Freebook! - Buy Two, Get One Free
 
 

Special Offers see all

Enter to WIN!

Weekly drawing for $100 credit. Subscribe to PowellsBooks.news for a chance to win.
Privacy Policy

More at Powell's

Recently Viewed clear list

Interviews | September 19, 2013

Chris Faatz: IMG Larry Watson: The Powells.com Interview

0 comments By Chris Faatz

Larry WatsonLarry Watson, the author of Montana 1948 and many other fine novels, has just published Let Him Go, his latest foray into literary fiction. Let Him... Continue »
  1. $16.80 Sale Hardcover add to wish list

    Let Him Go

    Larry Watson 9781571311023
spacer
Ships free on qualified orders.
$8.95
List price: $14.00
Used Trade Paper
Ships in 1 to 3 days
Add to Wishlist
Qty Store Section
2 Hawthorne Literature- A to Z

Magic for Beginners

by

Magic for Beginners Cover

ISBN13: 9780156031875
ISBN10: 0156031876
Condition: Standard
All Product Details

Only 2 left in stock at $8.95!

 

Review-A-Day

"Magic For Beginners reads more like a book of spooky old fairy tales and fables than a contemporary short story collection. Link embraces various genres, such as fantasy and horror, lovingly takes them apart, combines their pieces, and revives them, creating stories that never fail to please or surprise. This is some of the most interesting writing — in any genre — out there today." Alexis Smith, Powells.com (read the entire Powells.com review)

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Magic for Beginners is Kelly Link's eagerly anticipated and critically acclaimed follow-up to her beloved debut, Stranger Things Happen. "Cumulatively weirder and wiser" (The Believer), this new story collection riffs on zombies, marriage, witches, superheroes, haunted convenience stores, and weekly apocalyptic poker parties, among other things.

Link's work is truly unique. Time Out New York called her stories "cross-genre gems," and her admirers in the literary community — from Peter Straub and Karen Joy Fowler to Alice Sebold and Michael Chabon — reflect the amazing range that makes her style so special. Call it kitchen sink magical realism: Fantastic and bizarre but funny and down to earth, there is something for everyone in Magic for Beginners.

Review:

"Kelly Link has an uncanny knack for casting spells over her readers, for luring them into the dark places — the attic, the underworld, a realm beneath a hill." The Boston Phoenix

Review:

"Move over, Russell Edson. Link is the purest, most distinctive surrealist in America, and she doesn't stop at prose-poem length." Booklist

Review:

"[E]ven when I didn't know what to make of her stories, I couldn't put them out of my mind. That sort of resonance, that lingering, haunting effect, is the product of real magic, and Kelly Link is no doubt a sorceress to be reckoned with." New York Times

Synopsis:

Magic for Beginners is the highly anticipated second collection by Kelly Link, the author of the cult favorite collection Stranger Things Happen. As the title suggests, this is an engaging, funny, and magical selection of stories about haunted convenience stores, husbands and wives, rabbits, zombies, weekly apocalyptic poker parties, witches, superheroes, marriages, and cannons, and includes several stories original to the collection. Stories from Magic for Beginners have previously been published in McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales, Conjunctions, and The Dark.

Synopsis:

Cult favorite Link unfurls a second engaging, funny, and magical selection of stories, with riffs on marriage, cannons, convenience stories, superheroes, zombies, and apocalyptic poker parties. Illustrations.
back to top

About the Author

Kelly Link is the editor of Trampoline, and co-editor of Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet and The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror. Link lives in Northampton, Massachusetts.
back to top

Table of Contents

Contents

The Faery Handbag 

The Hortlak 

The Cannon 

Stone Animals 

Catskin

Some Zombie Contingency Plans 

The Great Divorce 

Magic for Beginners 

Lull 

 

back to top

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 11 comments:
Max, September 1, 2011 (view all comments by Max)
Brilliant, strange, and disturbing short stories by Kelly Link. The tone ranges widely throughout the work, meaning there is something for everyone in this collection, from the subtly political to the darkly funny. My favorite story was Magic for Beginners, about adolescence in a troubled family narrated alongside the plot of a fantastical tv show that has as much life and reality in the story as the main character's conflict with his parents. The father of the boy is an author himself, and to reveal anymore would be to deprive you of the chance to watch the story unfold yourselves, but suffice to say that the layers and boundaries of what is fiction in the story are both dense and slippery. A really lovely collection-- I read the whole thing in chunks feeding my son and kept wanting him to eat longer so I could read more. Do yourself a favor and pick it up.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
report this comment
sophiefranz, January 1, 2011 (view all comments by sophiefranz)
Kelly Link writes exactly how I want to paint.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
report this comment
katie spain, September 25, 2010 (view all comments by katie spain)
this is one of the best collections of short stories i have ever read.
i don't often reread books more than twice, but this is worth each new read.
link's writing style is innovative and engaging. she creates worlds that are compelling and intriguing, dark, historic, magical, in only a few pages. her stories have many layers of gorgeous and scary and mysterious and funny and disturbing and sparkly.
i'm going to go all the way downtown now to buy a copy for a friend (don't worry, i will read it again before i give it away).
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(0 of 1 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment
View all 11 comments
back to top

Product Details

ISBN:
9780156031875
Author:
Link, Kelly
Publisher:
Harvest Books
Illustrator:
Jackson, Shelley
Author:
Jackson, Shelley
Subject:
Short Stories (single author)
Subject:
Science Fiction - Short Stories
Subject:
Stories (single author)
Subject:
Literature-A to Z
Copyright:
2005
Edition Description:
Trade Paper
Publication Date:
20060931
Binding:
TRADE PAPER
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Ten black-and-white illustrations
Pages:
320
Dimensions:
8 x 5.31 in 0.64 lb
back to top

Other books you might like

  1. Day Shift Werewolf
    Used Trade Paper $4.95
  2. Stranger Things Happen
    Used Trade Paper $9.95
  3. Willful Creatures: Stories
    Used Trade Paper $8.00
  4. Year's Best Fantasy & Horror:... Used Trade Paper $8.95
  5. McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of... Used Trade Paper $3.50
  6. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell
    Used Hardcover $3.50
back to top

Related Subjects

Featured Titles » Genre
Featured Titles » Literature
Fiction and Poetry » Literature » A to Z
Fiction and Poetry » Science Fiction and Fantasy » A to Z
Fiction and Poetry » Science Fiction and Fantasy » Adventure

Magic for Beginners Used Trade Paper
0 stars - 0 reviews
$8.95 In Stock
Product details 320 pages Harvest Books - English 9780156031875 Reviews:
"Review A Day" by , "Magic For Beginners reads more like a book of spooky old fairy tales and fables than a contemporary short story collection. Link embraces various genres, such as fantasy and horror, lovingly takes them apart, combines their pieces, and revives them, creating stories that never fail to please or surprise. This is some of the most interesting writing — in any genre — out there today." (read the entire Powells.com review)
"Review" by , "Kelly Link has an uncanny knack for casting spells over her readers, for luring them into the dark places — the attic, the underworld, a realm beneath a hill."
"Review" by , "Move over, Russell Edson. Link is the purest, most distinctive surrealist in America, and she doesn't stop at prose-poem length."
"Review" by , "[E]ven when I didn't know what to make of her stories, I couldn't put them out of my mind. That sort of resonance, that lingering, haunting effect, is the product of real magic, and Kelly Link is no doubt a sorceress to be reckoned with."
"Synopsis" by , Magic for Beginners is the highly anticipated second collection by Kelly Link, the author of the cult favorite collection Stranger Things Happen. As the title suggests, this is an engaging, funny, and magical selection of stories about haunted convenience stores, husbands and wives, rabbits, zombies, weekly apocalyptic poker parties, witches, superheroes, marriages, and cannons, and includes several stories original to the collection. Stories from Magic for Beginners have previously been published in McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales, Conjunctions, and The Dark.
"Synopsis" by , Cult favorite Link unfurls a second engaging, funny, and magical selection of stories, with riffs on marriage, cannons, convenience stories, superheroes, zombies, and apocalyptic poker parties. Illustrations.
spacer
spacer
  • back to top
Follow us on...




Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.