The Museum For Forgetting by Pete W Sutton
I would like to thank the author for an advance copy of this collection in exchange for a fair and honest review
Publisher - Kristell-Ink
Published – Out Now (paperback) 1/9 Kindle eBook
Price - £9.99 paperback £3.99 Kindle eBook
We are made from memories, they are stories we tell ourselves to build our personalities. So what does it mean to forget?
A collection of eleven tales about memory and its fallibility. About hauntology, the weird, and the eerie. Museum Doyens try to hold out against ever-increasing painful cuts in funding. Detectives go through the motions and hope to suppress the bitter past. Cultists keep an angel captive and raid its memories. A grieving mother is forced to confront her past. A lonely man tries to forget and in forgetting cannot remember why. An elderly man tries everything in his power to keep the past alive. Stories of loss and regret recur in worlds painted in sepia.
Stories are quite interesting as they create false memories. Your favourite book and characters lurk in our brains and yet don’t exist. In fact, if you meet another fan of the same book you may find they have a different take on them too. Books create different pasts and futures and of course make the unreal real. In Pete W Sutton’s fascinating short story collection The Museum for Forgetting we get tales of past, present and future from all sorts of genres to enjoy and all with people dealing with memories in some way.
Amongst the stories I enjoyed were: -
The Museum for Forgetting – the opening tale is a wonderfully weird tale of a museum where people store the memories they wish to protect and a greedy minister decides to introduce more and more cuts. A tale of the importance of culture, memory and its delightfully weird.
Memories to the Flame – a mysterious angel lies prisoner, and many people attempt to understand it’s writing. A strange fantastical tale that keeps surprising us as a small group of characters find their life changes for good or bad. Dark yet ultimately hopeful.
Benediction – my favourite tale in the collection is a tale of past and present. Childhood versus adulthood and love. Beautifully bittersweet a man goes on a quest to the start of his life. I love the way this tale capture innocence and the pain of adulthood. An excellent story.
A Signal in the Dark – a grieving space salvager goes on a rescue mission that goes horribly wrong. In some ways a classic space puzzle but this really works due to the emotional journey our lead character goes on dealing with anger and ultimately finding her own way to move on.
Thresholds - A really unusual tale of an elderly man and their social worker. I love the way Sutton helps us see our character’s point of view and this tale deals with loss and pain in an unusual and sympathetic way.
The Ghost Conspiracy – A story within a story of a woman writing about some secret government experiments using psychics in WW1 she was involved with. It’s sinister and also has a fascinating take on ghosts that is actually more disquieting as you discover the reason behind strange events. Fascinating and pays tribute to a famous ghost story too!
It’s a hugely enjoyable collection perfect for our darkening evenings and each story has surprises in store for you combined with some beautiful use of character and setting to make each story stand out. Highly recommended!
