Now for Part 2 of my two-part squee series. Despite her weirdly fanficcy name, Catherynne M. Valente is possibly my favorite modern author not just because she’s so talented, but because she’s so prolific. I’m not even halfway through her huge catalogue, and every single thing is equally as good as everything else, no matter when she wrote it. It’s hard to believe she’s just one person; I can’t imagine being this good of a storyteller for this long with apparently zero fuckups.
Valente’s main genre is mythofantasy. Her works have tackled Christian, Arab, Russian, Japanese, Nordic, and a whole bunch of other mythologies with grace, nuance, and aplomb. She’s written for children and adults and always manages to say things that I need to hear when I’m reading her work. If someone wanted my worldview summed up in one author, I’d direct them to Valente.
I don’t think I’ll be able to do anything but gush about these books but oh well.
Also, if you do nothing else with this post, read The Refrigerator Monologues. It’s a series of vignettes about the fridged girlfriends of superheroes and it is this blog condensed into novella form.