Summerlong

This book is a brilliant little piece of magic realism. Modern life with classic mythology. Beagle's style always strikes me as more literary than a lot of my favorites, which lends this solid grounding to his fantasy. The characters in this book are strikingly vivid and unique, and at this point in my life, people I really need to read about. Del and Abe have been together 22 years, but live literally on different islands and never married. This concept alone is intriguing even before a literal goddess enters the scene.

This is a book about habits and routines, about the comfort they bring and the danger of being too comfortable. The ability of humans to change stands in stark contrast to the inability of myths. Consequences are real both for stagnation and risk, and the characters have to decide over and over again which is their real priority. This is not a story that gets told with such delicacy very much, and I found the whole thing touching at a time when I needed to hear that humans are never too old to change.