Stories That Work: “It Never Snows in Snowtown” by Rebecca Zahabi, and “Dust” by Edward Ashton
 |
 |
F&SF cover art by Bob Eggleton
Ray Bradbury caused the ruckus first with The Martian Chronicles, but I also blame Eric Frank Russell’s Men, Martians and Machines, and Anthony Boucher’s A Treasury of Great Science Fiction. Before those three books, I only read novels — short ones to be sure — like Tom Swift and Tom Corbett and anything that the Weekly Reader Book Club featured in their regular catalogs. After reading Bradbury, Russell and Boucher, short stories hooked me. They drew me so powerfully that when I grew older I believed that maybe I could write some, and for the last thirty-five years, that’s what I’ve been doing.
Here’s the thing, though, the mood, energy and time to write exactly overlaps reading time, so I found that I read much less as an adult than I did when I was younger. Also, my tastes have narrowed. Where I used to read indiscriminately, uncritically, I now am a picky reader. Time seems short, and I hate to waste it on middle-of-the-road writing.
So when I find an outstanding short stories, I point them out. Reading time is precious!
F&SF offered a truly disturbing piece by Rebecca Zahabi in the Nov/Dec 2019 issue. “It Never Snows in Snowtown” starts like a Christmas card as the unnamed narrator decides to find out more of her city’s cultural heritage. Zahabi’s artful language creates a compelling portrait. Snowflakes catch in a child’s clothes “like sugar icing sprinkled on this human cupcake,” and on the city’s lake, “couples danced together, twirling around each other like birds trying to tell their love in flight.”
