Pathos, poignance and gentle humor accent the nine stories in this stellar fantasy collection from Spencer (Zod Wallop
), whose characters engage readers' sympathies through their efforts to accommodate the tectonic shifts of wildly unpredictable life experiences. "The Oddskeeper's Daughter" begins as a fantasy of a man's love for an otherworldly woman before revealing itself to be a moving meditation on the frailty and tenuousness of romance itself. In the title story, a family's annual visit to a seaside resort ends with a tragedy that reveals the awe and terror of the sea to the jaded innkeeper who has long taken it for granted. The book's best selection is the giddy "The Essayist in the Wilderness," whose unreliable narrator—a writer who looks to the natural world as inspiration for his philosophic reflections—is blissfully ignorant that the animal activity he is reporting is not only unnatural but potentially horrifying. Spencer includes an insightful introduction on the importance of fiction that the contents of his book bear out magnificently. (June)
