Bluegrass Symphony

Nominated for a World Fantasy Award, Bluegrass Symphony is Lisa L. Hannett’s debut collection. In these twelve stories, shapeshifting is both a bootlegger’s skill and a twig-wife’s cruel punishment. Desperate deals are brokered between woodsmen and minotaurs, fae creatures and midwives, soul-smoking mayors and pegasus-riding delivery girls―for safety, as well as selfishness. These are tales of the superstitions, dreams, nightmares and realities of life in harsh prairie country, trailer parks, and deep woods teeming with wolves. They tell of revenants and cowboys, pageant queens and rednecks, soothsaying fowl and talking squirrels―and the magic that draws such strange folk together.

Robert Shearman, author of Tiny Deaths

“Lisa L. Hannett’s collections plays like a country music album composed in the darker places of imagination, the little corners that you don’t want to look in as you tap-tap your foot to the catchy beat. Coolly beautiful, then coldly brutal, this is one of the most unnerving debuts in years.”

Jeff VanderMeer, author of the Southern Reach trilogy

“Here at the beginning of her career, Hannett shows a stylistic flair and depth of story rare in even established writers. Her fiction in this collection is smart, confident, and in her own voice.”

Ann VanderMeer

“Hannett’s work has the uncanny ability to get under your skin. . . . Her use of language can make even the most horrifying scenes beautiful, so that you can. you won’t, turn away. That’s a rare talent.”

Kirstyn McDermott, author of Perfections

“Take a scruff of minotaur hair and a handful of mermaid scales, mix them with mothdust and the bloody feathers of a murdered oracle, and you might get a taste of the strange and dream-soaked magic that Lisa Hannett conjures with this remarkable debut collection. Bluegrass Symphony introduces a rare and original voice whose stories linger, dark and luscious and bold as tarnished brass, long after you have finished reading them.”

Angela Slatter, author of Sourdough and Other Stories

“Lisa Hannett weaves words the way the Norns weave fates, elegantly, seamlessly and with just a little bit of cruelty. Her stories are astonishing in their scope, so strange and yet familiar. Her ability to insert the unlikely and the terrifying into the everyday with such a convincing touch that you have no problem believing in Swan Girls, Minotaur rodeos, soul cigars and twig-wives, is simply stunning.”

Publishers Weekly

“Australian author Hannett’s first collection shows off her fondness for lush imagery, unsettling concepts, indirect prose, and multilayered plots. The stories push boundaries and experiment with style, form, and meaning, rarely straightforward and often hovering between fantasy and horror . . . this is a collection for fans of weirdness, wonder, and oft-disturbing twists.”

Publishers Weekly

“As an act of literary worldbuilding, [Lament for the Afterlife] is a triumph, evoking the unclassifiable oddness of Arkady and Boris Strugatsky’s Roadside Picnic and Jeff VanderMeer’s Area X trilogy.

Kirkus Reviews

“An excellent example of speculative fiction-as-mirror, Lament for the Afterlife causes readers to challenge comfort and question the status quo.”

About the Author

Lisa L. Hannett has had over 70 short stories appear in venues including Clarkesworld, Weird Tales, Apex, The Dark and Year’s Best anthologies in Australia, Canada and the US. She has won four Aurealis Awards, including Best Collection for her first book, Bluegrass Symphony, which was also nominated for a World Fantasy Award. Her first novel, Lament for the Afterlife, was published by CZP in 2015. A new collection of short stories, Little Digs, is coming out in August 2019. You can find her online at www.lisahannett.com and on Twitter @LisaLHannett.

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