Rating: 
Summary: Stories of extremes
Review: Byatt's collection of sumptuous stories reminded me of Banana Yoshimoto, Emma Donoghue, and Jeanette Winterson. These tales seem like modern faerie tales without the classic imagery. Or rather, with the classic imagery shifted. In "Cold", an ice princess discovers true love in a desert land. In my favorite in the collection, "Christ in the House of Martha and Mary", a cook finds the meaning of art in life. These tales of extremes of emotions, temperatures, lives are full of joy and life, and make many a reader celebrate. This will certainly not be the last book by Byatt I'll read.
Rating: 
Summary: More exercise for your brain from Byatt
Review: Elementals is another set of thematic pieces in the same vein as The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye, the Matisse Stories and Sugar. As always, the delight of reading her work comes from the wealth of cultural associations that she packs into every sentence.I like her novels best, and so I again find that the longer stories are the most satisfying. The book has six pieces, each quite distinct in style. "Crocodile Tears" is probably the best, and explores similar themes to the "Djinn". It is full of familiar Byatt obsessions: Modern Art, the South of France, sudden death, crisp white sheets,a berserk Scandinavian. She says that life is the act of looking. It ends when one decides to stop looking. The subject's bathroom design business is called "Anadyomene" - this is always good for a chuckle among her afficionados. But it's more than just an in-joke. With one unexplained word (it's a by-name of Aphrodite), she encourages you to conjecture that Botticelli's "Birth of Venus" is the image used by this business in its advertising, and then to ponder the ambiguous iconography of that painting and its connection with the themes of this short story. This is typical Byatt, making you draw on all the resources of your cultural heritage. "The Lamia in the Cevennes" continues the themes of Art and Mediterranean Light, and re-introduces the delicious and fearsome Melusina. It is about some of the ways in which human beings can be happy. "Cold" is one of her "fairy stories" that would be tiresome if it were just that. But it includes more familiar themes and obsessions: glass, the blond ice-maiden ironically called Fiammarosa,the arrogant destructiveness of male passion. Even ice maidens have to find a way to be happy. I'm not sure this is it. "Baglady" is a very short tale telling us how close we live to the edge. A tourist loses her identity in an Asian shopping mall. Her dead-pan account of this horror is uncannily realistic. In "Jael", she elaborates on the feeling of disgust for Judeo-Christian religion that I share with her. But again, whether atheist or no, the language we use is as much the King James Bible as it is Chaucer or Shakespeare or Donne or Austen or Byatt, and so we serve up butter in a lordly dish. "Christ in the House of Martha and Mary" draws together several of the previous themes. Art, food, the power of anger. Velasquez is the artist here. Sometimes her references give a flash of recognition - a line from a love-poem by John Donne - a horse-painting by Stubbs. But sometimes the references are unfamiliar, and you just have to track them down. After reading "Possession", I had to read Vico and Browning. "The Virgin in the Garden" made me look at Ovid for the first time. Velasquez has always seemed too baroque and popish for my cold northern sensibilities, but now I've got to look at some Velasquez. Because she likes the things I like, there's no better recommendation than ASB. There's so much out there still to learn, and time's getting on.
Rating:
Summary: Look up fantastic in your unabridged dictionary.
Review: Elementals is fantastic in all senses of the word. As a summer escape to places both sensuously real and richly imagined, I can't envision a better collection of stories. A literary treasure: buy it to revisit Byatt's glowing world and ponder her mystical yet human messages again and again
Rating: 
Summary: Sensuous indulgence
Review: Elementals. A S Byatt. Chatto and Windus. £12 (UK) Subtitled 'Stories of Fire and Ice', A S Byatt's latest collection are works of sensuous indulgence. Occasionally her story-telling gifts are overwhelmed by the detail of her sensory observations, yet most readers will forgive this and allow themselves to be carried away by her mission to winkle out the truth of a subject through finding exactly the right words. In a similar way, the artist in 'A Lamia in the Cevennes' becomes obsessed with capturing the exact blue of his swimming pool. The challenge makes him happy, 'in one of the ways in which human beings are happy.' In Crocodile Tears, Patricia has lost this ability to be happy. She notes her surroundings, the heat and history of Nimes, with sublime indifference. This opening story gets off to a flying start. Having argued with her husband as to whether a painting in a London art gallery is banal or not, Patricia rounds the stairs to see him lying dead at the bottom, surrounded by concerned couriers and paramedics. Hearing them pronounce him dead, she walks straight past, gets a train to Paris then south, eventually ending up at Nimes. A fellow guest in the hotel she has picked at random tries to bring her out of her grief: "You may sit there, glass-eyed while things slip past...crocodile fountains, the stones of this city. Or you may look with curiosity and live." The same message is given in the final story: 'Christ in the House of Martha and Mary'. An artist paints fish and eggs in a kitchen where the cook bemoans her fate. The artist tells her, "the divide is not between the servants and the served, between the leisured and the workers, but between those who are interested in the world and its multiplicity of forms and forces, and those who merely subsist, worrying or yawning." Byatt paints beautiful word pictures for the reader to admire. In 'Cold' she builds them out of snow and ice and intricate glass palaces. In Jael she takes us into a posh girl's school where a pupil colours in a biblical picture with a bright red crayon. From here she recreates every nuance of the atmosphere of the school: "whenever I remember that patch of fierce colour I remember, like an after-image, a kind of dreadful murky colour, a yellow-khaki-mustard-thick colour, that is the colour of the days of our boredom." The lyricism of the collection is balanced by a sharp, sometimes surreal, wit, as when the Lamia (half woman half snake) appears in the artist's pool and tries to seduce him, finally making do with his friend. In 'Baglady' a well-to-do wife accompanying her husband on a business trip to the Far East finds herself lost and penniless in the nightmarish Good Fortune Shopping Mall. A policeman moves her on with a stick. Throughout the book, fairytale and mythical elements combine with insights into modern life. This is a collection to be savoured slowly.
Rating:
Summary: An exquisite little book
Review: I found the opening story, "Crocodile Tears," rather disappointing, but things soon get better. "A Lamia in the Cevennes," about an artist who finds a lovely mythical beast in his swimming pool, offers another version of the old conflict between the artist's romantic ideal and harsh reality. The artist in question refuses to make the lamia turn human, with reason, as it turns out, since the beautiful and mysterious fantastic monster turns out to be a vulgar and rather stupid woman. "Cold" is the best of the book, a fairy tale about a woman of ice and a man of the desert who fall in love, with the inevitable clash, until the two are united in a palace of glass, which unites the beauty of ice, but comes from fire. The rest are little vignettes that range from the charming to the disturbing. As a whole, a treat.
Rating: 
Summary: No Better Than Average
Review: I liked Byatt's "Possession" and her volume of short stories entiteled "Sugar and Other Stories," so I was happily anticipating reading "Elementals." It was a big disappointment. The stories in this volume can't begin to compare with the stories in "Sugar." Although labeled "Stories of Fire and Ice," I saw mostly ice in this volume. There was little, if any fire. Characterization seems to be a weak point of Byatt's. Even in "Possession," which I thought was beautiful, I failed to develop a "connection" with any of the characters. They just don't evoke an emotional response and the characters in these stories are even weaker than most. The first and longest story, "Crocodile Tears," concerned a woman who fled the scene of her husband's death, hoping to flee her past as well. While I found the premise a good one, Byatt soon fell into stereotypes and cliches and far too much dreaded coincidence. The second story, "A Lamia in the Cevennes," was kind of interesting in a perverse sort of way. Unlike some of the other reviewers, I did not care for the fairy tale like story, "Cold." The characters just didn't move me at all and I found the ending too easy and "pat." I thought "Baglady" could have been a masterpiece had Byatt only developed it more. As it is, it feels truncated and wanting. "Jael" seems to be a story that was overlooked by many of the other reviewers, but honestly, it was probably my favorite. In it, we get a much more complete view of the main character as a real person rather than a cardboard cutout. "Christ in the House of Mary and Martha" was also quite good but it, too, suffered from a trite and rather "pat" ending. I didn't find much that was redeeming in these stories. All of them failed to find any emotional resonance in me and I didn't even think the writing was particularly sensuous or beautiful. Byatt does seem to be deliberately sacrificing both character and plot to artifice, however. Artifice can impress the immature reader but in the end, I just don't think it has any staying power. I feel sure hard core Byatt fans will love this book but I know I'm going to be much more careful about buying Byatt's works from now on.
Rating:
Summary: No Better Than Average
Review: I liked Byatt's "Possession" and her volume of short stories entiteled "Sugar and Other Stories," so I was happily anticipating reading "Elementals." It was a big disappointment. The stories in this volume can't begin to compare with the stories in "Sugar." Although labeled "Stories of Fire and Ice," I saw mostly ice in this volume. There was little, if any fire. Characterization seems to be a weak point of Byatt's. Even in "Possession," which I thought was beautiful, I failed to develop a "connection" with any of the characters. They just don't evoke an emotional response and the characters in these stories are even weaker than most. The first and longest story, "Crocodile Tears," concerned a woman who fled the scene of her husband's death, hoping to flee her past as well. While I found the premise a good one, Byatt soon fell into stereotypes and cliches and far too much dreaded coincidence. The second story, "A Lamia in the Cevennes," was kind of interesting in a perverse sort of way. Unlike some of the other reviewers, I did not care for the fairy tale like story, "Cold." The characters just didn't move me at all and I found the ending too easy and "pat." I thought "Baglady" could have been a masterpiece had Byatt only developed it more. As it is, it feels truncated and wanting. "Jael" seems to be a story that was overlooked by many of the other reviewers, but honestly, it was probably my favorite. In it, we get a much more complete view of the main character as a real person rather than a cardboard cutout. "Christ in the House of Mary and Martha" was also quite good but it, too, suffered from a trite and rather "pat" ending. I didn't find much that was redeeming in these stories. All of them failed to find any emotional resonance in me and I didn't even think the writing was particularly sensuous or beautiful. Byatt does seem to be deliberately sacrificing both character and plot to artifice, however. Artifice can impress the immature reader but in the end, I just don't think it has any staying power. I feel sure hard core Byatt fans will love this book but I know I'm going to be much more careful about buying Byatt's works from now on.
Rating:
Summary: No Better Than Average
Review: I liked Byatt's "Possession" and her volume of short stories entiteled "Sugar and Other Stories," so I was happily anticipating reading "Elementals." It was a big disappointment. The stories in this volume can't begin to compare with the stories in "Sugar." Although labeled "Stories of Fire and Ice," I saw mostly ice in this volume. There was little, if any fire. Characterization seems to be a weak point of Byatt's. Even in "Possession," which I thought was beautiful, I failed to develop a "connection" with any of the characters. They just don't evoke an emotional response and the characters in these stories are even weaker than most. The first and longest story, "Crocodile Tears," concerned a woman who fled the scene of her husband's death, hoping to flee her past as well. While I found the premise a good one, Byatt soon fell into stereotypes and cliches and far too much dreaded coincidence. The second story, "A Lamia in the Cevennes," was kind of interesting in a perverse sort of way. Unlike some of the other reviewers, I did not care for the fairy tale like story, "Cold." The characters just didn't move me at all and I found the ending too easy and "pat." I thought "Baglady" could have been a masterpiece had Byatt only developed it more. As it is, it feels truncated and wanting. "Jael" seems to be a story that was overlooked by many of the other reviewers, but honestly, it was probably my favorite. In it, we get a much more complete view of the main character as a real person rather than a cardboard cutout. "Christ in the House of Mary and Martha" was also quite good but it, too, suffered from a trite and rather "pat" ending. I didn't find much that was redeeming in these stories. All of them failed to find any emotional resonance in me and I didn't even think the writing was particularly sensuous or beautiful. Byatt does seem to be deliberately sacrificing both character and plot to artifice, however. Artifice can impress the immature reader but in the end, I just don't think it has any staying power. I feel sure hard core Byatt fans will love this book but I know I'm going to be much more careful about buying Byatt's works from now on.
Rating:
Summary: Another amazing short story collection by A.S. Byatt!
Review: I love A.S. Byatt's short-story collections. Elementals is another staggering offering from this talented writer. These adult fairy tales enthralled me from beginning to end. I love Byatt's use of magical realism. She takes you into a unique and literary reading experience. I also love the stories settings -- the ones set in France are especially great. My favorite stories are "Crocodile Tears," "A Lamia in the Cevennes," "Bag Lady," and "Jael." I liked all of the stories, but these were the most unforgettable ones for me. I look forward to reading more stuff by A.S. Byatt. She is truly one of the best writers of the moment.
Rating:
Summary: A Wonderful Read...
Review: I love the strength and poetic beauty of Byatt's stories - especially "Crocodile Tears" and "Cold", both of which I have recommended to many people. "Cold" was my favorite out of many, many short stories that I have read this year by a wide range of authors. The story is a fairytale that transports you into the world of an ice princess and her love affair with a man of fire. What I loved about it was her amazing ability to create the details of that world in simple language, not uncommon in fairytales, but then she goes beyond that, deeper, by surprising you with her beautiful and elaborate glass sculptures, the inventions of a highly imaginative mind - a complex and lifelike beehive, a castle of many layers of clear and green-blue glass - and the love that grows with the complexity of these creations. I was in awe of the writer's ability to make such a beautiful story seem like such an easy thing to tell. Byatt's voice carries throughout the book in a similar tone, with simple yet stunning descriptions and characterizations. I recommend it highly.
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