Ings, Dead Water (2011)

Simon Ings, Dead Water. Corvus Books, 2011. Pp. 343. ISBN 978-1-84887-888-4. £16.99

Reviewed by Djibril al-Ayad

Dead Water is Simon Ings’s seventh novel, and the second published by Atlantic Books. Although published by Corvus, the relatively young genre imprint of Atlantic, this novel is neither quite a thriller nor historical fiction nor science fiction, although it owes aspects of mood and tropes to all of the above. The story is told in non-linear fashion, set simultaneously in five periods of Twentieth Century history, from the Arctic to the Indian Ocean. Viewpoint characters change so dizzyingly that it would be fair to say there is no real protagonist, certainly not one with whom we empathize for long. The cavalcade of disaster the cast go through—the more sympathetic the character, the more grotesque their fate—becomes numbing after a while. This dark and bleak tone, which in places leaves the reader cold, is clearly not accidental.. This is an impressive book, well written and masterfully researched, but it left me a little confused. Perhaps this was just me being slow, but the subject that I suspect is meant to be the core of the plot, the titular “dead water”, took so long to show up that over halfway through the book I was still wondering if I had missed something.

Whates (ed.), Fables from the Fountain (2011)

Ian Whates (ed.), Fables from the Fountain. NewCon Press, 2011. Pp. 252. ISBN 978-0-907069-24-6. £9.99.

Reviewed by Steven Pirie

Don’t go traipsing London’s streets looking for The Fountain pub. You might find the Old Fountain, on Baldwin Street, but that’s never the Fountain.

“The Fountain is in Holborn… It nestles on one of the network of little lanes that leads eventually to the broader Chancery Lane, though I’ve never yet arrived there by the same route twice… You might stumble on the Fountain and slow down, perhaps make a mental note to come back here sometime, only to never find the place again.”

This ethereal public house, then, is the rather wonderful setting for an anthology of eighteen tales—eighteen writers given a common setting and a predefined list of characters, and the remit to write up their antics and anecdotes and drinking habits.

It’s not a new concept. In fact, the book is dedicated in homage to Arthur C. Clarke, whose work Tales from the White Hart was the first and definitive offering of this kind of conversational, shared-world, linked-story anthology. Where Fables from the Fountain differs is that it’s also a shared-author anthology, and I was interested from the outset to see if each author’s writing style would flow between stories or if each would rub against the other. I wondered given each author uses the same characters just how similar or otherwise the characters would turn out.

The book’s editor, Ian Whates, opens proceedings with the story ‘No Smoke Without Fire’. It sets the tone very well, and is written somewhat as an oeuvre that’s intended to introduce and ease us into the setting and characters as much as to entertain as a story in its own right. It’s not surprising, then, that the bones of the story—the rather pun-like idea of how a smoking habit saved a life—begins well into the narrative and is almost an afterthought. But as a scene-setter this opening is perfectly constructed, and most certainly whets the appetite as to what’s to follow. I like Whates’ easy-on-the-eye writing style. It adds a friendliness to this fictitious group of pub oddballs, and draws the reader in without trepidation, as if to reassure this is one group he’d gladly join for a pint or two of Old Bodger and a yarn on a wet Tuesday in Holborn.

In ‘Transients’, Stephen Baxter introduces the notion of ‘extra’ characters that might wander into, or be introduced to, the Fountain’s group of Tuesday night regulars. In Baxter’s own words: “A transient is a guest, you might say, who will show up once or twice, who will if we are lucky will have something interesting to say, and if even luckier will have a fecund credit card lodged behind the bar…” Barry Noakes is such a transient (or is it Norrie Boakes? He’s so much the transient that no one really remembers his name) and he brings with him the yarn of the equally (and cleverly) transient nature of signals the likes of SETI might get excited about.

What follows is, as with Whates’ opener, very conversational in tone and is deliciously humorous, although a reader without a science bent may feel parts of the story reads like a science lesson. Of course, this is in keeping with Clarke’s original work, and indeed the science in Fables from the Fountain as a whole can seem somewhat esoteric at times. I myself have a science degree, but I wondered at times what was factual and what was artistic license. The boundary is fuzzy in places and the stories are either well researched or written by authors who have some expertise in the field of science.

There’s certainly plenty of meat in ‘Transients’, from extra terrestrials to CIA conspiracies, to the periodic table and the physics of star death and more. But then Baxter adds such concepts as the Fountain’s three ploughman’s lunches being the same three prepared in 1946, and these deft touches reassure the reader that all’s not to be taken too seriously, that if you need to skim the science there’s still plenty there to entertain in these stories. Be assured; all’s still well within the Fountain if you like your science in moderation.

In ‘Forever Blowing Bubbles’, Ian Watson follows a similar style to Whates and Baxter, and produces a fine, humorous tale of bubble universes and quantum foam and unfortunate flatulence. Must be the Old Bodger, I assume. The science is still there, but as you might guess this one is written very tongue in cheek. Great stuff.

On the ‘Messdecks of Madness’, by Paul Graham Raven, sees ‘The Raven’ recount the story of how he ‘left the Navy’. This story is laid out slightly differently from the first three offerings in that while it starts and end as a told anecdote, the crux of the story is related by Raven without interruption from the Fountain’s denizens. This takes us out of the pub somewhat and instead immerses us in the story itself. Such a diversion is not unwelcome, providing that little bit of difference lest we get too bogged down in the conversational nature of the work so far. The story is a twisting affair of alliance and counter alliance and in truth feels more fantastical than science fictional. This slight leaning away from science fiction I also welcomed as something of a breather from the purish science fiction presented thus far.

By this point I felt there was a potential problem with Fables from the Fountain in that the stories, though undoubtedly well written and entertaining as they are, begin to feel a little samey. All tend to follow roughly the same format—a brief introduction in the pub, followed by the meat-and-veg of the tall tale told, and finally a short postscript back in the pub where comments may be made or the story’s veracity dissected.

I think also that all the stories on offer miss the opportunity to explore the pub itself as a character. Any pub that’s not entirely on the map and yet is frequented by such tellers of tall tales as we are presented with should surely be a character in its own right. Only in ‘The Hidden Depths of Bogna’, by Liz Williams, with it’s brief sojourn to the cellars and the catacombs therein, is the suggestion there’s much more to the Fountain than a meeting place of story tellers. Had I been invited to write for the Fountain (oh, how I wish I had been—am I allowed to say that in a review?) I’d have written a tale told in the grunt of the pipes and the hum of the fridges when the pub was closed and no one was there. Possibly Whates would claim giving the pub more of an active role would produce a different anthology than his remit requires, and if so I certainly wouldn’t argue with that.

Strangely, there is also one tale told in an Edinburgh pub with barely a passing nod to the Fountain. ‘The Last Man in Space’, by Andrew J. Wilson, is a good story, but why it strays from Holborn I’m not sure.

Probably the biggest name in the anthology, Neil Gaiman, provided by far the shortest tale with ‘And Weep Like Alexander’. I must confess to being a big fan of Gaiman’s work, and his tale of Obediah Polkinghorn, the uninventor didn’t disappoint. Except, perhaps I wanted more.

I loved the suffusion of humour in many of the stories:

“‘…knew a barmaid in Rhyl, back in the late seventies,’ Crown baker was saying. ‘Face like the offspring of a stoat and a hatchet…’” (Liz Williams, ‘The Hidden Depths of Bogna’).

and…

“For God’s sake don’t risk the ploughman’s,” Laura warned her new protégée: “the cheese is unpasteurized, and as for the pickle, Graham’s sure it’s recycled from an experimental growth medium for GFAJ-1-” (Charles Stross, ‘A Bird In Hand’).

… to quote just two of many fun lines.

Then there’s ‘Cyberseeds’, by Steve Longworth, which is a rather awful pun on the Jack and the Beanstalk nursery story, that somehow mixes burger vans and space elevators and magic beans and yet nevertheless works very well. Possibly my only criticism is that towards the end it perhaps tries a little too hard to be funny. But, Christmas Panto will never be the same.

And so, to answer my question at the outset—do the characters flow between authors/stories, or do they conflict in style? They flow very well. Whether this is down to Whates’ editorial skill, or whether each author simply nailed each character from the outset, I’ve no idea. But not once did I feel any one character acted, urm, out of character. Fables is probably the closest I’ve ever seen to a multi-author anthology reading like a single-author work. I’m guessing this is what Whates set out to do, and if so he’s achieved it admirably. There’s not a poor tale in here, and but for brevity in this review I could have quoted much good from any of them.

Do I recommend Fables From the Fountain? Without a doubt. I read the anthology as a PDF on a computer screen, which in truth is as close to torture on the eyes as I can get, but even then I was lost in the entertainment value of each story. I’d say reading it in book form (in the bath, of course) will be pleasurable indeed. I have to admit to not having read Tales from the White Hart, so I can’t say how Fables from the Fountain compares to Clarke’s original. But, of course, ultimately Fables is its own beast, and will stand or fall on its own merit. All in all, I think it will stand nicely.

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Vanderhooft, Steam-Powered (2011)

JoSelle Vanderhooft (ed), Steam-Powered: Lesbian Steampunk Stories. Torquere Press, 2011. Pp. 378. ISBN 978-1610401500. £8.69.

Reviewed by Aishwarya Subramanian

Steampunk is often associated with nineteenth-century Europe, implying a world the majority of whose population is under colonial rule, and where gender roles are still strictly segregated. This is, of course, a very narrow definition of a far wider genre. However, if this subsection of the genre has been criticised in the past for the uncritical romanticisation of a far from perfect moment in history, it’s equally true that it provides ample opportunity for engagement with this historical period.

A number of the stories in Steam Powered: Lesbian Steampunk do just this. A lesbian story in this setting is necessarily going to challenge some cultural mores, but most of these stories go beyond that, bringing in issues of race, class and gender. A notable feature of this anthology is the sheer range of settings used. N.K Jemisin’s ‘The Effluent Engine’, has as its main character a Haitian agent, sent to New Orleans to find a scientist to develop an engine that will produce energy from the waste product of rum distillation. Only with this energy will her countrymen be able to withstand French colonial forces. ‘The Padishah Begum’s Reflections’, by Shweta Narayan, is set in the Mughal court of Shah Jahan’s daughter Jahanara and in the context of diplomatic relations with the British and French. Narayan chooses not to simplify or explain her history, leaping quite happily from the Mughals, to Tipu Sultan to Shivaji and trusting the reader to catch up. Both of these stories engage with the larger politics of colonial history in ways that are complex and give a lot of depth to comparatively short pieces. Both fictional worlds give the impression that they could quite easily sustain longer works. In the case of “The Effluent Engine” in particular I think a longer story might have done more justice to the plot.

Georgina Bruce’s ‘Brilliant’, which takes place in a train travelling across Africa, is a completely different sort of story. Occasional references gesture towards a complex world outside the train, but the focus is entirely on the two central characters and their relationship. The setting and the style give this piece a very classic, early Twentieth-century feel, and it’s one of my favourite pieces in the book.

Not every story that attempts to engage with Victorian mores does so successfully. D.L. MacInnes’s ‘Owl Song’ starts off well enough, with a British father despairing of his daughter’s shameful (and open) interests in women and engines. Once the daughter has been shipped off to South America it all goes downhill. The story’s attempts to deal with the racial and cultural aspects of the romances it introduces are clearly well meant, but shallow and unsatisfying.

‘Love in the Time of Airships’ by Meredith Holmes also sets itself against historical social norms, this time in Europe. I get the feeling that this would make for quite a good film. As a short story, it is far, far too long. Particularly since things happen so abruptly; the predictable American heroine who is uncomfortable with European class consciousness takes all of a minute to leave her evil husband for a working-class woman.

And yet, as I mentioned above, steampunk as a genre has far wider interests, and this focus on the nineteenth century is only a part. Other stories in the book demonstrate this admirably. Beth Wodzinski’s ‘Suffer Water’, one of the best pieces in the collection, plays with the tropes of the Western and has a cyborg for its protagonist. Rachel Manija Brown also touches on the western, marrying it to gundam-esque robots that would earn the story points for sheer coolness even if it was not wonderfully written. Mike Allen’s gorgeous ‘Sleepless, Burning Life’ bases the mythology of a universe on something that feels like clockwork. Mikki Kendall’s ‘Copper for a Trickster’ feels a little like a myth, and so works despite the ending that is not quite horrifying enough. Tara Sommers is in slightly dangerous territory with ‘Clockwork and Music’ which tackles mental illness, institutionalisation and automata. I think she does well: she certainly manages to create something that is quiet and creepy and lovely.

Some stories had me questioning, then dismissing the question of whether they really belonged here—I’m too glad to have read Amal el-Mohtar’s beautiful ‘To Follow the Waves’ to question whether it was ‘really’ steampunk (though on reflection my answer is probably ‘yes’). The very dark ‘Under the Dome’ by Teresa Wymore made me wonder if it was still ‘lesbian’ if it was post-human; but then this question of bodies and relationships and where personhood ends came up constantly through the collection (in Narayan’s and Wodzinski’s stories among others) and it was never a bad thing to have to think about. And there were many points at which I had to remind myself that “Lesbian Steampunk” need not mean “Lesbian Steampunk Romance”.

Like most anthologies, Steam-Powered: Lesbian Steampunk Stories varies in quality from story to story. But by any standards this is a solid collection with the good stories by far outweighing the less impressive ones.

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Farooqi, The Jinn Darazgosh (2011)

Musharraf Ali Farooqi, The Jinn Darazgosh. Amazon Media, 2011. 3500 words. ASIN B00546MF7G. $1.13 / £0.69.

Reviewed by Paul Wilks

First in a series entitled ‘The Scandals of Creation’ published through Amazon Media, The Jinn Darazgosh is a supernatural fable which crafts a tale loosely around the familiar notion that ‘curiosity kills the cat’. The ‘cat’ here is the character Darazgosh, whose curiosity leads to problems in the lives other characters, then ultimately his own. The text itself is a mere 3500 words and is finely reminiscent of traditional folk tales. There is a familiarity with tales such as those of the Brothers Grimm, Aesop and ancient religious texts. They infer a basic morality of some kind, demonstrated elaborately across the narrative. Whether we agree curiosity is a bad thing or not—I certainly do not—the story nevertheless has an incredibly well crafted plot that creates a number of narrative strings which come together by the end of the tale.

Darazgosh is a Jinn, a form of genie common in Arab folklore and Islamic texts, that can apparently exist on a spiritual plane as well as the human one. Darazgosh’s purpose would appear to be that of a messenger. He eavesdrops on angelic conferences, determining what God has planned for mankind, and subsequently advises humans known as ‘augurs’ who in turn advise their people accordingly. Darazgosh overhears one such conversation amongst some angels, yet out of curiosity withholds part of the news regarding the God-determined deaths of two lovers. While the purpose of their deaths never revealed, and the pettiness of God’s whim in the tale is unexplored, Darazgosh’s actions ultimately save the lives of the lovers.

The construction of the plot and its subsequent unravelling is superb. I am unsure whether this is a retelling or translation of a specific Arabic tale or a fully reworked adaptation of a mythical story, but there is a genuine brilliance to the maintenance of such a narrative, and the simplistic yet precise way the story is conveyed. Ancient religious texts are often written in a simple way—the messages were usually directed at the poor and needy of the time, not the scholars and philosophers. Therefore it is a challenge, in the 21st Century to tell a story such as this that yet retains the innocence and simplicity of the genre. The narrative isn’t in any way a challenge to read and feels effortless and comfortable.

However I also feel the need to wrestle with the problems this kind of text presents in a modern context. It might be argued that the suppression and repression of women is sometimes at its most fervent in many ancient texts. The Jinn Darazgosh, written in this archaizing style, is not an exception. While it might be easy to negate writing about the abuse of women as being, sadly, historically accurate, I do not believe it should be glossed over as irrelevant. In the tale an honest, kind and generous young woman is essentially sold into marriage and later raped. While this is isn’t the only form of abuse in the story, it is perhaps the most striking and this is why I wish to discuss it. The delivery of this treatment, in particular the rape, is done so in such a matter-of-fact way it should be shocking to a modern reader. The coincidental and vehemently selfish manner in which the perpetrator rapes the woman in never considered either, appearing to normalise the assault. The rapist here would appear to be, if anything, ultimately rewarded for his behaviour and, if such actions and fates are controlled by God—which the nature of the text might arguably imply—then God is permissive in the abuse, resulting in scant justice in the story’s resolutions.

However the ‘crime’ of the tale isn’t rape but rather curiosity which, in our more enlightened eyes represents a deeply unpleasant logic. Texts such as these are usually given protection or apology, under the guise of being traditional, historic or mythological, but this doesn't mean this is valid defence. Texts should be challenged and kept alive by analysis, interpretation and debate. The theology behind a world where curiosity is worthy of punishment yet rape is shrugged off makes me wonder how advanced our world might be if it had been the other way around. So, vitally, The Jinn Darazgosh provokes great debate.

While I found the treatment of this issue unsatisfactory, this in no way detracts from the skill and the writing of Farooqi—the book is crafted expertly and with an extremely sharp eye for detail and imagination. The construction is complex yet consistently maintains a coherent simplicity that would perhaps appeal significantly to fans of intelligent mythological narratives. The story is part of a series so it might be interesting to follow how the collection unfolds.

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Grimwood, Bloody War (2011)

Terry Grimwood, Bloody War. Eibonvale Press, 2011. Pp. 276. ISBN 978-1-908125-03-3. £8.99/$15.00.

Reviewed by Paul Wilks

Bloody War is a new novel by Terry Grimwood and published by Eibonvale Press. Set in the not-too-distant future, the book is a dystopic vision of a gritty modern-day London caught in the middle of a brutal war. The aggressors are the unseen and unidentified Enemies of Democracy (EoD), and it would appear London suffers nightly air-raid attacks and is under perpetual threat of invasion.

At the centre of the novel’s bedlam is protagonist Pete Allman. Readers follow his narrative stream-of-consciousness as he wakes up with amnesia, befuddled by the existence of this 18-month old conflict. It is this slightly unbelievable, yet wholly forgivable, narrative tool which permits the reader the same sense of intrigue and discovery as Pete as he attempts to get to grips with his predicament. A significant feature of Pete’s life is his family, and his concern for them amidst the falling bombs and the nostalgic social pluck drives most of his actions and behaviour. It is the focus on the individuals, and the avoidance of wider ideological concepts that differentiate Grimwood’s text from that of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. It would seem very much to be from the perspective of Pete the proletariat, rather than Winston Smith’s party affiliate, and this view has a certain vitality and freshness.

Pete is almost stereotypical in his modern ‘Allman’/‘everyman’ status; middle aged, wife, family and stable job. I would suggest the author was at pains to present Pete as almost a nobody, a virtual invisible—much like a Winston Smith. Pete is permitted a few interesting character components which are interesting; he is a reformed bad-boy, very much a biker (a proper one too—not a mid-life crisis suffering one!) and he still wears his hair long. The text is littered here and there with references to the old heavy metal bands of the 1970’s and 80’s and, while I might be wrong, I got the sense the author was indulging himself a little bit with this repeated inclusion! This in no way detracts from the novel; rather it adds depth to Pete’s character. Due to the protagonist’s background and subsequent regrets, I found him a little maudlin at times as it seemed that he had never quite forgiven himself for his prior wrongdoing, and thus while he worries about his family, his personal feelings very much dominate his rhetoric. While this doesn’t entirely endear a reader, it perpetuates his depth and realism—and it is his realism, and realistic reactions to the devastation around him, which helps immerse the reader within the novels pages.

The atmosphere of the novel endeavours to replicate that of a World War 2-era London, and the clichéd phrases “There is a war on!” become post-post ironic. They words sit ill at ease with the reader as now the biting clichés are no longer funny. It contributes to the absurdity of the predicament Pete finds himself in. Perhaps the idea that London is being bombed in the 21st Century veers on both the sublime and the ridiculous. But this is the point, war is ridiculous and the novel makes this assertion with endearing aplomb. The reader is drawn to challenge: is the author really trying to pull this off?—that is, the transition between modern-day peacetime, resplendent with nuclear deterrents and special relationships to one where the United Kingdom is under constant attack and with little voice of contention? The almost unfathomable nature of this position is however matched by Pete’s own genuine bewilderment at the situation, and subsequent lack of answers. There are a number of times I wished Pete would grab someone by the lapels and ask what was happening but he never does this with conviction, instead the story is unravelled over the pages of the novel rather that the brisk conversation a reader might demand in the same situation. While this might frustrate someone demanding immediate answers it also allows the picture to be painted fully by the end of the novel. This captivates the reader in the dystopian society Pete also exists in and it is this tangibility which negates the virtual impossibility of the situation.

The novel roars along at a blistering pace and there are plenty of cliff-hangers. I read the book in two sittings but many readers will require only one. It is very difficult to elaborate on the plot at too great a depth without releasing spoilers, but the novel is packed with twists and turns and these continue until the final page. I must admit I worked out one major twist quite early on in the novel but the audacity of the author to follow this through should be applauded. Some of the ideas are both ridiculous and conspiratorial, but the author delivers them so well this doesn’t seem to matter. The narrative is engrossing and the plot devastating. I would not necessarily call the writer a ‘wordsmith’ as such—the prose is basic but very well written. He is however, in my opinion an incredible storyteller and crafter of intrigue with a vivid imagination and the ability to keep readers on the very tip of their chairs.

I think it would be unfair to wholly compare Bloody War with its, in my mind ‘big brother’, Nineteen Eighty-Four. It lacks the intrinsic political ideology and linguistic expertise abundant in Orwell’s novel. I think however, this is what makes this novel a humbler experience, it isn’t trying to be altogether original yet it puts a modern twist on something many readers will already be familiar with. While this in no way lets the story down, it does perhaps limit it as the political ramifications are never completely explored. Part of me didn’t think the novel lacked anything specific in this regard—after all, it would appear the author was keen to present an individual’s tale rather than a grand political narrative. However I might argue that the individual focus restricts the discourse around the events the novel visualises, there are no new themes to come from the text, instead it’s simply a different take, albeit a very rewarding take, on the conventional tomes of dystopian texts.

Both refreshing and disturbing, Bloody War is a speculative gem; an honest, well written ‘What If?’ novel. It proposes an old fashioned war coming to modern-times London and describes deliciously the societal vacuums and issues this creates. The character of Pete Allman is a good vehicle for moving the plot forward as he grows impatient quickly and his temper bristles the novel along at quite a pace. The book is highly enjoyable, and while it doesn’t fully engage with the dystopian social politics it presents an engaging individual war-narrative with an increasingly tumultuous plotline. As much as Pete is a virtual Orwellian proletariat, I’d very much like to read a Grimwoodian Winston Smith.

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Sein und Werden #7.2 (2011)

Magnificent Monsters: Sein und Werden #7.2, April 2011. Pp. 64. ISSN 2046-8601 (print) / ISSN 2046-8598 (web). £4.50.

Reviewed by N.A. Jackson

Magnificent Monsters is a slim home-made volume, only 64 pages, but packed with stories and poems from the comic to the sinister. This issue has a striking cover illustration by Dan Cvammen and is printed on lurid green, rather thick paper—so thick in fact that it needed not just one but two jam pots to hold it open on the breakfast table.

Rauch, Laredo (2008)

Tony Rauch, Laredo. Eraserhead Press, 2008. Pp. 201. ISBN 1-933929-72-3. $10.95.

Reviewed by Terry Grimwood

A lot of fiction is described, with varying degrees of accuracy, as dreamlike. In this case, however, dreamlike is a very accurate description indeed. Laredo is a bizarre, surreal but often highly funny and entertaining work. There is seldom any sense or logic, sometimes no coherence, yet as I set off on this odd, odd journey, I found the writing was so utterly compelling I simply had to know what the next story was going to show me. What are these stories about? Does it matter? They are random, splintered fragments of... well, it’s hard to say really. Sometimes Rauch’s stories follow a narrative stream and some seem to be stream of consciousness torrents of imagery and thought.

The opening story is a funny, philosophical discussion between a man and his ex-girlfriend. The problem is that the ex-girlfriend has shrunk to the size of an ant and discovered that far from being a terrifying experience it is actually quite enlightening and comfortable. ‘Once I saw a pretty girl’ draws us back into a semblance of the real world of urine stinking bus stations and infatuation. In ‘Saturday Splendour’ the narrator goes on an insane high speed ride with his brother-in-law. ‘The strange green moss of my discontent’ begins with the discovery of a weird growth on the living room walls and quickly spirals into Rauch-ian madness.

‘Analonia’ has a Kafka-esque metamorphosis that involves extra eyes and mouths. In ‘Happy’ a young man discovers that his father has turned into a fish, and there is a possibility that ‘The President may be shrinking’. And so it goes on, bizarre conversations, trains of events that are described with gleeful breathlessness. There are crashes, apocalyptic and intricately choreographed fights and domino-like disasters and that build to impossible and catastrophic climaxes.

Then there are the lists, fascinating, intense, astounding lists.

Tony Rauch writes in a straightforward, simple very clear style. His American rhythms and slang enhance the story telling.

The cover illustrations and occasional illustrations look to be stills from a Land of the Giants style film or television series, featuring a group of mouse-sized humans attempting to bring mischief to us normal sized mortals. Other pictures, such what looks like a wrestling class, have a surreal quality enhanced by the fact that although they were originally devoid of any irony but now seem utterly bizarre. The publisher, Eraserhead Press, deals exclusively with absurdist fiction and it is good to see this area of literature embraced, encouraged, packaged and delivered to a world cursed with literary blandness.

So, did I enjoy Laredo? Because of the review requirement to read the book from cover to cover, the strange procession of oddities, nonsense, absurdity and surrealism became somewhat overwhelming and meant that after a while, I could not enjoy each story on its own merit. So a word of advice, dip in and out, work your way through slowly, sporadically and that way you can appreciate each tale of what it is.

For me there is a lack of emotional engagement in many of the stories. This is not down to bad writing because there is no bad writing here, it is, rather, the nature of these tales, the odd world of the dream where people are suddenly rowing boats through the sky, or clowns and other circus acts are waging war in the street, make it difficult to really get under the skin of Rauch’s characters. It was something that I came to miss as I spent more and more time with the book.

So, don’t approach Laredo looking for an intense emotional rollercoaster, board it looking for a wild ride through the world of the dream, a world in which logic plays little part and the unexpected is part of the fabric of its universe.

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Lundoff & Vanderhooft, Hellebore & Rue (2011)

Catherine Lundoff and JoSelle Vanderhooft, Hellebore and Rue: Tales of Queer Women and Magic. Lethe Press, 2011. Pp. 238. ISBN 978-1590213773. $15.00.

Reviewed by Carey Gates

From a servant girl with healing powers to a witch detective who uses demons instead of a computer to solve cases, the stories in Hellebore and Rue have a nice range of settings from medieval through modern. There is also a nice mix of locations from both sides of the Pond, with very identifiable North American and English backdrops. The stories range from “good” or white magic to black magic. Overall, the editors selected a nice sampling of stories.

I was looking forward to what looked like it should be an interesting exploration of female relationships in occult settings. I was somewhat disappointed that almost all of the stories involved a less than happy relationship between the lovers, and most worked from the premise of the two women having ended their relationship. It sometimes seemed that the relationship aspect was thrown in as an afterthought rather than an integral part of the story. Most of the relationships end at the beginning of the story, very often due to the main characters choosing to continue the use of their magical abilities. The impression from the collection as a whole is that a lesbian woman can’t have her magic and a relationship too, which is just so the opposite of what I was looking for in an anthology styled as “Tales of Queer Women and Magic”. The collection wasn’t nearly as strong in the “queer” aspect of the stories as I would have expected. This observation isn’t necessarily a criticism of the editors, as I have seen how difficult it is to get quality pieces that portray healthy lesbian relationships. This is more my call to writers to step up—there’s a lot of opportunity here!

The magical aspect however, was very rewarding. Had this been a book about “Women and Magic” it would have been exactly what I expected.

The first story, ‘Counterbalance’, got my hopes up. Even though it is written in an abstract third person voice, the relationship is just what you would expect to actually see in real life—a little bickering, a little forgetfulness, but always there for each other. It also showed more of what I expected from at least a few more of the stories, but didn’t find.

‘Trouble Arrived’ was probably the most “traditional” magic story from an American standard. This one was the best in the anthology at pulling me into the narrative and almost making me feel like I was in the story. This may be partially due to having been to Louisiana, so I could really picture the marshy backwoods the story it is set in.

‘Personal Demons’ felt like it could have been a story from my family, which has been inordinately obsessed with demons and possession. The relationship aspect of this one was confusing and actually detracted from the story for me. I expect the intention was to convey a conflicted relationship, but it came across more as a confused relationship. The mix of a traditional Judeo-Christian approach to demon possession and exorcism combined with Eastern philosophy was unique and brought a nice, fresh touch to this piece.

‘Sky Lit Bargains’ was the most traditional, expected sword-and-sorcery tale. The story had some inconsistencies that would lead me to believe that it had originally been written as a traditional sword-and-sorcery with a hero which was lightly modified to have a heroine to submit to this collection. It was very difficult to get any sense of a relationship other than mistress and servant from this story.

‘D is for Delicious’ was definitely the most “creepy”. It made me stop and think for a moment about visits to the school nurse during my grade school days. And you won’t be able to look at the sweet little ladies at the nursing home the same ever again. But again, the lesbian aspect of this story was a brief implied romance rather than an integral part of the plot.

‘And Out of the Strong Came Forth Sweetness’ had the strongest relationship element of the stories in this volume. The magical part of the narrative was actually more minor in this one, which was a refreshing change. It was also one of the two pieces where the relationship continued past the end of the story.

‘A State of Panic’ was my favorite piece in this collection, combining magic with a “whodunit” story—until I got to the end, which could have used a bit more work. As it was, I found myself transported from a maelstrom with Pan in a woodland glade to a tired row house with just a few words—and not particularly magical ones. I did really enjoy the complication of using magic in a modern, computerized world. The juxtaposition is rather unusual in magic stories and was well handled.

I enjoyed reading this anthology. The variety and quality of the stories was good. My only disappointment was that Hellebore and Rue had the opportunity to lead the charge in lesbian literature. Instead, this is a nice collection of stories of female magickers, with nods to the queer aspect.

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Bergen, Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat (2011)

Andrez Bergen, Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat. Another Sky Press, 2011. Pp. 236. ISBN 9780984559701. $4.74.

Reviewed by Jessica Nelson

Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat follows a man named Floyd through his daily life in the last city left on earth, Melbourne, Australia. Sure, other cities still exist, but you wouldn’t find anything alive in them. Every single living being left on the planet after a catastrophic viral outbreak has been walled into one supremely urban area. So, how does a government keep such a place from becoming dangerously over-populated and chaotic? Well, they don’t, really, but they attempt to control it with rampant streams of propaganda and fear-mongering.

The dim and gritty atmosphere is expertly set, using a massive amount of references to film noir and pop culture, courtesy of our narrator’s nostalgic love for film and all things reminiscent of simpler times. This made me a tad nervous at first; I worried about missing too many subtle cues and allusions. Luckily, the book does include a few appendices, including a handy list of recommended movies, so I watched as many as possible beforehand. ‘As many as possible’ turned out to be only four, but it was good enough, and the first, The Third Man, was really the key reference. As the story progressed, I realized the worry was groundless, although a familiarity with the movies certainly does add to the mystique. If you’re a movie buff, you’ll enjoy the abundance of nods to great movies and literature, but if you’re not, you’re likely to leave this book wanting to become one. The author even makes a few amusing references to his own record label, If? Records, where he records under the pseudonym Little Nobody.

The first pages of Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat are a bit confusing as Floyd tells about a recurring dream that plagues him; once you sort out what’s dream and what’s real, though, the flow picks up the perfect tempo for the tale. Floyd’s common decency and inarguable sense make him an appealing character that’s easy to identify with. He’s the perfect narrator for this story; the perennial underdog, an average guy forced to make his way through difficult circumstances. He often feels he can’t do anything about his position in life and is at times suicidal, but he struggles through as best he can, bullied into being a hired-henchman for a government which has done nothing but take away the people and things he loves.

This book does a fabulous job of highlighting the complexities and dangers of current world social, economic and political climates. As one monolithic corporation wiggles its fingers further and further into the political realm and manipulates its way into the hearts of the general public, Floyd is unwittingly pulled deep into the propaganda machine, giving us a singular behind-the-scenes view of what is quickly beginning to feel like some warped, twisted three-ring circus. As the boundaries between government and corporation become ever less defined, selling the people mouthsful of lies while convincing them it’s food, the people eat it all up. It doesn’t even matter anymore if people recognize the lies, because they’ve become so enamored of the people spouting the drivel that they actually rationalize it all and defend them. – Eat it up, little doggy, there’s more where that came from.

There isn’t much danger here of people getting too fed up and wanting to take their lives back, because they’re haunted by the fear of having their loved ones ripped away on made-up charges or for things they have no control over; all the people in charge have to do is label them Deviants, terrorists, and the little-doggy lie-eaters fly into a panic (the many government claims against WikiLeaks and Julian Assange makes for an excellent real-life example of an attempt at this) ...because of course, if they called them Revolutionaries, well... that might be too tempting a term for the public to resist. As the head of the corporation himself says, “Reality and perception are entirely different things, and let me tell you, Floyd, reality is the lesser of the two.”

This is my first review for The Future Fire, and I couldn’t have asked for a better book to begin. The only fault I can find with this book, is after such a compelling, well-written narrative with fantastic imagery and a perfectly set tone, the flow falters at the end. The entire story seems to trip over some huge boulder, like The Flying Nun doing a face-plant, and it never really recovers. The author seems to try to tie everything up so neatly it’s painful, but then you can almost pick out the exact spot where he said, “ah, screw it,” and tossed in a handful of arbitrary questions to leave open, instead. The commentary on the current socio-economic and political climate is dead on without ever being overbearing, woven perfectly into the tapestry of the story, but the author makes no real effort at a lasting solution, opting instead for a quick and easy way out. Like this. Uncomfortable, isn’t it?

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Dombrowski (ed.), Growing Dread (2011)

Caroline Dombrowski (ed.), Growing Dread: Biopunk Visions. Timid Pirate Publishing, 2011. Pp. 150. ISBN 978-0983098744. $12.95/£8.00.

Reviewed by Kate Onyett

I have of late had something of a renaissance over my enjoyment of the short story. And it is primarily thanks to this collection of intriguing bio-punk stories. I hope to show what lively interest and thought processes the stories sparked, and invite you to get your own mind sparking on this witty collection.

I would like to begin considering something of the etymology of ‘bio-punk’. All the ‘punk’ sub-genres seem to share a common ground: that of being vehicles for exposing human fallibility and taken to its extreme, to examine the most personal of failures: hubris through pride. Someone is going to come off worse for the events told in the stories. There is also, in this view, a form of ritualised punishment for those who aim too high or too arrogantly; or for those who take to much advantage of such advances. The ‘punks’, irrespective of whether they add steam-powered anachronistic machinery or biological experimentation or flow along the fast lanes of the information super-highway, connect back to the ancient Greek tragedies. The protagonist’s position in those plays was as a lowly human, in contrast to the elevated status of the gods, and his fall when he attempts to prove himself their equal was played out as a lesson in morality and humility.

These short stories work well when read on those terms; as tales of warning. Not only of potential apocalyptic dangers dredged from the minds of the writers (and note that ideas once considered science fiction are nowadays finding their realities in science fact and technological development), but also of the question of just how far scientist-Icaruses should spread their wings.

Virtue is rewarded; innocence, honesty and repentance are given leave to continue. The patriarchal sub-mariner (‘God Bloom’), the desperate person utilising technology to try to reach a lost loved one (‘Boosting the Signal’), the bioengineered sex slave, released from her owner and forging a new life and responsibilities (‘Unchained Melody’), and the repentant Dr Circe, ready to give her own life to destroy her work and prevent another catastrophic war (‘Doctor Circe and the Separatist Man-Cheetahs’). The arrogant, the unrepentant, the selfish; these are punished; either directly in the action of the tale or by an implication sown in the reader’s mind that carries on after the recorded events have ended. These include a genetic engineer (‘Muffin Everlasting’), murderous scientists that find their own creation turning on them (‘Kundalini Rising’), the narcissistic cop (‘Necrosis’), lazy, wasteful societies (‘God Bloom’ and ‘Green, Green World’), and manipulative, selfish investigators (‘Aesthetic Engine’). But there are also ambiguities; what would modern speculative fiction be without its grey areas, after all?

The ‘evil’ actions of Queen Victoria at the very end of ‘Aesthetic Engine’ are seen as such by her victim; the proud investigator she has ordered to death. But why this value judgement? Is the monarch perhaps seeking to repress the machine and its dangerous power for the sake of Empire and man? Or will she use the powers it offers to rule forever in an alternative history? Then there is the machine itself: fuelled on beauty. Surely consideration over what constitutes beauty and the value we place on it is an area so grey with ‘for’s and ‘against’s, that the very crux of this adventurous steam-bio-punk Victoriana tale is one steeped in uncertainty. This is a juicy juxtaposition against the very in-period detail of the certainty of the characters that their cause is right. The modern cult of celebrity, primarily based on physical perfection, only goes to show this is one argument that will not lie down and die, and could well be hypothesised a strong influence for the writer.

Then there is the desperately ill scientist (this book positively overflows with men and women in labs) in ‘Neurolution’, fighting to engineer a brain from scratch in order to save his ‘self’ from an early death. We learn he plans to download his complete self into the brain of a genetically engineered life-form in order to live on. While it is a practical success, we are left wondering how much of a success. Is the homicidal strangulation of the scientist at the very end by the new creation an act of mercy or a twisted act of confused rage by a malfunctioning experiment? Should selfish desire drive scientific advancement? This is a relevant point to raise. A bio-punk book is all about questioning the ethics of biological ‘development’: the big question of morality discussed above.

But... is science not, in fact, mostly about the ‘niggle’ that won’t quit? It’s the personal quest for the scientist attempting to find a satisfactory answer to a question put to them by the observation of events and matter. What they are satisfying is essentially their ego: this is something I do not know, I do not like not knowing, I want to know! Then, by finding an answer, we believe we have control over what we have manipulated? A long-standing trope of morality tales is the element of a greater, more powerful force at work to thwart the overconfident. In earlier cultures it was ascribed to one or more deities. In modern times this is attributed to Nature: Nature the great Thwarter and Destroyer. We watch in amazement as storms, tsunamis and quakes render our best achievements to waste. Nature, given the weight of totality, is the one force that can defy and destroy us in the end.

And these fictions tell us again; nature will out, and she will come down heavily on us for our conceit. The hijacking eco-warrior of ‘God Bloom’ turns out to be something a lot more... vegetative, and magnanimously forgives the decent sub-mariner, choosing to save him, the innocent children he is treating to a ride, and the scientists in retreat in their undersea laboratory. These will be the ‘allowed’ seeds of a new humanity, while everyone else is in for a cleansing-away of Biblical proportions. The mariner’s patriarchal figure is further blessed with restored health and vitality: attributes this new Noah will need to rebuild the world. This is the germ of hope: these few, frightened people huddling under the sea: the place from where life first crawled. Why save us? asks the mariner. Because there has to be a balance, replies the girl; the youthful face of Mother Nature. Humankind is recognised as destructive, but necessarily so. These things go in cycles; we rise, but we must accept we will fall, in the knowledge that there will be a rise once more. There is no final end; there is only the start of a new beginning.

Finally, there is the questionable area of augmentation. Already we have the technology to tweak our wrinkles and shape. DNA research seems to offer hope of ‘switching off’ undesirable genes. Given these very real issues, ‘How To Hack Your Dragon’ makes us question, should a hedonistic young man be allowed to alter the genetics of his dragon (yes, a genuine, bio-engineered, scaly, flying, fire-breathing beastie) to ‘upgrade’ it? In the hero’s favour, he does show evidence of taking responsibility for his decisions. At first it all seems a game, but when the first tweak goes wrong, putting himself, his girlfriend, and possibly the whole city in danger, he does not slink off and forget it happened, but attempts to make amends; to re-work the problem and resolve it. He even starts to show the beginnings of feelings of affection for his new pet and alters his own genetic code to be able to smell it out when disappears. Underneath this, there is the steelier issue of control: with a few casual swipes of a keyboard, one can create a vial of goo to effect profound alteration. This is primal control over one’s self and immediate environment effected as casually as ordering a pizza. Added to which, not only can one create a mythic animal to order, but the type of animal, we are told, is itself a status symbol. The ego needs soothing; to keep up with the Joneses, crazier and more dangerous creatures are required. This is very similar to the first story in the book, where an engineer is stuck making possible whatever strange creature his boss’s drunken son blabs about next. Just where does the buck stop? One cannot help wondering how far we should be allowed to go to tweak for fashion—a notoriously fickle entity. The shadow of eugenics in media-hyped tales of made-to-order babies looms long over both stories, yet both are told with believable panache and detail. It is the grounding of the stories in believable reality that keeps them ‘real’ and applicable to the reader.

Just thirty or forty years ago, and these would be pure science fiction, but even the man on the street knows about genetic science and hoped-for leaps in health and wellbeing this promises. What keeps the stories even more rooted in current times is the very human element of them. The hubris, the pride: those aspects of the morality play are so recognisable that one can relate very quickly to even the most extraordinary of concepts; hybrid man-cheetahs, anyone? For stories based on the ‘futuristic’ hypothesis, they are surprisingly mundane because one realises that none of these biological adventures would be possible without the human curiosity and human drive behind it. Possibly because it is tied into a biological slant, bio-punk is a more recognisable ‘punk’ than the others; for nothing is more intimate or bonding between writer and reader than the shared experience of the human body.

And then there is the playfulness. At the beginning I called the stories ‘witty’. Even when the tone is dark and dire, the sprightliness of style, the pace (these stories all move along at a far old speed) and the dextrousness of dialogue and information sharing is something I can only call ‘witty’ to best express the light touch. The collection was a pleasure to read for its engaging quality with the reader. The editor knows their stuff.

Timid Pirate is a small, independent press, proudly claiming to be not for profit. It espouses on its webpages and literature that it loves to ‘take a chance with a story’, aiming to highlight narrative quality over readership quantity. With a motto of ‘Adventures unlimited!’ this isn’t a shy and retiring press, contrary to what the name suggests. The major project underway is Cobalt City, a collection of books and podcasts about a place populated by superheroes. The bio-punk collection seems a little off-centre from this, unless one considers that both genres critique human behaviours. Superheroes have long been the stamping-ground for the emotional/ethical debate (even in the 50s, during the more bombastic era of their genesis, they were aligned specifically to ‘goodness’ and ‘justice’ and by extension their opinions and feelings were ultimately justified); both of which are rooted in the human experience. The morality plays of the bio-punk collection would be natural cousins to such examination of the human condition. Both genres lie within the fantastic-mythic: fantasy really does earn its corn when it is used properly as a ground for expanding the debates on human experience. Growing Dread wasn’t dread-full at all (!). It was juicy, jolly, dark and light, and it was a pleasure to review.

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Yu, How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe (2010)

Charles Yu, How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe. Corvus Books, 2010. Pp. 256. ISBN 9781848876828. £7.99.

Reviewed by Sam Kelly

This book contains itself. Which is to say, this book exists inside this book, just as Charles Yu exists inside this book. The inescapable corollary of this is that this book exists outside this book, or—to put it another way—this book exists without this book.
The book is read; the book is written; the book is reconstructed, repaired, rewritten. These actions are all simultaneous and equivalent, and Yu is clearly saying that this book is our book, that if we aren’t going to put the work in then he can’t do it for us. He’s right; this is an intensely complex and dense book, and one that powerfully rewards a reader who’ll work at their reading.

The spine of the novel is structured in a relatively classical way for an SF story, telling the story of a single time loop and its resolution. On the other hand, not only is “relatively” the keyword for two very good reasons, but this is as much meta-SF as it is SF. The universe within which the book’s set is quite literally science-fictional, operating by explicitly science-fictional physics (operated by Time Warner Time™), and undramatically aware of its own ontological status. As we can expect from a non-white author, it is very aware of status and hierarchy issues within the universe-that-is-SF, and “the way the world works”, socio-politically, is literalized in the story of Yu (senior)’s attempt to invent a time machine in his garage and the establishment figures for whom his demonstration doesn’t work. As with any good science-fictional inventor, Yu doesn’t let that put him off, and he effectively goes on to invent newer, more rarified branches of fictional science. Since this is a family novel, however, he never will have gone on to become the man who invented the time machine, and all the time spent inventing inevitably becomes snarled up with love and belonging and selfhood in Charles Yu’s mind.

As I mentioned above, “relatively” is the keyword for this book. First, time travel operates via a mechanism of perspective, shifting tenses and thus one’s perception of time, and there are no absolutes. Secondly, it’s a very traditional Family Novel, interested in father-son and mother-son relationships; the narrator is obsessed with finding his lost father, in the kind of looping circling way that normally requires therapy to untangle. His childhood trajectory was a fairly standard masculine one: from mother-space, home and abstract learning (tenses, particularly) into the father-space of the inventor’s garage, and thence into the wider science-fictional world. One way to look at this book is as Yu’s reified psychological journey out of father-space (tellingly, it’s described—as is nearly everything else in the book—as a box) into full independent selfhood, and coming to terms with his adult relationship with his mother. I am of course speaking of the fictional Yu; I wouldn’t want to venture an opinion on how closely that Yu maps to the Yu who wrote this book, nor to be honest do I care.

Yu tells us up front that he is not a protagonist, since that’s a restricted occupation within the science-fictional universe; instead, someone has to be the guy who fixes stuff, and what Charles Yu fixes is time machines. With nothing but his work, he lives inside his own time machine, with the AI who controls it and his nonexistent dog (a member of a set of ontologically valid entities which nevertheless do not actually exist; likewise, The Woman You Never Married and The Woman Your Mother Might Have Been, both of whom play roles in the novel) and the main strand of the novel is what happens when he crosses his own time stream and gets trapped in a loop. As in all SF, this is something you should never do; it always causes problems. Then again, that’s what time machines do, here; they cause problems. The first thing everyone wants to do is to set right what once went wrong, and they can’t. So: a time machine is a device for reliving the worst parts of your life. On the other hand, as Yu demonstrates for us, that isn’t always a bad idea.

Especially for a first novel, How to Live Safely in a Science-Fictional Universe is extremely well-written, and I enjoyed it immensely. The acclaim it received last year is well-deserved, and I think that whilst it approaches its aims very obliquely, they are very thoroughly met.

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Reed, What Wolves Know (2011)

Kit Reed, What Wolves Know. PS Publishing, 2011. Pp. 230. ISBN 978-1-84863-134-2. £19.99.

Reviewed by Sarah Ann Watts

This collection of stories by Kit Reed from PS Publishing contains 13 stories and also an essay: ‘What she thought she was doing: The fictions of Kit Reed’ by Joseph Reed. This gives an overview of her work and a bibliography of her titles. Coming new to Reed’s work as I did, I think it was for the best that the essay concluded the collection, allowing the reader to discover the stories first and form their own impressions. The essay provides context, further information and a guide to future reading.