Our houses were specifically for the dreamless, signifying nothing.” The Mullens’ house, conversely, was a midcentury bungalow with a long, low roofline, orange-toned brick and wood, with that carport and a sprawling, unruly backyard - the specific architectural dream of a designer or previous owner, representing a specific moment in time.
“The rest of us lived in two-story homes that crowded to the lots’ edges, hipped roofs matching the cube-like dimensions as neatly as a lid to a jar, our driveways and yards stout and begrudging. It’s a premise one might find in an 80s Stephen King story, but the setting is deliberately made less distinct, too faceless to even be sinister: ‘The Doll,’ for instance, centres on a group of a young kids who find a haunted toy after a family in their neighbourhood tragically dies. The deadening, ossifying qualities of neoliberalism inform many of Fu’s settings. Even the most obvious literary archetypes reveal hidden depths, such as the genius inventor who never moves beyond designing elaborate toys, and the plucky band of child adventurers including “Isaac and Abby Gibbs, enemies the other nine months of the year, finished each other’s sentences in the summer.” These details are delivered with wit and economy, a lyrical finesse which helps deepen the more stock elements of these stories. Fu has stated that she aimed to “take the speculative ideas very seriously and at face value… asking what this character would do in this situation, without a winking eye to metaphor.” In truth there are moments when the metaphors become obvious, but Fu’s attention to character is unwavering.
The collection contains twelve stories, ranging from science fiction to horror to literary absurdism. Actual bug-eyed beasts are thin on the ground Fu’s monsters wait just outside the frame, as patient and inevitable as daybreak.
“The realm of pretend had only just closed its doors to us, and light still leaked through around the edges.” This motif of light spilling past an imperfect barrier defines the feel of Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century, the debut short fiction collection from acclaimed novelist Kim Fu.
In ‘Sandman,’ an insomniac is visited by a mysterious hooded figure, who pours sleep into her by “the faint light that leaked around her drawn curtains.” In ‘In This Fantasy,’ the narrator disclaims that “I don’t have fantasies where I’m the young, cheating wife, the one rolling over a made bed, drugged light leaking past net curtains, pulled shut in full daylight.” In ‘Liddy, First to Fly,’ a group of adolescent girls react calmly to their friend sprouting wings from her ankles.
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