Indistinguishable from Magic

In Indistinguishable from Magic, more than 60 essays by New York Times-bestselling author Catherynne M. Valente (The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland, The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland) are brought together in print for the first time, sharing Cat’s observations and insights about fairy tales and myths, pop culture, gender and race issues, an amateur’s life on planet Earth and more.  

Join Cat as she studies the fantasy genre’s inner clockwork to better comprehend its infatuation with medievalism (AKA “dragon bad, sword pretty”), considers the undervalued importance of the laundry machine to women’s rights in locales as wide-ranging as Japan and the steampunk genre, and examines how stories teach us how to survive - if Gretel can kill the witch, Snow White can return from the dead, and Rapunzel can live in the desert, trust that you can too.

Catherynne Valente Catherynne M. Valente is a NYTimes-bestselling fantasy / SF author, whose novels include Palimpsest, Deathless, and The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.In 2011, the latter book ranked #8 on the NYTimes bestseller list. Its sequel, The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There, was #5 on Time's Best Fiction of 2012. She has won the James Tiptree Jr. Award and three Locus Awards. As part of the SF Squeecast, she has won two Hugo Awards.