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INTERMEDIATE FICTION
Andrews, Christiane M.

Spindlefish and Stars

400 pp. | Little | September, 2020 | Trade ISBN 978-0-316-49601-8 $16.99 | Ebook ISBN 978-0-316-49602-5 $9.99
(2) 4-6 "Once, on the far end of the village in the last of the crumbling homes, lived a girl." Andrews's novel begins as a fairy tale and quasi-medieval quest story but soon veers into the mythic and supernatural with imagery that is both mysterious and evocative. Clo and her father never stay in one place for long, and Clo is used to the nights they flit, taking with them a few pilfered pastries and stolen works of art. One night, her father doesn't show; instead, he sends her a ticket for "half passage" for a sea voyage. Dropped at a gray, remote island halfway between the world of the living and that of the dead, the miserable Clo lands up in the sparse hut of an old woman whose language is incomprehensible but whose orders are clear: Clo is to card and spin baskets of glittering fish into yarn. Andrews draws on the Greek tale of Icarus and the imagery of the three Fates, the Ship of the Dead, and the tools of spinning and weaving for a dreamy, immersive story that raises questions about the power of art and the value of human suffering.
Reviewer: Deirdre F. Baker | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2020

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