a nested tale of gifts and repair
October 16, 2024 10:59 AM   Subscribe

"I guess we were both hungry for company, what with the physical distancing and all, because she lingered and I lingered too." "The Fake Birdhouses of Springville" by Amy Johnson, published March 2024, is a short, sweet piece of fantasy fiction that starts "on a warm summer day of 2020.... a third of the way through my route delivering supplies to the elderly and other pandemic-homebound for our local mutual aid society". Worm, a woman who's "always had an affinity for small creatures", finds her kindness unexpectedly repaid.
posted by brainwane (4 comments total) 8 users marked this as a favorite
 
(Bookmarked to read as soon as I can. brainwane, I am so glad you've been posting stories this week - I love the things you find. Thank you! I'll be back soon, I hope, with an actual comment on the story itself.)
posted by kristi at 11:18 AM on October 16 [2 favorites]


kristi, I thought of you in particular when I teared up while reading this story.

And I think people who enjoy fiction by Ursula Vernon and Charlie Jane Anders and Naomi Kritzer may also like this story, its attention to care and community, and the pandemic, and repair.
posted by brainwane at 11:23 AM on October 16 [1 favorite]


That was both painfully cozy and comfortingly hard to read. It caught a time that seems a long time ago but is still real fresh, with a little magic and hope to fill in the cracks. A difficult but rewarding read. And, yes, there were tears.

The dancing in the sidewalk scene remind me of this FPP, which I looked up recently out of some unnamable desire to remember what the early days of the pandemic felt like.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:27 PM on October 16


Awwwwwww.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:01 PM on October 16


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