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xf_book_clubThis week's story, nominated by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bravenewcentury, is "Strangers and the Strange Dead" by Kipler. In the 2000 Spooky Awards, it tied with "Aquinnah" by Anjou for first place for best mid-length story. I suspect it would make many writers' top ten lists, as it is technically brilliant, memorable, and original.
Summary: In which dead bodies and shivering people disturb the hilltown of Bradenton, and our young, orphaned narrator serves hot beverages to the investigating agents even as she ponders the peculiar, elusive nature of their relationship.
I was in the coffee shop, late afternoon, mid-January. I liked to work the afternoon shift, from 11 to 4:30, because no one came for a bagel or a sandwich at 4:00; the most I had to do was brew another pot of decaf, refresh the cream in the creamer. That gave me time to sit in the big booth and write. I was working to save money to start at college the next fall. Technically I was too old to be a freshman - 21 - but it was time for me to get out of town. So, I sat alone in the coffee shop with my books and my paper when the door opened and the bell went off to alert me. A man stood there in the slanting light. I couldn't really see him but heard his voice: "I need some food."
I got up and moved behind the counter.
"We close in a half-hour," I said. "There's not much left. A couple muffins and some beef barley."
"Soup?" the man asked, and I looked at him then because his voice shook and his teeth chattered as he finished speaking. He was slight, swallowed by the jacket he wore. His lined face was dirty or bruised - I couldn't tell which - and his right coat sleeve was torn from elbow to cuff. At first I thought he was drunk but then I saw a drop of water run off the pull-cord of his hood and realized that he was wet and cold.
"You OK?" I asked, wondering if I should be alone with him.
He looked at me, then pointed out the window, toward the hills.
"I was up there," he said. "I need some food."
"Your car break down?" I asked.
"No. I was up in the woods."
Up in the woods was nothing in summer and even less in winter. Bare trees, cold ground, our little mountain and then another and twenty minutes' drive on Route 60 to the next town.
"You were camping?" I asked. The man stared at me, his face blank as though I'd been speaking a language he'd forgotten. I pressed on. "Were you lost?"
"Lost," he said. "Yes."
"God," I said, and scalded myself pulling the ladle out of the soup pot. I brought a bowl to the man, and he looked at it for a minute, as if he'd forgotten how to eat, too, but then he picked up the bowl - no spoon - and drank the broth down in a series of gulps. The barley and celery he pushed into his mouth with the fingers of his left hand. The fingers were shaking, still.
"Can I get another bowl?" he asked.
The smell of him hit me then. I knew it from hunting parties and schools of fishermen, times when they'd come back from a trip to the woods with no running water and no women. And I knew the smell from trips to Boston, walking past the men on the street-corners, the ones who rattled tin cans as I moved by. People who are tied to normal life don't carry that smell.
If the link doesn't work, her stories are archived at Gossamer. If anyone has a working email address for her feedback, let me know. Suggestions for next time can be made here.
Strangers and the Strange Dead.
Kipler's Fan Fiction
bravenewcentury, is "Strangers and the Strange Dead" by Kipler. In the 2000 Spooky Awards, it tied with "Aquinnah" by Anjou for first place for best mid-length story. I suspect it would make many writers' top ten lists, as it is technically brilliant, memorable, and original.Summary: In which dead bodies and shivering people disturb the hilltown of Bradenton, and our young, orphaned narrator serves hot beverages to the investigating agents even as she ponders the peculiar, elusive nature of their relationship.
I was in the coffee shop, late afternoon, mid-January. I liked to work the afternoon shift, from 11 to 4:30, because no one came for a bagel or a sandwich at 4:00; the most I had to do was brew another pot of decaf, refresh the cream in the creamer. That gave me time to sit in the big booth and write. I was working to save money to start at college the next fall. Technically I was too old to be a freshman - 21 - but it was time for me to get out of town. So, I sat alone in the coffee shop with my books and my paper when the door opened and the bell went off to alert me. A man stood there in the slanting light. I couldn't really see him but heard his voice: "I need some food."
I got up and moved behind the counter.
"We close in a half-hour," I said. "There's not much left. A couple muffins and some beef barley."
"Soup?" the man asked, and I looked at him then because his voice shook and his teeth chattered as he finished speaking. He was slight, swallowed by the jacket he wore. His lined face was dirty or bruised - I couldn't tell which - and his right coat sleeve was torn from elbow to cuff. At first I thought he was drunk but then I saw a drop of water run off the pull-cord of his hood and realized that he was wet and cold.
"You OK?" I asked, wondering if I should be alone with him.
He looked at me, then pointed out the window, toward the hills.
"I was up there," he said. "I need some food."
"Your car break down?" I asked.
"No. I was up in the woods."
Up in the woods was nothing in summer and even less in winter. Bare trees, cold ground, our little mountain and then another and twenty minutes' drive on Route 60 to the next town.
"You were camping?" I asked. The man stared at me, his face blank as though I'd been speaking a language he'd forgotten. I pressed on. "Were you lost?"
"Lost," he said. "Yes."
"God," I said, and scalded myself pulling the ladle out of the soup pot. I brought a bowl to the man, and he looked at it for a minute, as if he'd forgotten how to eat, too, but then he picked up the bowl - no spoon - and drank the broth down in a series of gulps. The barley and celery he pushed into his mouth with the fingers of his left hand. The fingers were shaking, still.
"Can I get another bowl?" he asked.
The smell of him hit me then. I knew it from hunting parties and schools of fishermen, times when they'd come back from a trip to the woods with no running water and no women. And I knew the smell from trips to Boston, walking past the men on the street-corners, the ones who rattled tin cans as I moved by. People who are tied to normal life don't carry that smell.
If the link doesn't work, her stories are archived at Gossamer. If anyone has a working email address for her feedback, let me know. Suggestions for next time can be made here.
Strangers and the Strange Dead.
Kipler's Fan Fiction
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-04-17 01:33 pm (UTC)Anyway.
That winter, when our town was a layover spot for strangers and the strange dead, I was writing the river.
This has to be one of my favourite opening lines of anything, ever.
We steal what we can see and piece it together, mend the seams to make a story.
This is such a meta line. Third-party POV fics really interest me because there's something about writing an observer of Our Heroes that is very close to our own experience of watching the show, and writing fic. I like the episode 'Hungry' for the same reason, though of course there the viewpoint character was still pretty central. Kipler tells us the story from the eyes of an extra.
Also, the show often racks up the body and tragedy count right left and centre with such little regard for the bit players (which is understandable, given the format, but it hurts to watch sometimes) that having a character who would be peripheral, were this an episode, be so real and vivid and beautiful is a real treat.
The man was tall, roughly handsome with a deep voice.
In fact, it's Mulder and Scully who are peripheral here; they're just descriptions. But of course that has to be Mulder. Who else would it be? They're the important people, who stories are about.
I watched the man, saw the way his eyes did not leave the woman. It was the same as it had been in the library. It was as if she were a thing he was studying
This had me completely duped the first time I read the story. Doesn't that sound like Mulder? But of course the second time through it means something entirely different.
People are hard to write truly; they have so many frayed threads, loose strands that don't connect one to the other. But still: the threads stand there daring us to trace them back, to see what started them fraying. We always want a story.
*flails* Again, the very experience of being a reader/viewer. And of course this is what everybody will be doing on reading this story- tracing the threads back, but doing it wrong, because of the assumptions we make about what story we're being told. It's the same as we do every day- the same kind of process used for writing about strangers one sees in coffee shops, which is a pasttime of mine- but Kipler forces you to notice it.
I looked up from reading to see Pop beaming at me, proud of his investigative coup.
I love how the narrator and her grandfather are drawn in to the investigation themselves. Again, it's very meta. Half the fun of watching/reading investigative fiction is trying to crack the case yourself.
"You're not fine. You're too close to this."
Argh. ARGH.
If I had known, I would have watched her more closely, as she sat alone at the table and very still. I would have studied the piece of the story in her hands, pressed palms-down on the table, and in her lips drawn in, and in her head just-bowed and her eyes closed.
If only any of us had known.
It had been three weeks without drama in town, and suddenly I wanted the mystery to hang fresh over us.
This is a real kick of a comment too. We do get enjoyment out of stories about peoples' traumas, and it really comes back to bite here.
"He's walking toward the bridge."
I love the return to the river at the end- the kind of 'loop' to the narrative (a very 'fluid' sort of thing), the final piece that suddenly, shockingly alters everything, when we've only been seeing a little part of how the river flows.
"I've been looking for you, Mulder," she said. Her voice was deep and cracked. "I've been looking for you."
aghahjdajkl. The first time I read this it was like a kick in the stomach. Even though I know it's going to happen it's still a real shock to the system. Suddenly the story means something very different to what you thought. I think this really altered the way I think about reading fic, or at least made me think much more carefully about the process of reading. Absolutely brilliant.
Also I can hardly believe that this was actually written pre-Requiem. Talk about creepy.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-17 02:58 pm (UTC)the assumptions we make about what story we're being told.
Kipler plays on that vagueness, the little fragments of what an outside observer can offer-- which are referenced often in the idea of a story made from pieces, threads. One of my favorite parts is the end of Part One, which ends: I looked at his face and again at their feet in a snow-melt puddle under the table, and wondered what lines ran between them. Scratch that--I love the way the entire idea is presented, those paragraphs preceding/ concluding a section.
I can hardly believe that this was actually written pre-Requiem.
Well, after seasons of near-death, undeath (okay, so it's not a word) and alien abductions Chris Carter has to up the ante. Season finales need major cliffhangers, and the options are a) character(s) is/are in dangerous, life-threatening situation, b) character(s) is/are in unknown, probably also life- threatening situation. a) is utilized pretty much every episode, b) to a slightly lesser extent. I think it was just a matter of time before it happened. /cynicism
Still, it is creepy to know this was written before Requiem-- the writing resonates with the general feel of the episode.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-18 03:18 pm (UTC)Ha, I must say I do agree, I think what I meant was more what you said- that there's something very reminiscent of the Requiem abduction scenario in particular about it.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 12:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 02:20 pm (UTC)"big, dark-haired, handsome man" is a tad generic. Although I must say that any description that runs along those lines in an XF fic doesn't leave much room for interpretation. I find it amusing to note, however, that a description of a 'big nose' is often the clincher.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-22 03:28 am (UTC)yes! and you know, i've never understood that. honestly, mulder's nose doesn't seem that big to me. it's not a 'beak', and it's not mountainous. i'm not arguing it isn't somewhat larger than average, but it's nothing i would personally use to describe him to someone who had never seen him. also, people always seem to be saying that scully's nose is also quite large, which i don't see either. scully's nose is certainly unusual. but her nose is wonderfully narrow and even when i see her in profile, i don't find myself thinking about her nose being bigger than the usual. perhaps i have skewed nose expectations?
anyway, nose rant finished. *g*
I need to understand
Date: 2009-04-18 12:07 am (UTC)The comments that have been written highlight the strengths and the brilliance of this story, but I must be stupid because I still don't understand a crucial aspect, and is what left me confused about it when I first read it: in Chapter 2 they use their names for the first time and the "FBI man" addresses the woman as Scully...fine. But then she refers to him as Mulder...I thought the whole point is that he is NOT Mulder, or have I just missed an elementary point somewhere? (I guess I must have)
Re: I need to understand
Date: 2009-04-18 12:45 am (UTC)Scully is clearly pretty shaken up by all of these returnees, some alive, some dead. She must be terrified in fact. Will he be a stranger, like the ones who are returned alive, barely functional, nearly catatonic. Or will he be one of the "strange dead"? She calls her partner "Mulder" by accident, which is very upsetting to him. "I'm fine, Mulder." How many times have we heard her say that? Well, clearly she's not fine this time, but she isn't going to listen to her new partner any better than she did her old one. She has confirmed for him that she is indeed too close to this case, so close that everywhere she looks all she can see is what she has lost.
The parallel to Jess Mabe's "The Other Man" is striking, and not one I had considered.
You did not miss anything. Kipler wants the reader to think they are reading one story and then come to find out it is another story altogether. The other story that comes to mind in this genre is "Cellphone" by Marasmus. This one is even more of a shocker though, at least it was to me.
Re: I need to understand
Date: 2009-04-18 02:42 pm (UTC)I'm sorry for the Anonymous thing, it's not polite. I am not a Livejournal user, but have been following this club for a few weeks with great enjoyment. Generally I don't comment as I am not a member, but on this occasion comments seemed few....more's the pity.
Re: I need to understand
Date: 2009-04-18 04:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-18 05:18 pm (UTC)I think I'm hitting an "it's famous and perfect" wall. Because it is. Anyone who's hung around X fandom for any length of time has been introduced to "Strangers," usually by people who are signalling their politeness in not giving away the breathtaking ending. It's our Sixth Sense, our Murder of Roger Ackroyd. And it subtly earns the surprise, especially with that daring mention of Mulder. Our first response is to say, "wait, she cheated." No, she didn't. It's so cool.
Though not flashy, this is a very literary story, and that is also quite daring when we think that the observing pov is a young waitress earning money for college. But that's solved in the first line. She's a *literary* young waitress. Also very cool.
If I sound flippant, it's because I tend to be more comfortable with light and clever than serious and touching. Fortunately, I think we can all agree that "Strangers and the Strange Dead" is both clever and serious. And this is confirmed by the chill, after that final reunion scene with its shock and relief, of remembering all those strange dead bodies...
no subject
Date: 2009-04-18 08:31 pm (UTC)It is indeed perfect. And literary. I was shocked by the reveal--and I predicted the ending of The Sixth Sense before I had even seen the film. So for me to get that sort of psychic jolt was quite impressive. I don't know anything about Kipler but I am pretty damn certain she writes for a living, maybe not fiction, but something. This story would certainly make my top ten list of XF fiction, it might even make my top ten list of fan fiction. With very little tweaking this could have been a publishable science fiction short story, in my humble opinion.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-19 01:26 am (UTC)Of course I love this amazing story. I count this and Cell Phone as the two examples of how fanfic can achieve a power that's generally unavailable to "regular" fic. While it's possible that this could be tweaked into a publishable story, it wouldn't have the same impact. It's not only that we already know about Mulder and Scully, it's that we've cared about them for a very long time.
At the end, when the stranger's identity becomes clear, I had a larger revelation. First the stranger is smelly and dirty and you don't want Scully to let him touch her. And then, from one second to the next, the dirty man is Mulder, and he's not disgusting any more. It's something I try to hold on to, in my better moments. Humanity lurks under appalling exteriors.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-19 05:27 am (UTC)I confess, I've been sending vibes.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 10:31 pm (UTC)Yes, a good point, and another one I had not thought of before. That is certainly a theme that could not be conveyed as easily or with as much emotional resonance outside of fan fiction, where the love we share for the characters adds so much to how we approach the text. Thank you.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-21 02:01 am (UTC)that is so fascinating. i love those weird, one-eighty moments, no matter what kind of art i find them in. now i really wish i'd been surprised. all the same, i think the sensation of that moment for me was similar to what you're describing. I was feeling the pain (scully's pain, i guess) at being uncertain of who the man was, so in a way i did feel repulsed by him, or rather, as soon as he walked into the narrator's diner i started trying to ward off the massive rush of feeling i had towards him. what if it wasn't mulder? i'd be crushed. scully would be crushed.
when it turned out to be mulder, all that relief and gladness and fear crashed through. while scully was leaning there against mulder, i suddenly kinda wanted to do the same in a cerebral sense to the story itself. i'd felt so alienated from this story the whole time. now i didn't feel alienated anymore.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 01:28 am (UTC)I CAN HAZ THEME?
I think Nature is a central theme to this story. The interplay between life/death - vitality/inertia seems to come up time and again. The prose takes on a strange energy as the narrator manages to co-exist, vitally attuned to what is happening around her, yet separate from what she is perceiving. Her life is not the river of this story. She is ‘writing the river’. The story seems to use this dissonance between the stillness of observation and the vitality of involvement as its recurring theme.
META:
As
Kipler addresses the feeling I think some fans have of being torn between wanting to get into the vital heart of the story and feeling contrarily that we must afford the story as much privacy as possible. What the narrator says about telling a true story, about telling only the things she could know, ties in with how she feels about death - that in their state of strangeness the dead deserve our silence and reverence. This is a meta story, but it manages the polar opposite of what most meta sets out to accomplish: it mystifies mulder and scully’s story. In it’s reverence for their story, it shows us only what we can know for fact, before ushering us away.
SCULLY EMBODIES THE THEME:
Throughout the story the living and the dead, while part of the same basic plot, seem to be held separate. Likewise, Scully can be seen to embody both the thematic elements of this story: She is ‘holding herself still and apart’ from seemingly everything. She seems to be a microcosm in and of herself. Is she trying to remain stable and unchanging while mulder is absent? (I think so.) At the same time she is moving, inexorably, relentlessly, like a current or a seasonal shift. She seems unswayed by the world around her, but she is intent on something we cannot fully understand. She is elemental within herself, worn down.
I like that Scully is really the spine of this story from the beginning and it simply takes some time for the full scope of her role to become apparent. She follows the original abductee from 1994 to 2006. She is in the newspaper article. Kipler is smart to use her as a way of conveying to us the underlying mood of the piece. Kipler has taken her own narrator’s advice and written the river. I think Scully is our river in this story. She is the element that we know in our bones, that can be spoken of and understood.
BUILDING A STORY TO THE ‘MAKE-OR-BREAK’ POINT:
Unfortunately, once I realized early on that Scully had to be the basis on which I measured what was happening, I was relatively sure that Mulder had been abducted and was being searched for. The ending wasn’t much of a surprise. Still, despite my relative certainty, I felt unspeakably relieved of some unnamed burden once mulder - the real mulder - was confirmed found. scully's quiet "i've been looking for you, mulder" was just a dynamite line.
I'd say this story was written to a make-or-break point. For scully, ‘yes you’ve found him’ is all that matters. ‘No you haven’t’ means nothing, means ‘keep holding yourself in suspension’. Similarly, by the end of the story, as a reader I felt that ‘Yes I was right in my assessment of the situation’ would mean that the story made sense and completed itself and I would feel the payoff of that. ‘No I was wrong in my assessment’ would have left the story floundering and senseless and it would have doubtlessly been very disappointing. Effectively, Kipler raised the emotional stakes. I was holding my breath the entire fic, like scully, 'waiting for something to be over'. was it mulder? WAS IT MULDER!?
I think that kind of coercive story telling, when done as well as this, is pretty amazing.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 08:16 pm (UTC)Keep it up, fangirl.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 10:23 pm (UTC)I love this.<3
sunflowerseed in the night
Date: 2015-07-18 03:53 pm (UTC)I wonder if any of you have read "Soliloquy" by Kipler? I don't want to spoil anything but she uses some interesting writing techniques there for the first time that inform this story as well. Dare I says "quid pro quo"? What a spectacular writer!
no subject
Date: 2016-10-09 08:43 pm (UTC)