Review: The Rental Heart and Other Fairytales by Kirsty Logan
About:
The Rental Heart and Other Fairytales was written by Kirsty Logan and published in 2014. This is her debut collection of short stories and all have a touch of the magical and fairytalesque. They all feature tales of longing, lust or love in its various forms.
Did I like it?:
Sadly, I wasn’t totally thrilled with this collection. Although there were still stories that I liked. I had read The Gracekeepers previously which I adore, but this didn’t live up to that. However, this short story collection is where she began and I could see her exploring and discovering her style, which was cool!
Favorite stories:
The title story The Rental Heart was good about a place you could rent hearts to save yourself the pain of heartbreak. Underskirts was a favorite, written from different perspectives, all about a woman who hires maids simply for her pleasure and orgies. Surrounding herself with femininity to stave off harsh controlling masculinity. Coin- Operated Boys was in a similar vein to The Rental Heart in that it was about boys you can rent for companionship that have all the perfection that real men don’t. Girl #18 was a good, but sad story about a boy whose sister dies. Una and Coll are not friends was about a girl with antlers and a boy with a tiger tail who have a chemistry they wish they could deny. That story felt full of lust and longing in a tangible youthful way. The Gracekeeper is obviously the short story that inspired The Gracekeepers so that was fun to read. Witch was a twist on the Baba Yaga fairytale filled with coming of age lust that I enjoyed. The Man From the Circus was good about a girl who gets drawn into being a trapeze artist. I saw other glimpses similar to The Gracekeepers in that one. Feeding was one of the best stories in the collection. All about a couple living in the Outback. The woman is barren and so is her land and she slaves away all day until she wastes away trying to ‘grow something’. That story was powerful and well put together. Perhaps the best in the collection. Matryoshka was another one I liked about the unrequited love a princess has for her maid. Origami was a poignant story about a lonely woman who constructs a man out of paper because her husband works on an oil rig and she struggles without him. Last but not least Tiger Palace was a great story about a traveler who goes to a famed castle where an empress lives and they change the story that people tell about that place to suit themselves. Ending with the wonderful line: “But, as it turned out, stories can have any ending you like”.
Do I Recommend This?:
It depends. I really recommend The Gracekeepers to get into Kirsty Logan. If you have read everything else of hers and are quite a fan perhaps getting to see her beginnings and she her trying to find her bearings would be of interest. At the moment I’m thinking her short stories are a way for her to get a bunch of neat ideas out, but that she has mastered the novel. However, that may only be the case with this one. Kirsty Logan in general is for fans of the magical and fairytale inspired.
~ Katie
