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This embodiment of the consumptive, universal desire to simultaneously become and lose oneself sinks in immediately. On the night of the story, she ends up finding one of her sisters, journeying toward what she believed to be her secret pleasure, the “Dead Zone”. Each journey to this “Dead Zone” is followed by crushing guilt for endangering the family and herself and for the inherent selfishness. In this landscape, the primary character is able to silence the ever-present noise and find true solitude, where neither she nor her sisters exist. The story centers around a journey to a forbidden section of the ruins. They are intrinsically entangled and fatefully dependent. In “The Gondoliers,” the echolocation-using sisters in the apocalyptic world rely on each other to live. These wild stories capture attention with their promise of newness, but maintain it by offering insight that feels, at times, unexpectedly raw. Remembering the book is to see flashing visions of a woman inhabited by the spirit of a Joshua Tree after an unfortunate prick in “The Bad Graft,” two young girls wandering unexpectedly into a haunted ski lodge while trying to find riches out West in “The Prospectors” and a young girl, compared to the birds of Chernobyl, living in a post apocalyptic, sunken “New Florida” using echolocation to navigate a new existence in “The Gondoliers.” When I try to explain the collection to friends or passing strangers, their faces contort in confusion or a tentative chuckle possesses them. In any form, they unfold like a stroll through a fever dream landscape. To describe the stories in summary is to do them injustice. In a world saturated with media, this ability to create something truly unique and outlandish seems rare and close to enchantment.

They tell accessible stories unlike any that came before. The works dive into the sea of magical realism, with an oxygen tank of comedy. Russell’s work deviates from this expectation with its smashingly vivid images, its inventive narratives and poignant emotions. The high-brow nature of these accomplishments may induce images of a distant, elitist and exclusive version of literature for the world of academia. In May of 2019, Russell released a collection of short stories titled “Orange World and Other Stories.” The eight stories inside its neon orange book covers brim with wit, with outlandish delight, with fury and with intention. In the years after this impressive debut, she received both a MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowship. Swamplandia!, her 2011 debut novel, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. After spending undergraduate years at Northwestern, Russell received her MFA at Columbia University. Karen Russell is an outstanding force in the modern literary scene.