You Are Such a One: 09/19/09

I'm grateful that she second story in the August / September issue of Fantasy & Science Fiction is short. I think it's only about ten pages (give or take). It was perfect for a hot end of summer day when I was busy cleaning house and suffering from a migraine.

So this week's story is "You Are Such a One" by Nancy Springer. Springer has fifty books under her belt. I need to look for them at the library when it re-opens. For the meantime I only know her writing through her FSF short stories.

Written in second person present tense, "You Are Such a One" puts the reader into the body of a middle-aged menopausal woman. She's on her way to the funeral of a distant relative. She's left her husband and children for this trip. On her way to the funeral she sees a house she knows inside and out; it's the home from her nightly dream.

Here Springer states her thesis: there is no difference between conscious life and dream life. If there is no difference, can one trade one for another? If you are middle aged nearly invisible woman in your job and your family life, maybe it's better to be the ghost your dreams allow you to be. So, where do you haunt in your dreams?

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