Mini-Review: Long Black Curl by Alex Bledsoe

Long Black Curl by Alex Bledsoe is the third Tufa book which is a ‘series’ of interconnected novels that all really stand on their own with independent stories. Of course the reader familiar with the other books in the series will experience things at a deeper level.

Anyway, as evident from my reviews of other Tufa books, I really, really enjoy them, and Long Black Curl is no exception to this trend. It always surprises me that I don’t read more Mythic Fiction – books that loosely fall into category of Mythic Fiction seem to connect with me at a deeper level, bringing me a much more holistic and satisfied reading experience. Not merely entertaining or escapist and not really the sort of book that makes me feel like I’m a better person for having read it, but books that truly connect, books that awaken deeper awareness of myself.

Bledsoe’s Tufa books are about an exiled faerie clan who settled in the Appalachian Mountains long before humans came along. These stories tell how the Tufa people interact with the modern world around them and show how they are connected to their land and their music at deeper levels than the people around them. While set within the modern world, they bring the reader back in time, reminding us of the deeper connections to nature and the land around us. For the Tufa, music is the vehicle that this connection is founded within.

Long Black Curl is specifically about two exiled Tufa who have lost their ability to sing. These exiled exiles are cursed in a fundamentally horrific form of suffering for their people, further complicated by their means of surviving in the modern world – both work in the music industry. This forms the back bone for a story of revenge, loss, and redemption. A large part of the success of this story works because of duality of the modern world and the ‘other’, timeless world of the Tufa, and it’s an approach that I am especially fond of.

I love the Tufa books because they really embody Mythic Fiction in a way few books achieve. The emotions invoked are full of mystery, darkness, fear, love, and a whole host of other primal emotions for us all. While I believe that it’s the connection to nature that leads me to back to Mythic Fiction, the vehicle of music to form this connection is fully realized in these books. This is a very tough balance to achieve as it’s quite easy to nerd out on the music without ever creating the deep emotional connection that is really necessary¹. Charles de Lint is another author I who can achieve this balance and I rank him and Bledsoe at the top of a short list of authors who do.

Long Black Curl is another wonderful addition to the collection of Tufa novels by Bledsoe and another reminder of how much I enjoy these books.

The Tufa Novels

The Hum and the Shiver: My Review, Amazon

Wisp of a Thing: My Review, Amazon

Long Black Curl: Amazon

Chapel of Ease: Amazon

Gather Her Round: Amazon (Forthcoming)

¹For an example of a Mythic Fiction book where the bridge of music between the modern world and something other never quite works out an fails to achieve the emotional connection needed, see The Crow of Connemara by Stephen Leigh (I’ll eventually get to writing a full review for it).

Mini-Review: The Hum and the Shiver by Alex Bledsoe

As I sit down to write this review of The Hum and the Shiver by Alex Bledsoe, I’ve come to realize that it’s hard. Not because I don’t have a lot to say about the book – I do. Not because I didn’t love the book – I did love it. But, really it comes down to that I’ve said it all before, most likely better than I could again. So, go read the review I wrote for Wisp of a Thing. Everything in that review applies to The Hum and the Shiver. Bledsoe’s Tufa books are probably the books I’m enjoying most right now, and that earlier review really says all I need to say.

Still here? OK, again, go read that earlier review if didn’t already, because this is where I simply get nit-picky. The Hum and the Shiver is the first Tufa book – in sequence of writing, publishing, and occurrence in ‘book world’. It tells – The Hum and the Shiver has a few bumpy spots that weren’t present in Wisp of a Thing. Most notably is the relatively slow start. This is because this is not an action book, and all the conflict is truly personal conflict that comes from within. This is tricky ground to cover in a society (and genre for that matter) that craves action and real, in-your-face conflict. Related to that, some of the subplots never quite melt into the full story. It’s just a little rough around the edges.

But for all of that, by about halfway through the book, it’s all gone. I was completely immersed into the story and couldn’t even come up for air. With these books it’s just best to let it all go and lose yourself in the music of the story.

The Hum and Shiver (Indiebound, Book Depository, Amazon)

Wisp of a Thing (My Review, Indiebound, Book Depository, Amazon)

Long Black Curl (Indiebound, Book Depository, Amazon)

Review: Wisp of a Thing by Alex Bledsoe

I find that some of the books I enjoy most are basically a form of modern mythic – sometimes this is called mythic fiction, and what feels like a long-lost time ago, many of these books were considered urban fantasy. However you choose to define them, these are books that are set in a modern(ish) world and contain a deep connection to some mythic past, often through or including nature, though not necessarily so, often through some form of spirit or mythic race, and music often plays a very important role. The books of Charles de Lint immediately come across like this and other names like Robert Holdstock fit just as easily. And now I’ve found another name to add to this list – Alex Bledsoe and his Tufa novels. Two are currently available, The Hum and Shiver and Wisp of a Thing, with a forthcoming book titled Long Black Curl.

The Tufa are a people in small area in Appalachia that have a mysterious past and deep connection to music and the land they live on – they mistrust outsiders and many rumors swirl about them – often dark, tragic rumors that are only whispered.

When I first came across the description of these books – something like that paraphrased discussion above – I knew these books were for me. I had the second, Wisp of a Thing and was very hesitant to jump in – once I was informed that while related, each book stands on its own, I could no longer resist the call and plunged into the deep, old forests of Appalachia and the Tufa.

I’ve often wondered why these mythic books appeal so much to me and I believe it begins with my love of the outdoors. But it’s way more than that, because these mythic books can succeed without ever stepping out of the concrete jungle of a city. I think it must be the combination of what is often a love and respect for the world that is beyond what is found in modern life, with a deep connection to the past in combination with an otherworld-ness that feels just out of reach. It’s that ‘irrational’ fear of that dark place, the ‘unnatural’ feeling of an old forest at night, the unexplainable connection of hugging a tree, the transcendence of music.

When stories achieve this place, they lose that common focus of an external goal – be it a quest, or vengeance, or whatever. It becomes a journey internal to those who experience it. The pace slows and the story takes over like a song while escape is an unwanted dream.

Wisp of a Thing does all of these. There is a deep, personal journey, not a hero’s journey, not one where the end is known, but a journey none-the-less. The old world music of Appalachia plays a big part, along with weathered epitaphs in lost, overgrown cemeteries. It’s tragic and hopeful. Love is lost and found. Old wrongs are righted. Blood runs deep.  

I loved Wisp of a Thing – now I crave a journey into the mountains of Appalachia, a hike down my favorite trail to visit that giant old-growth Ponderosa Pine, to look out over the beauty of the land around and listen to the music of the wind. For whatever reason, my love of mythic fiction doesn’t end, but it does fade to the back only to seemingly leap up out of nowhere. Through Bledsoe and the Tufa, I now have another ever-present beginning of a journey waiting for me. I will be back again…and again…and again…

The Hum and Shiver (Indiebound, Book Depository, Amazon)

Wisp of a Thing (Indiebound, Book Depository, Amazon)

Long Black Curl (Indiebound, Book Depository, Amazon)