In the mood for more speculative fiction? Check out these speculative story collections to enjoy in 2021. Where to start…Everyone in this book has ennui. Though of course much of the book’s 2020 success must go to V.E. Schwab’s imagination and talent, as well as her loyal and well-earned following, I’d also argue this book touched on a certain mood that was present during the pandemic. Time stopped having its usual meaning. Moments slipped into each other. We flailed for meaning in a world where we were all disconnected. This story follows a lonely time travel machine repairman as he tries to heal his heart and his family by hunting down his father, who went missing (or perhaps abandoned his family?) when he was very young. Amid a tropey lark through space and time, this novel explores the hole that’s left behind within a family when a parent is suddenly gone — regardless of the reason. Ennui levels are off the charts here. The characters are familiar too — in a good way. In Nothing to See Here, rather than a high-action romp as one might expect from such a combustible premise, readers delve into characters just as lost as defunct as in Family Fang, and once again caught in arrested development, who can’t seem to figure out what they want or who they are. Ennui? Check. The greatest embodiment of ennui in this novel actually comes from Francis, the youngest member of the Doyle family, who wishes to be freed of the family’s haunted entanglement with the estate but can’t seem to break free. This graphic novel is utterly charming in its snark and quirky gaming humor, which gives a lot of pep to a character who is, let’s be honest, (intentionally) kind of a drag.
