very Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan

  “Lyrically compelling tales that are nearly impossible to stop reading . . . fans of weird writers like Carmen Maria Machado, Jeff VanderMeer, and China Miéville will be glad to find this volume and thereby discover a writer who inspired them all.”

  —Booklist

  “Caitlín Kiernan is a minister of dark magic, and any collection of her work is a must-read.”

  —Chuck Wendig, author of Hyperion and The Shield

  “Caitlín Kiernan is one of the true visionaries and finest stylists in our field, and very possibly the most lyrical. Her tales enrich the imagination, and represent the literature of the dark at its most gorgeous and disturbing. This book is a treasure house of wonders and terrors, and an essential purchase for anyone who cares about the great tradition of weird fiction.”

  —Ramsey Campbell, author of The Parasite and Thirteen Days by Sunset Beach

  “Caitlín R. Kiernan is one of the most inventive, seductive, and wickedly intelligent writers working today in any genre, and this treasury puts her powers on full display. Her stories are promiscuous vampires, eager to draw their energy from folklore, space opera, crime fiction, weird tales, and the dreams of the silver screen. Whether their tone is streetwise or scholarly, archaic or futuristic, these tales share Kiernan’s signature flavor of a last drink on the edge of the abyss. She is Our Lady of Elation and Melancholy. A sinister, spellbinding collection.”

  —Sofia Samatar, author of A Stranger in Olondria and Monster Portraits

  “To begin a Caitlín R. Kiernan story is to enter a world so vividly imagined that it’s almost unbearable, on a journey as terrifying as it is irresistible.”

  —Sam J. Miller, author of Blackfish City

  “Kiernan’s stories will submerge you in a strange world filled with the twisted, radical reflections of Giger and Lovecraft, their aesthetic skins stretched over anger, pain, queerness, and courage.”

  —Lara Elena Donnelly, author of the Amberlough Dossier series

  Praise for Caitlín R. Kiernan

  “Caitlín Kiernan is the poet and bard of the wasted and the lost.”

  —Neil Gaiman

  “Caitlín R. Kiernan is an original.”

  —Clive Barker

  “Caitlín R. Kiernan draws her strength from the most honorable of sources, a passion for the act of writing.”

  —Peter Straub

  Praise for The Drowning Girl

  “Incisive, beautiful and as perfectly crafted as a puzzle-box, The Drowning Girl took my breath away.”

  —Holly Black, New York Times bestselling author of Red Glove

  “Kiernan pins out the traditional memoir on her worktable and metamorphoses it into something wholly different and achingly familiar, more alien, more difficult, more beautiful, and more true.”

  —Catherynne M. Valente, New York Times bestselling author of Deathless

  “This is a masterpiece. It deserves to be read in and out of genre for a long, long time.”

  —Elizabeth Bear, author of Grail

  “A beautifully written, startlingly original novel.”

  —Elizabeth Hand, author of Illyria

  “In this novel, Caitlín R. Kiernan turns the ghost story inside out and transforms it. This is a story about how stories are told, about what they reveal and what they hide, but is no less intense or suspenseful because of that.”

  —Brian Evenson, author of Last Days

  “The Drowning Girl features all those elements of Caitlín R. Kiernan’s writing that readers have come to expect—a prose style of wondrous luminosity, an atmosphere of languorous melancholy, and an inexplicable mixture of aching beauty and clutching terror.”

  —S. T. Joshi, author of I Am Providence: The Life and Times of H. P. Lovecraft

  Praise for Daughter of Hounds

  “Inspired by H. P. Lovecraft’s tales of legendary monsters running amok under the streets of New England, Kiernan’s fifth novel (after Low Red Moon) to feature psychic sensitive Deacon Silvey and his supernaturally scarred family and friends is a hell-raising dark fantasy replete with ghouls, changelings and eerie intimations of a macabre otherworld.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Kiernan’s storytelling is stellar, and the misunderstandings and lies of stories within the main story evoke a satisfying tension in the characters.”

  —Booklist

  “A pretty explosive and captivating read. Highly recommended.”

  —Green Man Review

  Other Books by Caitlín R. Kiernan

  Novels

  Silk (1998)

  Threshold (2001)

  The Five of Cups (2003)

  Low Red Moon (2003)

  Murder of Angels (2004)

  Beowulf (2007)

  Daughter of Hounds (2007)

  The Red Tree (2009)

  The Drowning Girl: A Memoir (2012)

  Blood Oranges (writing as Kathleen Tierney; 2013)

  Red Delicious (writing as Kathleen Tierney; 2014)

  Cherry Bomb (writing as Kathleen Tierney; 2015)

  Agents of Dreamland (2017)

  Black Helicopters (2018)

  Collections

  Tales of Pain and Wonder (2000)

  Wrong Things (with Poppy Z. Brite; 2001)

  From Weird and Distant Shores (2002)

  To Charles Fort, With Love (2005)

  Alabaster (illustrated by Ted Naifeh; 2006)

  A Is for Alien (illustrated by Vince Locke; 2009)

  The Ammonite Violin & Others (2010)

  Two Worlds and in Between: The Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan

  (Volume One) (2011)

  Confessions of a Five-Chambered Heart (2012)

  The Ape’s Wife and Other Tales (2013)

  Beneath an Oil-Dark Sea: The Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan

  (Volume Two) (2015)

  Dear Sweet Filthy World (2017)

  Houses Under the Sea: Mythos Tales (2018)

  The Dinosaur Tourist (2018)

  The Very Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan

  Copyright © 2019 by Caitlín R. Kiernan

  This is a collected work of fiction. All events portrayed in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form without the express permission of the publisher.

  Introduction copyright © 2019 by Richard Kadrey

  Interior and cover design by Elizabeth Story

  Tachyon Publications LLC

  1459 18th Street #139

  San Francisco, CA 94107

  415.285.5615

  www.tachyonpublications.com

  [email protected]

  Series Editor: Jacob Weisman

  Project Editor: Jill Roberts

  Print ISBN: 978-1-61696-302-6

  Digital ISBN: 978-1-61696-303-3

  First Edition: 2019

  “Andromeda Among the Stones” copyright © 2003. First appeared in J. K. Potter’s Embrace the Mutation, edited by William Schafer and Bill Sheehan (Subterranean Press: Burton, Michigan).

  “La Peau Verte” copyright © 2005. First appeared in To Charles Fort, With Love (Subterranean Press: Burton, Michigan).

  “Houses Under the Sea” copyright © 2006. First appeared in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, Volume Eighteen, edited by Stephen Jones (Robinson: Frankfurt, Germany).

  “Bradbury Weather” copyright © 2005. First appeared in Subterranean, Issue #2.

  “A Child’s Guide to the Hollow Hills” copyright © 2006. First appeared in The Ammoni
te Violin & Others (Subterranean Press: Burton, Michigan).

  “The Ammonite Violin (Murder Ballard No. 4)” copyright © 2007. First appeared in Dark Delicacies II: Fear, edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb (Carroll & Graf: New York).

  “A Season of Broken Dolls” copyright © 2007. First appeared in Subterranean Online, Spring 2007.

  “In View of Nothing” copyright © 2007. First appeared in A Is for Alien (Subterranean Press: Burton, Michigan).

  “The Ape’s Wife” copyright © 2007. First appeared in Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue #12, September 2007.

  “The Steam Dancer (1896)” copyright © 2008. First appeared in Subterranean: Tales of Dark Fantasy, edited by William Schafer (Subterranean Press: Burton, Michigan).

  “Galápagos” copyright © 2009. First appeared in Eclipse 3: New Science Fiction and Fantasy, edited by Jonathan Strahan (Night Shade Books: San Francisco).

  “Fish Bride (1970)” copyright © 2009. First appeared in The Weird Fiction Review, Fall 2011.

  “The Mermaid of the Concrete Ocean” copyright © 2012. First appeared in The Drowning Girl (Roc/New American Library: New York).

  “Hydrarguros” copyright © 2011. First appeared in Subterranean: Tales of Dark Fantasy 2, edited by William Schafer. (Subterranean Press: Burton, Michigan).

  “The Maltese Unicorn” copyright © 2011. First appeared in Supernatural Noir, edited by Ellen Datlow (Dark Horse Books: Milwaukie, Oregon).

  “Tidal Forces” copyright © 2011. First appeared in Eclipse 4: New Science Fiction and Fantasy, edited by Jonathan Strahan (Night Shade Books: San Francisco).

  “The Prayer of Ninety Cats” copyright © 2013. First appeared in Subterranean, Spring 2013.

  “One Tree Hill (The World as Cataclysm)” copyright © 2013. First appeared in Black Wings III: New Tales of Lovecraftian Horror, edited by S. T. Joshi (PS Publishing: Hornsea, United Kingdom).

  “Interstate Love Song (Murder Ballad No. 8)” copyright © 2014. First appeared in The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of the Year: Volume Nine, edited by Jonathan Strahan (Solaris: Oxford, United Kingdom).

  “Fairy Tale of Wood Street” copyright © 2017. First appeared in The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of the Year: Volume Twelve, edited by Jonathan Strahan (Solaris: Oxford, United Kingdom).

  CONTENTS

  Introduction

  Andromeda Among the Stones

  La Peau Verte

  Houses Under the Sea

  Bradbury Weather

  A Child’s Guide to the Hollow Hills

  The Ammonite Violin (Murder Ballad No. 4)

  A Season of Broken Dolls

  In View of Nothing

  The Ape’s Wife

  The Steam Dancer (1896)

  Galápagos

  Fish Bride (1970)

  The Mermaid of the Concrete Ocean

  Hydrarguros

  The Maltese Unicorn

  Tidal Forces

  The Prayer of Ninety Cats

  One Tree Hill (The World As Cataclysm)

  Interstate Love Song (Murder Ballad No. 8)

  Fairy Tale of Wood Street

  About the Author

  INTRODUCTION

  Richard Kadrey

  CAITLÍN R. KIERNAN isn’t a horror writer, though she’s often referred to that way. True, there are horrific elements to many of her stories, but none of them are designed to shock, scare, or horrify the reader in the traditional sense of horror writing. Instead, what she gives us is something more subtle and strangely ephemeral. In a way, her best stories are acts of haunting. There’s a kind of intoxication to them. They’re often nonlinear paths to fantastic destinations, eschewing straightforward plots in favor of mood, mystery, and shadows. If you need to label her, “dark fantasy” is a better description. A “weird tale” writer is another. Not weird as in odd for the sake of oddness, but in the sense that H. P. Lovecraft meant, it as “something more than secret murder, bloody bones, or a sheeted form clanking chains.” It’s weird in the sense of the unknowability of some of the characters, creatures, worlds, and the tales through which they move.

  Certain themes and ideas flow through these stories. Gender and gender fluidity are there. So is the natural world, in all its beauty and fearsomeness, which isn’t surprising since herpetology and paleontology were some of Kiernan’s earliest interests. Water and water-related images abound, both in the text and even the titles themselves, “Houses Under the Sea,” “The Mermaid of the Concrete Ocean,” “Tidal Forces,” and “Galápagos.” The liquid tone is set by the opening story, “Andromeda Among the Stones,” which begins with a burial by the “relentless Pacific.”

  Kiernan is also a screenwriter, and some of the stories have a vivid film-like quality to them, as if you’re swallowed in the darkness, watching a tale unspooling before your eyes. Film also takes center stage in stories, such as in “The Ape’s Wife,” and the haunting “The Prayer of Ninety Cats,” which contains vivid descriptions of an imaginary film, along with snippets of the screenplay.

  There are even touches of the science fictional here. In “Bradbury Weather,” we find a Mars populated by women and a mysterious parasite called Fenrir, a name which connects the story from outer space to ancient earthly myths. And you’ll find another sort of science fiction in the unsettling “Galápagos,” where a woman becomes host to alien organisms.

  However, “The Maltese Unicorn” takes you on another unexpected kind of journey. It’s told as a noir tale, its name an obvious reference to Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon. But Kiernan’s noir takes some very different turns than an ordinary gumshoe tale, as it’s the tale of a legendary cursed dildo made of unicorn horn. Kiernan plays with gender roles here too, with a female detective who plays the male role in a traditional noir story, while rejecting strict gender roles out of hand.

  What you have in your hands is a book of weirdness in the best sense of the word. Senses, memory, consciousness, even bodies, are unstable and malleable concepts, winding around each other in dreamlike ways, colliding and exploding in a series of darkly alluring surprises. If you’re a fan of Kiernan’s work, you’ll some of her best work here. If you’re new to her stories, get ready. You’re traveling to places that might seem familiar at first, but don’t get too comfortable. There’s something new and wonderful just around the corner, and when it finally reveals itself to you, in all its beauty and strangeness, you won’t be able to look away.

  ANDROMEDA AMONG THE STONES

  “I cannot think of the deep sea without shuddering . . .”

  —H. P. Lovecraft

  October 1914

  “IS SHE REALLY and truly dead, Father?” the girl asked, and Machen Dandridge, already an old man at fifty-one, looked up at the low buttermilk sky again and closed the black book clutched in his hands. He’d carved the tall headstone himself, the marker for his wife’s grave there by the relentless Pacific, black shale obelisk with its hasty death’s-head. His daughter stepped gingerly around the raw earth and pressed her fingers against the monument.

  “Why did you not give her to the sea?” she asked. “She always wanted to go down to the sea at the end. She often told me so.”

  “I’ve given her back to the earth, instead,” Machen told her and rubbed at his eyes. The cold sunlight through thin clouds was enough to make his head ache, his daughter’s voice like thunder, and he shut his aching eyes for a moment. Just a little comfort in the almost blackness trapped behind his lids, parchment skin too insubstantial to bring the balm of genuine darkness, void to match the shades of his soul, and Machen whispered one of the prayers from the heavy black book and then looked at the grave again.

  “Well, that’s what she always said,” the girl said again, running her fingertips across the rough-hewn stone.

  “Things changed at the end, child. The sea wouldn’t have taken her. I had to give her back to the earth.”

  “She said it was a sacrilege, planting people in the ground like wheat, like kernels of corn.”


  “She did?” He glanced anxiously over his left shoulder, looking back across the waves the wind was making in the high and yellow-brown grass, the narrow trail leading back down to the tall and brooding house that he’d built for his wife twenty-four years ago, back towards the cliffs and the place where the sea and sky blurred seamlessly together.

  “Yes, she did. She said only barbarians and heathens stick their dead in the ground like turnips.”

  “I had no choice,” Machen replied, wondering if that was exactly the truth or only something he’d like to believe. “The sea wouldn’t take her, and I couldn’t bring myself to burn her.”

  “Only heathens burn their dead,” his daughter said disapprovingly and leaned close to the obelisk, setting her ear against the charcoal shale.

  “Do you hear anything?”

  “No, Father. Of course not. She’s dead. You just said so.”

  “Yes,” Machen whispered. “She is.” And the wind whipping across the hillside made a hungry, waiting sound that told him it was time for them to head back to the house.

  This is where I stand, at the bottom gate, and I hold the key to the abyss . . .

  “But it’s better that way,” the girl said, her ear still pressed tight against the obelisk. “She couldn’t stand the pain any longer. It was cutting her up inside.”

  “She told you that?”

  “She didn’t have to tell me that. I saw it in her eyes.”

  The ebony key to the first day and the last, the key to the moment when the stars wink out, one by one, and the sea heaves its rotting belly at the empty, sagging sky.

  “You’re only a child,” he said. “You shouldn’t have had to see such things. Not yet.”