Full name: The Fantasy Writer's Assistant and Other Stories

Author: Jeffrey Ford Rank: Rating: Original Rating: Pop Rating: Genres/categories: Fantasy, Award winners, Short Stories Purchase/reserch links: Goodreads LibraryThing Amazon ISBNs: 9781930846104 9781930846579 193084610X 1930846576

At times literary, at other times surreal, this collection offers an eclectic group of stories that deal with real-life conflicts, human values, and coming-of-age experiences all placed within fantastical settings. One tale recounts the author's search for a Kafka story that can only be found in an elusive and quite possibly cursed edition. Other stories feature humans dressing in full-body protective exoskins in the personas of old Hollywood movie stars to barter old Earth movies for an alien aphrodisiac and a young boy coming to terms with creation and moulding his own man out of detritus from a nearby forest. In the title story, a great fantasy writer loses touch with the world he has created and pleads with his young assistant to help him visualise the story's end and enable him to complete his greatest novel ever. Similar books: The Bread We Eat in Dreams by Catherynne M. Valente The Empire of Ice Cream by Jeffrey Ford Innocents Aboard by Gene Wolfe 13 Phantasms by James P. Blaylock The Bible Repairman and Other Stories by Tim Powers The Overneath by Peter S. Beagle Moon Mirror by Andre Norton The Line Between by Peter S. Beagle Sleight of Hand by Peter S. Beagle The Adventures of Doctor Eszterhazy by Avram Davidson The Very Best of Tad Williams by Tad Williams The Very Best of Kate Elliott by Kate Elliott Cartomancy by Mary Gentle Scholars and Soldiers by Mary Gentle The Woman Who Loved the Moon by Elizabeth A. Lynn The Drowned Life by Jeffrey Ford Crackpot Palace by Jeffrey Ford The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke Chivalry by Neil Gaiman Waifs and Strays by Charles de Lint