Thursday, September 27, 2018

Five top fantasies driven by unconventional minds

Heidi Heilig's new novel is For a Muse of Fire.

At Tor.com she tagged "five books [that] are great examples of the way mentally ill characters fit and function in the fantastical," including:
Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves

After her aunt’s attempt to hospitalize her against her will, Hanna flees to Portero, a crazy town where doorways to other worlds open up to let bloodthirsty monsters in. Hanna herself, an unmedicated bipolar girl dealing with hallucinations and violent mania, is a beautifully written unreliable narrator with a dark sense of humor. The hedonism and the macabre fascinations familiar to many who share her disorder drive her choices, which push the plot forward briskly as Hanna tries to prove herself to a mother who wants nothing to do with her. These family dynamics might be very familiar for too many people living with mental illness, but in this case, there are deep machinations afoot. Bleeding Violet is a fabulous example of a book that can only exist because the main character is mad.
Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue