Part IV. Nostalgia for the Body and Part V. The Land of Mists contain stories of the inhabitants of the Subtle World: souls not yet incarnated, but preparing for incarnation; disembodied, but longing for physical, as well as stories of other creatures, for example, like the Black Raven, who serves as a Guardian in the Land of Mists, and characters of fairy tales and other thought-forms. Here the influence of H. Chr. Andersen and E. T. A. Hoffmann, O. Wilde and A. S.-Exupery is captured, and the pearl of this collection, in my opinion, is the fairy tale Water Lily, by the way, reprinted three times and beloved by readers. The story A Guest explodes ones mind with a trivial tea-party with Death.
The book Tales of Ghosts includes both new stories and previously published ones (from the books Do You Believe in Ghosts? and Water Lily), which received positive reviews from literary critics even after their first publication. The famous poet and writer Alexander Karpenko rightly compared Kryuchkovas short stories to the mystical thrillers of Edgar Allan Poe (Poetograd, No. 12 (113), 2014).
The stories from the book Tales of Ghosts got the following literary awards: Shadow of a Bird after Edgar Allan Poe and Case No 2021 in the nomination in honor of A. Hitchcock (the Moscow City Organization of the Union of Writers of Russia, NP Literary Republic, 20212), H. Chr. Andersen and E. T. A. Hoffman Tales for adults (Open Literary Club Response, 20223), Literary Olympus (League of Eurasian Writers, 2012).
A striking feature of Kryuchkovas prose is the complete absence of a line between earthly and the Other Realities: while reading, we sometimes do not even notice that the hero or heroine has already passed into the Other World! And all the characters decisive and not so much ones, romantic and prudent, loving and hating, smart and naive, happy and unhappy, rich and poor have one thing in common: they are mortal and, basically, suddenly.
The mystical spirit is masterfully matched by the author with the daily routine and real events of the era. Thus, behind the plot of the The City of Rains there is an ominous panorama of the crash of the twin towers in New York on September 11, 2001. The story Stuck Pluto is about an epidemic of coronavirus. In the story Disembodied we hear an echo of the Great Patriotic War, the ghost of a woman, a member of an intelligence network settled in Italy during the war years, has been looking for her son, evacuated to Siberia with an orphanage, with motherly persistence for half a century.
The short novel Good Night recreates a picture of the frantic rhythm of life and rotation in the business circles of Moscow in the sinister 1990s, when there was a demand for such unscrupulous people as Sackman, who robbed the owner of a furniture company, and the lovesick Oksana, ready to do anything for money, who easily sold her friend to the customer of the murder.
The image of Mr. Piggins (in the story A Photo film) is also quite remarkable, convex and brightly drawn by the author with obvious sarcasm. We see a state official, who has successfully moved from the Soviet era into the era of radical changes: as he received his tips in the form of interest, bribes and kickbacks, so he continues to receive them. And he will never die, because the Piggins are eternal
It is surprising that many of the works gathered in this book were created by Alexandra when she was a teenager, they are so well faceted. Written in pastel colors, they are lyrical, tender, they contain a slight sadness and a non-childlike understanding of the beauty of the world, in which Divine Love prevails over everything. A considerable portion of it is produced by the author herself, as if she remained to live on Earth at the age of a teenage girl. However, the character of her Farewell to Childhood is right,
Time doesnt exist. It is conditional and relative. And you will learn how to manage it when you realize that it doesnt really matter how old you are on Earth, the main thing is who you feel like.
Yes! To look at the world through childrens eyes, being an adult, is a gift from the Creator.
After reading the book, one gets the feeling that the author is constantly and intently watching his characters and even the reader! not from the side, but as if from Above, from different heights, now approaching them, then moving away, but never leaving them like a guardian angel.
However, in answer to the question Do I believe in ghosts?, I will quote the wise A Letter from the Astral Tablets, included by the author in Tales of Ghosts,
Of course, my dear friend in my life there have been other inexplicable cases related to those who passed into the Other world, but I confess to you that most of all I have always been worried about the relationship of living people, because it is it that turns some of us into ghosts
Dmitry Nemelstein,
poet, writer, historian,
member of the Union of Writers of Russia,
laureate of literary awards
The magazine CHILDREN of RA No. 1 (194), 2022, Magazine Hall Gorky-Media.