Peter S. Beagle, "Mirror Kingdoms"

I like short stories, but I have trouble to read any collection of it whole. No matter whether it is a themed anthology, or “best of”, or one-author collection, I start out excited and run through several stories, and then I my enthusiasm fizzles out and I have to make myself read on, and them there are always some stories that are left unread – not necessarily at the end of a book, since I rarely read them in order. There are exceptions, of course. But all my latest science-fiction and fantasy short stories reading followed the same pattern. And I've decided to make piece with it. Yes, I won't read the whole collection, so what? I'll still read several whole short stories and get my fun.
The last attempt is the collection of best short stories by Peter S. Beagle's Mirror Kingdoms. I have never actually read anything by Beagle before, so I came with no expectations except that it was supposed to be awesome. And it was – some of what I read, anyway. I started withMy Uncle Chaime, My Aunt Rifke and the Blue Angel . And... You have to read this, it's amazing, and possibly beyond amazing. It's a very stark, very simple story and it touches something - our sense of wonder, our hunger for mystery and some deep-seated sadness. It is my favourite type of stories – when in our regular world something wondrous happens. There are other stories in the collection of that type, but none had a similar effect on me. It happens in New York of author's childhood, and the details are so vivid that I can feel everything the boy narrator sees and feels – Beagle's stand-in, his uncle Chaim, the artist, uncle's friend, aunt Rifke, the rabbi, and the city they live. It's an amazing story.

After that – I was not reading in order, but by accident, I had a totally unexpected treat. You see, my parents had a book, a part of science fiction collection, that I loved to read when I was about 10 or 12. It was an anthology of magical short stories by foreign writers (foreign to USSR ) It was mostly translations from English, but I think there was a Japanese story and something else non-English. The thing is, it all being in Russian and me not caring about names as much as about stories I hardly remember whose stories I read and loved. But I remember the stories themselves. (I probably could research it on the Internet, but it was never urgent, just a delicious memory.) Back to the book: I open one page, and I see a story from that book, from my childhood! Very much the same, translation notwithstanding. Come Lady Death.

Then there were other stories – some I liked a lot, some I was kind of meh about. All worthwhile read. And I read El Regalo – which I liked, and realized that I am done with this book. I am leaving it in a very good place and hope to come to it again some day in the future. There are still unread stories there. I might even love them, but not now.