Perfect for readers of George Saunders, Karen Russell, Neil Gaiman, and Aimee Bender, Magic for Beginners is an exquisite, dreamlike dispatch from a virtuoso storyteller who can do seemingly anything. Kelly Link reconstructs modern life through an intoxicating prism, conjuring up unforgettable worlds with humor and humanity. These stories are at once ingenious and deeply moving. They leave the reader astonished and exhilarated. Includes an exclusive conversation between Kelly Link and Joe Hill Praise for Magic for Beginners “A sorceress to be reckoned with.” -- The New York Times Book Review “[Kelly] Link’s stories . . . play in a place few writers go, a netherworld between literature and fantasy, Alice Munro and J. K. Rowling, and Link finds truths there that most authors wouldn’t dare touch.” --Lev Grossman, Time “She is unique and should be declared a national treasure.” --Neil Gaiman “Funny, scary, surprising and powerfully moving within the span of a single story or even a single sentence.” --Karen Russell, The Miami Herald “This is what certain readers live for: fiction that makes the world instead of merely mimicking it.” --Audrey Niffenegger “[These] exquisite stories mix the aggravations and epiphanies of everyday life with the stuff that legends, dreams and nightmares are made of.” --Laura Miller, Salon, Best Books of the Decade “A major talent . . . Like George Saunders, [Link] can’t dismiss the hidden things that tap on our windows at night.” -- The Boston Globe “The most darkly playful voice in American fiction.” --Michael Chabon “I think she is the most impressive writer of her generation.” --Peter Straub “Link’s world is one to savor. [Grade:] A” -- Entertainment Weekly “Intricate, wildly imaginative and totally wonderful . . . will fill you with awe and joy.” --NPR ...

ldquo;A sorceress to be reckoned with.”—The New York Times Book Review
* 
“[Kelly] Link’s stories . . . play in a place few writers go, a netherworld between literature and fantasy, Alice Munro and J. K. Rowling, and Link finds truths there that most authors wouldn’t dare touch.”—Lev Grossman, Time
 
“She is unique and should be declared a national treasure.”—Neil Gaiman
 
“Funny, scary, surprising and powerfully moving within the span of a single story or even a single sentence.”—Karen Russell, The Miami Herald
 
“This is what certain readers live for: fiction that makes the world instead of merely mimicking it.”—Audrey Niffenegger
 
“[These] exquisite stories mix the aggravations and epiphanies of everyday life with the stuff that legends, dreams and nightmares are made of.”—Laura Miller, Salon, Best Books of the Decade
 
“A major talent . . . Like George Saunders, [Link] can’t dismiss the hidden things that tap on our windows at night.”—The Boston Globe
 
“The most darkly playful voice in American fiction.”—Michael Chabon
 
“I think she is the most impressive writer of her generation.”—Peter Straub
 
“Link’s world is one to savor. [Grade:] A”—Entertainment Weekly *
 *
“Intricate, wildly imaginative and totally wonderful . . . will fill you with awe and joy.”—NPR*

Autorentext

MacArthur “Genius Grant” fellow Kelly Link is the author of the collections Get in Trouble, Stranger Things Happen, Magic for Beginners, and Pretty Monsters. She and Gavin J. Grant have co-edited a number of anthologies, including multiple volumes of *The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror *and, for young adults, Monstrous Affections. She is the co-founder of Small Beer Press. Her short stories have been published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, The Best American Short Stories, and Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards. She hasalso received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. Link was born in Miami, Florida. She currently lives with her husband and daughter in Northampton, Massachusetts.

Zusammenfassung
From MacArthur “Genius Grant” fellow Kelly Link, bestselling author of White Cat, Black Dog and The Book of Love, an “eerie and engrossing” (The Washington Post), “dazzling” (The New York Times Book Review) collection of short stories
 
**“[These] exquisite stories mix the aggravations and epiphanies of everyday life with the stuff that legends, dreams and nightmares are made of.”—Laura Miller, *Salon, “*Best Books of the Decade”
 
LOCUS AWARD WINNER • A TIME AND SEATTLE TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR**
 
One of the most critically acclaimed collections of our time, Magic for Beginners is an exquisite, dreamlike dispatch from a virtuoso storyteller who can do seemingly anything. Kelly Link reconstructs modern life through an intoxicating prism, conjuring up unforgettable worlds with humor and humanity. **These stories are at once ingenious and deeply moving. They leave the reader astonished and exhilarated.

Includes an exclusive conversation between Kelly Link and Joe Hill

Leseprobe

The Faery Handbag

I used to go to thrift stores with my friends. We’d take the train into Boston, and go to The Garment District, which is this huge vintage clothing warehouse. Everything is arranged by color, and somehow that makes all of the clothes beautiful. It’s kind of like if you went through the wardrobe in the Narnia books, only instead of finding Aslan and the White Witch and horrible Eustace, you found this magic clothing world—instead of talking animals, there were feather boas and wedding dresses and bowling shoes, and paisley shirts and Doc Martens and everything hung up on racks so that first you have black dresses, all together, like the world’s largest indoor funeral, and then blue dresses—all the blues you can imagine—and then red dresses and so on. Pink reds and orangey reds and purple reds and exit-light reds and candy reds. Sometimes I would close my eyes and Natasha and Natalie and Jake would drag me over to a rack, and rub a dress against my hand. “Guess what color this is.”

We had this theory that you could learn how to tell, just by feeling, what color something was. For example, if you’re sitting on a lawn, you can tell what color green the grass is, with your eyes closed, depending on how silky-rubbery it feels. With clothing, stretchy velvet stuff always feels red when your eyes are closed, even if it’s not red. Natasha was always best at guessing colors, but Natasha is also best at cheating at games and not getting caught.

One time we were looking through kids’ T-shirts and we found a Muppets T-shirt that had belonged to Natalie in third grade. We knew it belonged to her, because it still had her name inside, where her mother had written it in permanent marker when Natalie went to summer camp. Jake bought it back for her, because he was the only one who had money that weekend. He was the only one who had a job.

Maybe you’re wondering what a guy like Jake is doing in The Garment District with a bunch of girls. The thing about Jake is that he always has a good time, no matter what he’s doing. He likes everything, and he likes everyone, but he likes me best of all. Wherever he is now, I bet he’s having a great time and wondering when I&r…