In his essay “On Daemons & Dust,” an analysis of the His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman, Michael Chabon writes, “Epic fantasy distills and abstracts the idea of thinning– maps it, so to speak; but at its best the genre is no less serious or literary than any other. Yet epic fantasises, whether explicitly written for children or not, tend to get sequestered in their own section of the bookstore or library, clearly labeled to protect the unsuspecting reader of naturalistic fiction from making an awkward mistake. Thus do we consign to the borderlands our most audacious retellings of what is arguably one of the two or three primal human stories: the narrative of Innocence, Experience, and, straddling the margin between them, the Fall.”

While talking specifically about epic fantasy, I think part of Chabon’s meaning can be generalized to all of speculative fiction. We neatly label things as fantasy, science fiction, or horror and relegate such books to back corners and second stories, away from the prestige shelves of more grounded, literary fiction. These genres have soared in popularity in the twenty-first century, of course, but they still struggle to achieve the same critical acclaim as fiction grounded in our own reality.

Which is a shame, because Chabon is right, the borderlands between fantasy and reality, the unmapped expanse of the boundless human imagination is the most fertile ground for telling poignant stories about the human experience. Since the invention of the written word, humans have been jotting down dreams and visions of worlds alike to and yet abstracted from our own. The Epic of Gilgamesh, Journey to the West, and Paradise Lost, among countless other myths and legends from around the world remain relevant and worth studying today because their fantastical elements reveal core truths of the human experience that transcend time, language, and culture.

All great speculative fiction does. It breaks the laws of reality to reveal the truth of the soul, and I have read few books more revealing than Find Me Where It Ends by Cassandra Khaw. Ostensibly this is a fable about a woman who comes from a line of witches cursed to see their death approach them in the form of a black spectral dog. Her grandmother’s appeared outside the hospital when she was dying of a terminal illness. Her mother’s showed up unexpectedly one day and her mother immediately took her own life. Now on a random, otherwise uneventful day, a large black dog in the shape of a german shepherd with glowing gold eyes appears in front of Antigone’s house. The rest of the book follows Antigone in her day to day life as she decides for herself what the presence of her Death means and what she intends to do about it.

In her acknowledgements, Khaw says this was never a book she intended to write, partially because she did not intend to live long enough to bother writing it. It is a visceral depiction of loneliness, depression and the grinding fatigue that leads someone to consider killing themself.

While I have never struggled with active suicidal ideation, I have been blessed to love many people that do, and I am so thankful that so far they have all chosen to stay with me. This book reminded me how precious the love of a suicidal person is and how every day they chose to stay is a day they chose to love you and the life you have built together.

For a long time, I have known that suicidality is neither a selfish, nor a cowardly act. People who actively choose to die are often suffering immense pain, hopelessness, loneliness, and fatigue. People choose to die when life is so agonizing or empty that they can’t tolerate the idea of carrying on. They want the pain to stop more than anything. This book did such a fantastic job of depicting suicidality with empathy and grace because it came from the heart of a person who has stared into the abyss of her own mortality and thought that it might be preferable to everything life had to offer.

Though suicide is not cowardly, actively choosing to stay is one of the bravest things a person can do. It is a radical act of love, for your people, for the world, for yourself. This book made me so fucking thankful for every person I love who at some point actively chose to stay. I hope I never take for granted the days the people I love choose to spend with me.

When I finished this book, I immediately got up to hug my spouse and text my found family group chat to tell them how much I love them and how thankful I am that they’re all still here, despite the horrors we face. I’m even getting choked up again while writing this review. That’s what all great literature, especially that of a speculative nature, can do. It makes us more human, more alive than we could ever be alone.

(If you are struggling to find reasons to stay, please don’t suffer in silence. This is not a battle you should have to face alone. Reach out to those you love and to whatever resources you think could help, including crisis hotlines. I believe you will find your reason to stay. Please stay.)