The Merry Spinster: Tales of Everyday Horror

I am an unapologetic (Daniel) Mallory Ortberg fangirl. I've followed his work since the Toast, was overcome with glee when he took over Dear Prudence and basically think he can do no wrong. I also love faerie tales and hate short stories, so that's pretty much the context for where I'm coming from.Ortberg is a master of language and it shines here. His wit is subtle, but biting, and each story quickly comes into focus with a clear tone and setting, in a way that many short stories authors struggle with. In a lot of ways, the book reminded me of Kelly Link's work – designed as an intellectual puzzle that left you feeling something, without necessarily understanding why or what was literally happening in the story. Which is a super cool effect. But sometimes, a girl just wants to get what's happening, so by the end of the book the impact of that had kind of worn off.My favorite stories was the first, a really atmospheric retelling of The Little Mermaid, perhaps because many of the conceits that Ortberg used throughout the book were new and shiny still then. I loved the way Ortberg played with my expectations of “mermaid” by introducing radial symmetry, and the administrative humor of the Rules of the Fae. The siren/selkie tale later on used a lot of the same tricks, but just felt less cool. The two Frog & Toad-based stories stood out. Both because I don't consider Frog & Toad a faerie tale, but also they both had the same tone of passive aggressive/gaslighting horror. (Which was kind of also present in the Merry Spinster – where Beauty basically just bullied everyone by “never thinking of herself”) And yes, that is my personal bogeyman, but at the same time, I kind of wanted to be like “who hurt you?”Daniel Mallory Orbterg came out as a transman and changed his name coincident to the publishing of this book.

So this JUST came out. I'd had my eye on it for a few months, and put a request in as soon as my library ordered it. The author recently came out as trans, so it's also part of my effort to read more inclusively. Ortberg definitely played with gender and sexuality in several of these tales; in one of them people decided whether to be the husband or the wife, independent of their gender, in their marriage. (One party to the marriage in the story stated “I've been trained for both roles.”) In another all of a man's daughters used male pronouns and that was never explored further. That was slightly odd.

These were dark, twisted versions of these stories. “Our Friend Mr. Toad,” for example, involved gaslighting and psychologically torturing poor Mr. Toad. I found that one particularly disturbing. I enjoyed the title story, Ortberg's version of Beauty and the Beast, which has a very different ending from expected. I also really liked “The Daughter Cells”, inspired by The Little Mermaid. I LOVED “Fear Not: An Incident Log.”

I think this was a great, albeit strange, little book. It's unique, for sure, and a quick read. If you're looking for a fairy tale collection that is VERY different, try this one.

You can find all my reviews at Goddess in the Stacks.

This is one that I'm not sure how to rate–it's billed as “tales of everyday horror” and I think these absolutely are horror stories. But I...had hoped that they wouldn't be? I was hoping for something that skewed more funny and less horror-y. And I mean, it is funny, and has some Extremely Ortberg turns of phrase. But also I couldn't read this before bed (as is my custom) because it was really fucking me uppp

Which speaks to the power of the writing, but also I DON'T LIKE THAT.

I thought it was just me. I read these stories and thought, is this too clever for me? Am I not getting it? Perhaps. Or perhaps the things that left a bad taste in my mouth such as flip-flopping gender pronouns (which is NOT the same as having gender fluid characters), abusive dialogue as character development, and vague endings bothered other readers too. I am not alone.
I appreciated Ortberg's fresh takes on some tales, but I have read a great many retellings over the years and many have been more clever than this. I found the writing to be unnecessarily repetitive. My favorite story was The Rabbit, which was horrifically wonderful (if only because I have always disliked The Velveteen Rabbit). I would hold The Six-Boy Coffins up as a fun feminist read, but the rest....meh.
By far, my favorite thing about this collection was the cover. The cover is gorgeous.