I reviewed Sarah Blackman's
Mother Box and Other Tales for the Kenyon Review Online. Here's the first paragraph of that review:
The subtitle of Sarah Blackman’s Mother Box: and Other Tales—evoking
as it does Arabian nights, anthropomorphic animals, and high seas
adventures—promises that the twelve pieces collected therein will
present something out of the ordinary. And, from the first page of the
collection, it is clear that these tales will fulfill that promise: “Of
course, she was the sort of person who had a lot of secrets. Her secrets
were how she understood it was herself and not, say, a peanut or a
broken-bottomed chair.” As that quote hints, however, these adventures
will take place in unfamiliar internal spaces, rather than in dark woods
or distant lands.
