Book 41: Wilde Stories 2011 edited by Steve Berman, isbn 9781590213032, 289 pages, Lethe Press, $18.00
The Premise: WILDE STORIES 2011 is the fourth installment in editor and publisher Steve Berman's annual collection of the best gay speculative fiction. This time he's drawn from a variety of anthologies and magazines to compile 14 stories with strong gay characters at the center of the action. The stories skew heavily to the fantasy and horror quadrants of the speculative fiction map; possibly there were just not that as many hard-sf stories with gay characters to choose from.
My Rating: 4 stars
My Thoughts: I was already familiar with two of the entries: Christopher Barzak's "Map of Seventeen" from its appearance in THE BEASTLY BRIDE, and with Jeremy C. Shipp's "How To Make A Clown" from his FUNGUS OF THE HEART collection. I liked both stories the first time I read them, and liked them equally as well reading them again. Barzak's tale is great YA fiction with a straight female narrator talking about her older gay brother and his new boyfriend; Shipp's story is classic bizarro fiction that makes my brain hurt in a good way.
Possibly my favorite story in the collection was Laird Barron's "Mysterium Tremendum." I described it in a tweet as "Lovecraft meets Danielewski." I'd like to expand on that a bit: Barron, in his own style, evokes the best of Lovecraft's stories -- the focus on human characters chancing upon physical manifestations of the great unknown -- but the tone and pace of the story put me almost immediately in mind of Mark Z. Danielewski's THE HOUSE OF LEAVES. That novel is not perfect, but what lingers with me years after reading it is the sense of what I can only call "claustroagoraphobia." Barron's story (and Danielewski's) makes me feel tense because spaces that shouldn't be vast and endless (say, a cave hidden in a hillside) suddenly are, and spaces that should feel wide open (hiking trails in the Pacific Northwest) feel tight and threatening. For this story alone, pick up this collection.
I also really enjoyed Nick Poniatkowski's "How To Make Friends in Seventh Grade." It's not quite hard-sf, but that's okay -- a coming-of-age drama set against an "alien invaders are watching us" backdrop, it works very well because of the authenticity of the narrator. Sandra McDonald's "Beach Blanket Spaceship" is closer to hard-sf and feels reminiscent of the scenes from 2001 where Dave is alone with HAL and he knows something is not right but can't put his finger on what.
Barbara A. Barnett's "Mortis Persona" is also moving, a tale of love cut short by death and how both the departed and the left behind deal with it. There's a tinge of horror that is highly effective, but again it's the human emotions that make the story.
I'm a fan of pulp and Victorian sleuths, so I also really enjoyed Chaz Brenchley's "Hothouse Flowers, Or the Discreet Boys of Dr. Barnabas." It is an homage to Stoker and Doyle in style but is also entirely Brenchley's own. I'd enjoy further adventures of Messrs. Furnival and Alshott investigating the outre. They'd be a fine addition to the greater Wold-Newton Universe, as well.
I'll admit I struggled with Hal Duncan's "Oneirica." There were portions of it I liked, but I think I might have missed the point in it somewhere along the line. But even this story I can't say was "bad," just that it didn't work for me as well as most of the others. Likewise Alayna Dawn Johnson's "Love Will Tear Us Apart," Peter Dube's "Blazon," and Richard Larson's "The Noise." All GOOD stories, but for me not GREAT.
Joel Lane's "All The Shadows" was moving and didn't end the way I expected (that's a compliment). Jeffrey A. Ricker's "Lifeblood" shares some ground with Alayna Dawn Johnson's tale without sharing any plot points. Richard Bowes' "Waiting For the Phone To Ring" feels like it wants to be a novel but works in the shorter form.
Overall, a book well worth picking up when it hits stands in August. Of course, as with any multi-author collection, the stories I enjoyed the most may be the ones you enjoy the least -- but don't let that stop you from checking the book out and experiencing some authors you've never read before.
Showing posts with label short stories 2010. Show all posts
Showing posts with label short stories 2010. Show all posts
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Horror Stories
A mixed bag of genre stuff this entry. I'm trying to weed out books I know I'm not going to read, to donate to the book drive that will be happening to support National Novel Writing Month. I can't let any anthologies go without at least reading a couple of stories in each. So:
From Cthulhu's Reign, edited by Darrell Schweitzer (the concept of the anthology is "what the world will be like after Cthulthu and the other Lovecraftian monsters return to Earth):
304. Such Bright and Risen Madness in our Names by Jay Lake. Lake takes the anthology's premise and narrows it down to the personal level: the narrator is one of an ever-dwindling group of "rebel" humans / near-humans striving to maintain some kind of resistance against Cthulhu and the humans/near-humans who serve "him." In Lake's interpretation, there seem to be very few baseline humans left: almost everyone has undergone some kind of physical change since the Olde Ones returned. The narrator ends up involved in a plan to wipe out the Lovecraftians, but if every other form of resistance has failed, what are the odds this one will succeed? And is our narrator willing to do what it takes? What works about this story is that it could just as easily be about a resistance cell in an over-run third world country -- if the dictators in the story were not actual monsters, the emotions and interplay of the three main people in this story would be just as heart-wrenching and their decisions would be just as difficult to try to understand. The best genre stories speak to the "real" world, and this ranks right up there.
305. The Seals of New R'Lyeh by Gregory Frost almost crosses genre -- it's a crime caper (let's see if they can steal the heavily-guarded Seals), it's a sort-of buddy flick (if the buddies don't actually like each other but work together anyway) and it's at least dark fantasy, if not outright horror (after all, the setting is The World After Cthulhu Returns). At least twice, I thought I knew where this story was going and found that it wasn't going there. Frost makes several neat turns in the story work with just a word or two; he never beats you over the head with clues to where things are headed, but the clues are there nonetheless in the way the story progresses. See if you can put it together before the end; I'll admit, I didn't but afterwards said "of course!"
And now four from the first Dark Delicacies anthology, edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb:
306. The Reincarnate by Ray Bradbury. Is there anything like a Ray Bradbury short story? This is one of those stories that is addressed directly to the reader-as-main-character: "After a while you will get over being afraid." This type of story is, I think, very hard to pull off even in the short form. So far, Bradbury and Norman Partridge seem to be the only authors that come to mind has having succeeded enough for me to not only remember the story, but to add it to my list of favorites. Bradbury's starts off a little rocky for me, but within a trio of paragraphs I was pulled right in and stayed in the story through the really satisfying ending.
307. Part of the Game by F. Paul Wilson. This is a tidy little "pulp / penny dreadful" type story. 1930s Chinatown setting, prejudiced white detective tries to horn in on the gambling and other illicit activities from which a mysterious figure called The Mandarin takes a cut. He tells the Mandarin's Emissary that he wants to "be a part of the game," or else he will bring the entire police department to bear and essentially shut Chinatown down. Famous last words, of course. What I really liked about this story is that Wilson does not attempt to make the detective, or the emissary, or the Mandarin himself, at all sympathetic. Occasionally, a story in which everyone is simply out for himself is exactly what the reader needs. This was one of those times for me. And it's not that the detective is a particularly flat character -- he has motivation and such -- it's just that he's thoroughly unlikeable. Great story, and I'm wondering if Wilson intended "The Mandarin" to be Fu Manchu.
308. Bloody Mary Morning by John Farris. I'm not a "gore horror" fan so much -- I'd much rather watch or read a psychological horror story than see the latest SAW movie. Farris' tale sort of walks the line between the two. There is a lot of blood here, and described in very cinematic terms, even though there are only three deaths. The blood permeates the entire story, and just when I thought it was getting to be a bit too much and perhaps a bit cliche ... Farris ends the story on a grace note that makes you realize why all the blood was necessary and what it was really all about. The psychological dramatic tension (will he get away with it, is the best I can summarize without giving anything away) walks you through a few cliches but not in any way that feels cliched.
309. A Gentleman of the Old School by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro. I read this because it is a Count Saint-Germain story, and it's been years since I've read a Saint-Germain story. That being said ... it's not really a horror story. In fact, I'm not really sure what to call it. It's got murder mystery and serial killer elements in it, it's got the whole "will she learn his secret and what will happen if she does" element, and it's got that "intrepid reporter who might be getting in over her head" element. And they somehow work together, but there's nothing particularly horrific about the story, nor is there anything really in the way of a satisfactory exploration of the serial killer aspect. For fans of Saint-Germain, I think it's a great little character moment, but others might wonder just what the story is doing in this collection.
And finally three from Dark Delicacies II: Fear, also edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb:
310. Dog by Joe R. Lansdale. I normally try not to boil stories down to comparisons with other authors, but this story made me immediately think of two Stephen King works: CUJO (for perhaps the obvious reason), and "The Gingerbread Girl" (for reasons that hopefully will become apparent when you read the story). Which is not to say that Lansdale spends the story channeling King -- this is definitely a Lansdale story beginning to end. The tension just keeps ratcheting up through the story. I literally was sweating along with the main character, feeling chased and harried. And left the story with an unsettling feeling that this is the kind of thing that happens to you once, and you can't explain what it was all about but you hope you've done your time and it won't come around to bite you again. Which is meant as a great compliment.
311. First Born by John Farris. This Farris story didn't work quite as well for me as the one above, but it still had its nice twists. The main character is a famous actor who finds that he doesn't remember a promise he made 20 years ago to the man who started his career -- or at least that's what the odd voice on the other side of the phone claims. The caller wants the actor to turn over his first born child -- I'm not giving anything away here because the title pretty much leads you to that already. Farris works in a twist about halfway through that allows the story to resolve in a little bit of a different way than is typical. I think the details he leaves out (allowing the reader to piece things together) are more interesting than the details he leaves in.
312. The Ammonite Violin (Murder Ballad No. 4) by Caitlyn R. Kiernan. I know this is part of a longer book. I read it and decided that I really want to read that longer work now. Kiernan gives us a view through a serial killer's eyes -- a killer who has two passions, killing and collecting ammonite shells. He has a violin constructed using some of those shells and we spend most of the story wondering what his purpose is. It becomes very clear at the end. Kiernan does a great job of building that tension and wording things in such a way that even up to the end you're wondering exactly how the story is going to play out. Very well done.
From Cthulhu's Reign, edited by Darrell Schweitzer (the concept of the anthology is "what the world will be like after Cthulthu and the other Lovecraftian monsters return to Earth):
304. Such Bright and Risen Madness in our Names by Jay Lake. Lake takes the anthology's premise and narrows it down to the personal level: the narrator is one of an ever-dwindling group of "rebel" humans / near-humans striving to maintain some kind of resistance against Cthulhu and the humans/near-humans who serve "him." In Lake's interpretation, there seem to be very few baseline humans left: almost everyone has undergone some kind of physical change since the Olde Ones returned. The narrator ends up involved in a plan to wipe out the Lovecraftians, but if every other form of resistance has failed, what are the odds this one will succeed? And is our narrator willing to do what it takes? What works about this story is that it could just as easily be about a resistance cell in an over-run third world country -- if the dictators in the story were not actual monsters, the emotions and interplay of the three main people in this story would be just as heart-wrenching and their decisions would be just as difficult to try to understand. The best genre stories speak to the "real" world, and this ranks right up there.
305. The Seals of New R'Lyeh by Gregory Frost almost crosses genre -- it's a crime caper (let's see if they can steal the heavily-guarded Seals), it's a sort-of buddy flick (if the buddies don't actually like each other but work together anyway) and it's at least dark fantasy, if not outright horror (after all, the setting is The World After Cthulhu Returns). At least twice, I thought I knew where this story was going and found that it wasn't going there. Frost makes several neat turns in the story work with just a word or two; he never beats you over the head with clues to where things are headed, but the clues are there nonetheless in the way the story progresses. See if you can put it together before the end; I'll admit, I didn't but afterwards said "of course!"
And now four from the first Dark Delicacies anthology, edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb:
306. The Reincarnate by Ray Bradbury. Is there anything like a Ray Bradbury short story? This is one of those stories that is addressed directly to the reader-as-main-character: "After a while you will get over being afraid." This type of story is, I think, very hard to pull off even in the short form. So far, Bradbury and Norman Partridge seem to be the only authors that come to mind has having succeeded enough for me to not only remember the story, but to add it to my list of favorites. Bradbury's starts off a little rocky for me, but within a trio of paragraphs I was pulled right in and stayed in the story through the really satisfying ending.
307. Part of the Game by F. Paul Wilson. This is a tidy little "pulp / penny dreadful" type story. 1930s Chinatown setting, prejudiced white detective tries to horn in on the gambling and other illicit activities from which a mysterious figure called The Mandarin takes a cut. He tells the Mandarin's Emissary that he wants to "be a part of the game," or else he will bring the entire police department to bear and essentially shut Chinatown down. Famous last words, of course. What I really liked about this story is that Wilson does not attempt to make the detective, or the emissary, or the Mandarin himself, at all sympathetic. Occasionally, a story in which everyone is simply out for himself is exactly what the reader needs. This was one of those times for me. And it's not that the detective is a particularly flat character -- he has motivation and such -- it's just that he's thoroughly unlikeable. Great story, and I'm wondering if Wilson intended "The Mandarin" to be Fu Manchu.
308. Bloody Mary Morning by John Farris. I'm not a "gore horror" fan so much -- I'd much rather watch or read a psychological horror story than see the latest SAW movie. Farris' tale sort of walks the line between the two. There is a lot of blood here, and described in very cinematic terms, even though there are only three deaths. The blood permeates the entire story, and just when I thought it was getting to be a bit too much and perhaps a bit cliche ... Farris ends the story on a grace note that makes you realize why all the blood was necessary and what it was really all about. The psychological dramatic tension (will he get away with it, is the best I can summarize without giving anything away) walks you through a few cliches but not in any way that feels cliched.
309. A Gentleman of the Old School by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro. I read this because it is a Count Saint-Germain story, and it's been years since I've read a Saint-Germain story. That being said ... it's not really a horror story. In fact, I'm not really sure what to call it. It's got murder mystery and serial killer elements in it, it's got the whole "will she learn his secret and what will happen if she does" element, and it's got that "intrepid reporter who might be getting in over her head" element. And they somehow work together, but there's nothing particularly horrific about the story, nor is there anything really in the way of a satisfactory exploration of the serial killer aspect. For fans of Saint-Germain, I think it's a great little character moment, but others might wonder just what the story is doing in this collection.
And finally three from Dark Delicacies II: Fear, also edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb:
310. Dog by Joe R. Lansdale. I normally try not to boil stories down to comparisons with other authors, but this story made me immediately think of two Stephen King works: CUJO (for perhaps the obvious reason), and "The Gingerbread Girl" (for reasons that hopefully will become apparent when you read the story). Which is not to say that Lansdale spends the story channeling King -- this is definitely a Lansdale story beginning to end. The tension just keeps ratcheting up through the story. I literally was sweating along with the main character, feeling chased and harried. And left the story with an unsettling feeling that this is the kind of thing that happens to you once, and you can't explain what it was all about but you hope you've done your time and it won't come around to bite you again. Which is meant as a great compliment.
311. First Born by John Farris. This Farris story didn't work quite as well for me as the one above, but it still had its nice twists. The main character is a famous actor who finds that he doesn't remember a promise he made 20 years ago to the man who started his career -- or at least that's what the odd voice on the other side of the phone claims. The caller wants the actor to turn over his first born child -- I'm not giving anything away here because the title pretty much leads you to that already. Farris works in a twist about halfway through that allows the story to resolve in a little bit of a different way than is typical. I think the details he leaves out (allowing the reader to piece things together) are more interesting than the details he leaves in.
312. The Ammonite Violin (Murder Ballad No. 4) by Caitlyn R. Kiernan. I know this is part of a longer book. I read it and decided that I really want to read that longer work now. Kiernan gives us a view through a serial killer's eyes -- a killer who has two passions, killing and collecting ammonite shells. He has a violin constructed using some of those shells and we spend most of the story wondering what his purpose is. It becomes very clear at the end. Kiernan does a great job of building that tension and wording things in such a way that even up to the end you're wondering exactly how the story is going to play out. Very well done.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Jeremy Shipp's Stories
A couple of months ago, author Jeremy C. Shipp sent out a call for reviewers on his Twitter. Some of those reviewers got print ARC's of Shipp's forthcoming short fiction collection FUNGUS OF THE HEART from the publisher. I was amongst those who got the ARC in .pdf form directly from the author. Here are my thoughts on the individual stories:
291. The Sun Never Rises in the Big City Shipp has a knack for combining genres, in this case mystery and horror. Most of the mystery-horror hybrids I've read have been in the Harry Dresden / urban fantasy mode. This one is decidedly not. The narrator pretends to be a noirish private dick with a sexy customer named Adeline who wants help confirming that her husband is cheating on her; the truth of the situation comes out quickly and the twists flow from there. It's still a mystery, it's just not the mystery you initially think it is. The true personality of the narrator becomes apparent as the story moves along. This one made an impression on me and made me wonder more about the world the characters live in.
292. The Haunted House Another mystery-horror hybrid, this time with a narrating character who could fall more into the Harry Dresden mold. Ash possesses her clients in order to get deep into their psyches to help solve them find solutions to the emotional trauma / problems they have. I liked how Shipp doled out the information as to what was really going on slowly, eerily. Apparitions, manifestations of the client's personality and past, come and go, but not everything Ash encounters is a figment of her client's imagination. This story has a different kind of mystery-tension than the story that precedes it, even though they can be lumped under the same "mystery-horror" label.
293. Fungus of the Heart Shipp creates interesting worlds in these short stories. In this story, the narrator is a trained Sentinel, meant to protect The Protectors, a breed of humans who are set slightly apart from the rest -- their powers give them responsibility but also cause those they protect to pull away. But Nightingale, the Sentinel, has a mission: to rescue her lover, also a Protector, from the people who have kidnapped her. Nightingale is willing to do anything it takes to rescue Cailin; the question is will she forfeit her soul to do what she thinks is right? Shipp very capably addresses the issue of when it's time to let go, within the bigger issue of finding your own personal boundaries.
294. Boy in the Cabinet A lot of Shipp's stories seem to be dialogue-driven. This is one of those: a boy who lives in a cabinet talks to a Death Cat, a Cup, a Girl, and a Man. The Boy discovers things about his life, his past, his future. The relatively small amount of actual descriptive writing in the story actually increases the feeling that we're reading a fairy-tale. The cat in particular is a great character, ranking right up there with the cat in Neil Gaiman's CORALINE in terms of almost overshadowing the human main characters.
295. Just Another Vampire Story is also not your typical vampire story. I really don't feel like I can say much about why this story worked so well for me without spoiling the way Shipp plays the story out. I think I can summarize it: a husband cheats on his wife, and vampires fit into the resolution of their marital problems. By keeping the story in Steven's POV, and showing how little he really understands Helen, Shipp keeps the narrative tension tight. Possibly my second-favorite story in the book after the opening story.
296. Ticketyboo Another story that did not go at all where I thought it would, and that's a good thing. I'm not sure I ever got a really clear sense of where / what Ticketyboo actually is (although there's a heavy implication that again, I don't want to spoil; but I think it can also be interpreted as something very different from what's implied by the end of the story), but I did get a strong sense of the bond between the young siblings the story centers on. I found the choice of the name "Massa" for the surrogate mother figure to be a little odd but that's a minor quibble.
297. The Escapist is a legend among Gnomekind, the best greatest hope for ending the war with the Goblins. But is he really what the bards sing about? The Escapist IS the main character in the story, and we see what he really thinks of himself and his abilities and his past as compared to what his fellows think. I'm not sure if Shipp intended this as almost a treatise on the Cult of Personality, but the theme certainly fits the story. What happens when the Savior/Hero we think we need not only is not what we thought but is also not what he thinks he is? The story is also an absolutely great war story -- how far will we go to win a battle? What happens when one general decides to take matters into his own hands, literally?
298. Ula Morales I'll admit I don't "get" the title, but I'm pretty sure I got the story, about a ten year old girl with antlers raised by an oak tree who will go to any lengths to protect her forest. One of the shorter, more pointed stories in the collection. On the one hand, it feels light a great character piece; on the other hand it feels like maybe it could have used a bit more development -- but then again, being in first person I'm not sure how the story could have been expanded. So it's a bit of a catch-22.
299. Spider House In contrast to the preceding story this one not only cries for more exploration, it would be very easy for the author to do more with it. If Shipp hasn't yet considered expanding this into at least a novella, he should. The main character is heavily burdened with her past involvement in a war that at first seems a bit vaguely described and later, with just a few lines, takes on a dimension that is both cliche and creative. Her supporting characters include a pumpkin-dwelling Sprite with low self-esteem and a vampire who can travel through computers and is searching for details on the person who destroyed his village and his family. And then there is the foil, General Thomas Reed, who wants to pull Shanna back into the war. It's a great cast of characters that almost demand to be developed further, which is a compliment to the story and not a criticism. I feel like I already know these characters and now want to see where events take them.
300. Monkey Boy and the Monsters Another war-based story, with a far more "anime" feel to it. That's the term that just popped into my head. I can see this story as a wildly-insane Japanese cartoon. Which is not to say the story's silliness is its only dimension. Far from it. Underneath the story of Monkey Boy, his sidekick Soapy and their battle against zombies, werewolves and dirt, we get commentary on controlling parents, censoring bodies, puberty, teen angst, and prejudice against "Georgians." Reading this only a week or so after the latest gay-bullying-related suicide here in NJ, I couldn't help but layer my own thoughts and concerns onto Shipp's words. Sometimes the right story comes along at the right time, and for me this was one of those happenstances.
301. Agape Walrus I am forced to admit that this particular story, about a rare "love walrus" named Kevin Donihe, his zombie lover, and three visitors to their remote home who are all looking for something. It was, perhaps, just a little too "out there" for me, but I'm sure the story will work very well for others. It felt like the silliness that propelled the Monkey Boy story (with the more serious undercurrent) took a wrong turn here; for me, too much of what goes on in this story felt more like it was there for shock value than for anything else.
302. Kingdom Come Another story I can't say too much about without spoiling the best part of the story. The story is about a man who takes his family on vacation in a national park in a world where people are equipped with Filters that essentially sound like high-tech "rose colored glasses." Early on, the narrator mentions his Filter editing out the utility wires and pollution so he can enjoy the view. The story of course takes a darker turn when the narrator's son disappears -- the author really excels at this "dark sf / dark fantasy / mystery" sort of mash-up. The story feels like it falters a bit in the middle and almost shows all the cards too soon, but it redeems itself in the final act and delivers a neat ending and (as with several other stories in the collection) a decided anti-war message.
303. How to Make a Clown is another of Shipp's dialogue-driven stories. It takes a more careful reading to really parse apart what's going on, but it is worth the effort. The opening is a bit rocky (what is up with that Clown, anyway), but the rest of the story has a romantic side in among the weirdness that I really liked. If I had a say, I'd recommend this story for Lethe Press' next Wilde Stories anthology.
Full book review will be posted over on my LJ and various other online places a little later tonight.
291. The Sun Never Rises in the Big City Shipp has a knack for combining genres, in this case mystery and horror. Most of the mystery-horror hybrids I've read have been in the Harry Dresden / urban fantasy mode. This one is decidedly not. The narrator pretends to be a noirish private dick with a sexy customer named Adeline who wants help confirming that her husband is cheating on her; the truth of the situation comes out quickly and the twists flow from there. It's still a mystery, it's just not the mystery you initially think it is. The true personality of the narrator becomes apparent as the story moves along. This one made an impression on me and made me wonder more about the world the characters live in.
292. The Haunted House Another mystery-horror hybrid, this time with a narrating character who could fall more into the Harry Dresden mold. Ash possesses her clients in order to get deep into their psyches to help solve them find solutions to the emotional trauma / problems they have. I liked how Shipp doled out the information as to what was really going on slowly, eerily. Apparitions, manifestations of the client's personality and past, come and go, but not everything Ash encounters is a figment of her client's imagination. This story has a different kind of mystery-tension than the story that precedes it, even though they can be lumped under the same "mystery-horror" label.
293. Fungus of the Heart Shipp creates interesting worlds in these short stories. In this story, the narrator is a trained Sentinel, meant to protect The Protectors, a breed of humans who are set slightly apart from the rest -- their powers give them responsibility but also cause those they protect to pull away. But Nightingale, the Sentinel, has a mission: to rescue her lover, also a Protector, from the people who have kidnapped her. Nightingale is willing to do anything it takes to rescue Cailin; the question is will she forfeit her soul to do what she thinks is right? Shipp very capably addresses the issue of when it's time to let go, within the bigger issue of finding your own personal boundaries.
294. Boy in the Cabinet A lot of Shipp's stories seem to be dialogue-driven. This is one of those: a boy who lives in a cabinet talks to a Death Cat, a Cup, a Girl, and a Man. The Boy discovers things about his life, his past, his future. The relatively small amount of actual descriptive writing in the story actually increases the feeling that we're reading a fairy-tale. The cat in particular is a great character, ranking right up there with the cat in Neil Gaiman's CORALINE in terms of almost overshadowing the human main characters.
295. Just Another Vampire Story is also not your typical vampire story. I really don't feel like I can say much about why this story worked so well for me without spoiling the way Shipp plays the story out. I think I can summarize it: a husband cheats on his wife, and vampires fit into the resolution of their marital problems. By keeping the story in Steven's POV, and showing how little he really understands Helen, Shipp keeps the narrative tension tight. Possibly my second-favorite story in the book after the opening story.
296. Ticketyboo Another story that did not go at all where I thought it would, and that's a good thing. I'm not sure I ever got a really clear sense of where / what Ticketyboo actually is (although there's a heavy implication that again, I don't want to spoil; but I think it can also be interpreted as something very different from what's implied by the end of the story), but I did get a strong sense of the bond between the young siblings the story centers on. I found the choice of the name "Massa" for the surrogate mother figure to be a little odd but that's a minor quibble.
297. The Escapist is a legend among Gnomekind, the best greatest hope for ending the war with the Goblins. But is he really what the bards sing about? The Escapist IS the main character in the story, and we see what he really thinks of himself and his abilities and his past as compared to what his fellows think. I'm not sure if Shipp intended this as almost a treatise on the Cult of Personality, but the theme certainly fits the story. What happens when the Savior/Hero we think we need not only is not what we thought but is also not what he thinks he is? The story is also an absolutely great war story -- how far will we go to win a battle? What happens when one general decides to take matters into his own hands, literally?
298. Ula Morales I'll admit I don't "get" the title, but I'm pretty sure I got the story, about a ten year old girl with antlers raised by an oak tree who will go to any lengths to protect her forest. One of the shorter, more pointed stories in the collection. On the one hand, it feels light a great character piece; on the other hand it feels like maybe it could have used a bit more development -- but then again, being in first person I'm not sure how the story could have been expanded. So it's a bit of a catch-22.
299. Spider House In contrast to the preceding story this one not only cries for more exploration, it would be very easy for the author to do more with it. If Shipp hasn't yet considered expanding this into at least a novella, he should. The main character is heavily burdened with her past involvement in a war that at first seems a bit vaguely described and later, with just a few lines, takes on a dimension that is both cliche and creative. Her supporting characters include a pumpkin-dwelling Sprite with low self-esteem and a vampire who can travel through computers and is searching for details on the person who destroyed his village and his family. And then there is the foil, General Thomas Reed, who wants to pull Shanna back into the war. It's a great cast of characters that almost demand to be developed further, which is a compliment to the story and not a criticism. I feel like I already know these characters and now want to see where events take them.
300. Monkey Boy and the Monsters Another war-based story, with a far more "anime" feel to it. That's the term that just popped into my head. I can see this story as a wildly-insane Japanese cartoon. Which is not to say the story's silliness is its only dimension. Far from it. Underneath the story of Monkey Boy, his sidekick Soapy and their battle against zombies, werewolves and dirt, we get commentary on controlling parents, censoring bodies, puberty, teen angst, and prejudice against "Georgians." Reading this only a week or so after the latest gay-bullying-related suicide here in NJ, I couldn't help but layer my own thoughts and concerns onto Shipp's words. Sometimes the right story comes along at the right time, and for me this was one of those happenstances.
301. Agape Walrus I am forced to admit that this particular story, about a rare "love walrus" named Kevin Donihe, his zombie lover, and three visitors to their remote home who are all looking for something. It was, perhaps, just a little too "out there" for me, but I'm sure the story will work very well for others. It felt like the silliness that propelled the Monkey Boy story (with the more serious undercurrent) took a wrong turn here; for me, too much of what goes on in this story felt more like it was there for shock value than for anything else.
302. Kingdom Come Another story I can't say too much about without spoiling the best part of the story. The story is about a man who takes his family on vacation in a national park in a world where people are equipped with Filters that essentially sound like high-tech "rose colored glasses." Early on, the narrator mentions his Filter editing out the utility wires and pollution so he can enjoy the view. The story of course takes a darker turn when the narrator's son disappears -- the author really excels at this "dark sf / dark fantasy / mystery" sort of mash-up. The story feels like it falters a bit in the middle and almost shows all the cards too soon, but it redeems itself in the final act and delivers a neat ending and (as with several other stories in the collection) a decided anti-war message.
303. How to Make a Clown is another of Shipp's dialogue-driven stories. It takes a more careful reading to really parse apart what's going on, but it is worth the effort. The opening is a bit rocky (what is up with that Clown, anyway), but the rest of the story has a romantic side in among the weirdness that I really liked. If I had a say, I'd recommend this story for Lethe Press' next Wilde Stories anthology.
Full book review will be posted over on my LJ and various other online places a little later tonight.
Friday, October 8, 2010
4 Story reviews
A mixed bag of genres, before I start my usual "Month of Horror" reading:
287. The Fall of the Moon by Jay Lake, from the October 2010 issue of Realms of Fantasy. In a world that seems to be in the future of our own (based on the use of certain words and the way characters refer to what used to be), a young man realizes that the insular, despondent life of his family's village is not all there is -- and that taking a risk (even if it is a risk prophecied by a book he finds under a bed) to see what's beyond the horizon is better than staying miserable. Jay Lake's short tale of Hassan and the boat he builds is rife with great details that reveal a world turned extremely dangerous (ocean tides bring in a flood of rodents, but also a flood of predators), but Hassan himself is what propels the story to its open end. Well done.
288. Twins by C.E. Morgan, from the June 14/21, 2010 issue of The New Yorker. This is one of those stories that I really can't figure out what to say about. I didn't hate it, I didn't dislike it even, but I also can't say I liked it. It's the story of very young twin brothers, one light-skinned and one dark, the progeny of mixed parents. It's told with a focus on the darker, less daring, brother and his interactions with more his more daring twin, their smothering single mother, and their distant father. It's full of physical detail that evokes the industrial area of Cincinnati, an area I've passed through and could picture. But I didn't click with the characters or the point of the story.
289. Torhec The Sculptor by Tanith Lee, from the October/November, 2010 issue of Asimov's Science Fiction. I'm going to sound like a broken record if someone goes back and rereads all of my Tanith Lee reviews in succession, but I love how she creates alternate Earths that are just a tweak or two away from our own. Is this story far in our future or in an alternate dimension? I don't know, and I'm not sure it really matters. The story is really about the ephemeral nature of art and the ever-lasting nature of man's pride and his doubt. The title character is an artist who creates, and then destroys. He does not sell collectors. Until the "multinaire" Von Glanz names a price high enough. Torhec and Von Glanz are opposite sides of "playing God," one destroying and one preserving. Or are they really all that different? Great story.
290. Death and the Countess by Win Scott Eckert, from The Avenger Chronicles. Another fun foray into the Wold-Newton Crossover Universe by Eckert, this one centering on Richard Benson, the gray-faced Avenger of the pulp magazines, and his team Justice Inc. They are drawn into a conspiracy in which a mysterious Countess is demonstrating a deadly new weapon to be auctioned off to the highest bidder -- and every major nation on the Allied and Axis sides of the soon-to-be World War Two want to get their hands on it. I won't spoil the fun of figuring out just how many other pulp (and other) literary figures Win manages to reference, since that's half the point of the story. A fun, easy read.
287. The Fall of the Moon by Jay Lake, from the October 2010 issue of Realms of Fantasy. In a world that seems to be in the future of our own (based on the use of certain words and the way characters refer to what used to be), a young man realizes that the insular, despondent life of his family's village is not all there is -- and that taking a risk (even if it is a risk prophecied by a book he finds under a bed) to see what's beyond the horizon is better than staying miserable. Jay Lake's short tale of Hassan and the boat he builds is rife with great details that reveal a world turned extremely dangerous (ocean tides bring in a flood of rodents, but also a flood of predators), but Hassan himself is what propels the story to its open end. Well done.
288. Twins by C.E. Morgan, from the June 14/21, 2010 issue of The New Yorker. This is one of those stories that I really can't figure out what to say about. I didn't hate it, I didn't dislike it even, but I also can't say I liked it. It's the story of very young twin brothers, one light-skinned and one dark, the progeny of mixed parents. It's told with a focus on the darker, less daring, brother and his interactions with more his more daring twin, their smothering single mother, and their distant father. It's full of physical detail that evokes the industrial area of Cincinnati, an area I've passed through and could picture. But I didn't click with the characters or the point of the story.
289. Torhec The Sculptor by Tanith Lee, from the October/November, 2010 issue of Asimov's Science Fiction. I'm going to sound like a broken record if someone goes back and rereads all of my Tanith Lee reviews in succession, but I love how she creates alternate Earths that are just a tweak or two away from our own. Is this story far in our future or in an alternate dimension? I don't know, and I'm not sure it really matters. The story is really about the ephemeral nature of art and the ever-lasting nature of man's pride and his doubt. The title character is an artist who creates, and then destroys. He does not sell collectors. Until the "multinaire" Von Glanz names a price high enough. Torhec and Von Glanz are opposite sides of "playing God," one destroying and one preserving. Or are they really all that different? Great story.
290. Death and the Countess by Win Scott Eckert, from The Avenger Chronicles. Another fun foray into the Wold-Newton Crossover Universe by Eckert, this one centering on Richard Benson, the gray-faced Avenger of the pulp magazines, and his team Justice Inc. They are drawn into a conspiracy in which a mysterious Countess is demonstrating a deadly new weapon to be auctioned off to the highest bidder -- and every major nation on the Allied and Axis sides of the soon-to-be World War Two want to get their hands on it. I won't spoil the fun of figuring out just how many other pulp (and other) literary figures Win manages to reference, since that's half the point of the story. A fun, easy read.
Monday, September 13, 2010
3 from The New Yorker
Three from recent issues of The New Yorker. In mid-June, the magazine started featuring "20 Under 40," twenty writers under the age of 40. It seems this will run through the fall. I'm behind on my New Yorker reading, and I'm not approaching the stories in any kind of order. Just whatever's next on the pile.
268. The Entire Northern Side Was Covered With Fire by Rivka Galchen from the June 14-21, 2010 issue. To be blunt: I really didn't like this story. I read it, and as I was reading I hoped I'd find something favorable to say about it. The best I can say is that it is not badly written. But I thoroughly disliked the characters and the fact that the story doesn't seem to go anywhere and the abrupt ending that failed to resolve anything at all. If all of that was the author's intention, then she did a good job. The main character is either incredibly self-involved or is the stereotype of the dumb blond who just doesn't get what's going on around her. Both of the people she expresses her problems to (her brother and a close friend) are equally self-involved. The main character's agent seems like the only person who might have a clue as to anything, and we never actually see him on-screen, just get a summary of a phone conversation. And I realize that there are very good stories out there (some of which I've reviewed here) that have ambiguous endings and lack complete resolution. This story's ending doesn't just leave things hanging, it feels tacked on.
269. The Erlking by Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum from the July 5, 2010 issue. I've only read one other Bynum story, Yurt, reviewed earlier this year. The main character in that story struck me as disconnected from herself and the world around her, and the main characters in this story strike me in much the same way. Kate, the mother, and Ruthie/Ondine/Dorothy, the young daughter, both are wrapped up in their own heads (as so many of us so often are) that even the simplest social interaction between them becomes something absolutely different to each. Bynum works the neat trick of alternating pov without making any sharp breaks in the narrative (and the few sharp breaks there are don't occur at a POV change but in the midst of Kate's thoughts, providing us with some indication of the recent past). Both mother and daughter are caught up in their own fantasy worlds, although Kate's fantasies are of the mundane kind: find the right school for her daughter, find the right colored doll, and the child's problems will disappear, while Ruthie's are typical child flights of fantasy: the strange man and the Renaissance Faire-like day at a nearby school surely has an amazing surprise gift meant only for her, if only she could get her mother to talk to the man. The story takes on a darker tone near the end, as the mother's searching for the right doll overwhelms her attention to what her daughter is doing. The ending is a bit ambiguous -- is the last paragraph in Ruthie's imagination or is it real -- but compared to the story above, the ambiguity is a satisfying ending.
270. The Dredgeman's Revelation by Karen Russell from the July 26, 2010 issue. Karen Russell is one of those writers I feel I've read more of than I really have. I've read Vampires In the Lemon Grove twice now, and St. Lucy's Home For Girls Raised By Wolves once, although I can't seem to locate the review of that latter story here in the community. Perhaps I mis-tagged it. Anyway -- I loved both of those stories, taking genre tropes and tweaking them. This story works in a very different way. There is no obvious genre feel to the story at the beginning, unless you consider "Depression-era Dust Bowl Lit" to be a genre like SF or Horror. The story is about an adopted son who runs away from home during the Depression and ends up on first one, then another, work crew in Florida dredging a swamp. Most of the story has a very Oh Brother Where Art Thou / Grapes of Wrath feel: the boy is optimistic despite hard times, does what he has to to survive, doesn't talk about his past with his coworkers. You can almost feel the tension building like humidity on a summer day: something is going to happen, things seem too happy. Sure enough, something does happen -- something that caught me so off-guard I don't want to spoil it here. In its final page the story takes on a genre aspect, and in fact reminded me of a very different movie than the two referenced above. Very much enjoyed this one, and will be surprised if it doesn't end up in Best American Short Stories in 2011.
268. The Entire Northern Side Was Covered With Fire by Rivka Galchen from the June 14-21, 2010 issue. To be blunt: I really didn't like this story. I read it, and as I was reading I hoped I'd find something favorable to say about it. The best I can say is that it is not badly written. But I thoroughly disliked the characters and the fact that the story doesn't seem to go anywhere and the abrupt ending that failed to resolve anything at all. If all of that was the author's intention, then she did a good job. The main character is either incredibly self-involved or is the stereotype of the dumb blond who just doesn't get what's going on around her. Both of the people she expresses her problems to (her brother and a close friend) are equally self-involved. The main character's agent seems like the only person who might have a clue as to anything, and we never actually see him on-screen, just get a summary of a phone conversation. And I realize that there are very good stories out there (some of which I've reviewed here) that have ambiguous endings and lack complete resolution. This story's ending doesn't just leave things hanging, it feels tacked on.
269. The Erlking by Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum from the July 5, 2010 issue. I've only read one other Bynum story, Yurt, reviewed earlier this year. The main character in that story struck me as disconnected from herself and the world around her, and the main characters in this story strike me in much the same way. Kate, the mother, and Ruthie/Ondine/Dorothy, the young daughter, both are wrapped up in their own heads (as so many of us so often are) that even the simplest social interaction between them becomes something absolutely different to each. Bynum works the neat trick of alternating pov without making any sharp breaks in the narrative (and the few sharp breaks there are don't occur at a POV change but in the midst of Kate's thoughts, providing us with some indication of the recent past). Both mother and daughter are caught up in their own fantasy worlds, although Kate's fantasies are of the mundane kind: find the right school for her daughter, find the right colored doll, and the child's problems will disappear, while Ruthie's are typical child flights of fantasy: the strange man and the Renaissance Faire-like day at a nearby school surely has an amazing surprise gift meant only for her, if only she could get her mother to talk to the man. The story takes on a darker tone near the end, as the mother's searching for the right doll overwhelms her attention to what her daughter is doing. The ending is a bit ambiguous -- is the last paragraph in Ruthie's imagination or is it real -- but compared to the story above, the ambiguity is a satisfying ending.
270. The Dredgeman's Revelation by Karen Russell from the July 26, 2010 issue. Karen Russell is one of those writers I feel I've read more of than I really have. I've read Vampires In the Lemon Grove twice now, and St. Lucy's Home For Girls Raised By Wolves once, although I can't seem to locate the review of that latter story here in the community. Perhaps I mis-tagged it. Anyway -- I loved both of those stories, taking genre tropes and tweaking them. This story works in a very different way. There is no obvious genre feel to the story at the beginning, unless you consider "Depression-era Dust Bowl Lit" to be a genre like SF or Horror. The story is about an adopted son who runs away from home during the Depression and ends up on first one, then another, work crew in Florida dredging a swamp. Most of the story has a very Oh Brother Where Art Thou / Grapes of Wrath feel: the boy is optimistic despite hard times, does what he has to to survive, doesn't talk about his past with his coworkers. You can almost feel the tension building like humidity on a summer day: something is going to happen, things seem too happy. Sure enough, something does happen -- something that caught me so off-guard I don't want to spoil it here. In its final page the story takes on a genre aspect, and in fact reminded me of a very different movie than the two referenced above. Very much enjoyed this one, and will be surprised if it doesn't end up in Best American Short Stories in 2011.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Knights of various stripes
Another short story round-up: Stories 259 - 267 for the year.
259. AAAA Wizardry by Jim Butcher, from The Dresden Files Role-Playing Game: Our World volume. Harry Dresden instructs a group of fresh new young Wardens of the White Council in the art of being a detective of the supernatural. He illustrates each of the "A"s in turn by relating a case involving a single mother and her "sensitive" children. Tension builds nicely, and there really aren't any spoilers for the series overall aside from mention of the on-going War with the Red Court of Vampires, which is a background note to most of the books to date anyway. The story is a really nice glimpse into what makes Harry a good detective, but also what makes him a good character: the fact that he makes mistakes.
The rest are from the anthology Dark And Stormy Knights, edited by P.N. Elrod:
260. A Questionable Client by Ilona Andrews Even without the author's note at the end of the story, I could tell this adventure of mercenary Kate Daniels takes place within a larger fictional world. Too many small things are mentioned off-handedly: The Mercenary Guild, the fact that magic and technology seem to alternate in unpredictable waves, Kate's interactions with her boss and fellow mercs. Still, the story itself, about Kate taking on bodyguard duty with extra hazard pay for a client no one else seems to want to touch, flows well and feels complete. I can't say it made me want to run out and buy the Kate Daniels novels, but I am curious about how her world works and how this adventure, involving a very questionable client and the people after him, fits into the overall scheme of things.
261. The Beacon by Shannon K. Butcher Yes, Shannon is Jim Butcher's wife. But her story is not, so far as I can tell, at all related to his Dresden Files world. This also seems to be an introduction to a character who I think could hold his own series well. Ryder Ward is the latest in a line of Terraphage hunters -- he inherited the job from his father, and the implication is that it's a family heritage. Ryder tracks down "The Beacons" whose dreams summon the phages into the real world, and he kills them before the phages can be summoned. The problem is, Ryder's latest Beacon is not an easy kill. The question quickly becomes: how far can a man be pushed to do something that he knows is for the good of the society no matter what it does to him emotionally? I liked the way Shannon Butcher built the main and supporting characters and gave the story several possible directions to go in, with a satisfactory (almost, dare I say it, fun) final moment.
262. Even a Rabbit Will Bite by Rachel Caine This was a really fun story. Like Shannon Butcher's, I did not get the sense it was part of an already-existing fictional world and I think I enjoyed the story more for that. Caine asks the question: what happens when the last near-immortal dragon hunter, living in our modern world, gets a letter from the Pope telling her it's time to train her own replacement? How do you train someone to fight dragons when the last remaining dragon is as old as you and hides in a dessert half a world away? I loved the exasperation and crotchetiness of Lisel Martin and how she handles being made obsolete. I also loved the way the story goes from snarky to serious in a heart-beat. Naturally, all is not what it seems to be at the story's start, and Caine uses the story to make a bigger point than just "be constantly vigilant."
263. Dark Lady by P.N. Elrod This is the second Jack Fleming story I've read. The Fleming stories take place in 1930s Chicago and feature a vampire private eye who runs a bar. In this story, Fleming is called on to aide one damsel-in-distress and finds himself needing help as well. The Dark Lady of the title turns out to be an interesting secondary character. I've never read any of Elrod's Fleming novels, but the two stories I've read have been reasonably fun.
264. Beknighted by Deidre Knight Another story that doesn't seem to take place in an previously-existing world. Each of the stories in this collection plays with the concept of what it means to be a "knight," male or female, and most of the main characters can easily be described as "dark," or "stormy" or both. Knight's story puts a bit of a twist on the theme. The main character is an artist who, thanks to intense dreams, has set herself the task of creating a mystic puzzle that will set an imprisoned knight free. Her main problem is that none of the materials she has to hand are really up to the task - until a mysterious patron shows up with a small cache of "templar gold," living gold that can be mixed with the paint to provide the painting/puzzle with the oomph it needs to free the nameless knight. The question, of course, is what the mysterious patron is really up to, and can he be trusted at all? Knight's story flows well, although there are a few details I'd like to have seen explained (such as how our main character knows painting the knight and then creating a puzzle of the painting will free him -- there's an implication that this sort of thing is done, although highly regulated, in her world, but I'd have liked a more explicit explanation.) Still, I recommend this as one of the better stories in the volume.
265. Shifting Star by Vicki Pettersson Another story that takes place in an already-established world with which I am unfamiliar. I think that this story contains a few more spoilers for Pettersson's "Signs of the Zodiac" series than the Dresden, Daniels or Fleming stories do, judging from the focus of the story. It took me a few paragraphs to understand that the main character is a magical construct given a name, autonomy, and a life -- to which she is mostly not adapting well at all. The mystery she becomes embroiled in seems to be connected to something of a major series point. And the main character's growth, through her interaction with a mortal man she meets, also seems like it should have a large affect on this character's role in the book series. The Zodiac books have been recommended to me, but I haven't added them to my TBR list just yet. I would say, of all the stories in this volume, approach this one with the most caution if you're reading the Zodiac books but are not up to the current volume yet, just in case the spoilers are as big as they seemed to me to be. That said, I did enjoy Pettersson's take on "what it is that makes us human."
266. Rookwood & Mrs. King by Lilith Saintcrow I got the impression that this story was part of an already-established world, but nothing in the author's notes at the end confirms that suspicion. So this might be one of those rare anthology stories that feels like it belongs to something already extant even though it is in fact it's own new thing. The Rookwood of the title is a cop-turned-private investigator with a problem: he's not quite human, not quite vampire. He's been surviving, taking on cases, but waiting for the one case that will enable him to come face-to-face with the creatures that created him, and it seems that case has finally fallen in his lap. There are a series of double-crosses, often telegraphed with phrases like "if only he'd told her the truth at the beginning..." Those phrases cause the story to stumble a bit and feel clunky in spots. It's not a bad story, and in fact I like the concept of half-turned victims of vampires who need to find a way to survive (reminiscent of The Fellowship of St. Giles in the Harry Dresden books, but Saintcrow handles the concept differently, which I appreciated).
267. God's Creatures by Carrie Vaughn This story of Cormac, Monster Hunter, feels a bit similar to Shannon Butcher's story above -- the monsters are more your traditional sort (in this case, a werewolf) but like Ryder Ward, Cormac carries the weight of a family tradition handed to him before he was really ready to take it on. Ward and Cormac are essentially loners, and loners who hold to a certain code that doesn't allow them to believe what is right in front of their eyes. I found the identity of the werewolf to be a bit easy to figure out -- the "red herrings" weren't really much of a distraction -- but that didn't really detract from the overall flow of the story. The question is a bit less "who" and a bit more "how is Cormac going to finish this?" Which again, makes it bookend nicely with the Butcher story. Cormac is apparently a supporting player in Vaughn's ongoing werewolf series, but this felt nicely stand-alone. Only the author's note at the end clued me in to the fact that Cormac had appeared before.
And since I reviewed Jim Butcher's Even Hand, his Johnny Marcone story in this anthology, a month or so back ... that means I'm done with the book!
259. AAAA Wizardry by Jim Butcher, from The Dresden Files Role-Playing Game: Our World volume. Harry Dresden instructs a group of fresh new young Wardens of the White Council in the art of being a detective of the supernatural. He illustrates each of the "A"s in turn by relating a case involving a single mother and her "sensitive" children. Tension builds nicely, and there really aren't any spoilers for the series overall aside from mention of the on-going War with the Red Court of Vampires, which is a background note to most of the books to date anyway. The story is a really nice glimpse into what makes Harry a good detective, but also what makes him a good character: the fact that he makes mistakes.
The rest are from the anthology Dark And Stormy Knights, edited by P.N. Elrod:
260. A Questionable Client by Ilona Andrews Even without the author's note at the end of the story, I could tell this adventure of mercenary Kate Daniels takes place within a larger fictional world. Too many small things are mentioned off-handedly: The Mercenary Guild, the fact that magic and technology seem to alternate in unpredictable waves, Kate's interactions with her boss and fellow mercs. Still, the story itself, about Kate taking on bodyguard duty with extra hazard pay for a client no one else seems to want to touch, flows well and feels complete. I can't say it made me want to run out and buy the Kate Daniels novels, but I am curious about how her world works and how this adventure, involving a very questionable client and the people after him, fits into the overall scheme of things.
261. The Beacon by Shannon K. Butcher Yes, Shannon is Jim Butcher's wife. But her story is not, so far as I can tell, at all related to his Dresden Files world. This also seems to be an introduction to a character who I think could hold his own series well. Ryder Ward is the latest in a line of Terraphage hunters -- he inherited the job from his father, and the implication is that it's a family heritage. Ryder tracks down "The Beacons" whose dreams summon the phages into the real world, and he kills them before the phages can be summoned. The problem is, Ryder's latest Beacon is not an easy kill. The question quickly becomes: how far can a man be pushed to do something that he knows is for the good of the society no matter what it does to him emotionally? I liked the way Shannon Butcher built the main and supporting characters and gave the story several possible directions to go in, with a satisfactory (almost, dare I say it, fun) final moment.
262. Even a Rabbit Will Bite by Rachel Caine This was a really fun story. Like Shannon Butcher's, I did not get the sense it was part of an already-existing fictional world and I think I enjoyed the story more for that. Caine asks the question: what happens when the last near-immortal dragon hunter, living in our modern world, gets a letter from the Pope telling her it's time to train her own replacement? How do you train someone to fight dragons when the last remaining dragon is as old as you and hides in a dessert half a world away? I loved the exasperation and crotchetiness of Lisel Martin and how she handles being made obsolete. I also loved the way the story goes from snarky to serious in a heart-beat. Naturally, all is not what it seems to be at the story's start, and Caine uses the story to make a bigger point than just "be constantly vigilant."
263. Dark Lady by P.N. Elrod This is the second Jack Fleming story I've read. The Fleming stories take place in 1930s Chicago and feature a vampire private eye who runs a bar. In this story, Fleming is called on to aide one damsel-in-distress and finds himself needing help as well. The Dark Lady of the title turns out to be an interesting secondary character. I've never read any of Elrod's Fleming novels, but the two stories I've read have been reasonably fun.
264. Beknighted by Deidre Knight Another story that doesn't seem to take place in an previously-existing world. Each of the stories in this collection plays with the concept of what it means to be a "knight," male or female, and most of the main characters can easily be described as "dark," or "stormy" or both. Knight's story puts a bit of a twist on the theme. The main character is an artist who, thanks to intense dreams, has set herself the task of creating a mystic puzzle that will set an imprisoned knight free. Her main problem is that none of the materials she has to hand are really up to the task - until a mysterious patron shows up with a small cache of "templar gold," living gold that can be mixed with the paint to provide the painting/puzzle with the oomph it needs to free the nameless knight. The question, of course, is what the mysterious patron is really up to, and can he be trusted at all? Knight's story flows well, although there are a few details I'd like to have seen explained (such as how our main character knows painting the knight and then creating a puzzle of the painting will free him -- there's an implication that this sort of thing is done, although highly regulated, in her world, but I'd have liked a more explicit explanation.) Still, I recommend this as one of the better stories in the volume.
265. Shifting Star by Vicki Pettersson Another story that takes place in an already-established world with which I am unfamiliar. I think that this story contains a few more spoilers for Pettersson's "Signs of the Zodiac" series than the Dresden, Daniels or Fleming stories do, judging from the focus of the story. It took me a few paragraphs to understand that the main character is a magical construct given a name, autonomy, and a life -- to which she is mostly not adapting well at all. The mystery she becomes embroiled in seems to be connected to something of a major series point. And the main character's growth, through her interaction with a mortal man she meets, also seems like it should have a large affect on this character's role in the book series. The Zodiac books have been recommended to me, but I haven't added them to my TBR list just yet. I would say, of all the stories in this volume, approach this one with the most caution if you're reading the Zodiac books but are not up to the current volume yet, just in case the spoilers are as big as they seemed to me to be. That said, I did enjoy Pettersson's take on "what it is that makes us human."
266. Rookwood & Mrs. King by Lilith Saintcrow I got the impression that this story was part of an already-established world, but nothing in the author's notes at the end confirms that suspicion. So this might be one of those rare anthology stories that feels like it belongs to something already extant even though it is in fact it's own new thing. The Rookwood of the title is a cop-turned-private investigator with a problem: he's not quite human, not quite vampire. He's been surviving, taking on cases, but waiting for the one case that will enable him to come face-to-face with the creatures that created him, and it seems that case has finally fallen in his lap. There are a series of double-crosses, often telegraphed with phrases like "if only he'd told her the truth at the beginning..." Those phrases cause the story to stumble a bit and feel clunky in spots. It's not a bad story, and in fact I like the concept of half-turned victims of vampires who need to find a way to survive (reminiscent of The Fellowship of St. Giles in the Harry Dresden books, but Saintcrow handles the concept differently, which I appreciated).
267. God's Creatures by Carrie Vaughn This story of Cormac, Monster Hunter, feels a bit similar to Shannon Butcher's story above -- the monsters are more your traditional sort (in this case, a werewolf) but like Ryder Ward, Cormac carries the weight of a family tradition handed to him before he was really ready to take it on. Ward and Cormac are essentially loners, and loners who hold to a certain code that doesn't allow them to believe what is right in front of their eyes. I found the identity of the werewolf to be a bit easy to figure out -- the "red herrings" weren't really much of a distraction -- but that didn't really detract from the overall flow of the story. The question is a bit less "who" and a bit more "how is Cormac going to finish this?" Which again, makes it bookend nicely with the Butcher story. Cormac is apparently a supporting player in Vaughn's ongoing werewolf series, but this felt nicely stand-alone. Only the author's note at the end clued me in to the fact that Cormac had appeared before.
And since I reviewed Jim Butcher's Even Hand, his Johnny Marcone story in this anthology, a month or so back ... that means I'm done with the book!
Friday, August 13, 2010
Holmes in brief
254. The Adventure of the Speckled Band Holmes once again comes to the rescue of a pretty young damsel in distress. This one is concerned that her step-father and the gypsies in residence on his property are somehow complicit in the death of her sister, who was due to be wed. The action takes place in the town of Stokes Moran, and for some reason I expected a connection to Col. Sebastian Moran, aide-de-camp to the notorious Prof. Moriarity, Holmes' nemesis. But there is no connection (at least not in the story itself. I'd have to read back through various Wold-Newton sites to see if any later authors came up with a connection). The story moves quickly, and Holmes of course spots the key details everyone else has missed. Several early details are essentially red herrings.
255. The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb Doctor Watson is brought an intriguing patient: a young civil engineer who has somehow lost his thumb. Once he's patched up as best as Watson can manage, Watson brings Holmes on board to hear the man's story. How he lost his thumb is not the mystery Holmes needs to solve, but rather where the man lost his thumb and who the perpetrators really were. Another of those cases in which Holmes solves the crime but doesn't catch the criminals.
256. The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor Doyle seems to like these stories in which one member of a wedding party disappears before, during, or just after the nuptial ceremony. (Jim Butcher somewhat pays tribute to this trope in his Harry Dresden story Heorot.) This time, it is the newlywed husband who is left without a spouse when his new bride disappears during a post-wedding luncheon. The facts of the mystery itself are a good read, although I do wish more of them had been hinted at in the story itself.
257. The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet The implication at the start of the story is that the Important Person who hocks the royal beryl coronet to a banker for a loan is Prince Albert. In our modern day and age, it's almost impossible to imagine someone so well known being able to visit a major banker in full daylight business hours to hock a piece of jewelry that normally resides in a locked guarded case. The late 1800s were a simpler time, for sure. The main mystery is not why "Prince Albert" put the coronet up as collateral for a loan (that's never revealed by Doyle in the story), but rather how the coronet is almost stolen and definitely damaged by someone in the banker's household. Holmes believes the man arrested for the crime didn't do it and sets about to prove himself right. I felt like this was one of the fairer-play mysteries in this set. I could not only understand how Holmes got to his conclusion, I could actually go back and see the hints where they were dropped.
258. The Adventure of the Copper Beeches Much is made of the fact that Irene Adler, or "The Woman," is the only woman for whom Holmes ever showed actual respect as an equal. In this story, Holmes and Watson meet a young governess named Violet Hunter, and I humbly submit that Miss Hunter shows as much mental fortitude and attention to detail as Holmes himself. Adler may be the woman who outwitted Holmes, but Hunter is the one who essentially matches him stride for stride. She starts out a little demure and unsure of herself, but by the end she has gained Watson's respect and I suspect Holmes' as well.
And that wraps up the first Holmes short story collection. I'm going to hold off on starting Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes for a little bit so as to cleanse the palate a bit, so to speak.
255. The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb Doctor Watson is brought an intriguing patient: a young civil engineer who has somehow lost his thumb. Once he's patched up as best as Watson can manage, Watson brings Holmes on board to hear the man's story. How he lost his thumb is not the mystery Holmes needs to solve, but rather where the man lost his thumb and who the perpetrators really were. Another of those cases in which Holmes solves the crime but doesn't catch the criminals.
256. The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor Doyle seems to like these stories in which one member of a wedding party disappears before, during, or just after the nuptial ceremony. (Jim Butcher somewhat pays tribute to this trope in his Harry Dresden story Heorot.) This time, it is the newlywed husband who is left without a spouse when his new bride disappears during a post-wedding luncheon. The facts of the mystery itself are a good read, although I do wish more of them had been hinted at in the story itself.
257. The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet The implication at the start of the story is that the Important Person who hocks the royal beryl coronet to a banker for a loan is Prince Albert. In our modern day and age, it's almost impossible to imagine someone so well known being able to visit a major banker in full daylight business hours to hock a piece of jewelry that normally resides in a locked guarded case. The late 1800s were a simpler time, for sure. The main mystery is not why "Prince Albert" put the coronet up as collateral for a loan (that's never revealed by Doyle in the story), but rather how the coronet is almost stolen and definitely damaged by someone in the banker's household. Holmes believes the man arrested for the crime didn't do it and sets about to prove himself right. I felt like this was one of the fairer-play mysteries in this set. I could not only understand how Holmes got to his conclusion, I could actually go back and see the hints where they were dropped.
258. The Adventure of the Copper Beeches Much is made of the fact that Irene Adler, or "The Woman," is the only woman for whom Holmes ever showed actual respect as an equal. In this story, Holmes and Watson meet a young governess named Violet Hunter, and I humbly submit that Miss Hunter shows as much mental fortitude and attention to detail as Holmes himself. Adler may be the woman who outwitted Holmes, but Hunter is the one who essentially matches him stride for stride. She starts out a little demure and unsure of herself, but by the end she has gained Watson's respect and I suspect Holmes' as well.
And that wraps up the first Holmes short story collection. I'm going to hold off on starting Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes for a little bit so as to cleanse the palate a bit, so to speak.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Glimmer Train Stories Summer 2009
Here are my thoughts on the stories from the Summer 2009 issue of Glimmer Train Stories. I thought I was bringing the most current issue with me on my trip, but it turns out I grabbed an older unread issue instead. For 2010, these are stories 245 - 253.
245. Save by Carmiel Banasky Save attempts a strong colloquial voice (somewhat Southern, perhaps Delta-ish?) that just didn't quite work for me. I had a hard time entering the story. I can usually follow stories that bounce between past and present with no warning, but I had a hard time keeping the sequence of events here straight. I'm not sure why. The author has a story to tell that should be interesting, about a family, and a family business, coming apart at the seams. It just didn't work for me personally.
246. Korean Wedding by Hubert Ahn When a short story can make two different points, and make them both equally well, that should be lauded. This story manages to be about unrequited love and about the way close groups of friends drift apart once the situation in which they bonded no longer exists. The main character is attending a wedding of an old college friend, along with the rest of his crowd of Korean college (and possibly high school) friends. He is the only one who has not made some kind of career for himself since graduation. He holds it against himself, just as he holds not winning the girl against himself. Present and past do a dance here, as in the preceding story, but the dance flows better in Ahn's story. There's a great line in this story that sort of describes me: "My personality is dynamite around girls I'm not attracted to; put me in a room full of ugly women, and I turn into Oscar Wilde."
247. Melting at Both Ends by Cynthia Gregory The story takes place over the course of one long phone call between the narrator and her friend. Each of them has different ways of coping with life changes. The narrator lights candles and prayers to various gods; the friend goes on retreat to a health spa. Neither one seems to be finding their way to happiness, and I think that's sort of the story's point: as long as we look to someone/thing to fix our unhappiness, we're going to be disappointed. Or we're going to become sycophantic, but I don't see either of these characters heading in that direction. There's a smooth fluid feel to the story, although it's another one that dances between past and present ... and in fact between two different characters' pasts. Seems to be a theme of this issue.
248. Pronouncing the Apostrophe by Johnny Townsend The "dancing between past and present" theme seems to take a break in this story. There are still, of course, references to things in the character's past, but no actual flashbacks. Most of the past is delineated in dialogue or in the lines surrounding dialogue. I have to say, with all apologies to Mr. Townsend, while I liked the idea of the story I so thoroughly disliked the main character that I almost stopped reading it. It's a tribute to the author's style that I didn't give up on it, though. The main character is obsessive-compulsive to a fault, but doesn't see that perhaps that is why his relationships (romantic and otherwise) don't seem to pan out. He reminded me a bit too much of a friend of mine, which made the story a little tough to read.
249. Morth by Marc Basch The author's note at the beginning of the story says this is one of a group of interconnected stories related to the suspicious death of the title character. There are times when reading a story that is part of a cycle "out of order" is a detriment -- think of all those genre short stories that take place between novels in your favorite fantasy or SF series, that reveal key information you haven't encountered in the books themselves yet. This was not one of those times, however. Basch's story feels very complete, very done-in-one. As with almost every other story in this issue, there is a feeling that we're witnessing a Memory Play of sorts. The main character, Guy, starts out as a fifteen-year-old getting a job at a local pharmacy, where he meets the slightly-older title character. The story details their odd connection, and of course there's a girl involved, but eventually Guy moves on. He only finds out about Morth's death in the closing pages; in fact I would not have expected to hear about the death at all if I hadn't read the author's note before the story. I liked the development of the characters, and Guy's obvious confusion as Morth and others assume he understands what they're talking about.
250. Which Leaves Me by Lindsey Crittenden This might be the shortest story in the issue, and the most autobiographical. In fact, in retrospect I'm not sure it's actually a short story. It might be a creative non-fiction essay. Either way, it's a short compelling story about life for Crittenden in the aftermath of the deaths (over a span of years) of her brother, her mother, and her father, leaving her to parent her teenage nephew. I think in part it's also about allowing parts of our real life to inspire our writing.
251. Proximity by Diana Spechler This may be the lone story in the issue that relies less on what happened in characters' pasts and more on what happens in their present. The main character has an eating disorder and is involved in group therapy. One of the group fails to show up for two meetings in a row, which leads to acting up on the part of the others in their personal lives, especially the title character who is juggling several emotional issues at once. I suppose it's a tribute to the author that there were several points where I found myself wanting to slap the main character and tell her to wake up to the reality of her situation, and yet I still felt satisfied with the end of the story.
252. Marijuana, Lipton Tea, and Jazz by Scott Schrader I'm not sure I like any of the characters in Schrader's story. Each of the three -- narrator, narrator's wife, narrator's troubled daughter from his first marriage -- are largely disconnected from the world and from each other. Even the connections narrator and wife do have -- for instance, their interrupted Sunday night ritual of the title -- seem forced, a method by which they convince themselves the relationship is working when really it's just rote. I couldn't find any hook to make me care how the daughter's visit interrupting their ritual affects them, although the end of the story implies that it does. Another story that might work better for others than it worked for me.
253. The Scream by Mary Morrissy The framing device of this story is the anguish felt by a terminally-ill woman who has tried to leave her bed and has collapsed at the top of the stairs, while her daughter watches television in the kitchen down below. In the interminable time between collapse and rescue, the woman's mind flits back to various moments in the past, particularly settling on the relationship between her late husband and their daughter. To me, the implication is heavy that there was an unsavory aspect to that relationship, but I could also have been reading too much into it. Perhaps the relationship was innocent, and it is the ailing woman who wants to see more in that relationship than was actually there. The story works, but it's not a feel-good story that I'll be running back to. If I run across it in an anthology, though, I'd read it again just to see if my interpretation holds up.
245. Save by Carmiel Banasky Save attempts a strong colloquial voice (somewhat Southern, perhaps Delta-ish?) that just didn't quite work for me. I had a hard time entering the story. I can usually follow stories that bounce between past and present with no warning, but I had a hard time keeping the sequence of events here straight. I'm not sure why. The author has a story to tell that should be interesting, about a family, and a family business, coming apart at the seams. It just didn't work for me personally.
246. Korean Wedding by Hubert Ahn When a short story can make two different points, and make them both equally well, that should be lauded. This story manages to be about unrequited love and about the way close groups of friends drift apart once the situation in which they bonded no longer exists. The main character is attending a wedding of an old college friend, along with the rest of his crowd of Korean college (and possibly high school) friends. He is the only one who has not made some kind of career for himself since graduation. He holds it against himself, just as he holds not winning the girl against himself. Present and past do a dance here, as in the preceding story, but the dance flows better in Ahn's story. There's a great line in this story that sort of describes me: "My personality is dynamite around girls I'm not attracted to; put me in a room full of ugly women, and I turn into Oscar Wilde."
247. Melting at Both Ends by Cynthia Gregory The story takes place over the course of one long phone call between the narrator and her friend. Each of them has different ways of coping with life changes. The narrator lights candles and prayers to various gods; the friend goes on retreat to a health spa. Neither one seems to be finding their way to happiness, and I think that's sort of the story's point: as long as we look to someone/thing to fix our unhappiness, we're going to be disappointed. Or we're going to become sycophantic, but I don't see either of these characters heading in that direction. There's a smooth fluid feel to the story, although it's another one that dances between past and present ... and in fact between two different characters' pasts. Seems to be a theme of this issue.
248. Pronouncing the Apostrophe by Johnny Townsend The "dancing between past and present" theme seems to take a break in this story. There are still, of course, references to things in the character's past, but no actual flashbacks. Most of the past is delineated in dialogue or in the lines surrounding dialogue. I have to say, with all apologies to Mr. Townsend, while I liked the idea of the story I so thoroughly disliked the main character that I almost stopped reading it. It's a tribute to the author's style that I didn't give up on it, though. The main character is obsessive-compulsive to a fault, but doesn't see that perhaps that is why his relationships (romantic and otherwise) don't seem to pan out. He reminded me a bit too much of a friend of mine, which made the story a little tough to read.
249. Morth by Marc Basch The author's note at the beginning of the story says this is one of a group of interconnected stories related to the suspicious death of the title character. There are times when reading a story that is part of a cycle "out of order" is a detriment -- think of all those genre short stories that take place between novels in your favorite fantasy or SF series, that reveal key information you haven't encountered in the books themselves yet. This was not one of those times, however. Basch's story feels very complete, very done-in-one. As with almost every other story in this issue, there is a feeling that we're witnessing a Memory Play of sorts. The main character, Guy, starts out as a fifteen-year-old getting a job at a local pharmacy, where he meets the slightly-older title character. The story details their odd connection, and of course there's a girl involved, but eventually Guy moves on. He only finds out about Morth's death in the closing pages; in fact I would not have expected to hear about the death at all if I hadn't read the author's note before the story. I liked the development of the characters, and Guy's obvious confusion as Morth and others assume he understands what they're talking about.
250. Which Leaves Me by Lindsey Crittenden This might be the shortest story in the issue, and the most autobiographical. In fact, in retrospect I'm not sure it's actually a short story. It might be a creative non-fiction essay. Either way, it's a short compelling story about life for Crittenden in the aftermath of the deaths (over a span of years) of her brother, her mother, and her father, leaving her to parent her teenage nephew. I think in part it's also about allowing parts of our real life to inspire our writing.
251. Proximity by Diana Spechler This may be the lone story in the issue that relies less on what happened in characters' pasts and more on what happens in their present. The main character has an eating disorder and is involved in group therapy. One of the group fails to show up for two meetings in a row, which leads to acting up on the part of the others in their personal lives, especially the title character who is juggling several emotional issues at once. I suppose it's a tribute to the author that there were several points where I found myself wanting to slap the main character and tell her to wake up to the reality of her situation, and yet I still felt satisfied with the end of the story.
252. Marijuana, Lipton Tea, and Jazz by Scott Schrader I'm not sure I like any of the characters in Schrader's story. Each of the three -- narrator, narrator's wife, narrator's troubled daughter from his first marriage -- are largely disconnected from the world and from each other. Even the connections narrator and wife do have -- for instance, their interrupted Sunday night ritual of the title -- seem forced, a method by which they convince themselves the relationship is working when really it's just rote. I couldn't find any hook to make me care how the daughter's visit interrupting their ritual affects them, although the end of the story implies that it does. Another story that might work better for others than it worked for me.
253. The Scream by Mary Morrissy The framing device of this story is the anguish felt by a terminally-ill woman who has tried to leave her bed and has collapsed at the top of the stairs, while her daughter watches television in the kitchen down below. In the interminable time between collapse and rescue, the woman's mind flits back to various moments in the past, particularly settling on the relationship between her late husband and their daughter. To me, the implication is heavy that there was an unsavory aspect to that relationship, but I could also have been reading too much into it. Perhaps the relationship was innocent, and it is the ailing woman who wants to see more in that relationship than was actually there. The story works, but it's not a feel-good story that I'll be running back to. If I run across it in an anthology, though, I'd read it again just to see if my interpretation holds up.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Cat Valente's Thirteen Ways (2010 Story 244)
Last night, I noticed author Cat Valente announce on Twitter that she had a new story posted online at Clarkesworld Magazine's site. I replied to her that I'd have to track it down, she sent me the link. I then Tweeted "bout to read @catvalente's newest story, over at http://tinyurl.com/2eakr3u Join me, won't you?" Cat got a kick out of that and retweeted it, and others picked it up as well. She also said "I love the idea of Twitter-organizes live communal reading."
Which is all just prelude to actually posting my review, of course. In case people are wondering, I've reviewed two other Cat Valente stories in the past year: Palimpsest and Days of Flaming Motorcycles. I liked both stories quite a bit. In fact, I only recently found out that Palimpsest is also a novel, which I will be reading for![[info]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sVXpNeLTikpsxpVANRY3RZyg9N3YYKFFyLMlfXC9F54t3O4NmSNcMJUoAl8atJxDqQKNDtLKFsLMVxJCOtc-D8gD3BYyKKsn8nuqGgmyS96A=s0-d)
calico_reaction 's August book club here on livejournal.
Story 244. Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time By Catherynne M. Valente, in the August 2010 issue of Clarksworld magazine. My brain needed a day to process this story after reading it last night, mainly because I dove into it in the midst of a headache (of course, had I gone to bed when the headache started, I'd have completely missed Cat's announcement that the story was live). "Thirteen Ways" is not an easy story to read, but it's worth the extra effort you have to put into it. There are two threads going on: permutations on various creation myths, retold with hard science tossed in among the mythology (it took me a minute or so to get used to this, and then I found the concept working for despite my dim understanding of most actual science); and a science fiction writer's life story, told in forwards- and backwards-moving vignettes (which comment not only on the nature of memory as a component of creating fiction, but also on how we recreate our memories, consciously or not, to support who we think we are). By alternating science-filled creation myths with science fiction author life story, we get to look at the creative act from multiple sides. I can't claim to speak for Cat in terms of what the story was intended to Be About, but what I drew from it was the idea that we can reinterpret the act of creation however we want: the fact is, we'll never truly understand why and how it happens, it just does. I felt each of the vignettes, as time-and-space-warped as they were, touched on that idea. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to read the story for again for the first time (I think ... depending on which me is writing this review and which me is editing it and which me/you is reading it...)
Which is all just prelude to actually posting my review, of course. In case people are wondering, I've reviewed two other Cat Valente stories in the past year: Palimpsest and Days of Flaming Motorcycles. I liked both stories quite a bit. In fact, I only recently found out that Palimpsest is also a novel, which I will be reading for
calico_reaction 's August book club here on livejournal.Story 244. Thirteen Ways of Looking at Space/Time By Catherynne M. Valente, in the August 2010 issue of Clarksworld magazine. My brain needed a day to process this story after reading it last night, mainly because I dove into it in the midst of a headache (of course, had I gone to bed when the headache started, I'd have completely missed Cat's announcement that the story was live). "Thirteen Ways" is not an easy story to read, but it's worth the extra effort you have to put into it. There are two threads going on: permutations on various creation myths, retold with hard science tossed in among the mythology (it took me a minute or so to get used to this, and then I found the concept working for despite my dim understanding of most actual science); and a science fiction writer's life story, told in forwards- and backwards-moving vignettes (which comment not only on the nature of memory as a component of creating fiction, but also on how we recreate our memories, consciously or not, to support who we think we are). By alternating science-filled creation myths with science fiction author life story, we get to look at the creative act from multiple sides. I can't claim to speak for Cat in terms of what the story was intended to Be About, but what I drew from it was the idea that we can reinterpret the act of creation however we want: the fact is, we'll never truly understand why and how it happens, it just does. I felt each of the vignettes, as time-and-space-warped as they were, touched on that idea. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to read the story for again for the first time (I think ... depending on which me is writing this review and which me is editing it and which me/you is reading it...)
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
One of the things I do over on Livejournal is maintain a community called 365shortstories. My intent, every year, is to read a short story per day. Needless to say, it doesn't always work out -- and the years where I even come close, I don't actually read a story per day. I'm going to start cross-posting my story reviews here as well, but I'm not going to go back and port them all over. I'll pick up with the current one, and all the previous reviews can be found at
This past business trip I slacked off on the short stories (even though I brought a bunch with me) in favor of a novel and a history of fictional character crossovers, both written by friends / acquaintances. Got home from my trip today, hit Barnes & Noble, and saw that the latest P.N. Elrod-edited urban fantasy anthology, Dark and Stormy Knights, had been released. And since you can't spit into an UF anthology without hitting a Jim Butcher short story, of course I picked it up:
243. Even Hand by Jim Butcher. Before now, the only Dresden Files short story not narrated by / starring Harry Dresden was the Thomas Raith novella Back-Up. But after the events of the novel Changes, I'm not surprised to see a Dresden Files short story that does not feature Harry. I suspect we'll see a few more of this type of story in the next few months. This time out, Butcher casts the spotlight on Harry's sometimes-grudging-ally / mortal nemesis (as opposed to all of his immortal nemesises ... nemesisi .... nemesese? neme-never-mind ...) Gentleman Johnny Marcone. It's a welcome, first-person look into this very complicated, very deadly man whom Harry may despise but whom he can't help but respect. And not only do we get a good glimpse into some of Marcone's pet peeves, we also get at least one juicy little tidbit about red-headed sidekick Hendricks that makes him a bit less of a one-note heavy. The story revolves around someone coming to gangster Marcone for help, because he's the nearest signee to the Unseelie Accords, the agreement that maintains some form of civility between the various supernatural races / realms in the Dresdenverse. And that's about all the background you need to know, and about all the spoiling you'll see in the story. Butcher goes out of his way to not mention recent book events, so this story is a good "feeler" for what the Dresden books are like in terms of the world-building. It's not a good "feeler" for the voice of the novels, though. Butcher does a great job of making Marcone sound like Marcone, so gone is the pop-culture-laden patter of the novels. Marcone is far more straightforward (but not succinct) than Harry is. One character even makes a comment about Marcone's lack of sense of humor. I recommend The Dresden Files to everyone, and I definitely recommend this particular story, which might now be one of my favorites.
This past business trip I slacked off on the short stories (even though I brought a bunch with me) in favor of a novel and a history of fictional character crossovers, both written by friends / acquaintances. Got home from my trip today, hit Barnes & Noble, and saw that the latest P.N. Elrod-edited urban fantasy anthology, Dark and Stormy Knights, had been released. And since you can't spit into an UF anthology without hitting a Jim Butcher short story, of course I picked it up:
243. Even Hand by Jim Butcher. Before now, the only Dresden Files short story not narrated by / starring Harry Dresden was the Thomas Raith novella Back-Up. But after the events of the novel Changes, I'm not surprised to see a Dresden Files short story that does not feature Harry. I suspect we'll see a few more of this type of story in the next few months. This time out, Butcher casts the spotlight on Harry's sometimes-grudging-ally / mortal nemesis (as opposed to all of his immortal nemesises ... nemesisi .... nemesese? neme-never-mind ...) Gentleman Johnny Marcone. It's a welcome, first-person look into this very complicated, very deadly man whom Harry may despise but whom he can't help but respect. And not only do we get a good glimpse into some of Marcone's pet peeves, we also get at least one juicy little tidbit about red-headed sidekick Hendricks that makes him a bit less of a one-note heavy. The story revolves around someone coming to gangster Marcone for help, because he's the nearest signee to the Unseelie Accords, the agreement that maintains some form of civility between the various supernatural races / realms in the Dresdenverse. And that's about all the background you need to know, and about all the spoiling you'll see in the story. Butcher goes out of his way to not mention recent book events, so this story is a good "feeler" for what the Dresden books are like in terms of the world-building. It's not a good "feeler" for the voice of the novels, though. Butcher does a great job of making Marcone sound like Marcone, so gone is the pop-culture-laden patter of the novels. Marcone is far more straightforward (but not succinct) than Harry is. One character even makes a comment about Marcone's lack of sense of humor. I recommend The Dresden Files to everyone, and I definitely recommend this particular story, which might now be one of my favorites.
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