Midnight and Moonshine

In “Seeds,” the opening story of Hannett and Slatter’s innovative dark fantasy collection, Mymnir, Odinn’s white raven, flees the Ragnarok, “an apocalypse for the gods alone,” and comes to the New World. There she creates a Fae kingdom in the image of Asgardr, transforming herself from a thieving, neglected raven into the fearsome, immortal Fae Queen. Though each story in this collection is self-contained and varied in tone and setting (Mymnir’s Fae Court, Prohibition-era Charleston, the present, to name a few), each one builds upon its predecessor, with multiple generations of protagonists and recurring objects, characters (especially Mymnir, whose desires and memories, over the centuries, bring her to the cusp of another Ragnarok), and themes. Marked by imagery both beautiful and grotesque, and unnerving twists that recall the uncanny horror of original fairy tales, this collection contains a unifying, multilayered plot that draws upon Norse mythology to take the reader on a thrilling, unsettling journey. (Nov.)