#ShortStoryMonth Day Nine — “That Door is a Mischief,” by Alex Jeffers

Through the Door

I love connected short fiction. I love Alex Jeffers’ talent and skill and sheer artistry with short fiction. I love one of his characters I bumped into, I think, in Icarus magazine way back in the day: Liam, the fairy raised by gay dads who found him. All this came into a perfect little microcosm of things ‘Nathan loves when That Door is a Mischief was released, and there was an entire book—an entire book!—of Liam stories in my little hands.

That Door is a Mischief is a brilliant whole made of magnificent parts. There’s pain, and love; fear, and growth; beginnings, and, yes, and ending. But even the ending has that Jeffers magic spun through it, and somewhere alongside the choking feeling of sadness at the final few lines I was still smiling in spite of myself.

If you’re at all a lover of short fiction, and if you’re at all a lover of speculative fiction where our world intersects with something ‘other,’ then you need to do yourself the favour of finding a copy of That Door is a Mischief.

Open it. Step through. You won’t be same, but then again, with magical doors that’s always the point.

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Other connected short fiction I love? I’ve already mentioned Jeff Mann’s Desire and Devour yesterday (but it bears repeating: 1700’s Scot leather-bear Vampire living in today’s Appalachia); Jimmy Misfit’s The Silliest Stories out of Bustleburg, America’s Worst City is a delight of satire and amusement (and a little on-the-nose with the way things are going down there, to be honest); and, of course, the Newford stories by Charles de Lint are freaking amazing, urban fantasy/magical realism that all starts with Dreams Underfoot.

What about you? Connected short fiction you’ve read and loved? Hit me with it.