THE DEEP ONES: "The Familiars" by Micaela Morrissette

"The Familiars" by Micaela Morrissette

Discussion begins September 20, 2023.

First published in Conjunctions 52: Betwixt the Between (2009).



BIBLIOGRAPHY

https://isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?92823

SELECTED PRINT VERSIONS

The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories

ONLINE VERSIONS

No online versions found to date.

ONLINE AUDIO VERSIONS

No online audio versions found to date.

MISCELLANY

https://www.worldswithoutend.com/author.asp?ID=4160
https://tinyurl.com/5445m9ky

This story could have tamped down on the many descriptions of childhood games, but I thought was alright.

It struck me as sort of a fairy story though with many unanswered questions. Was the husband a fairy? Did the mother kill her husband? Was he the same type of creature as the friend? Is she some kind of witch who cast a spell that went wrong? (The scene with the dance seemed a sort of ritual being performed given those objects on the floor.) Does the friend return at the end or is it another entity?

I don't understand why the title is a plural. Surely the boy's friend is the "familiar," and I don't see what else in the story would qualify for the label.

By the end of this story, a "smile" seemed like a very menacing and disquieting thing.