I’m not 100% sure what I read, like for real, the opening story in this book, “In Our Own Image” almost did me in with how creepy it was! I legit read it and then was like do I want to keep going? Is this collection going to give me nightmares?
This book wasn’t on my radar as I don’t read a lot of short stories, but the author, a fellow knitter (@fairygodfatherknits) and I follow each other on Instagram and I had randomly posted about getting my works-in-progress and my ARC pile under control this year and he reached out.*
Every story in here was worth the read, there were five that have stayed with me since I finished it nearly a month ago as I’m writing this. I have either spent quite a bit of time thinking about them or they have randomly popped back into my head over the past few weeks. Some were because they were creepy as hell, others because Trafford really made me think about things in a different way and that’s the sign of a good storyteller. Below are my quick thoughts on each:
- “In Our Own Image”
- WTAF did I read? Trafford wrote a psychological horror story without blood or murder that lives in the mundane in under 10 pages. This one seriously messed me up. After reading it one night, I put the book down and questioned whether or not I could stomach reading the rest of the stories. This visceral response made me both cautious and curious to continue the collection. I wasn’t sure if the stories would (or could) get better or if the collection was going to flame out in the first story.
- “This Is How We Remember Kayla”
- This one was mediocre for me until there was one throw away line that turned the entire story on its head close to the end. Sure I appreciated the ridiculousness of the situation, the “other” mother being present and having a huge chip on her shoulder, the hilarious spammy leafleting, but it was just sort of okay. However, in the penultimate section, 5-6 paragraphs from the close of the story Trafford throws in a cut-off line between the protagonist and her therapist, that was an absolute gut punch. That one line had me rethinking everything about the story and how the entire thing might’ve been experienced differently if he had opened with that line or a similar line. That one line highlighted his talent in being able to turn a well crafted story into an expertly crafted one.
- “A Complete Index of How Our Family Was Formed”
- This one stood with me for its structure. It is an alphabetical list of things related to the creation of a family. When I saw the format all I could think sarcastically was “Oh, joy, someone playing with format. What will I actually get out of this? Is this going to be one of those poem type ones that I just don’t understand or that tries too hard?” Nope, thankfully it was again very well crafted. It was a cohesive and relatively easy to follow story that had crescendos and built on itself in circular references somehow being both clinical (from the structure) to emotional (from the content) simultaneously.
- “Swipe Right for Chad” and “Far from the Tree”
- Many of Trafford’s stories play with and lean into psychological impact and the “grotesqueries of the modern world” (from the blurb) and they often feel as if they live in the space between realistic fiction and magical realism and some go all the way into fantasy. Not epic-fantasy, but every-day mundane fantasy: a world where centaurs exist and they use dating apps and interspecies relationships are just as messy as human-human (Swipe Right). And an incredibly sad story full of anthropomorphic racoons trying to start a modern family (Far from the Tree). I think because these were at the end and they moved from the psychological to the mundane with fantastical elements I was a little confused at first, but I was 100% invested in them and they’ve stood with me because they were so well crafted and each had moments of sheer joy and absolute betrayal that stood out over some of the other stories.
Many of the other stories have also stuck with me since I read it, these were just the five that had the largest impact.
Recommendation: Overall, I found this collection to be incredibly well written and worth the read. The title and the blurb do not lie, these are not light hearted stories and they really dig into the darker side of humanity and individuals. I would recommend mentally bracing yourself because none of them are light reads, even those that start out lighter or mundane fall into a deep dark undertone that you don’t always come out of before the end. Trafford’s writing pulls you in and doesn’t let you go, sometimes not until long after you’ve finished reading the story. And this says something about him as an author, because short stories are compact. They’re succinct and you only have so much space to make an impact and every one of them does.
*I received a copy of Runs in the Blood from the author in return for my honest opinion. No goods or money were exchanged.
No opening or closing lines as this is a book of short stories.
