Marguerite Sheffer won the Iowa Short Fiction Award for her inventive debut collection, The Man in the Banana Trees. Technology and art are major themes, and the 18 short stories here, half of which are flash length, incorporate speculative elements to explore how the past--and the dead--might persist.
Sheffer draws on history or envisions an alarming near-future--or both within four pages, as in "The Unicorn in Captivity," which strings together moments in the life of a tapestry from a French chateau. In 2073, the "children of the sunken city," viewing it behind plexiglass, marvel more at the background foliage than the legendary creature. "At the Moment of Condensation" features drones in a teardrop formation carrying upturned umbrellas to collect water. In a drought-ridden future where corporations monopolize airspace to harvest rain, the act is both protest and performance art.
Several stories are voiced by teachers contemplating their responsibility to a certain student--like a boy objecting to the status quo during a staging of The Nutcracker composed of "white Victorian children and... mostly Black and Latino mice." In the title story, set in Covid-era New Orleans, a woman miscarries twins. Although this seems like one of the most realistic stories in the book, she imagines the title character, a Rumpelstiltskin-like imp, ushering in disasters. Here and elsewhere, Sheffer dabbles in magic realism and horror.
Sheffer moves between time periods and genres with aplomb, exhibiting variety and verve. Her final paragraphs and lines, in particular, are killer. This terrific collection should attract fans of Megan Mayhew Bergman, Alexandra Chang, and Louisa Hall. --Rebecca Foster, freelance reviewer, proofreader and blogger at Bookish Beck