Books That Burn reviewed Where You Linger by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam
Review of 'Where You Linger' on 'Storygraph'
3 stars
This is a collection about relationships and brokenness, the pieces which linger and the parts which are lost forever. Sometimes obsolesce is planned, other times it’s unexpected and strange. The stories each explore duration, impermanence, and loss in different ways.
My favorite story is “Husband Wife Lover”, a story told in notes from three people after their relationship as a trio ended. It has such subtle worldbuilding. I also love “Where You Came from”, which has a longing similar style in just one perspective, and a very different setting.
“The Mammoth” is a gender plague story, focusing on just a couple of survivors, and one which has the smart storytelling decision of having the plague target people with y-chromosomes, but to not have killed literally everyone who has one. There are little details which make it clear that society has adapted to many fewer cis men, but didn’t lose them …
My favorite story is “Husband Wife Lover”, a story told in notes from three people after their relationship as a trio ended. It has such subtle worldbuilding. I also love “Where You Came from”, which has a longing similar style in just one perspective, and a very different setting.
“The Mammoth” is a gender plague story, focusing on just a couple of survivors, and one which has the smart storytelling decision of having the plague target people with y-chromosomes, but to not have killed literally everyone who has one. There are little details which make it clear that society has adapted to many fewer cis men, but didn’t lose them completely.
I like the collection overall, but my enjoyment of the stories individually was very uneven. The titular story, “Where You Linger”, is about someone using a therapeutic technology to relive past relationships in order to adjust something in their own perceptions of them. All of the stories have a surreal edge to them, this more-so than most.