"I'll Bring You the Birds from Out of the Sky" (2017) by Brian Hodge

May 19, 2025

Readers unfamiliar with "I'll Bring You the Birds from Out of the Sky” may wish to read my notes only after reading the novella.

"I'll Bring You the Birds from Out of the Sky" (2017) by Brian Hodge is a novella published as a chapbook by Cemetery Dance. A friend on Goodreads recommended it to me based on my love for David Morrell's 1988 novella "Orange Is for Anguish, Blue for Insanity."

Both works detail protagonists exploring painters who (they eventually discover) "found out" the true nature of a part of our world.

Both stories are also careful reconstructions of a landscape weirder than the protagonists first imagine. Both depict ground that inspired a painter the protagonists study. Famously, "Orange Is for Anguish, Blue for Insanity" is about a man exploring a European landscape that inspired a painter similar to Van Gogh. The landscape eventually reveals that artist Van Dorn simply “painted what he saw.” Sublime terror, indeed.

"I'll Bring You the Birds from Out of the Sky" details the discovery of works by Cecil Conklin, a long-dead Appalachian mountain artist, unlettered and uneducated in any of the plastic arts, who made much with only (apparently) native wit and everyday flat surfaces that would hold pigment.

As "I'll Bring You the Birds from Out of the Sky" begins, Timothy Randolph, a gallery owner in Richmond, is visited by Nona Conklin, a young woman from Buell, West Virginia. Nona presents him with a painting by her deceased great-grandfather, Cecil. Intrigued by the raw power and unique vision of the artwork, Timothy travels with Nona to her isolated family homestead to see the rest of Cecil's collection—seventy-three paintings found stored in the family home place.

As Timothy studies the paintings, he learns more about Cecil. He was a man considered lazy and strange by his community. He had a deep, unsettling connection to the surrounding wilderness. Nona and her friend Lucas hope that showcasing Cecil's work could bring positive attention and perhaps economic benefit to their struggling region.

Timothy discovers that a crucial third panel of a triptych by Cecil is missing. Their search leads them to Broadwater Hollow, an abandoned settlement on the other side of the mountain where Cecil's wife, Olivia, was from. They find the missing panel in a dilapidated church, but it is being consumed by a strange, massive orange fungus that seems to permeate the entire valley. The fungus appears to kill and preserve birds and other small animals, and the graves in the church cemetery are empty, seemingly connected to the fungus below.

During their exploration, Lucas falls into a collapsing grave and inhales spores from the fungus. He begins to undergo a physical and mental transformation, growing larger and more primal, believing he is connecting with something ancient and powerful. It is a fate that reportedly also befell Cecil.

Realizing the profound and dangerous nature of the fungus and its influence, and seeing Lucas's transformation, Timothy understands the dark inspiration behind Cecil's art. He makes arrangements for his gallery and Nona's future, then returns to Broadwater Hollow, drawn by the fungus. He ultimately surrenders to it, becoming a "servant" to the vast, ancient entity, while Lucas becomes a "wild man" who brings "bodies" to the hollow.

The story ends with Timothy absorbed into the collective consciousness of the fungus. Nona is left to grapple with the legacy of her family and the changes in those she knew.

Reading After Dusk

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