Red Rook Review

Pocket Universe, Fissure, Hernia, or Portal Novel: A Reading of Adam Christopher's "Empire State"

2012-01-16T10:50:00.000-08:00

When I first heard about Adam Christopher's debut novel, Empire State (Angry Robot Books 2012), I immediately began to imagine a world similar to the Coen Brothers' Miller's Crossing, intermixed with a panoply of superheroes à la Alan Moore.

As my imagination took off, I heard Scott Joplin tunes playing in speakeasys in Harlem and wild nights spent at the Cotton Club, listening to Cab Calloway, dancing to Minnie the Moocher. Around the city, Murder Incorporated butchered its enemies and bloated bodies floated on the East River, while out-of-work veterans lived in a make-shift Hooverville in Central Park, forgotten men panhandled on Fifth Avenue, and a William Powell and Myrna Loy film runs at a theater on Sixth Avenue. Communist cells spring up in Brooklyn and the Bronx, enlisting Jewish immigrants, disenfranchised blacks and poor whites. Irish cops, maybe one of my relatives, walk their beats in Manhattan and the FBI dukes it out with gangsters bringing in whiskey from Canada. Raymond Chandler writes The Big Sleep and the first-person noir voice is born.

Unfortunately, my imagination got ahead of me. Adam Christopher's novel contains some of the same elements delivered by my fevered imagination but his novel is something different, more original than just a science fiction novel set within a historical period. His novel owes more to the strange, almost bizarre comics that emerged in the thirties and forties. Anyone who grew up in the forties and fifties is familiar with the strange comic world of Chester Gould's Dick Tracy. Tracy appeared in 1931 and received its impetus and story lines from gangland violence in Chicago. Gould imbued his comic with violence, strange science and villains so evil that they expressed their personalities through their tortured and deformed flesh. Christopher's novel does not allude to Gould but it certainly hums with comic vibrations from the work of Bob Kane. Kane, the creator of Batman, entered the field in 1936. His characters, like those of Gould, are dark, haunted creatures who live in a Gothic universe. Christopher is a young man, who admits that he came to comics late. His sensibilities rely more on Doctor Who, Alan Moore, the Disney film The Rocketeer and Grant Morrison. Consequently, his vision formed in the cauldron of modern pop culture envisions something unique and slightly grotesque; a pocket world, hernia-like, is formed when two superheroes-- disputing lovers--wage a combat to the death over the skies of Manhattan in 1930. From their duel a fissure is formed and a new world created. But it isn't just one world that springs fully formed from New York; it is a mirror image similar to a series of soap bubbles, forming world after world. The first world on the string is Empire State, a pocket world born in 1930.

Within the first fissure, doubles live, unaware of their counterparts above them. It is a strange gaseous place, similar to the world of the film Dark City, where people from both sides of the fissure wander, fall, disappear, and work. The protagonist, Rad Bradley, is a down and out gumshoe, existing without any visible means of support, waiting for that one femme fatale to walk into his seedy office. And , of course, she enters, as sexy as Veronica Lake and as rich as Croesus. Katherine Kopek is looking for her lover, who has disappeared without a trace and she hires Rad to find her. His search will connect him to intrigue emanating from the fissure and the machinations of the cognoscenti within the fissure. So begins his quest and the adventure.

Within the structure of the noir, Christopher creates a comic-book sensibility with enough ideas in this book to fuel a long run of subsequent tales, after all there are a million stories in the Naked City or Empire State.

Empire State, however, is not a re-creation of New York in the 30s; it is a comic book facsimile with modern tonalities and an understanding of various genres--noir, science fiction, portal novel, time travel (of sorts). It is a unique work, although it has borrowed memes from a panoply of authors and genres and it is some-what raw at times, carving its own niche in a field and a publisher known for its unique works.

Finally, Empire State is a veritable petri dish of ideas and images.

Catabasis into the Underworld or Nykia in Fillory: A Reading of Lev Grossman's "The Magician King"

2012-01-03T12:36:00.000-08:00

Lev Grossman sets off on a night-sea journey to skirt the edge of the genre where fantasy literature and literary fiction collide in his second "Fillory" novel. His artistic journey is a dangerous one, fraught with beastly memes and tropes that could scuttle his novelistic vessel at any moment. Always in danger of losing tone and voice, he navigates through the known waters of myth and psychology to give us one of the bravest fantasy novels of 2011.

The Magician King tells of Quentin Coldwater's catabasis into the underworld; a psychological tale wrapped in fantasy. Purporting to be a"portal" novel, its devices sometimes seem taken from a classic Dungeons and Dragons scenario or mimic the frenetic world hopping of a magus through a series of constructed portals in World of Warcraft . The truth of the matter is that Grossman is well-versed in games, fantasy literature, literary memes, and psychological tropes and he employs them freely and liberally in The Magician King. The result is a somewhat disorienting meta-fiction that is self-referential and self-defining, resulting in a novel that cannot be ghettoized to the fantasy section of the book store or sit comfortably in the literary fiction section.

In this second book in what is developing either as a trilogy or a series, Quentin, the protagonist of both The Magicians and The Magician King, is a whiner; a self-involved, immature jerk, who lacks self-knowledge and whose involvement in magic results more often than not in mayhem and chaos rather than in order. In this novel, Quentin progresses from a student in a bildungsroman to a hero on a journey (a quest). He begins his journey as a blind hero (metaphorically sightless, as in King Lear and Oedipus the King) and as obtuse as that idiot savant--Parsifal. And because it is a second book, he undergoes a series of tests, leading of course to his apotheosis.

In The Magician King, Quentin rules as one of the magical-realm Fillory's four sovereigns--two kings and two queens. He lives in luxury but he yearns to be a hero. However, he has none of the obvious qualities of a hero; instead, he demonstrates a non-delineated yearning for heroics without the requisite skills or mindset at the same moment that he suffers from a solid dose of youthful ennui and a soupcon ( maybe a barrel) of egotism. In other words, he is a twenty-something kid who has had a good education at Brakebills, a secret school of Magic in upstate New York, and some luck, but he hasn't really changed, i.e. matured, yet. It is Quentin's psychological state and Grossman's meticulous control over his material in relating that state that raises The Magician King to a level of adult-fantasy.

Called upon by Ember to launch himself on a quest, Quentin sails east to find the seven golden keys and adventure, while Julia, one of the Queens, accompanies him on his voyage. Her presence and her past interact with the plot of the quest to form a two-fold plot: Quentin's adventure to find the keys and Julia's education and ultimate apotheosis. Of the two Julia's education as a hedge-Magus informs and supports the action of Quentin's tale. In modern parlance, Quentin went to school, while Julia was schooled. Of the two, she is the more powerful and the strongest at the conclusion of the novel.

Through the telling of Julia's story, Grossman delves into what I think is his ultimate interest: an exploration of the source and meaning of magic and how we respond to it in fiction. His project is ultimately an encounter with the genre literature he loves but a type of literature he is not always comfortable with. At times, I feel him struggling with the genre, wrestling like Jacob and the angel. Rather than jump into fantasy literature head first like George R.R. Martin or Joe Abercrombie, Grossman seems to be skirting the edge of the enchanted fountain, checking it out, examining its contours and its depth. He is a thinker and a reader who has emotional ties to C. S. Lewis, also a thinker. His fantasy is based in reality and ultimately a dialogue with the genre itself. We feel him struggling and thinking and we feel his pain as we follow him through the portal and then down the yellow brick road. Hopefully, we find treasure at the end of the rainbow.

Grossman's struggle with genre is not unique. What is unique is that he, along with Jonathan Lethem, Laura Miller, Colson Whitehead, Mat Johnson, James Hynes, Junot Diaz, and Michael Chabon (to name only a few), are the first generation of young, articulate, powerful American writers, who were raised during a period in which comics, genre movies, RPGs, MMORPGs, and genre fiction were ubiquitous and wildly seductive.This seduction is obvious and evident in their writing and as a result they are changing the landscape through a re-evaluation of genre and a re-definition of literary fiction.

See my review of The Magicians here: http://redrookreview.blogspot.com/2011/09/reading-lev-grossmans-magicians.html

Reading Philip Kerr's "Field Gray"

2011-12-29T13:15:00.000-08:00

Field Gray is a realistic, tightly plotted, multi-level mystery novel, firmly grounded in detail--both historical and geographical--that accomplishes the primary objective of historical fiction: it recreates the past in order to illuminate the present and warns subtly not to commit the same mistakes yet again.And, although it is modern in its approach and structure and does demonstrate an obvious agenda, it remains true to its subject, its milieu, its characters, and its historical framework.

Kerr, through the interrogation of his protagonist, Bernie Gunther, in five different prisons in 1954 recounts two stories--the lives of Bernie Gunther, ex-Berlin detective, and Erich Mielke, the minister of state security of the German Democratic Republic from 1957 to 1989.

The story begins in Cuba in 1954, where Bernie is working for Meyer Lansky, Jewish crime lord and one of the original founders of Murder Incorporated. Castro is active and Baptista's regime is in serious trouble. After meeting Graham Greene in a local brothel, Bernie sets sail to help a friend of a friend, a young woman, who has killed a police officer, with a United States sailor's stolen weapon. So begins a series of incidences that result in Bernie's incarceration in five different prisons, where he is interrogated by various intelligence agencies and remembers his past, until he finds himself back in Berlin and in the middle of a clandestine operation being conducted by the French, Russians, and the CIA. To survive and also mete out a bit of revenge, Bernie revisits his past and plays one country's intelligence service against another.

As the adage goes, the devil is in the details, and Kerr's command of early twentieth-century history is staggering. He knows what happened when and where; and, when I say "where," I mean he knows the street address. This attention to detail provides a sense of verisimilitude that is lacking in many historical crime novels. Kerr seems to be particularly well versed in legal matters and procedure, which in this novel in particular, is used to great effect.

Kerr dominates his corner of the historical/mystery genre.

As an aside, when I was working in Berlin in 1990, his second novel The Pale Criminal appeared and I quickly snapped it up, along with its predecessor March Violets. The novels were exactly the kinds of books that I loved at the time and still do. I was infected with German measles (metaphorically) at the time; I loved all things German, especially German literature and history. And the truth of the matter, after all, was that I was in Germany because of a book. That isn't really accurate: there was more than just one book that fueled my interest in Germany; there were hundreds of them--biographies, histories, and novels. It was a state of mind, an obsession that began earlier than my immersion in literature about the war. Maybe, it had to do with the return of my grandfather, father and two uncles from the war and their attitude of steely silence about it all. Maybe it was the way they held their cigarettes or drank their beers, staring off in the distance, holding their secrets close to their T-shirts. When I try to pinpoint the moment of my obsession, I can see toy German soldiers, or a pocket book edition of Cornelius Ryan's The Last Battle, Le Carre's The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, or Len Deighton's brilliant series set in Berlin. Or maybe it was The Blue Angel or the Blue Max or Cabaret or the poetry of W. H. Auden or Christopher Isherwood's novels and short stories. Eventually, it would become Einstein's Berlin or Döblin's Berlin or the German Expressionists' Berlin or Hitler's. By 1990, however, it was my Berlin; and through my Berlin filter, Field Gray seems both very real, very timely and extremely readable.

Reading Roberto Bolaño's "The Third Reich"

2011-12-27T12:23:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite novels of 2011 was Roberto Bolaño's The Third Reich. Anyone who has read my novels or my poetry will know why I found the book so sympatico, and why I find Bolaño not only a great artist--because he is--but why I feel an intuitive closeness to him: his concerns and obsessions are my concerns and obsessions; his tropes and metaphors are mine as well. Perhaps the reason I feel this way is that Bolaño and I were born just a few months apart. And, as we grew up, we eventually, after several moves, didn't really live that far from one another; the Rio Grande divided us, but in the fifties and sixties it was permeable, and we and all of our cultural memes crossed the border with impunity. Eventually, he moved to Spain and I started work in Germany and France. He was an autodidact who loved to read, as did I. And in our obsession we seem to have liked the same writers for the most part, although his passion and his hunger dwarf mine. There seems to be nothing he did not read and absorb into his world view, his Weltanschauung, which for the most part consisted of a Weltschmerz, formed by an understanding of the inherent and sinister fascism of the Capitalist world, which he experienced first hand in Chile. For him the Nazis immigrated to South America and continued their machinations. However, as the novel implies: fascism lives on in various forms, not the least being, in our obsession over its uses and forms during the second world war but most particularly in the Third Reich.

The novel concerns a young German gamer, named Udo Berger, who travels to Spain with his new girlfriend, Ingeborg, to a seaside resort hotel, where he stayed as a youth with his family and fell in love with the wife of the German proprietor. His goal for the summer is to write an article about the game, The Third Reich, a table-top strategy game, obviously modeled on the Avalon Hill games popular in the fifties and sixties. While there, Udo descends into his obsessions--games, the past, crimes, police, detectives, fascists, women--and the novel has the feel, mood and pacing of a Patricia Highsmith novel. The sunny beaches and resort hotel take on a sinister feel like that of Mann's Death in Venice or one of Highsmith's European watering holes. Even a mystery author that Ingeborg is reading is Highsmith-like, emphasizing the obvious connection to mystery, obsession and madness. And there is sickness (Mann's great metaphor) and violence: the owner of the hotel is dying, and several derelicts haunt the hotel and the beach amidst rumors of rape and mayhem, while a fellow German disappears.

The mood of The Third Reich slowly darkens, as we read the notebook entries of Udo through the summer and into the fall. He is, of course, an unreliable narrator but Bolaño's strong voice, one of the strongest and most unique in the latter part of the 20th century, is consistent throughout the novel and leads us inexorably into Udo's descent into fear and failure until we arrive at the logical conclusion--the defeat of the fascist.

Throughout the novel, Bolaño refers to numerous German historical figures, battles, and games. His descriptions are always spot on. He also refers to many writers, which he always does, which shows his auto-didactic tendencies. Autodidacts always have to show off. But for our purposes he reveals his tastes and his influences. We must remember that Bolaño, like Keats, was writing posthumously. In some ways he was writing for himself or for posterity. Consequently, his novels are unique and satisfying in a quirky way. And for my taste, this novel, although not as grand as 2666 or The Savage Detectives, is my favorite of his short novels, equal in beauty and tone to his collection of short stories--Last Evening on Earth.

For more on Bolaño, see my review of 2666 here: http://redrookreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/roberto-bolanos-2666.html, and his collection of poetry, The Romantic Dogs here: http://redrookreview.blogspot.com/2009/04/bolanos-romantic-dogs.html

Chuck Wendig's "Double Dead" as a Dialectic of Blood or How I got my Kicks on Route 66

2011-12-12T13:34:00.000-08:00

As a kid I loved the television series Route 66, maybe because we traveled it, journeying each summer to my father's family home in New Mexico, or maybe because I just liked the idea of a couple of cool guys, speeding along in the hippest car ever made in America, a 1961 corvette, for the simple reason that they could.

Chuck Wendig in his plot-driven, zombie/vampire hybrid, Double Dead, calls upon some of that nostalgic as his vampire hero herds his human flock west to Los Angeles along Route 66 in search of an escape from the zombie apocalypse, not in a corvette but in a run-down, diesel-fueled RV. Rather than escaping their pursuers, however, the travelers, who undertake a quest of sorts, run afoul of the most bizarre, grotesque collection of zombies, cannibals, clowns, and demons, ever assembled in a zombie novel.

Double Dead, although heavily plot driven and grotesque (here I'm relying on the original connotation of the word), is not your usual zombie novel; it overflows with piss and vinegar (Wendig employs this phrase several times in the novel to describe various characters); the prose is super-charged; his chapters are tightly organized, engineered to lead the reader inexorably into the next; and the story follows a satisfying arc (imagine a snake with its tail in its mouth, the alchemical symbol of wholeness) that begins and ends with the protagonist, the vampire, Coburn. More precisely, as the story unwinds, Coburn comes to understand that if he is to survive he must protect the few humans still alive. His realization is the exciting force of the novel and the girl Kayla, the one who implanted the idea, the reason for the (makeshift or ad hoc) family's journey or quest along Route 66.

The true strength of the novel, however, is the Jamesian turn of the screw that Wendig gives the genre by introducing a vampire, who awakens from a long sleep to discover his food supply has been tainted and destroyed and Wendig's dizzily precise and sometimes comic prose that conjures up brilliantly a red-neck America in the throes of the zombie apocalypse.

As an aside, Wendig will gag if he reads this (because I suspect he is full of piss and vinegar and manly)but I found myself deconstructing the novel, something I rarely do, because I wanted to understand where his book stands within the genre. It was obvious he is well-read in both zombie and vampire literature and that he has a firm grasp on America pop culture. I was particularly taken with the theme of blood as the source of evolution or dialectic (and contagion à la Stoker and Matheson) within the apocalypse and thought it somewhat ingenious. There was, of course, subtle allusions to zombie capitalism, situating the zombies in Walmart, malls, and other shopping areas of America, and a nod to religious imagery and fanaticism in the Sons of Man. Nevertheless, although there is richness underneath the breezy prose and non-stop action, Wendig is too much of a pro to dwell on it and (I suspect) too full of piss and vinegar to admit.

This book demonstrates the usual high standard of editing that Jonathan Oliver and his team at Abaddon are known for and should definitely be on your reading list if you like zombies,vampires or both.

Reading Dan Abnett's "Triumff, Her Majesty's Hero"

2011-12-06T14:06:00.000-08:00

I have been talking about my "cunning plan" for some time now to read and review all of Angry Robot Books' releases. The number is nearing fifty and I have reviewed only eleven. As you can see I am woefully in arrears, although I have purchased every book and with some titles I have two editions: big and little. I don't know what that means really except those I have ordered from England are big, i.e., trade paperback, verses, little, mass market. In regard to Dan Abnett's first novel for Angry Robot Books I have two copies: trade paperback, big, and mass market, little. I chose to read the mass market edition so I could stick it in my suit pocket and carry it around, bend it back and break its spine. That's the way I like to read genre fiction--aggressively. With Triumff my usual methodology, however, was foiled (frustrated), because it is such a rich book, full of puns and literary allusions, characters and details that I had to slow down, read a bit slower, for after all I'm sitting here on the prairie, on the edge of the comancheria, north of the Rio Bravo, where the English language, although rich, is different from that of Elizabethan England and where our vocabulary is mixed with both English and Spanish. Consequently, it took me a while to enter the book, but once I did I realized how nuanced it was. Although I know it is played for laughs, there is a full-blooded mimetic world, an alternate or parallel universe, here, a geography that could be expanded upon, a vast container that could house other stories and other novels. And this created world, along with its rounded characters, is what makes the book more than just a linguistic romp. In this regard, Triumff''s alternate world is as rich and satisfying as Lavie Tidhar's in his The Bookman or Colin Harvey's created planet in Winter Song or, if we are being truthful, most of the Angry Robot titles. Created worlds, mixed genres, and good writing seems to be the common denominator.

In Triumff, the year is 2010; however, it is not our 2010. It is an alternate history in which Queen Elizabeth XXX sits upon the throne and rather than science, alchemy and superstition run the world. To understand the energy and verve of the novel, imagine then an episode of the Tudors, written by Richard Curtis, starring Rowan Atkinson as our narrator, William Beaver, with a young Kevin Kline (as in A Fish Called Wanda), playing Sir Rupert Triumff. Also imagine a teeming London, as dark and dank as any Dickens or Peter Ackroyd novel and then throw in magic and wizardry reminiscent of Terry Pratchett. Stir up the mix and add every clown or buffoon from a Shakespearean comedy or any ork from a Warhammer novel and you will begin to understand the tone and tenor of the work.

This is the invented world in which the action occurs but the book is more than an invented world or a comic bit. There is a plot here and characters. Triumff is back from the Beach, Australia, with his Ishmael-like companion--Uptil. The big secret, which Triumff is concealing, is that Australia is modern and technological, a modern paradise, compared to the teeming squalor of Europe. On one hand he is trying to conceal his discovery and the other, he is involved in trying to protect the queen from a dangerous conspiracy created by masters of mayhem and Goetia. To solve the mystery and defeat the sorcerers Triumff goes underground, masquerading as a French lutenist, as the Queen prepares for the anniversary of her coronation. In the investigation a panoply of Keystone-like police, agents, soldiers and mages appear from all over Europe.

For Abnett fans, the novel is a departure; but, in reality, I think we are seeing an almost full measure of the man. Like most of his novels, this one contains full-bodied characters, rich language, and panoply of arms, but it also demonstrates or, perhaps better, shares his humor, his verbal intensity and range, along with his heart. Triumff, I think is Abnett's labor of love. It is what he wrote when left to his own devices.

Myth in the Age of Victoria or Steampunk in "The Bookman" by Lavie Tidhar

2011-12-05T09:36:00.000-08:00

Setebos, Setebos, and Setebos!

'Thinketh, He dwelleth i' the cold o' the moon.

The Bookman, a mesmerizing tour-de-force, refreshes Steampunk, while adhering to its basic elements and demonstrating the author's encyclopedic knowledge of the genre and his endearing love of literature. Its major theme is myth; however, its subsidiary theme is books or, more, precisely literature. Structurally, it is a quest novel, situated in a Steampunk-like setting, but hiding a Childhood's End-like mystery. Ultimately, it is a novel about novels with the overarching theme being myth. As the character Gilgamesh says: "Oh Orphan. This is the time of myths. They are woven into the present like silk strands from the past, like a wire mesh from the future, creating an interlacing pattern, a grand design, a repeating motif." Succinctly it is a mystery set in an alternate history of England during a steam age in which automatons, giant lizards, and humans equally abide, while an orphan braves danger in order to find his lost love.

The genre known as Steampunk, strictly speaking, if that is even possible to do, concerns a period of English history from June 20, 1837 to January 22, 1901, or, more precisely, a period that runs from the birth of Queen Victoria to her death, and incorporates elements of science fiction, fantasy, alternate history and speculative fiction. Accordingly, Steampunk harkens back to the scientific romances of Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, and Mary Shelley and emulates, or imitates, their style and content, while concentrating on certain identifiable memes and grand themes of the Victorian age: the industrial revolution, colonialism, revolution, nationalism, science, particularly biological science--Darwinism-- sociology, and the rise of the novel, as well as the flourishing of poetry and art, especially in France. The Victorian age also saw the emergence of the gentleman scholar in England and the rise of capitalism. With all these disparate but potent forces at work, the period is ripe for incorporation into the mise-en-scène of modern artists.

Lavie Tidhar's steampunk universe is bit larger than the Victorian age. As we said above, it is a novel about myth but it is myth filtered through English or French literature. The exciting force and one of the chief images of the novel is Shakespeare's The Tempest. The ruling power of England comes from Caliban's island and they themselves are monsters in the sense that Caliban was a monster. Caliban is an apt image for Tidhar because he can incorporate through a type of shorthand all the wondrous tropes in Shakespeare's fantasy as well draw on the image of the magician, Prospero, whose powers rely upon books. Magic, after all, is only language spoken to control or change the world, and Prospero is one of the most potent images or symbols of that power. Remember, too, Prospero has a daughter and that The Tempest is a love story. So Tidhar's alternate history begins in the 17th century. At that time, an event occurs that creates the alternate history of the world: the appearance of an alien race. One of the major tropes of science fiction underlies the meaning of the novel. And this is just one of the thousands of threads within the novel. To describe each is to destroy its beauty and complexity. Suffice it to say that the book is worth several readings because the author's vast knowledge and love of literature is on every page. And in this sense the book is a meta-fiction.

The Bookman has not garnered the exposure it deserves. It is an intelligent, clever book, that creates a wonderfully complex secondary world. And most importantly, it is as well-constructed as a Swiss cuckoo clock and as readable as any genre fiction being written today.

Reading Dan Abnett's "Salvation Reach"

2011-10-10T09:52:00.000-07:00

Book Thirteen in the Gaunt's Ghosts series marks an end and a beginning. It has the feel of a great Navy ship turning about in a high wind and reminds me of something Norman Mailer said in a television interview he gave after the publication of his novel, Ancient Evenings (Abacus 1997), when asked about its length: "it takes me a hundred pages to turn a barge." What Mailer really meant was that his story and plot were so detailed and rich that it took him time and description to move it along. Salvation's Reach (Games Workshop Ltd. 2011) is not overly long nor complicated; in fact, I wanted more, but the novel does feel like a turning, a shift in the force, as it were: people die and new characters arrive; several new plot lines emerge; and new themes surface. No matter the new elements and the obvious thrust forward, there is also a harkening back to previous stories and the appearance of characters from previous novels that complicate and enrich Gaunt's life. As characters surface from Gaunt's past, the man alone is no longer alone.

Several months ago, I reviewed Nathan Long's latest novel in the Gotrek and Felix series, Zombieslayer (Games Workshop Ltd. 2010), and made the following observation about long series. I believe the same applies to Gaunt's Ghost and bears repeating.

Growing up on the Louisiana/Texas border in the fifties, I use to watch men, women, and children picking cotton. The process involved their snatching the bolls and placing them in long bags that they dragged behind throughout the day. Every since I have imagined certain tasks (pleasant or otherwise)as metaphorical cotton picking. Usually, these thoughts emerge when the task becomes so tiresome, heavy, and unmanageable that its existence hampers my ability to move. When following long fantasy series, I sometimes see the continual accretion of volumes as being like the bag: the author over decades creates so many characters, so many themes, and so many plot threads, that the work becomes turgid and dense. More often than not I cease following the series, never to return. Sometimes, however, a series continues to be fresh year after year. Two series that continue to delight me are Gaunt's Ghosts and Gotrek and Felix. Both are from Black Library. Dan Abnett writes Gaunt's Ghosts and Nathan Long pens Gotrek and Felix.

The point of this quote is that long series present their own set of problems. Abnett, in both Blood Pact (Games Workshop 2010) and Salvation's Reach, seems to be freshening his series and preparing for closure. After all, this arc is entitled "The Victory."

The novel begins with Rawne and the creation of a new sub-unit within the Tanith Regiment: The Suicide Kings. The Suicide Kings, chosen by Rawne, are vying for the responsibility of protecting the double-triple agent Mabbon Etogaur. Mabbon, once an Imperial Guard, who defected to the Blood Pact and then to the Sons of Sek, a chaos war band, similar to the Blood Pact and loyal to Magister Sek, has devised a plan with Gaunt and Lord Militant Cybon to create an internecine struggle between the Blood Pact and the Sons of Sek. The plot of the novel might simply be described as Gaunt's planting the cheese in the trap. The trap is Salvation's Reach, a massive construct of space debris, where the Sons of Sek are based. Once again, Abnett has created a fabulous, wondrous battleground.

To set the trap, the Tanith is joined by new units and three Space Marines. Once they arrive at Salvation's Reach great mayhem ensues; however, most of the novel is set in space aboard an ancient ship of the line, refurbished and released from storage, the Highness Ser Armaduke.

Abnett said in a recent video-blog on Youtube that he would like to write an Imperial Navy novel. In his description of the Armaduke's voyage through the Warp and its subsequent battles, he has displayed his sea legs; nevertheless, the heart-rending battle within the narrow corridors of Salvation's Reach is where Abnett shines. Without giving anything away, get out your handkerchiefs because I dare you to finish the novel without a tear.

Salvation's Reach, although transitional, alludes to almost all of Abnett's 40Ks work and creates new themes and introduces new characters that freshen the franchise and open the field for more novels and greater adventures.

Reading Dan Abnett's "Sabbat Worlds"

2011-10-04T13:50:00.000-07:00

Dan Abnett begins his introduction to Sabbat Worlds, a collection of short stories set in his created portion of the Warhammer 40,000 universe, with the pronouncement: "It seems I can add 'world builder' to my CV." This statement of the obvious should come to no surprise to those readers that have waited with bated-breath for the next installment of the Gaunt Ghosts series. Abnett has a unique voice and an uncanny ability to create scenarios that suck the reader in like a vortex at the lip of the warp.

I've read most of his work and I'm still trying to define the Abnett "voice" or Abnett "style." With Sabbat Worlds, he presents us with an opportunity to enter his universe once again, not only through his own writing and his own voice, but through those of six others. He has gifted us with two tasty treats of his own and six other stories that complement the Gaunt series. These stories explore current themes emerging from Abnett's world and introduce new units and planets to the campaign, while presenting other venues of the war against the Ruinous Powers.

One of my favorite Abnett novels is Double Eagle, a story of the air war. And although it is science fiction, the novel reminds me of the World War II aerial-combat movies I loved as a kid. The first story of Sabbat Worlds, "Apostle's Creed," by Graham McNeill, follows the film formula perfectly but harkens back to an earlier mime--that of the combat ace of World War I. And instead of Phantine XX squadron in Double Eagle McNeill focuses on the Apostle Seven, an elite squadron of ace Thunderbolt pilots. McNeill captures the spirit and excitement of aerial combat in a story that is quite familiar to those of us who love The Blue Max, Dawn Patrol, or Wings.

Matthew Farrer's "The Headstone and the Hammerstone Kings" is the second story in the collection and it is a completely different take on the Sabbat Worlds. Suddenly, we find ourselves in the detritus of the war, following the machinations of the Adeptus Mechanicus. One of the reasons the 40K universe attracted my attention in the first place was because of its dark, Gothic tone; it is a universe of treachery and deceit. Farrer creates a feeling of claustrophobia and angst through his prose style and tone, as he drops us into an alien environment through his use en medias res. As we struggle to understand what is happening, it becomes quite obvious that Farrer is steeped both in the mythos and fluff of 40K and its underlying pathology of paranoia and anxiety.

Aaron Dembski-Bowden's "Regicide" employs the image of the chess-like game that pops up regularly in the Gaunt series. In this story, we are re-introduced to the Blood Pact and we see the death of Warmaster Slaydo, Gaunt's mentor. The story reminds me of early Gav Thorpe with its focused battle of wits between a Blood Pact witch and a member of the Argentum, another elite Imperial Guard unit. "Regicide" delineates some of Gaunt's history before the Ghosts.

The next story in the collection, "The Iron Star," by Abnett also fills in some of the blanks. This story, which I will not discuss in detail, is emotional and poignant. I dare you not to cry. It serves as a bridge between Only in Death and Blood Pact.

The "Cell" by Nik Vincent, similar in tone and style to Abnett's work, shares themes with Traitor General, my favorite Gaunt novel. The story is intimate in scope, well-written, and appropriately creepy in a LeCarre sort of way.

Nick Kyme's "Blueblood" is solid 40K, Imperial Guard fiction, focusing on a Volpone Battalion, arriving on a planet in preparation for an invasion. Even behind enemy lines, however, the Ruinous Powers are at work. 'Blueblood" furthers the religious themes that are prevalent throughout the Gaunt series and introduces strong characters that deserve further exposure.Kyme shows he's in total control of his material.

Just as McNeill's story was a bit of a pastiche, so too is Sandy Mitchell's "A Good Man." He very carefully delineates a 40K story following the plot of Graham Greene's and Carol Reed's "The Third Man." There is even zither music playing in the bars and tavernas of the ram-shackled Verghast. A lot of fun and very well-written.

The final piece of the collection is a novella by Abnett, entitled "Of Their Lives in the Ruins of Their Cities." I will not spoil the story for you but simply say it is a brilliant piece of writing. It is a truism now to write that Abnett writes well about soldiers at war. But unlike many hard-core military science fiction novelists, he has a sentimental streak and a heart, which reminds me of John Ford and Rudyard Kipling.

This collection could have been twice the length. I hope there are additional volumes.

Christian Schad

2011-09-19T08:43:00.000-07:00

For over thirty years I have been interested in fauvist, expressionist and surrealist art. Fate seems to have encouraged that interest because I have repeatedly stumbled onto exhibitions at just the right moment.In 2001, I was working in Paris and one free afternoon I set off on a walk. When I reached the Marais I saw a notice for a Giacometti exhibit at the Centre G. Pompidou. Once there I became fascinated with his systematic study of the human skull and I jotted down a sentence from one of his notebooks. I later used the line in my second novel: J’ai passé tout l’hiver dans ma chambre d’hotel à peine le crâne, voulant le preciser….

A few years later, once again in Paris, I was returning to my hotel when I noticed that there was an important exhibit of Picasso's erotic art. I spent the rest of the afternoon lost in Picasso's mythic universe. Since that time I have used his images of the Minotaur over and over again in my work. In fact, the character, Karl Wisent, grew out of my study of Picasso's Vollard Suite.

In the early 90's I was working for a major manufacturing company and I often accompanied the President of the company to New York. During this time I was studying Gustav Mahler and Oskar Kokoschka. One free afternoon as I passed the Guggenheim I noticed that the whole museum was featuring the works of Kokoschka. Fate once again was on my side.

Approximately, a year and half ago in New York, I stumbled onto an exhibit of Christian Schad's work. At the time I had no idea who he was but I was immediately struck by his images and the feeling tone of his work and I knew instantly that he would enter my pantheon of artistic gods. The painting above is one of his. I mention Schad because he, like Celan, was both an expressionist and a surrealist. He was born on August 21, 1894, in Miesbach. In 1913, he studied art in Munich. During the first world war, he fled to Zurich where he joined Hugo Ball and Tristan Tzara. Together with Walter Serner he started the magazine-Sirius. From 1920 to 1925, Schad lived in Rome and Naples where he studied the Italian Renaissance painters and in 1925, he joined with Otto Dix and George Grosz to particpate in the Neuen Sachlichkeit.

Reading Lev Grossman's "The Magicians"

2011-09-15T10:29:00.000-07:00

Lev Grossman's The Magicians (Plume 2010) is a Bildungsroman; and, although parallels have been drawn between J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and C.S. Lewis' Narnia, the comparisons are not apt. These fantasy novels are not "coming of age novels" in the sense or meaning contained within the definition of Bildungsroman or in the same way that Grossman's novel is. Instead, Grossman's use of and reference to them--both internally, within the text, and externally, through paralleling plots--reveal an emerging sub-genre of literary fiction that relies on tropes and memes of genre fiction--science fiction, fantasy, comics, and RPGS-- as a reference to or touchstone for his protagonist's life experiences. Through references to these tropes or memes, Grossman, like Junot Díaz, Jonathan Lethem, Michael Chabon, interacts, on one hand, with a genre that basically defines "virtual" through a rich and vertiginous simulacra and, on the other, the protagonist's "real" life experiences. These genre-specific allusions serve as a short-hand to their audience--people raised at the same time on the same fare--but transcend those genres in which they define their "coming of age." This melange results in a richer, more complete and complex, text that transcends its putative genre, grounds both the reader and the text in the here and now, and, hopefully, broadens the novel's readership.

This is not to say, of course, that The Magicians cannot be read as fantasy; it can be. Awe-inducing set pieces are sprinkled throughout the text and it is easy for the reader to suspend his/her disbelief and accept the work as fantasy. But that would be too easy. From the very beginning, the protagonist Quentin, an unhappy teenager, is subverting the reader's expeditions by showing that magic, although powerful, does not solve his very human problems.There is a constant call home to the reality of the everyday--There is nowhere like home.

As the novel begins, Quentin is in high school in Brooklyn. He is intelligent, preparing for college, but he is not happy.

Quentin knew he wasn't happy. Why not? He had painstakingly assembled all the ingredients of happiness. He had performed all the necessary rituals, spoken the words, lit the candles, made the sacrifices. (p.65)

To deal with his unhappiness, Quentin repeatedly reads Christopher Plover's Fillory and Further, a series of five novels published in England in the 1930s. The books provide him with an escape from his quotidian existence as well as a location and container for his imagination. As he is walking with his two friends, James and Julia, to their Princeton interview, Quentin states that the cold of the day did not bother him because: He was in Fillory. (p.6) This reference to the Fillory novel is meant to be an allusion to C. S. Lewis' Narnia novels, as well as an indication of Quentin's state of mind and a self-referencing device. It is also a tip-off to the beginning of a portal novel, a rhetorical device used in fantasy literature and a clear example of the recursive or self-reflecting nature of the novel.

Additionally, it signals another significant theme: books, writing and reading. Through the internal construction of faux books, in this case, fantasy books, Grossman comments on books and reading. The reference, along with the map at the beginning of the novel, alerts us to the fact that The Magicians, like the Narnia series, is also a portal novel. As Farah Mendlesohn states in Rhetorics of Fantasy (Wesleyan University Press 2008), “the portal fantasy is about entry, transition and exploration (p.2). Portal novels and the Bildungsroman are compatible rhetorical devices and they are popular in children fantasies such as Narnia, The Wizard of Oz, Harry Potter, and Through the Looking Glass. Some critics even argue that Tolkien's The Lord of the Ring is a portal novel: Frodo and his friends leave the Eden-like shire and enter the chaotic world of Sauron and Saruman. So from the outset of the novel the reader is reminded of the pivotal portal novels of his/her childhood and on a deeper level reminds us that novels are portals as well.

The novel's impetus--off to college--quickly changes with Quentin's and his friends' discovery of a dead man, the interviewer. The plot moves almost instantly from reality to a supra-reality. He (Quentin) kept the back of his skull pressed firmly against the cool solid wall like it was his last point of connection to a same reality. (p. 10) And, frankly, it is his last point of connection with the everyday world. From this point on, Quentin's world changes: forces draw him toward the first portal, the portal that leads him to the school for magicians--Brakebill's.

Brakebill's appears to be the first of several worlds that Quentin passes through on his journey to maturation and self-knowledge; however, this supposed duality—between one world and another--is false. Because of Quentin's obsession with the world of Fillory all of his actions, all of his thoughts, reside there. Ultimately, one way to view the story is that it is the unpublished Fillory novel, The Magicians. In other words, Quentin is a character within a novel that he thinks he is reading. This interpretation furthers the idea of recursion, or the idea of fiction reflecting or reading itself. A Borgesian mirror effect exists within this very post-modern experiment in fantasy fiction.

The Magicians respects its antecedent tropes but ultimately the novel transcends them. Quentin Coldwater, the protagonist, grows, develops, and learns in our world and in our time, irrespective of his abilities as a Magus. His foibles are human failings, not super-human or magical ones. Quentin is closer to Holden Caulfied or one the Glass kids than to Harry Potter. Ultimately, his tale is a moral one: an Erziehungsroman. However, the novel's recursive nature and its sly literary tricks create a puzzle that places this novel in a category outside standard fantasy fiction.

Explication of Colin Wilson's Major Theme with Particular Attention Paid to the Lovecraftian Pastiche: "The Mind Parasites"

2011-09-08T12:22:00.000-07:00

Over the last fifty-five years Colin Wilson has stated and restated his major ideas. He has progressed from his thesis of the Outsider in literature, the man who suffers from the rigors of modern life because he sees too clearly and feels too deeply to live in a world of unreality, to a belief in phenomenological existentialism, a positive, optimistic philosophy which borrows from Abraham H. Maslow's existential psychology, Shaw's concept of the life force, Husserl's phenomenology, and themes of occult literature.1 Wilson, who reads widely and prides himself on his ability to assimilate his knowledge into a system of ideas, attempts to foresee man's possible evolution. This evolution does not depend upon biological development, but man's perceptual mutation. To accomplish this evolution, man must establish contact with the vital life force, the élan vital. The only men capable of making this contact, according to Wilson, are Outsiders. These men function as a link between the sleeping masses and the evolutionary Supermen.

Wilson summarizes these ideas in the introduction to his non-fiction work, Strange Powers: "I believed that if 'the Outsider' could learn to know himself, and make a determined effort to control his life instead of drifting, he might end as a leader of civilization instead of one of its rejects."2 In his novels (The Violent World of Hugh Greene, Adrift in Soho, The Glass Cage, The Black Room, The Space Vampires, Ritual in the Dark, The Philosopher's Stone), Wilson pictures Outsiders struggling to control their lives and expand their consciousness. Their fight, however, is always difficult, for man's consciousness is an unmapped region, filled with obstacles. To illustrate the nature of the Outsider's struggle, Wilson creates in The Mind Parasites an allegory, in which he shows an Outsider, Gilbert Austin, battling against the personified obstacles of the mind. The parasites symbolize human "blindness," the failure of man to see the value of life and the immense ramifications of expanded consciousness.

In the novel Wilson traces the perceptual development of Dr. Gilbert Austin. Austin, who feels the need to expand his consciousness, progresses from an Outsider to a Superman, who defeats the parasites and leaves the earth in search of other beings like himself. To show Austin's step-by-step progression, Wilson employs sight and perception images throughout the work, but, because the novel deals with the mind, seeing images possess special meaning. When Austin says he "sees" he is actually "feeling": You had to get use to thinking how your mind worked. Not just your 'mind' in the ordinary sense, but your feelings and perceptions as well. I found that by far the most difficult thing, to begin with, was to realize that 'feeling is another form of perception. .., our seeing is also feeling. Before Austin defeats the parasites, he progresses through several levels of understanding. Initially, he exists as an Outsider, who likes the world of the mind better than the external world. He constantly experiments to expand his consciousness. His interest in the mind brings him into contact with Dr. Karel Weissman.Weissman and Austin discuss problems of death and consciousness. Then Weissman dies and Austin receives his papers. By studying these documents, he learns of the parasites. Through his encounter with the parasites, he strengthens his mind, and finally taps into the vital life force. Once he knows how to use the "life force" to gain energy, Austin employs it against the parasites and obtains freedom.

Austin and Weissman are Outsiders. As Outsiders they depend heavily upon their mental and perceptual faculties. They want to dwell in "the land of the mind," for their intelligence and vision alienate them from the somnambulists who live around them. As Outsiders they perceive the phenomenal world as unreal: "Now, both Karel and I[Austin] agreed on one thing--no matter how dissimilar our temperaments might be in others--that our everyday lives had a quality of unreality" (p. 13). This sense of unreality causes them to experiment with their perception; they attempt to expand their knowledge of their consciousness: "We spent a great deal of time discussing problems of human consciousness, and so on" (p. 12).

To explore their minds, they conduct experiments similar to methods which Aldous Huxley and Wilson used to heighten their perception:

For a month or so, Karel Weissman and I tried to "experiment with consciousness." Over the Christmas holiday, we tried the experiment of staying awake for three days on black coffee and cigars. The result was certainly a remark able intensity of intellectual perception. I remember saying: "If I could live like this all the time, poetry would become worthless, because I can see so much farther than the poet." (p. 14)

Wilson, here, employs sight imagery to explain the poetic or mystical experience. Later, after they experiment with ether and carbon tetrachloride, Austin writes, "I certainly experienced some enormous feelings of insights" (p. 14). These insights foreshadow Austin's perceptual development. By showing that Austin and Weissman are Outsiders, interested in perception, Wilson hints at the direction in which their minds are moving. After Weissman's death, Austin undergoes several experiments which move him closer to a knowledge of the mind parasites. These "peak experiences" present Austin with glimpses of the "noumenal" world. Wilson uses sight images to explain these almost ineffable impressions. The first "peak experience" Austin recounts involves his decision to become an archaeologist. Wilson employs this example to illustrate that even at an early age Austin possesses exceptional concentration and perception:

I (Austin]had been reading a volume on the civilization of Ninevah by Layard, which I had picked up casually in the bedroom or a farm at which I was staying. Some of my clothes were drying on a line in the yard, and a burst of thunder made me hurry outside to get them in. Just inside the farmyard there was a large pool of gray water, rather muddy. As I was taking the clothes from the line, my mind still in Ninevah, I happened to notice the pool, and forgot, for a moment, where I was or what I was doing there. As I looked at it, the puddle lost all familiarity and became as alien as a sea on Mars. I stood staring at it, and the first drops of rain fell from the sky and wrinkled its surface. At that moment I experienced a sensation of happiness and of insight such as I had never known before. Ninevah and all history suddenly became as real and as alien as that pool. History became such a reality that I felt a kind of contempt for my own existence, stand in there with my arms full of clothes.(p. 18)

In this passage, Wilson describes a movement in which Austin feels godlike, excited by his glimpse into the "real" world. As he looks at the pool and feels the power of the storm, his mind turns to the book by Layard. For a moment, the excitement, generated by the storm, blends with his interest in the book. As this blending occurs, he feels elated, set free. As a romantic, he yearns to experience freedom and a sense of reality: "Now I have never tried to hide the powerful element or the romantic in my in my composition. I became an archaeologist through an almost mystical experience" (p. 18).

Austin, hoping to re-experience his initial sense of freedom, becomes an archaeologist. He does not know what instigates these "moments of freedom"; all he knows is that archaeology is somehow responsible. Wilson, in his "Post-script to the Outsider," recognizes that crisis and challenge initiate "peak experiences." Man, when things are going well, "tends to allow his grip on life to slacken."5 Austin experiences his first insight into reality accidentally, but this experience is enough to launch him on a lifetime preoccupation with perception and consciousness. Once he begins thinking deeply, concentrating upon methods to intensify his consciousness, Austin attracts the parasites. The parasites gather wherever men think clearly and deeply; they converge upon the thinking mind like sharks on a swimmer.

Austin's first impression of the parasites occurs on a night when he discusses the rise in the suicide rate with Dr. Reich and Dr. Darga. He feels their "cold eyes" watching him: "But as I listened to him, something happened to me. I felt a touch of coldness inside of me, as if I had suddenly become aware of some dangerous creature" (p. 21). Austin's awareness of the parasites creates a sense of challenge. Suddenly, he feels fear and defeat. He says to Reich, characterizing man as a sleepwalker, "after all, civilization is a kind of a dream. Supposing man suddenly woke up from that dream? Wouldn't it be enough to make him commit suicide?" (p. 21). The parasites inculcate these thoughts. Before Austin becomes aware of their insidious presence, he views life as absurd: "The idea that came to me was terrible. It was that the suicide rate was increasing because thousands of human beings were 'awakening,' like me to the absurdity of human life, and simply refused to go on" (p. 21). These thoughts, instilled by the parasites, seem paradoxical, for later Austin understands that men, who are "awake," do not commit suicide. Only men tormented by the parasites view life as absurd.

After the meeting breaks up, Austin progresses to another level of understanding. Still brooding about the meaninglessness of life, he decides to climb the stairs to the top of the wall:

"I admit that my mood was romantic, and that I experienced a need to intensify. So I stood there, hardly breathing, thinking of the dead sentries who stood where I now stood, and of the days when only the Assyrians lay on the other side of the mountains." (p. 30)

He uses history to stimulate another peak experience, but the mental activity attracts the parasites. Once the parasites appear, they quickly destroy Austin's mood: "All at once my thoughts took a gloomy turn. I felt totally insignificant, meaningless, standing there•••• suddenly it seemed that life was no more than a dream. For human beings, it never became a reality" (p. 30).

Austin plunges deeper into fear, and Wilson employs sight images to emphasize the insights he obtains:

"At this point, I looked at the moon again and was suddenly overwhelmed with an inexpressible fear. I felt like a sleepwalker who wakes up and finds himself balancing on a ledge a thousand feet above the ground•••• But I suddenly seemed to see that men manage to stay sane because they see the world from their own tiny, intensely personal viewpoints, from their worm's eye view. Things impress them or frighten them, but they still see them from behind this windshield of personality. Fear makes them feel less important, but it does not negate them completely; in a strange way, it has the opposite effect, for it intensifies their feeling of personal existence. ( p. 31)

By recognizing this "feeling of personal existence," Austin perceives that he is not insignificant. Instead, he feels that he possesses all the "knowledge of the ages" (p. 31). These thoughts astonish him, and he turns "his eyes" inside himself. At this point he discovers an important fact: he sees that the space inside his mind is as great as the external space which surrounds him: "Blake said that eternity opens from the center of the atom. My former terror vanished" (p. 32). When his terror subsides, Austin's thoughts develop rapidly, and he inadvertently stumbles upon another great insight. The irony here lies in the fact that the parasites induce his fear and this fear precipitates his insight. Wilson, in this passage, illustrates the parasites' symbolic purpose; they serve as an impetus to evolution. Wilson understands that man is a lazy creature, who needs a stimulus to grow and evolve. Austin, as he stares at the moon, would not have experienced an insight without the impetus of fear. Wilson ex presses this concept clearly in his novel The Black Room. In this novel Wilson presents the thesis that if man places himself in a dark room, devoid of external phenomena which affect his perception, he will force his mind to circumvent habit (one of the obstacles the parasites represent) and enter into a new dimension of consciousness. The black room, then, creates a crisis in the individual; it serves the same function as fear and danger, for it awakens the sleeping mind. As in The Mind Parasites, ordinary men can not survive the rigors of the black room. Only an Outsider possesses the insight to emerge from the room closer to the truth of consciousness. The black room, therefore, serves the same function as the mind parasites; it operates as an obstacle which enlivens, through crisis and challenge, the sleeping, habit-bound brain.

Austin, when he emerges from his "revelation," realizes its significance: "It was a movement. . . of overwhelming insight" (p. 32). Even though he feels strengthened and awake, he notices something dart across his consciousness as he strains to look deeper into himself: "But it seemed that, out of the corner of my eye--the eye of attention that was turned inward--I caught the movement of some alien creature" (p. 32). The mind parasites observe Austin's mental activities closely. From this point on they know he threatens them. The next morning when he awakens, he expresses an insight which marks the beginning of his campaign against the parasites: The everyday world demands our attention, and prevents us from "sinking into ourselves.

"As a Romantic, I have always resented this; I like to sink into myself. The problems and anxieties make it difficult. Well, now I had an anxiety that referred to something inside me, and it reminded me that my inner world was just as real and important as the world around me.(p. 32)

Austin, by seeing that something dwells in his consciousness, commences his evolution toward higher consciousness. As P. D. Ouspensky writes in his work The Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution,

to know oneself--this was the first principle and the first demand of old psychological schools...• We think that to know ourselves means to know our peculiarities, our desires, our hates, our capacities, our intentions, when in reality it means to know ourselves as machines, that is, to know the structure of one's machine, its parts, functions of different parts,the conditions governing their work, and so on.6

Like Ouspensky, Austin tries to understand his mind as machine. He attempts to fathom its structure, its hidden processes. By engaging his mind in a search for knowledge, he sets his personal evolution in motion.

One of the most important discoveries Austin makes on his voyage toward self-knowledge is Karel Weissman's notes entitled Historical Reflections. In this work Weissman proves the existence of the parasites and calls these creatures a plague threatening mankind.

As Austin reads Weissman's notes his mind opens to the truth he already suspects. The first sentence shocks him, but as he reads he understands what Weissman has found. Weissman's Historical Reflections seems a parody of Wilson's study of the Outsider and his bout with perception. Weissman states that the parasites appear shortly after the French Revolution. This fact parallels Wilson's conviction that the first Outsiders surfaced during the Romantic period. Weissman notices that until the eighteenth century most Europeans have the ability to renew themselves when depressed or bored. Even though human history before the eighteenth century contains many incidents of horror and terror, man finds a way "to throw it [depression] off as easily as a tired child can sleep off its fatigue" (p. 57). Man, at this time, according to Weissman, considers that he "is a god who will overcome every obstacle" (p. 57). Instead, towards the end of the century, the times drastically change, and "the tremendous, bubbling creativity of Mozart is counterbalanced by the nightmare cruelty of De Sade" (p. 57). Man enters a period of subjectivity and depression, for he is unable to throw off his fits of depression. In his work The Strength to Dream, Wilson discusses De Sade, Lovecraft, Greene, and others in an attempt to find the reason for their abject pessimism. In The Mind Parasites, he symbolically employs the parasites to explain the pessimism of the nineteenth and twentieth century. Austin asks why "the new man" has lost faith in life, lost faith in knowledge (p. 58). The answer, confirms Weissman's report, rests in the fact that the mind parasites, who suck the very essence of life from modern man, exist.

Weissman, like Austin, encounters the parasites when he experiments with perception. Initially, Weissman uses drugs, because he feels drugs reach down "to man's most atavistic levels, and release the automatic tensions that make him a slave to his own boredom and to the world around him" (p. 60). The parasites, however, sabotage Weissman's attempts to expand human consciousness. In an experiment he conducts, ten people experiment with drugs. Out of the ten, five commit suicide and two suffer mental breakdowns. Weissman does not know what has happened; he sees no reason for the suicides. Therefore, he undergoes the same experiment. At first he experiences the usual pleasant effect, but when he tries to gain a subjective view of his inner mind, his mood changes drastically:

I attempted to turn my attention inward, to observe the exact state of my mind, perceptions and emotions. The result was baffling. It was as if I were trying to look through a telescope, and someone was deliberately placing his hand over the other end of it. Every attempt at self-observation failed. And then, with a kind of violent effort, I tried to batter through this wall of darkness. And suddenly, I had the distinct feeling of something living and alien hurrying out of my sight. I am not, of course speaking of physical sight. This was entirely a "feeling." (p. 62)

This bout with the parasites unnerves Weissman, but he does not give up. Instead, he renews his effort in an attempt to pinpoint the exact nature of the creatures hiding in his consciousness. By using techniques he says he garners from Husserl's phenomenology, he starts afresh, slowly and methodically taking note of man's mental terrain. As he works, he senses "certain inner forces" resisting his investigation (p. 63).

These forces are the parasites, and Weissman engages them in battle. For two weeks he struggles, until he penetrates a region of consciousness which is new to him. He feels terror and defeat, but suddenly the battle turns and he wins a temporary victory. From his victory Weiss man gains an insight:

And then the realization came to me with such searing force that I felt as if I had been struck by lightning. Everything was clear; I knew everything. I knew why it was so important to them that no one should suspect their existence. Man possesses enough power to destroy them all. But so long as he is unaware of them they can feed on him, like vampires, sucking away his energies. (p. 64)

Weissman, after his victory, continues to investigate the parasites. He knows that once a man recognizes the problems he faces he can devise methods to overcome these problems. Therefore, his knowledge jeopardizes the parasites' existence. The parasites, awake to the threat, renew their attack against Weissman, insidiously using other people and external methods to destroy him. Weiss man, however, before his death, discovers the most essential fact about the parasites:

I have another theory, which is so absurd that I hardly dare to mention it, This is that the mind parasites are, without intending it, the instruments of some higher force. They may, of course, succeed in destroying any race that be comes their host. But if, by any chance, the race should become aware of the danger, the result is bound to be the exact opposite of what is intended. (p. 68)

The mind parasites, then, serve as a means to knowledge. Like man's fall from the Garden of Eden, the parasites denote a flaw in man's character, but in the long run a happy flaw. As man challenges the parasites, he invades new areas of the mind, stumbling upon exciting possibilities. Austin's role in the novel illustrates Wilson's belief that challenges to the human mind serve to develop and benefit the mind, for in his battle to destroy the parasites he becomes godlike.7

As Austin reads, he understands Weissman's notes immediately. Because he is an Outsider and a Romantic, Austin easily adopts the techniques of concentration which Weissman says is necessary to improve the mind:

The odd thing is that, by this time, it wasn't difficult. This exercise of concentrating upon one's own mind had an exhilarating effect. There were certain things that I began to under stand immediately. As an unabashed "romantic", I have always been subject to boredom. This boredom arises out of a kind of mistrust of the world ••• well, I now felt that my duty lay in ignoring the outside world. I knew what Karel meant: that it was vital for the parasites to keep us in ignorance of their existence. Merely to become aware of them was to gain a new feeling of strength and purpose. (p. 71)

From this initial insight gained through his study of Weiss- man's notes, Austin's internal vision begins to improve. He enters fully the "land of the mind."

After reviewing Weissman's ideas, Austin decides to enlist his friend, Dr. Reich. Reich, more scientific than Austin, immediately sees possibilities of which Austin is unaware. Reich introduces Jung's concept of the "racial unconscious" and Huxley's idea, stated in Heaven and Hell that the mind "stretches for infinity inside us" in an attempt to logically explain the parasites' existence (p. 39). The concepts Reich introduces play an important role in the novel, for they explain the powers and insights Austin gains as he looks into his own mind. Inside his mind he taps the unconscious of mankind and finds new truths. His ability to tap the vital life of mankind ultimately transforms him from Gilbert Austin, an Outsider, to Gilbert Austin, Superman, possessor of godlike perceptions.

One of the first changes which occur after Austin adopts Weissman's ideas and utilizes Husserl's phenomenological method to map his unconscious is his experiment with psychokinesis:

I can still remember the greatest experiment of those early days. I was sitting in the library at the A. I. U. at three o'clock one afternoon, reading a new paper on linguistic psychology, and speculating whether its author could be trusted with our secret•••• I started to make shorthand notes. At this moment a mosquito buzzed viciously past my ear with its high-pitched whine; a moment later it passed again. My mind still full of Heidegger, I glanced up at it, and wished that it would find its way to the window. As I did so, I had a distinct sense of my mind encountering the mosquito. It veered suddenly off its course and buzzed across the room to a closed window. My mind kept a firm grasp on it, and steered it across the room to the fan vent in the open window, and outside. (p. 88)

Austin's ability to generate psychic motion demonstrates a definite maturation of mental powers. Psychokinesis, how ever, marks only one step. Excitedly, Austin moves in another direction; he desires to map and correlate his new perceptions:

The business of mapping these mental realms was in a way more exciting and rewarding, for it brought a more exciting kind of control. My mind could now command prospects that were beyond anything I had dreamed of before. For example, I had always been bad at mathematics. Now, without the slightest effort, I grasped the theory of function, multidimensional geometry, quantum mechanics, game theory or group theory. (p. 93)

Although Austin's understanding and concentration improve rapidly and he sees with very little distortion, he still suffers depressions, inculcated by the parasites. Before he can progress to the highest level of perception, he must accept the fact that life is meaningful. Wilson, from his first novel, Ritual in the Dark to The Mind Parasites, creates characters who undergo a three-part development. Initially, the characters (the protagonists) exist as Outsiders, who perceive the world differently from most human beings. Next, after examining the world, watching the proceedings like spectators, the characters adopt a nihilistic attitude and suffer from spiritual dyspepsia. John A. Wiegel, in his critical work on Wilson, writes of Gerard Sorme, the protagonist of Ritual in Dark:

Gerard is one of Wilson's most sensitive Outsiders; and, as such he experiences "vastations" in which he doubts his own existence. He is also susceptible to fits of anger and deep depression. Once, when Gerard comes upon his upstairs neighbor who is quite naked, he is startled to discover an impulse to kill the old man. It is apparent that Gerard's threshold of indifference is low; and Wilson is obviously preparing for significant psycho philosophical perceptions.8

These perceptions come in the third phase of the Outsider's development. In this phase the protagonists see that if they judge life to be useless, they must be using some criteria. In other words, if a man knows something is meaningless, he must possess knowledge of what is meaningful in order to judge. Once the characters accept the fact that life contains meaning, they initiate search for that meaning. Hugh Greene, in Wilson's novel The Violent World of Hugh Greene, summarizes this idea: But as I sat in front of the bus, traveling back into town, it came to me that there was an element I had left out of my calculations. If all men are futile, why had I been given a perception of futility? If all men are equally diseased, how had I managed to recognize, if not from an intuitive idea of health? 9

Hugh considers that his concept of health springs from some "ultimate truth." Austin, like Hugh, during a period of crisis, also feels the existence of "ultimate truth." Hugh's impression of an unknown power directs him to assume that life has meaning; so, too, does Austin's glimpse into his unconscious. This glimpse into the unknown eventually enables Austin to defeat the parasites.

Austin's life and death struggle with the parasites occurs on a night when he sits in his room making notes. Suddenly, he "feels" the "shivery" presence of the parasites (p. 107). He understands, as he tries to deceive them by thinking about mathematics, that they are "watching" at a "deeper level of unconscious" than ever before. Finally, he falls asleep, and the parasites rush in and occupy his mind. To punish him, the parasites induce a feeling of nausea. This feeling parallels what Roquentin experiences in Sartre's novel Nausea. Under the malevolent influence of the parasites, Austin feels that life is meaningless:

Suddenly, abysses of emptiness were open beneath my feet. It did not even produce fear; that ''culd be too human a reaction. It was like contact with an icy reality that makes everything human seem a masquerade, that makes life itself seem a masquerade. It seemed to strike at the heart of my life, something I had thought untouchable. (p. 113)

At the moment of defeat, the parasites withdraw, and during this respite, Austin obtains an insight which fills him with strength. This insight parallels the "intuitive idea of health" Hugh receives: Now a thought came that helped to turn the tide. It was this: that since these creatures had deliberately induced this feeling of total meaninglessness, they must be in some way beyond it. As soon as this idea floated into mind, strength began to return. (p. 114)

Austin now sees that the absurdity of life is an illusion. Once he transcends his nihilistic world view and begins to perceive that "the mind ••• was a universe of its own," he grows rapidly; ultimately, contacting a force which he cannot identify. His contact with this force signifies his greatest change. Unable to name the force, he simply labels it as benevolent:

No doubt a religious man would have identified that force with God. For me, this was irrelevant. I only knew that suddenly that I might have an unexpected ally in this fight•••As soon as it started, it spread like an atomic explosion. I was almost more afraid of it than of the parasites. Yet I also knew that this power was being released from myself. It was not really some "third force", outside me and the parasites. It was some great passive benevolence that I had contacted, something that had no power of action in itself, but which had to be approached and used. (p. 116)

Once Austin taps the vital life force his change is complete. He has not overthrown the parasites completely, but this action is just a matter of time. His perception now improves rapidly, and he moves outside the realm of ordinary perception into the world of extraordinary in sights. Austin marks the existence of the first superman; he signifies the direction of man's possible evolution.
He explains what has occurred:

I should try to make this point quite clear. If man had not been an "evolutionary animal", the parasites would have found a permanent host. There never would have been the faintest chance of man discovering their existence••• But a small percentage of the human race--about a twentieth, to be precise--are evolutionary animals with a deep and powerful urge to become truly free. (p. 180)

Austin, with his genuine concern for freedom, obtains the ultimate in human perception. At the end he sees all, knows all. He metaphorically stands as an example of man's greatest potential. He represents the rope which stretches between "seeing" man and Superman. As Nietzsche writes, "man is a rope stretched between the animal and the Superman--a rope over an abyss. 10

1. Colin Wilson, Voyage to Beginning: An Intellectual Biography (New York: Crown Publishing Inc., 1969). In this work Wilson traces, by subjectively studying his motivations and the sources of his major ideas, his philosophical development.

2 Colin Wilson, Strange Powers (New York: Vintage Books, 1976), p. 13.

3 Colin Wilson, The Mind Parasites (Oakland, Calif.: Oneiric Press, 1967), p. 82. Subsequent references are to this edition, and hereafter page numbers will be included in parentheses in the text.

4 Wilson, Voyage to Beginning, pp. 320-23.

5 Colin Wilson, The Outsider (New York: Delta Book, 1956), p. 294.

6 P. D. Ouspensky, The Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution (New York: Vintage Books, 1973), p. 12.

7 Wilson, The Outsider, p. 294. Wilson defines his term St. Neot Margin: "It is the recognition that man's moments of freedom tend to come under crisis or challenge, and that when things are going well, he tends to allowhis grip on life to slacken."

8 John A. Wiegel, Colin Wilson (Boston: Twayne Publisher, 1975), p. 67.

9 Colin Wilson, The Violent World of Hugh Greene (Boston: Houghton M:lifflin Company, 1963), p. 217.

10 Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1961), p. 43.

Keith William Harvey
All Rights Reserved 2011

Reading Nathan Long's "Elfslayer

2011-08-18T09:38:00.001-07:00

"Elfslayer" opens in Felix Jaeger's father's Altdorf mansion. After twenty years, Felix and Gotrek have returned to their starting point chronicled in William King's short story, "Geheimnisnacht."

Jaeger's father has a mission for his errant son. The old man is being blackmailed by a Marienburg pirate named Hans Euler and he wants his son to retrieve the incriminating papers. Felix balks at the assignment but he finally agrees to help his father. Meanwhile, Gotrek is down in the dumps, literally, drinking himself into a torpor. As we know from the previous novel "Manslayer," Gotrek missed the evil invasion of Archaon and his chance to face a daemon.

Long quickly alerts us that this novel will be a return to old haunts and a reunion with missing friends, allies, and enemies. It is also a novel replete with Longian themes--drowning, shipwrecks, imprisonment, feckless women, jealousy, bravery, and deception.

Before Felix and Gotrek leave Altdorf, they are attacked by unknown assailants. We soon learn that an old enemy has decided to seek revenge. With the assault, Gotrek begins to awaken from his stupor and the action begins. The two travel to Marienburg pursued by assassins to meet Euler. Felix discovers another enemy in Euler and the plot, as they say, thickens. Before Felix can resolve the problem with Euler, old allies arrive. The wizard Max Schreiber, accompanied by a sorceress and an Elf, offer Gotrek the opportunity to face his glorious end. Felix is torn between serving his father or honoring his oath to Gotrek to be present at his death. He, of course, chooses to stand with Gotrek and they set set off on a quest to save the Empire with Schreiber.

The relic they seek is also being sought by Dark Elves. The action then turns to the sea. From this point, Long engages in what I can only call a melange of Jules Verne steampunk and Sabatini swordplay. He brilliantly describes an underwater city, the Black Ark of the Dark Elves, and the horrors of Dark Elf magic and ritual.

Long has concocted a nightmarish stew of villains and seamlessly presented them to us in a Sabatini-like thriller. He is one of the best writers at the Black Library and I challenge you to find a clunky sentence in the 412 pages of the novel. He ties up all of the plot threads nicely by the end but, of course, he leaves enough plot hanging that we anticipate and yearn for the next chapter of the novel.

Without giving too much away, Long convincingly presents dwarves, skaven, and dark elves. Additionally, never before have we seen a black ark described in such sinister detail.

As you might guess I highly recommend the novel. Not only is it an exciting book but I would postulate that it takes the Gotrek franchise in a new direction. Although Long is a student of William King he is refining King's themes and characters. This observation brings me to the explanation of my title for this review.

The figure in the carpet, as Henry James would say, in this novel is the seesaw. When Felix is up, Gotrek is down and when Gotrek is up, Felix is down, literally. The only time Gotrek is animated is when the likelihood of death and mayhem is near; Felix appreciates the tranquil moments, which in a Gotrek & Felix novel, are very brief indeed. However, Gotrek is the dark submerged animator of the series. It is his strength and resolve that drives the action. Long is aware of this and he consciously builds on it and structures the plot around the "humors" of the two characters in a clear and convincing way.

Finally, if you like this novel, I would suggest Gav Thorpe's "Malekith," Graham McNeill's "Guardian of Ulthuan," William King's "Trollslayer" and "Skavenslayer," and Long's Blackheart Trilogy.

I might also add, that the novels of Sabatini--"Captain Blood" in particular--might also interest you.

Review of Pat Kelleher's "The Ironclad Prophecy"

2011-08-17T11:59:00.000-07:00

In Issue 142 of Hub Magazine. http://www.hubfiction.com/2011/08/hub-142/

Reading Harry Sidebottom's "King of Kings"

2011-08-16T09:23:00.000-07:00

On February 10, 2011, I reviewed Harry Sidebottom's Fire in the East (Overlook 2008). The story takes place in A.D. 255 during the dual reign of Valerian and Gallienus and concerns a siege of a city on the Euphrates called Arete. Arete is based on a real city, Dura-Europos, which was besieged by the Sassanid-Persians in AD 256, and which has been the subject of a great deal of research and excavation.The novel begins with Marcus Clodius Ballista, a former war leader of the Angles and now the Dux Ripae, appointed to defend Arete from the Sassanid and traveling by trireme to the east. As Ballista journeys from city to city, Sidebottom introduces us to the Roman world, its subjects and its enemies. The novel ends with Ballista fleeing the city after Christians betray the occupying and besieged Romans.

King of Kings (Penguin Books 2010), the second book of the series, continues the narrative from Ballista's escape and his flight across the Syrian desert. The prologue of the novel demonstrates Sidebottom's ability to tell a rollicking tale. However, as we enter the action of the second novel it becomes apparent that Sidebottom is writing a series, similar to Bernard Cromwell's Sharpe series, not a trilogy As a result, my expectations as a reader diminished. Writing a series is a marathon; and, as a result, the reader must sit back, take a deep breath, and enjoy the ride. The ride will usually consist of a a long narrative arc and a shorter, internal arc to be resolved in each novel. And so it is with King of Kings. The grand narrative arc in Sidebottom's series, entitled Warrior of Rome, involves the life of Ballista and his familia as they struggle in the East during the dual reign of Valerian and his son Gallienus. This arc consists of a mixture of fact and fiction;Ballista and family being the fictional aspects interacting with the history of Rome. In regard to factional accuracy and historical verisimilitude, Sidebottom is superb. As I ask in my earlier review: Has there ever been a man better trained to write a historical novel about Rome in A.D. 255 than Harry Sidebottom? He is a Fellow of St. Benet's Hall and Lecturer in Ancient History at Lincoln College, Oxford, author of Ancient Warfare: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford 2004), and an avid student of historical novels.

The action of the second novel divides into three distinct stories with the overarching and nefarious dealings with the emperor Valerian and his aid, Macrianus, serving as the glue. First, Ballista is sent to relieve a siege on Circesium, only to be undermined by arrogant aristocrats who look down on the barbarian general. Second, returning to Antioch the Emperor sends Ballista to Ephesus to rid the city of the Christian atheists but Ballista finds persecuting Christians distasteful and fails. Third, in disgrace and demoted, Ballista accompanies the legions on an ill-fated battle against the Sassanids. Each section of the novel are well-researched and exciting.

In some ways, I found this novel better written than the first, although the three inter-connected stories detract from the continuity of the novel. In the first novel, shifting points-of-view disturbed me; and, although there are fewer abrupt breaks in this novel, the few sudden shifts of POV shatter the narrative spell. Nevertheless, Warrior of Rome is a strong series: well-researched and well-told. The fact that it is a series, however, creates certain logistical problems that distracts from the ultimate strength of the novel. But it is clear that Sidebottom wants to entertain and he accomplishes his goal.

Reading Richard Williams' "Imperial Glory"

2011-08-01T09:25:00.000-07:00

Richard Williams' Imperial Glory (Games Workshop Limited 2011)satisfies with its strong character development and slam-bang action sequences; however, the ride is rough and sometimes bumpy because of a disjointed plot structure that could have been easily remedied by focusing on a linear story-line at the beginning. An easy fix would have entailed either deleting late-development Ork-POV chapters or moving them to the beginning of the book. Nevertheless, because of the characters' roundness and depth and the thorough world-building, the plot flaws are soon forgotten or excused. Overall, Imperial Glory is a worthy entry into Black Library's Imperial Guard canon.

The novel chronicles the final battle of the last regiment of the Brimlock Dragoons and three of its members: Major Stanhope, a drug-addled survivor of his entire regiment's decimation, Lieutenant Carson, a swash-buckling duelist, and Private Blank, a man with no memory and no history. In addition, as with most Imperial Guard novels, there is a dozen secondary characters, comprised of the usual suspects: ambitious generals, cowardly officers, sergeants and medicaes. And, because this is a 40K novel, there are commissars, ogryns, Navy Pilots, orks, and cool equipment galore.

The structure of the novel seems to allude to Cy Enfield's brilliant military film Zulu(1964); Zulu chronicled the battle of Rorke's Drift (Ork's Rift), where the defense of the mission station of Rorke's Drift, under the command of Lieutenant John Chard of the Royal Engineers, immediately followed the British Army's defeat at the Battle of Isandlwana on 22 January 1879. The allusion is furthered through the description of the Voor populace, Afrikaner-like farmers, who have colonized the planet and established a feeble toe-hold. An Ork spacecraft crash lands in the jungle and new orks arise from the spores of the dead creating the exciting force.

The 11th Brimlock is sent in to destroy the orks and remain on the planet, because, once a planet has been infected by ork spores, the threat of contagion is forever present. The pacification proceeds apace but a wild card enters the fray late and complicates the end game. It is this late complication and a flashback to a year before that throws off the rhythm of the novel; however, Williams overcomes the structural stumble and powerfully concludes the novel.

Williams is a strong writer who focuses on character but who also writes thrilling action sequences. His description of the rise of the orks from the crash of their spacecraft and the Imperial Guard's effort to squelch it is evocative and convincing.

For further reviews of Richard Williams' work see my review of his Reiksguard here: http://redrookreview.blogspot.com/2010/01/reiksguard-by-richard-williams.html

Reading Darius Hinks' "Warrior Priest"

2011-07-25T09:30:00.000-07:00

Darius Hinks' Warrior Priest (Black Library 2010) is a well-written, well-paced novel set in the northern reaches of the Empire of the Old World. The Empire is once again under attack. This time a Chaos champion named Mormius leads a horde of chaos warriors south against the Imperial army generalled by the Iron Duke, Fabian Wolff. Fabian is the brother of Jakob, the eponymous Warrior priest, and their story and conflict provides the internal struggle and conflict of the novel, while the war supports the external conflict. This neat geometric pairing (brother against brother, chaos against order, North verses South, sanity verses insanity) is repeated throughout the novel, creating a well-balanced narrative, dependent on several point-of-view characters, juxtaposed against their polar opposites.

The narrative begins with Mormius, a beautiful and cruel Chaos champion gathering his troops for another attack. Mormius is on a collision course with the Iron Duke. The story then shifts to a small village where a fanatic witch hunter is about to burn a sister of Shallya at the stake. Enter the Warrior Priest, Jakob Wolff, not to save the sister but to avenge himself on the witch hunter, Otto Sürman. Sürman and his conflict with the Wolff brothers acts as the exciting force that propels the narrative.

Hinks competently uses multiple points of view and flashbacks to tell an intimate tale of the Old World that touches on most of the emblematic themes and symbols (fluff)of the Gothic series. He expertly handles both battles and intimate encounters, while creating well-rounded, full bodied characters. Although Jakob Wolff represents order, Hinks seems to have a real understanding (or sympathy) of Chaos. His descriptions of daemons, demons, and marauders are vibrant and memorable; whereas his descriptions of some of the more egregious fanatics of the Empire border on either contempt or ridicule. As an aside, it is this balance between chaos and order and the richness of the intellectual property that makes the Black Library novels so satisfying.

Warrior Priest is a worthy entry in the Empire Army series; an outstanding first outing from Darius Hinks.

Reading Fred Vargas' "The Chalk Circle Man"

2011-07-05T13:25:00.000-07:00

The first line of Fred Vargas' The Chalk Circle Man (Penguin 1996)presents us with a shock and ultimately a lie. Mathilde Forestier is writing in her diary about a handsome man standing too close to her at a bar. To her, he is a stranger or is he? So begins a novel--a Le Rompol-- a French police procedural, featuring Commissaire Adamsberg, one of the stranger literary detectives in a genre populated by bizarre detectives. Adamsberg intuits rather than deduces; he is no Sherlock Holmes. Feelings predominate, which causes consternation among his fellow police officers.

The novel moves beyond Mathilde Forestier's meeting with the man in the bar to Adamsberg's appointment as Commissaire of the 5th arrondissement in Paris and his investigation of the death of a textile merchant, murdered in his own warehouse. While other officers use scientific methods, Adamsberg sits and doodles on a pad or the wall, whatever is convenient, and allows the impressions of the case to flow over him. If someone asks him what he thinks, he cannot respond, because he doesn't know; instead, he expresses what he feels and, in this case, he feels that someone harbors a very personal grudge against the deceased. So while the other policemen interview disgruntled clients, Adamsberg keeps an eye on the dead man's stepson, "Patrice Vernoux, a fine-featured, romantic looking young man of twenty-three." He watches the young man until he knows and then he assigns his favorite officer Adrien Danglard, "a man who dressed impeccably in order to compensate for his unprepossessing looks and pear-shaped figure" to bring the young man in and question him. Danglard is logical and does not see a connection between the young man and the murderer; besides, the young man has an alibi, his fiance vouches for his whereabouts. But, of course, this mystery is just the appetizer, a more bizarre tale awaits us. This murder simply introduces Adamsberg and his team.

For four months prior to the resolution of the warehouse murder, Adamsberg has been following newspaper reports of chalk circles appearing throughout Paris. Each circle contains an item of some sort and the populace has become obsessed with their semiotic significance. Adamsberg believes the circles mean one thing--trouble-- and he begins to think about them, trying to anticipate their pattern. Soon he is proven right again when a female corpse, almost beheaded, is found in a chalk circle. Now the game is afoot and Adamsberg works quickly before the next body appears.

Vargas' novel is claustrophobic, dreamlike, and romantic. As Jeanne Guyon writes: Fred Vargas a inventé un genre romanesque qui n’appartient qu’à elle : le Rompol. Objet essentiellement poétique, il n’est pas noir mais nocturne, c’est-à-dire qu’il plonge le lecteur dans le monde onirique de ces nuits d’enfance où l’on joue à se faire peur, mais de façon ô combien grave et sérieuse, car le pouvoir donné à l’imaginaire libéré est total. C’est cette liberté de ton, cette capacité à retrouver la grâce fragile de nos émotions primordiales, cette alchimie verbale qui secoue la pesanteur du réel, qui sont la marque d’une romancière à la voix unique dans le polar d’aujourd’hui. Les personnages qui peuplent ses livres sont aussi anarchistes et lunaires que savants. Qu’ils soient férus d’Antiquité ou océanographes, le regard qu’ils posent sur le monde combat le conformisme et l’ordre établi avec pour arme la fantaisie et l’humour. To quickly paraphrase Guyon, Vargas' novel plunges the reader into a dreamworld, a world where children like to go (imagine) in order to scare themselves but also a world that is sober and serious.

The Chalk Circle Man surprised me. Several times I thought I had figured the mystery out and then was proven wrong, even though Vargas dropped the clues early. All in all a very satisfying novel with a very unique and appealing detective. But as I said above, it is claustrophobic, closed-in on itself, unrealistic in the sense that no police officer would work as Adamsberg does, but, of course, that is not the point. Ultimately, Vargas wants to talk about character not procedure. Hers is a novel of mood and dream, desire and romance.

"The Train"

2011-06-28T12:05:00.001-07:00

A La Ciudad story, "The Train," appears in Issue 141 of @Hub Magazine.

Reading Tim Akers' "The Heart of Veridon"

2011-06-27T09:08:00.000-07:00

Tim Akers' The Heart of Veridon ( Solaris 2009) is a mix of fantasy, noir, science fiction, and punk; a novel situated in a strange and unique world, told in the first person, by a cog-works creature named Jacob Burn, whose claim to fame initially is that he has crashed in not one but two zepliners and lived to tell the tale. Burn, an ex-pilot, a graduate of the Academy, works as an enforcer for a shady crime syndicate and is personally managed by a beautiful hooker named Emily, who may or not be a double agent. The novel begins en medias res; a zepliner is in flames and falls into the Reine, a river of some importance, inhabited by unique creatures, the Fehn. The Fehn, although not fully described, are important to the plot, because they, along with the anansi, are indigenous to the world and provide the novel with some of its internal weirdness, especially when juxtaposed against the humans, who seem to be relatively newcomers to the world.

These comparisons and conclusions are not clear because we learn of things through conversation. Uncertainty, however, is not detrimental to the novel's plot or success; instead, I would argue it is one of the novel's strengths: Akers builds his universe slowly, parceling out details of his weird world incrementally, along with the development of the plot. His stylistic choice works because it is consistent with its noir antecedents. The plot takes its energy and impetus from the novels of Hammett and Chandler and first person point-of-view. The result is that these choices create both tension and expectation. Imagine, a half-man, half machine Marlowe in a weird, fantastic world conducting one of his convoluted investigations. And, consistent with noir, further imagine our (somewhat unreliable) narrator wise-cracking and skylarking his way through a brutal and dangerous plot that involves a conflict between two religions and a marauding cogs-work angel. It is this religious struggle that provides the plot's internal complexity and intimates a rich, created world, not yet fully disclosed and the existence of some more serious themes that are not immediately apparent.

First, like Matthew Hughes's The Damned Busters(Angry Robot Books 2011) that I reviewed a couple of weeks ago, The Heart of Veridon foregrounds religion. In Akers' novel, two religions, diametrically opposed to each other, vie for control of the city. Within the conflict, technology plays a major role, transforming men into machines. Second, Jacob Burn is an outcast from his class and his family; a member of the aristocracy who works with the criminal element of the city. A father/son conflict is obvious, which adds a further complexity to the novel. Third, there is a game-like quality to the novel. Like a game, part of the pleasure of the plot arises from the ability to explore, to discover new and unique wonders. One of the major plot devices is the discovery of a map, which illuminates another sector of the unknown world and promises further discoveries, new creatures, and more weirdness. Fourth, like most new weird, the city, its structure and its politics function as theme. Veridon is not only socially nuanced and class-burdened, it is virtually multi-layered. Throughout the story we travel from the sewers to the Tower, meeting different types of citizens and creatures. The polis theme complements the game-theme and situates the novel squarely within the sub-genre of new weird.

Heart of Veridon is a controlled work: consistent in theme, voice, and tone. Akers does not overreach himself; he holds back, saving more surprises for further books. Nevertheless, this novel stands on its own. All and all it is a very entertaining read.

Reading Nathan Long's "Bloodborn" and "Bloodforged"

2011-06-15T13:53:00.000-07:00

Ulrika Magdova, a young Kislevite noble woman, first appeared in William King’s Daemonslayer (Games Workshop 2003), and should be familiar to all readers of the Gotrek and Felix novels. Alive, she is brave, beautiful, and maddening, especially for Felix. In death, she is still brave and beautiful but now also ruthless and deadly.

Nathan Long, creator of the Black Hearts trilogy, sets the first novel of this new Vampire series for Black Library a few weeks after the action of William King’s Vampireslayer (Games Workshop 2004). Ulrika’s abductor, Adolphus Krieger, dies at the hands of Snorri Nosebiter, and Ulrika, a fledgling vampire, tormented by an insatiable hunger and under the control of Gabriella, her mistress (figurative mother), is deserted by her friends. Gotrek and Felix, knowing they cannot help her, leave, as she struggles to come to grips with her destiny.

Bloodborn (Games Workshop 2010) and Bloodforged (Games Workshop 2011)are the first two volumes of a Bildungsroman, or a coming-of-age novel. But this theme is just one aspect of the multi-layered plot. Long has shown himself to be adept at genre fiction and has melded several forms into this novel to great success. On one level it is a vampire story but on another it is the story of a young woman deserted by her friends, who must learn how to live in an alien culture and environment. On another, it is a truly suspenseful detective story accompanied by horror tropes.

In keeping with the idea of the Bildungsroman in Bloodborn, Ulrika is reborn both literally and figuratively. And as a newborn (born of blood), she is, in every sense of the word, a child. At times she is petulant, demanding, selfish, reckless, and stubborn; and, throughout, her mistress, Gabriella, like a stern mother, has to rein her in and instruct her to focus and be disciplined and sensible. In that regard, Long accomplishes the near impossible; he creates an action novel, a swashbuckler, that both demonstrates a feminine voice and churns out a healthy dose of mayhem and action, while clearly delineating the birthing pains of a newborn vampire.

Irrespective of its vampire setting or the fact it operates as a Bildungsroman, the novel ultimately succeeds as a mystery set in a horrific Gothic environment, where sword and sorcery rule the day. Ulrika and Gabriella are sent to the city of Nuln to investigate the very public and brutal murders of several vampires. The exposure of vampires in the midst of the city sets off panic in the streets and Long minutely describes the city and its inhabitants’ fears as well as their brutalities as days pass and the number of corpses increases. He also describes the social castes of the city and the various organizations that run it as well as the empire. Witch hunters follow the vampires and ghouls spring from the cemeteries. Long even sends his characters into the famous sewers of Nuln, the home of the skaven, to ferret out clues.

In Bloodforged, Long moves the action from Nuln to Praag, Ulrika's starting point. Like a petulant teenager now, she rebels against her Lahmian mother, Gabriella, and heads north, vowing to use her supra-human strength to fight the creatures of the Ruinous Powers. Her goal is to be a Vampire avenger, protecting the weaker humans, who she feels a closer affinity to than the vampires that now control and protect her. When she strikes out for home, she is seeking freedom, family, and friendship.

At the beginning of the novel, Mr. Long brilliantly captures the anger and frustration of a young vampire (teenager), showing her virtually tearing apart her safe home in Nuln in a youthful rage and fleeing her sisters for her human home in Praag. Once there she makes contact with Snorri Nosebiter and discovers that Gotrek and Felix have disappeared. She also tracks down Max Schreiber, an ex-lover, only to discover that he is has taken another lover. This discovery results in unnatural paroxysm of jealousy, which demonstrates Ulrika's immaturity. "Quivers of rage made Ulrika's arms shake, and her claws dug deep into the bark of her branch. A growl started low in throat and she crouched forward like a hunting cat. How dare he take another lover!" (Bloodborn p.111)

Without friends and family, Ulrika, now truly alone, takes up residence in an abandoned and ruined bakery; however, because of her self-imposed rule--she can only feed on villains--she finds herself hungry most of the time. When she sees some abusive men, running a protections racket, rob a poor blind singer she quickly acts to avenge the wrong. However, in a scene, somewhat reminiscent of Aragorn's meeting with the Hobbits in The Fellowship of the Ring, she is seen by another vampire, a handsome and dashing male. This moment--this discovery by a male--acts as the exciting point of the story's main plot lines: the life and death struggle between the van Carstein vampires and the Lahmians, Ulrika's inability to tell friend from foe, Ulrika's acceptance that she is a vampire and no longer human, and Ulrika's sexual awakening.

Both Bloodborn and Bloodforged are exciting reads: well-plotted, with fully-developed characters. Mr. Long carefully charts out and illustrates a definite movement in Ulrika's character; she matures (very, very slowly) from a child-like creature in the first novel to a figurative teenager in the second. However, the novels stay true to their roots: they are rollicking adventure tales that roll along a fair clip like the Saturday morning serials I watched at the theaters when I was a kid, never really pausing to examine the psychological manifestations that occur simultaneously with the full-throttle action of their full-bodied (and charismatic) protagonist. This is because Mr. Long has demonstrated over and over again that he is the master of what he calls sabrepunk; that is, an adventure tale similar to those written by Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, Alexander Dumas, and Raphael Sabatini. To quote Mr. Long's own definition: "Sabrepunk is swashbuckling, street-wise sword and sorcery that draws from low fantasy, hard-boiled pulp, cloak-and-dagger thrillers, and old-fashioned romantic adventure. It is visceral and immediate. It is crude and sly. It is red and black and break-neck. The doings of sorcerers and kings may spark the action, but rarely are they the story themselves. Instead, the tales are of hard men and dangerous women whose lives are mauled by the whims of the powerful, and who must therefore draw swords and fight in order to survive. There are heroes here, but no saints."

Finally, I want to comment on the vampire as meme, which ultimately complicates Mr. Long's job. A vampire by definition is an evil predator that feeds on human beings. Once a writer decides to make one of these beings his/her protagonist, he/she must twist the genre into a virtual pretzel of contra-factual implausibilities. Mr. Long has come up with a nifty solution: Ulrika doesn't really identify with her "family"; she does not yet realize (she knows it but doesn't quite believe it) she is dead. He then uses this devise to form the main psychological thread of his Bildungsroman, which adds depth and weight to this genre fiction.

Reading Matthew Hughes' "The Damned Busters"

2011-05-31T12:28:00.000-07:00

Matthew Hughes has accomplished something unique: he has written a novel, without illustrations, that conveys the tone and feel of comics published during their Golden Age. The Golden Age of Comics lasted from the late 1930s until the early 1950s; and, it was during this period that some of its most iconic characters appeared: Superman, Batman, Captain America, Flash, Wonder Woman, and Captain Marvel. These comics were written for children(although many adults, especially men in the service, read them); they possessed a simplicity and naivety that modern comics no longer contain. However, in some marvelous way, Hughes has captured that earlier tone and transferred it to a novel that on a very fundamental level operates as a re-telling of the Faust myth. To accomplish this almost alchemical transformation--comic feel into novel form, he employs images and icons from the Jazz Age, the Golden Age of Comics, Milton and the Bible.

The novel unfolds from the third-person limited view of Chesney Arnstruther, a border-line autistic actuary, who accidentally conjures up a demon while constructing a five-sided poker table. The demon appears when Chesney bangs his finger, producing blood, and blathers in his made-up gobbledegook swear words an oath that summons it. When he attempts to dismiss the demon with protestations of a simple mistake made, the demon doesn't take no for an answer; instead, he does what any good bureaucrat does, he calls in his supervisor. The second one had "the head of a weasel that had been refitted to sport a pair of canine fangs of sabertooth caliber, and coal-black eyes the size of saucers"(p. 14). Xaphan, who has not appeared on earth since the 20s, comes on like Edward G. Robinson's Little Caesar: he wears "a pin-striped suit with wide lapels and a ridiculously small tie," "two-toned shoes of patent leather with the insteps covered by pieces of strapped-on cloth--spats." Xaphan quickly informs Chester that "they" do not make mistakes and starts bargaining with him, offering his services. But Chester is not tempted by the demon's gifts of wealth and power; he simply wishes to be left alone to play cards, read his beloved comics, and do math. However, Chesney's refusal of Satan's temptations causes a rift in Heaven and Hell, which ultimately discomfits the entire world, and becomes the exciting force of the novel. To right the world, Chesney must "bow down" to Satan. With a minister mediator's help, the parties might find a solution--Chesney wants to be a crime fighter like the heroes in his comics.

With just a cursory summary of the plot it becomes obvious that lurking in the humor and silliness of the situation is a serious story that relies not only on comics for its themes and structure but also narrative devices that borrow freely from philosophy, law, expressionist art, pulp fiction, theology, and psychology. For instance, many of the conflicts are resolved by lawyers, both secular and religious. When Chesney needs help his mother calls on the services of Reverend Hardacre--a lawyer and a minister. When a strike ensues in Hell, Hardacre mediates between the union faction--Infernal Brotherhood of Fiends, Demons and Tempters (the IBFDT), Satan and heaven's representative. When Chesney needs information on criminal activity he turns to his actuarial tables, computer, and the bell curve. When a character wonders what is the purpose of life, another quotes an English translation of Gauguin's epigram from his masterpiece asking the same question: D'où Venons Nous / Que Sommes Nous / Où Allons Nous (Where do we come from, where are we going, where are we).

The Damned Busters feels like a comic of the Golden Age. Because of its allusions to and reliance on themes of pulp fiction and comics of that age it reminds me of both Chester Gould's Dick Tracy and Al Capp's pastiche Fearless Fosdick. There may be even conscious nods to Gould through Hughes use of quirky names, including the obvious use of the name "Chesney" for the protagonist and "Blowdell" ( maybe Ernst Stavro Blofeld from three of Fleming's 007 novels) for the antagonist, but also in the physical description of the characters; Xaphan described above and the wormed-nosed Melech are primary examples. But even though the tone captures an earlier time and genre, the novel itself is post-modern, utilizing various narrative devices to tell the story, even turning meta-fictional at the end by commenting on itself as a book: the demons have heard a rumor that life is simply a book written by some other entity and that they, as characters, are not trapped within their fates but can through their free will change their destiny.

In conclusion, The Damned Busters is a very clever book (and fast read), exactly the type of work that Angry Robot Books is noted for: it is a smooth melange of genres--comic, noir, humor, fantasy, and metaphysical; ultimately entertaining and damned smart.

As a postscript, be on the watch for a passel of allusions and unresolved plot threads which beg the question--what happens next?

Reading China Tom Miéville's "Embassytown"

2011-05-26T11:46:00.000-07:00

Most writers carry around an ur-novel in their head; it's the one they play just before they fall asleep. Smart writers don't write the ur-novel first; instead, they let the ideas percolate for years and write it when they've matured. Miéville has said in various interviews that the idea of Embassytown has been with him since he was eleven and in some ways his youthful imagining is obvious in the construction of the novel. However, it's not really a child's book, although it starts with scenes from Avice's childhood, but a phantasmagoria of geo-political themes and images. And it is a violent book; a book about empire, colonization, exploitation, and rebellion. It is also a book about language and sexual politics, grounded in a science fiction construct. Nevertheless, it is not a space opera; instead, it seems more like the metaphysical romances of the sixties, when politics, rebellion, race and drugs were major themes; books like Delaney's Babel-17 or, on the other hand, a book of philosophical space romance like David Lindsay's Voyage to Arcturus or the cultural anthropological space sagas of Ursula K. LeGuin. Mostly, however, the book reminded me of Conrad's Heart of Darkness or Nostromo and the American romances of race and conquest, like Melville's Moby Dick or Cooper's Leather-stocking Tales. And like these novels the theme of good and evil played out in an innocent natural paradise is evident.

Additionally, the novel is replete with word play but I will deal with only a few examples. The novel begins with Avice, the protagonist and narrator, on the planet Arieka, in a colony established by Bremen, on the edge of the immer. From its beginning the novel draws our attention to language and perception. Miéville sprinkles German and French words through the text and uses names to convey larger associations. In our history, Bremen, a free imperial city on the Baltic, was a member of the Hanseatic League; an economic alliance of trading cities and merchant guilds that dominated trade along the coast of Northern Europe during the Late Middle Ages. By choosing Bremen, as the name of his colonial power, Miéville alerts us through allusion that he is dealing with a burgeoning imperial entity that views trade, exploitation, and expansion as its major goals. Avice's complete name is Avice Benda Cho. From her name, we see that she is multi-racial. There is also a possible allusion to the French political writer Julien Benda (La Trahison des Clercs). Additionally, the name of Avice is from the Germanic name Aveza, which was derived from the element avi, possibly meaning "desired". It was introduced to England by the Normans, and it became moderately common during the Middle Ages, at which time it was associated with Latin avis "bird". In regard to the word "immer," which means "always" in German, Miéville juxtaposes "manchmal," meaning sometimes. Avice, in her telling of the story, goes back and forth in time, heading chapters "Latter-day" and "Formerly." And he makes reference to Saussure's langue and parole, when discussing the language of the Ariekei and the Ambassadors.

The conflict of the novel arises from a failure of language. The Ariekei, called Hosts, and their human guests(or parasites)cannot communicate directly because the Hosts are polyvocal exots. They have two mouths. Overtime, the humans develop cloned doppels, Ambassadors, to communicate with the Hosts. Scile, Avice's husband explains the problem: "Their language is organized noise, like all of ours, but for them each word is a funnel. Where to us each word means something, to the Hosts, each is an opening." (p.55) Because of the nature of their language they cannot lie or write when the humans arrive but overtime and through interaction between the races change occurs; change that Scile chooses to see as a "fall" from innocence. Human language becomes a drug that intoxicates and almost destroys both the Hosts and the humans; leading finally to murder and mayhem.

Ultimately, the novel is about communication. Arieka at the far reaches of space is almost inaccessible. Only an ability to traverse the immer, a sort of deep structure of space allows humans access. The immer is to be understood in terms of language. "The immer's reaches don't correspond at all to the dimensions of the manchmal, this space where we live. The best we can do is say that the immer underlies or overlies, is a foundation, is langue of which our actuality is a parole, and so on." (p.31) And at the end of this space is a city, lodged within a hostile climate, where only the bio-rigged technology of the Hosts allows the humans to live. It is the city, lodged like a cyst, containing a parasite in the Host, that situates itself within the imagination of the reader. This strange city disorients us through the almost hallucinatory images of the insect-like Hosts and flora and fauna of the planet that share their DNA. When EzRa speaks, drugging the Hosts, even the walls of the city respond to their voice.

Embassytown is a hard novel to describe. It is about colonization and exploitation, about freedom, and dialectical movement. The Host change but so, too, do the humans.

Kafka Letters and Postcards Auctioned in Berlin

2011-05-10T13:49:00.000-07:00

Below is the text of a letter I received from a close friend in Germany, Dr. Detlef Meyer-Ohlert. As a devoted reader of Kafka, I found it interesting.

Dear Keith:

Some time ago you had told me that you are reading Kafka. If my memory is correct I had responded to it and reported which books I had read and which are part of my library.

So I thought that some news may interest you about Kafka’s unpublished works. Since many years one can notice the excitement about his estate particularly with respect to the original drafts, manuscripts and letters although Kafka had determined in his will that all this material should be burned up after his death. But the heirs or curators didn’t follow his instructions as you probably know.

Recently 45 letters and 66 postcards, which Kafka had written to his sister Ottla between 1909 and 1924, were presented in an auction in Berlin. The lowest bid was determined at $ 500.000. But the German Archive for Literature in Marburg was unable to pay this amount. It was therefore most probable that a private collector would make the buy as happened with the letters of Kafka to Felice Bauer 25 years ago. But in this case two public archives prevented this. The German Archive for Literature and the Bodleian Library of Oxford cooperated and they bought the letters jointly. This deal was sponsored in Germany with money of the Federal Government, the State Baden-Württemberg and private donators, in Britain solely by private donators. The letters to Ottla are stored in Marburg but the Oxford Library has access to it at any time. The final price is unknown. Two thirds of
Kafka’s estate, of which the manuscripts of the “Schloss”, “Verwandlung”, and “Urteil” are owned by the Bodleian Library, the “Process”, “Letter to the Father” and the letters to Kafka’s love Milena Jesenská are owned by the German Archive. It is estimated that these two institutions are administering four fifth of Kafka’s autographs.

Attached is a facsimile of a postcard which Kafka wrote to Ottla from Riva del Garda. I cannot identify the date but it is certainly one prior to World War I, because the card carries an Austrian stamp. Kafka reports that he had visited Malesine (Italian territory) a few miles south of Riva where Johann Wolfgang von Goethe had his affair and tells his sister that she would know about it if she had read Goethe’s “Italian Journey” and recommends that she should do it. He continues that the Castellan in Malesine had shown him the place where Goethe had worked on a drawing but that this place doesn’t correspond with (Goethe’s ?) diary, and that he (Kafka) had also difficulties to understand the Italian of the Castellan. I’m also attaching a picture of Kafka and his sister in their home quarter in Prague. DMO 05.09.2011

Dan Abnett's "Embedded"

2011-05-02T13:10:00.000-07:00

Embedded is Dan Abnett's second book for Angry Robot Books (hereinafter referred to as ARB). ARB has stated from the outset that it is their mission to publish cross-genre texts and I posit that Embedded fits that mandate. Additionally, without blatantly stating it, some of the ARB's authors are actually resorting to the original purpose and impetus that made science fiction a genre of ideas--social commentary. Irrespective of its underlying motives, Embedded fits squarely within the science fiction tradition of ideas and is similar to Isaac Asimov's novel Fantastic Voyage and George Orwell's 1984. And, hopefully, without undermining its attraction as a rollicking good novel (because it is a fun read),Embedded cleverly and, I would also say, subtly, combines several genre elements to make a comment on rampant capitalism while employing certain popular trends or memes. More particularly, Embedded is a zombie novel disguised as a military thriller that (1) comments on current geo-political trends, (2)critiques what I will refer to as zombie capitalism, and (3) continues a trend in Abnett's work toward a more intimate science fiction (I will explain this by resorting to his Black Library novel Blood Pact).

Lex Falk, a reporter, is the protagonist of Embedded. The novel begins with his arrival on a colony planet, designated Eighty-Six. The name Eighty-Six is an implied joke. In restaurant terminology, eighty-six means take an item off the menu. In the eighties, the term entered the general populace and came to mean "to throw something away." Initially, Planet Eighty-Six was a throw-away but something secret changes that; suddenly the major powers, as well as several oligarchic corporations, are vying for the planet's assets. Falk thinks there is a story to be had on Planet Eighty-Six but everyone he meets deflects him and feeds him pablum.

Abnett has the ability to create unique worlds with a scratch of his pen; through the suggestion of a few creatures--bugs the size of birds--and a climate that is too hot and too humid, he creates a unique environment. Other writers would have spent hundreds of pages developing the situs; Abnett writes--a bug the size of a bird flutters around my light, great forests cover the hills and
vast supplies of minerals lie beneath the vegetation--and we're there. And he populates his planet with settlers who come from known space, controlled by two or three of the Geo-political powers (the Bloc, as in Eastern Bloc, who speak Russian, the United Status that speak English, and the oligarchic corporation, GEO), corporate agents, and soldiers and spies.

Soon after he arrives on the planet, Falk realizes there is a shooting war going on and he looks for a way in, a way around the bureaucracy that is designed to obfuscate the truth and deflect reporters like him. The way in is to be embedded within the brain of a soldier, a soldier who is paid to carry another consciousness in his mind into battle without his superiors knowing it. Here we are in Asimov country; an intimate space: a mind within a mind. And we are also in a military science fiction space, a space that Abnett has made his own through his Gaunt's Ghost series. But it also a new space, a more compact space in which to move his characters. I first noticed a change in Abnett's canvas in the short story "Iron Star" and the novel Blood Pact. The writing seemed more focused to me, with a greater concentration on character, and a tightening of space (canvas). Of course, it contains all the usual suspects; however, it is smaller in scope and scale. Blood Pact begins two years after the horrendous battles on Jago. The Ghosts are on Balhaut, an important location for Gaunt. This is where it all began, where things went bad for Gaunt. In fact, the people of Balhaut celebrate the bravery of the "dead" hero Gaunt. So, in effect, Gaunt is a ghost of sorts. Abnett is telling us that before Blood Pact Gaunt was a ghost, lost in the campaigns and blind to his greater role. Now, things are changing; Gaunt can see again; and, as is usually the case, in this most literary of tropes, Gaunt can see what other men cannot. He has a second sight. He sees the future and he sees into others. The action takes place in a small space and covers a short period of time. Embedded, like Blood Pact, is also tightly plotted and set within a compact space but unlike the Gaunt novel, Embedded utilizes a single point of view (sometimes we see through Nestor's point of view but it is really Falk/Nestor and I would argue the same point of view). This more disciplined approach narrows the scene, focuses the story, and provides an even more unified narrative. And in support of this focused narrative, the novel consists of a few long scenes transpiring over a short period of time. Long scenes transpiring over a short period of time make for a richer text and reading experience.

But don't become confused. Because, ultimately, Embedded is a clever zombie novel, rip-roaring military science fiction, and caustic speculative fiction. At its most basic level, Falk's inhabiting the body of Nestor Bloom is a mind manipulating a dead body. Abnett writes "He walked like a zombie, like some lumbering, spavined thing that retained only the most rudimentary brain-stem connection between impulse and action." (177) And on the other hand, Planet Eighty-Six is a world being devoured by a combination of military and corporate greed, or, in other words, zombie capitalism, arising from the joint efforts of military plus corporation. Abnett's future looks very much like the present. However, Hegel's Geist has compacted the earthly states into Geo-political blocks. Orwell predicted that three intercontinental states would emerge in the future: Oceania, Eastasia, and Eurasia. Abnett seems to follow Orwell's lead and extrapolate the continuation of the space race onto other planets through the machinations of several large inter-continental blocks. In his universe,however, there is an added ingredient, oligarchic corporations, equal to states, work hand-in-glove with the inter-continental states to form a type of virtual fascism, which relies on aggressive exploitation of minerals and labor. Freedom does not seem to have made much progress and mind control is possible through patches, i.e. software and medication, provided to the populace by corporations, who even copyright words (Orwell).

Embedded is a fun novel; more science fiction than military science fiction. It is also a jaundiced vision of the future where Western civilization, through its military/corporate institutions, continues to grow, manipulate, and expand.

Review of "The Empathy Effect"

2011-04-19T09:15:00.001-07:00

Hub Magazine, Issue 137, contains my review of The Empathy Effect by Bob Lock.

Elif Batuman's "The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People who Read Them"

2011-04-07T10:19:00.000-07:00

The impetus for writing springs from reading. Reading and writing are part of the same process. Robert D. Richardson in First We Read Then We Write quotes Emerson:"There is then the creative reading as well as creative writing.Emerson's method of archaeology devolves from first choosing the word and then constructing the sentence. In choosing the word, 'a writer needs to get in as close as possible to the thing itself.' Emerson insisted that 'words do not exist as things themselves, but stand for things which are finally more real than words.'(Richardson 49) This belief, of course, is a form of idealism; an idealism that flows from Plato through the German Idealists to Emerson.In idealism ideas alone are real; man thinks the world; man is the center and nature is a form of dream or spirit of man. Emerson wrote: 'the Universe is the externalization of the soul.' When the poet writes he/she creates soul which gives birth to Nature.But first there is the reading and Emerson was a voracious reader, consuming anything and everything that fell within his reach. As Richardson notes he checked more books out of the library than he could read in the allotted time and we have a record of his charges to Boston Athenaeum, the Harvard College Library, and the Boston Society Library. From these records he read hundreds of books and of those books he re-read a favorite few over and over again.

I found myself thinking of Emerson and Richardson as I read Ms Batuman's book of essays about her adventures in reading, writing, and studying--first at Harvard and then at Stanford University. What becomes obvious is that she is passionately committed to language and reading and that her writing interests arise from her reading. She seems to be one of those persons whose reading becomes as important as everyday experience and colors and dominates the quotidian.As Cyril Connolly wrote: "Words are alive and literature becomes an escape, not from, but into living." My sense of Ms Batuman is that she has purposed to focus her attention on a deep reading of books and life rather follow what she calls a path of mimetic desire. She explicitly states her theme at the end of her introduction: "instead of moving to New York, living in a garret, self-publishing your poetry, writing book reviews, and having love affairs. . . .what if instead you went to Balzac's house, read every word he ever wrote, dug up every last thing you could about him--and then started writing? That is the idea behind this book."

And a very good idea it is, too. As she leads us through her studies of Russian literature, we discover increasingly interesting connections that prove that real life is indeed stranger than fiction. Two examples illustrate her project's purpose: in her chapter entitled "Babel in California," she recounts a find in her reading and researching of Babel's documents of a reference to a captured American pilot named Frank Mosher. Frank Mosher was an alias used by Captain Merian Caldwell Cooper, the creator and producer of the film King Kong. In the 20s he fought on the side of the White Russians and Poles against the Bolsheviks. With this information she finds a wealth of information that informs the making of the movie and its politics. In her final chapter, entitled "The Possessed," she uses her reading of Dostoevsky's Demons to explain one of the central ideas of the book: that desire for the other is the impetus behind our need to be the other. She uses this psychological phenomena to explain certain writers' choice to not only write but the manner and method in which they write. "Don Quixote, it turns out, doesn't really want any of his ostensible objects; what he wants is to become one with his mediator: Amadis of Gaul." (264) She continues by quoting René Girard, author of Deceit, Desire, and the Novel, who believes "mimetic desire is the fundamental content of the Western novel." And who also concludes that this mimetic desire in fiction leads to conflict and ultimately transcendence. As Girard concludes: "The hero sees himself in the rival he loathes; he renounces the 'differences' suggested by hatred."

Girard's thesis controls and supports the thesis of the book, which explains the conclusion. She writes:"If I could start over today, I would choose literature again. If the answers exist in the world or in the universe, I still think that's where we're going to find it."

If you like literature and traveling, this book is for you. However, there is much more to this collection: there is an almost metaphysical examination of writing, reading and their impetus. There is also the beginning of a trend; a whiff of the zeitgeist, signaling a change in the wind. In the world replete with escapist fiction and film, I feel a turning--a shift toward more serious subjects and a call for closer reading. As Coleridge once explained, there are four types of readers: the hourglass, the sponge,the jelly-bag,and the Golconda. Ms Batuman is obviously the latter; a Golconda is the reader par excellence--a person who, like a "high-grader," the person who goes through a mine and pockets only the richest lumps of ore.

A Re-Read of Ernst Jünger's "Aladdin's Problem"

2011-04-01T14:17:00.000-07:00

Aladdin's Problem appeared in 1983 when Jünger was eighty-eight years old. After it, he would live fourteen more years and write four more books.

I have entitled this review a re-read because the novel demands to be read over and over again, to be savored and studied. Because, as soon as you complete the novel, which is relatively short, you realize the ending, which is oddly consistent and logical within the magic realism of the book, has undermined your initial understanding and requires a return to the first paragraph. You also quickly understand that the novel is constructed like a poem or a series of aphorisms that must be savored and pondered. Jünger, who admired Nietzsche, calling him Old Gunpowder Head and carrying Thus Spake Zarathustra through the trenches of the Western front, is the master of the aphorism. And just like Nietzsche (maybe because of Nietzsche), Jünger employs aphorisms to carry his meaning, his themes, his exquisite metaphors and images.

The narrative is standard Jünger. A young man, Freidrich Baroh (read baron), born in Poland, joins the army, climbs within its ranks, and then defects to the West, settling in Berlin, where he attends university to study advertising, statistics, computer technology, insurance and journalism. These studies complement the age and fit within the Titanic revolution which ultimately overcomes Baroh, just as it did Prometheus. We are to understand Baroh as a very modern man, an individual, like Prometheus, who ultimately favors mankind over the Titans. As an aside, the theme of titanism runs throughout Jünger's novels and it is important to understand it as theme; just as it is equally important to understand his concepts of the Anarch,Waldgänger and Arbeiter.

Once Baroh finishes university he finds work with his Uncle Fridolin, who owns and operates Pietas Funerals. As he informs us early in the novel, Baroh is a climber. Just as he climbed through the ranks in the army, he puts his very modern skills to work in the funeral business. It is at the point that the novel "slips," to modify Bruce Sterling's term and leads us through several logical steps into the fantastic. But as the business of death grows, becoming a world onto its self, Baroh becomes aware of his problem, the same problem that he alerted us to in the first paragraph when he says: "It is time I focused on my problem." His problem is one of meaning or, more precisely, a disconnection between modern life and meaning. On a Jungian level, Baroh spends his early life enhancing his career and dealing with the material. As he ages, death becomes a reality and he becomes interested in depth, in meaning. His building of the necropolis Terrestra is the exciting force (Jünger believes the ritualization of death is the beginning of culture); the moment he realizes that "man is alone" and that modern Titanic society has destroyed all of those institutions that once presented illusions of solace, madness descends upon Baroh and he becomes nihilistic. Soon, he is visited by a spirit, by Phares, the bearer of light, who instigates an inward journey toward meaning.

Ultimately, what is Baroh's problem? He says:"madness is only part of my problem . . . . .A loss of individuality may be an additional factor." Madness arises from a split between his dream world and reality, while his role in the modern Titanic (nuclear) society is the cause of his disconnectedness. To achieve individualization he must leave and become a Waldgänger, one who walks away, a Zarathustra.

"Aladdin's Problem" presents us with a poetic statement of the modern problem and proposes a method to achieve an individual solution. But it is not didactic. It a well-constructed novel that stands firmly on all four legs of fiction, while at the same time promulgating Jünger's philosophy and obsessions.

Auster's "The Inner Life of Martin Frost"--Film Review

2011-03-22T13:13:00.000-07:00

Paul Auster has said that The Inner Life of Martin Frost is a comedic answer to his film Lulu on the Bridge. Lulu on the Bridge is a story about a dying man's fantasy about a woman playing the role that Louise Brooks made famous in the German expressionist film Pandora's Box. Louise Brooks was probably film's greatest portrayal of the idealized woman. Every man painted his fantasy on her lithe figure. So what do we make of The Inner Life of Martin Frost? In short, it is about a man's creation of a woman and that creation's struggle to become real and alive.

More specifically, the film begins with Auster's voice, which is apropos, because he has one of the strongest authorial voices writing. His narration immediately alerts us to the fact that this is a story, being told by a writer, about writers and their muses. But, more importantly, we learn that this story will be continued to be written and revised, even as the last scene fades out. Consequently, there is no resolution, no completion for the viewer by the the narrator. Instead, we must finish the tale on our own.

The story is also a meta-fiction, which constantly refers to writers and their books. To emphasize this a wall of books plays a pivotal part in the film. On that wall of books two particular writers seem to receive attention--Samuel Beckett and Franz Kafka.

It is also a film about perception and the philosophy of perception. Claire reads aloud from Berkeley and Hume.

It is also a story about how men create women and how women nurture that creation and the dangers that arise from this artifice. In that regard, Auster has picked two exquisite and ethereal actresses to play the spirits or the muses-Irene Jacob and Sophie Auster.

The men, or the writers, come in two flavors-the slow, serious writer-Martin (David Thewlis)-or the plumber/writer-James Fortunato(Michael Imperioli), an alter ego for both Auster and Frost. As an aside Fortunato is one of the most interesting characters that Auster has created. He reminded me of Kurt Vonnegut's Kilgore Trout.

So, what about this movie? It is beautifully shot; the actors are wonderful; but it is a puzzle and a mystery. It frustrated me but it made me think. I have watched it twice and it grows on me. I highly recommend it to literary souls who are interested in the creative process and don't mind the frustrating tropes of meta-fiction.

Steven Savile's "The Black Chalice"

2011-03-22T12:12:00.000-07:00

I have a theory that all fiction is pastiche. However, sometimes pastiche is the intended goal rather than the psychological underpinning of a writer's choice of subject matter. In that regard, intentional pastiche, as genre, is a literary work that imitates a renowned artist's oeuvre and includes a number of motifs copied from the original work in such a way as to give the impression of being a newly discovered original by that artist.

With that definition firmly in mind, Steven Savile's new novel for Abaddon Books, The Black Chalice, is most definitely pastiche. In fact the entire new series, Malory's Knights of Albion, purports to be the lost work of Sir Thomas Malory, the second volume as it were, and thereby gains its impetus and energy from the idea of pastiche. In this case, the pastiche is not satire (as many are) but a device to honor Malory and to create a modern version of Malory's themes in the secular age through the use of horror and fantasy memes. In other words, although the novel maintains a unified tone and fidelity to the Arthurian romance it imitates, it does so, while utilizing anachronisms of modernism. What this means is that, although the novel appears to be a rendering of the Arthurian romance, it is really a very modern horror tale. However, if we move away from the literary concept of pastiche, which is interesting in itself, the real question is: does the novel work as an independent work, irrespective of its connection to the original text; the answer, in this case, is a resounding yes. Savile has once against proven his ability to write a psychologically sound horror tale that operates successfully on all levels: he maintains a unity of tone throughout; he uses a single point of view, which adds suspense to the novel (did these fantastic things really happen to Alymere or were they the result of a diseased mind); the pacing is precise; and the unique elements of horror logically flow from the factual context of the novel and the age in which it is set.

The novel begins with an introduction that states that this manuscript was found in a Church vestry in 2006 and that it appears to be Malory's The Second Book of King Arthur and His Noble Knights. The Black Chalice, the first story of the text to be modernized, concerns a young man named, Alymere, who like many characters in Malory, is on his way to Camelot to pledge his loyalty to the King. We soon discover that Alymere is angry at his uncle who he believes usurped his father's lands and, in effect, disinherited him. Along the road, Alymere meets Sir Bors de Ganis, one of the first of Alymere's "father" figures, who escorts the young man to Camelot. Once there Alymere meets Arthur who fails to embrace him instantly; maturation, training, and discipline come first. What becomes apparent early in the novel is that, because this is a third-person limited point of view, we see only Alymere's impressions and hear only his explanations. It becomes quite obvious that he is not entirely reliable and at the time morally challenged. Arthur sends Alymere home under the charge of his uncle Sir Lowick, who agrees to oversee his training. Two years later, reivers from the North attack, seeking the Black Chalice, and Alymere and his uncle sally off to engage them in combat. At this point, Alymere leaves the road and discovers the world of faerie where he foolishly pledges loyalty to the crow maiden.

Many times throughout the novel Alymere is required to choose and each time he chooses the wrong path(or, at least, that is what popular mores would say); however, his choices lead him ultimately to his fate and the salvation of the kingdom and the king. This formula is very close to that used by Malory and furthers the successful completion of the pastiche.

The Black Chalice is a finely-wrought Gothic novel that adheres to the standards of Malory's tales, while at the same time satisfying a modern reader's expectations and sensibilities. I whole-heartedly recommend it. And if you are interested in pastiche as a rhetorical device, I refer you to my review of Andy Remic's Kell's Legend http://redrookreview.blogspot.com/2009/11/andy-remics-of-pastiche-in-kells-legend.html.

Finally, I want to once again throw out a plug for Abaddon Books. They are tremendously hard for me to find in Dallas and I have had to resort to Amazon. But each one I've read has been well-written, well-edited, and beautifully designed. Pye Parr drew the evocative cover of The Black Chalice, as well as one of my favorite covers from last year: The Black Hand Gang. For more on Abaddon see my reviews of novels by Rebecca Levine and Pat Kelleher.

Jon Courtenay Grimwood's ""The Fallen Blade"

2011-03-18T13:16:00.000-07:00

Ein jeder Engel ist schrecklich
Rilke

The Fallen Blade has a sub-title--Act One of THE ASSASSINI--which alerts us to the fact that it is the first book of a series, probably a trilogy, although I can imagine its narrative continuing, like a great canal, flowing around and through a strange, Gothic city, constructed on rotting pylons, hammered into tiny islands, for eternity. This eternal quality or tone induces an almost dream-like state in the reader and results from the novel's layered construction and the author's decision to use multiple POVs. The initial structural strength of the novel arises from the use of allusions to Shakespearean plays and poems, manifested in sub-plots taken almost directly from Othello (and perhaps even a nod to Measure to Measure with Lady Giulietta's pregnancy and undisclosed father)and the conscious use of the dramatic structure of a play to construct (and foreshadow) its various parts. In fact, the novel is a hodgepodge of resonances, calling upon memes from various fantasy tropes such as werewolves, vampires, fallen angels, viking narratives, and historical figures and events. In other words, the novel uses a known world upon which to create a new, fantasy world. Both the actual world of 15th century Venice and the newly created alternative world contain rich stories and flavors that the reader already knows, thereby providing a richness to the text. And, additionally, for anyone that has ever spent any time in Venice, that historical richness and Gothic beauty still exists. It doesn't take much while strolling through Venice on a wintry night to imagine the possibilities of vampires and werewolves struggling in the shadows.

The novel begins with the arrival in Venice of a beautiful boy, Tycho, hanging from shackles in the hull of a ship and the escape of Marco IV's cousin from her Doge. This exciting force illuminates and centers the machinations of the various power sources within the ruling family--the Millioni--of Venice. The boy suffers from amnesia and his true nature is unclear; and, although he appears to be a young adult, his actual age is unknown. He suffers flashbacks to a more ancient time and place. The girl is fifteen and of marriageable age. Both are pawns in the political games of the city and both seem destined to be together. The players of the game are the Millioni, the ruling family, their assassins, led by Atilo, the German Emperor and his army of werewolves, and the Order of the White Crucifers. However, although there are other forces in play (witches, alchemists, and sprites), both internal and external, the only game is between the Millioni.

Within this rich, political drama, is an origin tale--the story of the fallen angels and the birth of the vampire. Grimwood nurses this arc throughout the novel but he is hesitant to push the story too far. He even says in an interview:"to be honest I'm still not sure he is a vampire." This statement could be interpreted as disingenuous but I tend to believe him. I felt that he was letting the characters tell the story rather than his imposing his authorial will on them by marching them through the narrative, like his puppets. The book, for me, resembles an auteur-type production: it's a singular production of a singular mind, working just outside the boundaries of various genres. And, because of its singularity, or perhaps its idiosyncrasies, this novel is either going to be criticized or fetishisized.

Ultimately, it reminds me of one of my favorite novels: Patrick Süskind's Das Parfum. There is the same attention to historical detail, richness of colors and smells, and vibrant violence that induces dizzying madness and vertigo. I will definitely be attending the second act.

A Whimiscal Look at Parra's "Antipoems"

2011-03-07T14:00:00.000-08:00

I picked up this collection because Roberto Bolaño said that he gave up on Neruda and followed Parra. I love Bolaño so I followed him to Parra. Parra is different from Bolaño so if you follow Bolaño don't be surprised when you discover Parra. They are different; their poetry is different.

Parra is an antipoet. What does that mean? According to the translator's introduction, "antipoetry mirrors poetry, not as its adversary but as its perfect complement."

The book contains both the original Spanish version, which is good (all translation works should contain the original), and the English translation. Ms Werner captures the spirit, the humor, and the sense of Parra's poetry.

One of my favorite poetic ideas is from Holderlin, who calls for us to live poetically. I suppose Parra would say Holderlin is a poet. Parra, the antipoet, responds in his short poem "Poetry Poetry" to Holderlin's sentiment:"Poetry Poetry it's all poetry/we make poetry/ even when we're going to the bathroom." I think you can see from this fragment the antipoet at work.

Parra reminds me of the surrealists but he is not one. There is something quite material about his poetry. Within the poems you feel the steel of a political mind.

One of my favorite poems of the collection is "Stop Racking Your Brain." The whole poem consists of three lines but it is quite true and sad for people interested in poetry: "Stop Racking your brains/nobody reads poetry nowadays/it doesn't matter if it's good or bad."

Moorcock's "The Mad God's Amulet"

2011-03-07T10:24:00.000-08:00

Tor is re-releasing Michael Moorcock’s Hawkmoon tetralogy with exquisite illustrations. The first volume, The Jewel in the Skull (see my review of this novel at Hub Magazine: www.hubfiction.com/2010/03/issue-115/ ), and the second, The Mad God’s Amulet, are out. Not only are these editions a thing of beauty, they also have the power (magical power) to carry the reader back to the heady days of pulp fiction, which means, to me, a return to the feelings of my youth and the joy of discovering the multiverse.

Implicit in Moorcock’s multiverse is a metaphysical underpinning that raises these books above the level of pulp fiction and marks them as classics of the fantasy genre. Irrespective of their serious undertone and philosophical themes, however, the genius of these books is that on one level they can be read (perhaps a better word would be experienced) as picaresque pulp fiction, similar to the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Raphael Sabatini, or Robert E. Howard, while on the other they offer up a meditation or theodicy on the workings of fate and the machinations of modern man. The parallel between the history of twentieth-century Europe and the action evolving within the plot of these novels is thinly veiled, if not explicit. Additionally, the appearance of the Warrior in Jet and Gold, at pivotal moments within the plot, expresses the workings of a power much more potent that any army of Granbretan.

In the first volume we meet Count Brass, ruler of the Kamarg, Dorian Hawkmoon von Köln, a German nobleman, his boon companion, Oladahn, and his love, Yisselda. These characters are the last hold-outs against the forces of the Dark Empire and its vast armies and infernal machines.

The plot of the first novel involves the ingenious plan of Baron Meliadus, commander of the Clan of the Wolf, and general of the armies of the Dark Empire, to employ Hawkmoon to assassinate Count Brass. To facilitate this plan and to control Hawkmoon, he embeds a Black Jewel in Hawkmoon’s skull that has the power to destroy him if he does not do the Baron’s bidding. Eventually, Hawkmoon overcomes the jewel in his skull and defeats Meliadus.

In the first novel we have intimations of the workings of the Runstaff but in the second these themes surface and pre-dominate. Fate (or the Runestaff) reveals itself, although Hawkmoon refuses to acknowledge its power or his role within the multiverse.

Although the second novel, The Mad God’s Amulet, develops the serious themes of the Runestaff, it also reflects a move to pure adventure reminiscent of the novels of Raphael Sabatini with a bit of horror thrown in to season the pot. Where the first novel dealt with great armies moving across large battle fields, the second novel seems more intimate, closer to the Saturday morning adventure serials.

Two early episodes in the second novel demonstrate the workings of the Runestaff and the plight of those who serve it. Hawkmoon and Oladahn on their way home to the Kamarg are ambushed by Huillam D’Averc, the new general sent to find and capture them. D’Averc is a brilliant creation, similar to Doc Holiday but probably modeled on the character, Athos, in Dumas’ The Three Musketeers. D’Aver is ill and his maladies become a running theme throughout the rest of the tetralogy. He is also a romantic, like Athos, whose love (his fate) will eventually lead him to his doom.

In one of the initial scenes of the novel Oldahn is captured by D’Averc and the general uses him to draw Hawkmoon out of hiding. Refusing to be used to betray his friend, Oladahn jumps to his death. However, the Runestaff refuses to allow him to die because he has an essential role to play. Another scene, just as poignant, involves D’Averc. He chases after Hawkmoon in one of the empire’s elaborate ornithopters and crashes. Instead of dying like the pilot, he survives to be found days later, floating in the sea, by Hawkmoon.

These scenes, although perfectly installed in the plot and exciting to read, support a more important apparatus: the overarching plot of the tetralogy. And this is where Moorcock’s genius lies. The novels move like greased lightning with battle scenes equal to anything in Sabatini or Dumas but there is always a sense of control and a reminder that a greater story is running in the back ground.

However, as I said the novel also contains pulp fiction elements that in themselves are highly entertaining. Oldahan and Hawkmoon after escaping D’Averc set sail on the high seas with a dysfunctional crew of dissipate sailors and it is here that they encounter D’Averc, floating alone on a raft, the mad pirates of the Mad God, and Yisselda’s ring, alerting them to the fact that she has been kidnapped and fallen into the hands of the Mad God.

The pirate scenes are worthy of an Errol Flynn movie but they serve to lead us to the horror of the Mad God.

It is probably important to note that there is a certain Gothic quality to Moorcock’s work. In the first novel these elements are illustrated through the descriptions of Londra and the King-Emperor. In the second, the Gothic threads are exposed with the terrifying Mad God and the melodramatic sub-ploy of the hero rescuing the damsel in distress. Contained within the Gothic elements are the mechanical monster of the Wraith-Folk and the Mad God’s beasts.

In the final analysis, no matter the profundity I might find in The Mad God’s Amulet, the novel is fun to read. Moorcock, with a jaundiced eye on prospective critics, wrote of the tetralogy: “As with rock and roll, I was attracted to this form because, originally, it did not absorb the interest of the critics. The books were written in the hope that they would help readers pass their time without feeling they were wasting it, in much the same spirit as I performed on stage.” I must agree that although I find a certain seriousness in the novels, the author did succeed in producing a rollicking good read.

John Stack's "Ship of Rome"

2011-03-07T09:58:00.000-08:00

Delenda est Carthago Marcus Porcius Cato

In the last few months I have finished reading over ten novels situated in ancient Rome. Of those ten or so novels, three were by Rosemary Sutcliff and two by Alfred Duggan. Additionally, over the last fifty years I have read scores of historical novels and throughout that time I have devised a test: either (1) the novel is simply an action adventure (or perhaps romance or political thriller)with the characters dressed as Ancient Romans or (2) it is truly a historical novel, a novel that takes us to that specific time, teaches us something we did not know, and possesses a serious theme and purpose. Those novels that fall within the first category can be quite entertaining like a good movie; however, those that fall in the second category transcend the genre to become literature, especially if they are written with an eye on the first category. The movie Gladiator falls within the first category; I, Claudius is firmly situated in the second. John Stack's Ship of Rome, a novel set within the historical period of the first Punic war successfully chronicles the naval battles that occurred and Rome's emergence as a mighty sea power. It falls within the first category but clearly satisfies in its execution. The story is accurate; the characters well-rounded and believable.

Part of the problem for me is that novels that fall within the first category suffer from what I call anachronism of modernism. Even if the author does everything he or she possibly can do to fall in the second category, he or she sometimes fails because of the point of view or the method in which he or she tells the story. Primarily, the current crop of historical novelists want to follow the Bernard Cornwall model, which is not unlike Scott and Cooper of the 19th century, or O'Brien of the 20th. There is a formula and a heavily plotted story. Survival of the main characters is a given because they must live to fight another day and appear in the next installment. Consequentially, this formula is satisfying and safe. As I write this I can think of least twenty works that fall easily into the category; they usually include two characters--one patrician, the other a commoner-- fighting the good fight in some foreign war, a series of near death episodes, shady leaders and evil machinations by both friend and foe. The fact is that this formula works. From Sherlock Holmes to Batman, it succeeds in pulp, in comics and in movies. Novels that do not fit the first category are rarer and usually more difficult to read; they are idiosyncratic for the most part and based on character or theme. Nevertheless, let me be clear, I like books that fit both categories. I enjoy the novels of Scarrow and Cornwell just as much I like the novels that fall in category two. However, even within the categories some novels satisfy more than others as historical novels. John Stack's "Ship of Rome" is one of those novels. Even though he clearly falls in line behind Cornwall, Scarrow, and Sidebottom, for some reason I found his work more grounded, perhaps more realistic and less like cinema. And, even though, he employs several anachronisms of modernism, including the patrician/commoner duo, the romantic trio, and the devious senators, I found myself believing I was reading about early Rome. In other words I suspended disbelief and found myself engrossed in the novel, caring about the characters.

I believe Stack pulled this novel off by situating the action firmly within the facts of the times. Most of the characters are actually historical characters doing and saying what they actually did and said at the time. The battle scenes are carefully drawn and resolve themselves as the Roman historians said they occurred. The descriptions of ships, cities, and the Senate are precise and detailed; and although it is a technique of modernism, Stack's use of multiple points of views provides the reader a 360 degree view of the Punic war. Additionally, his main characters, Atticus, the Greek sea captain, and Septimus, the Roman Centurion, are well drawn and sympathetic. Conflict is rampant in the book on several levels: man against nature--the Romans are new to naval warfare and the sea itself is a daunting place; man against man--the characters struggle against one another, Rome wars against Carthage, Legion battles Navy, Senators deceive Senator, patricians detest nouveau riche; and man against himself--Atticus struggles to be a Roman and overcome his inferiority complex, while Septimus struggles against his prejudice of barbarians, more specifically, the Greek, Atticus.

All in all, Ship of Rome was a quick, exciting read; and although it contains many anachronisms of modernism, including the fact that it is the first book of a series, I found it one of the better books in the first category. Stack is a worthy newcomer to the Scarrow/Sidebottom Roman historical novel genre race.

Robert Bly's Leaping Poetry: An Idea with Poems and Translations (Pitt Poetry Series)

2011-02-22T13:23:00.000-08:00

In brief Bly states that "a poet who is leaping makes a jump from an object soaked in unconscious substance to an object or idea soaked in conscious psychic substance." He argues that ancient poets leaped naturally; however, over the centuries formulas and rules killed the "leap." Now, however, certain poets are reviving the "leap."

Through the presentation of his thesis, Bly uses several rhetorical devices to define his concept. He compares and contrasts. For instance, he points out the difference of the Spanish poets and the French surrealists and finds the Spanish writers more satisfying. He provides examples of Leaping poets: he discusses Blake, Wallace Stevens, Neruda, Vallejo, and Rilke. He illustrates "leaping" through poems that he has translated and he explicates the jumps.

In summary, Robert Bly's "Leaping Poetry" is important for several reasons: (1) he creates an evocative and simple image (leaping) for a concept that poets of a certain ilk have been trying to explain for centuries; (2) he examines and meditates on the concept with plenty of examples from poets like Lorca, Neruda, Rilke, Vallejo; (3) he shows the similarities of leaping poetry to Lorca's concept of duende; (4) he finds a physiological source of leaping by discussing the work of Paul Maclean; and (5) he presents us with some fine translations of poets from around the world.

Testimony to the Invisible: Essays on Swedenborg, edited by James Lawrence

2011-02-22T13:10:00.000-08:00

This volume from Chrysalis Books (1995) contains seven essays by diverse but well known thinkers, mystics and poets discussing the importance of an obscure--for most of us--Swedish thinker, Emanuel Swedenborg.

Swedenborg was born in Stockholm in 1688. As Borges states in his essay, "this peerless, solitary man was many men." He was a cabinet builder, a mathematician, a scientist, and inventor. However, and most important to us, he was a mystic. Wilson van Dusen in his essay defines a mystic as "one who experiences God." When Swedenborg was fifty-six an event occurred that Swedenborg called the "discrete degree." From that point on he dedicated himself to the life of the visionary. During the next thirty years--he was quite long-lived--he produced the incredible works that influenced, inter alia, William Blake, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry James, Sr., Carlyle, Dostoevsky. Jorge Luis Borges, Czeslaw Milosz, and countless other poets and mystics.

Each one of the essays in this collection sheds a different light on Swedenborg and his influence. For instance,Kathleen Raine's "The Human Face of God" is particularly illuminating. In it she discusses William Blake's dedication to and study of Swedenborg but she also discusses the way Blake's ideas, influenced by Swedenborg, informed the works of Carl Jung and Henry Corbin. Another strong essay in the collection is Eugene Taylor's "Emerson: The Swedenborgian and Transcendentalist Connection." After reading Mr. Taylor's essay, I was reminded of how saturated 19th American literature is with the visionary ideas of Swedenborg and how close to the Mundus Imaginalis such writers as Hawthorne and Melville are.

If you are interested in the visionary experience, I highly recommend this collection of essays.

Historical Review: Abnett's "Traitor General"

2011-02-18T09:33:00.000-08:00

In 1967, Alistair MacLean published "Where Eagles Dare." The book was made into a film with Richard Burton and a young Clint Eastwood in 1968. The plot involves an elite force of British and American Commandos who go behind enemy lines to rescue a United States general captured while enroute to Crete to meet with Russian counterparts. The story is replete with secrets and betrayals plus wholesale mayhem.

As a young man in 1968, I was enamored with the film and even today I will happily re-watch it. What does this have to do with "Traitor General," you may ask? Just this, the plot of the Maclean Book and Abnett's book have the same plot. Is that a bad thing? Absolutely not. The two works may have the same skeleton but Abnett makes the material definitely his own.

In "Traitor General" Gaunt and twelve of his "Ghosts" drop onto a planet controlled by the enemy. This planet, Gereon, an agri-planet within the Sabbat system is brilliantly and I would say beautifully rendered through Abnett's almost perfect prose. In addition, Abnett looks behind the curtain and begins to develop the Chaos world. In a recent interview, Abnett shows that he has been contemplating the workings of the forces of Chaos carefully. He has puzzled out the irrefutable conclusion that in order to function, it (the Chaos worlds)needs organizations, bureaucracies, and technologies. In this novel he illustrates the working of the world and the mind of the people trapped there and living there.

I cannot praise this novel enough for its execution and its depth. Abnett creates believable characters throughout. It doesn't matter if the character is a Ghost, a Chaos Space Marine, or a partisan; they are all roundly and soundly developed.

Finally, no one writes about the mechanical and technical aspects of modern war better than Abnett. I could smell the oil on the barrel of the las-guns while I was reading the novel.

Nathan Long's "Zombieslayer"

2011-02-14T13:35:00.000-08:00

Growing up on the Louisiana/Texas border in the fifties, I use to watch men, women, and children picking cotton. The process involved their snatching the bolls and placing them in long bags that they dragged behind throughout the day. Every since I have imagined certain tasks (pleasant or otherwise)as metaphorical cotton picking. Usually, these thoughts emerge when the task becomes so tiresome, heavy, and unmanageable that its existence hampers my ability to move. When following long fantasy series, I sometimes see the continual accretion of volumes as being like the bag: the author over decades creates so many characters, so many themes, and so many plot threads, that the work becomes turgid and dense. More often than not I cease following the series, never to return. Sometimes, however, a series continues to be fresh year after year. Two series that continue to delight me are Gaunt's Ghosts and Gotrek and Felix. Both are from Black Library. Dan Abnett writes Gaunt's Ghosts and Nathan Long pens Gotrek and Felix.

The Gotrek and Felix series began with Trollslayer (Black Library 1999), a collection of short stories or episodes written by William King in the eighties and early nineties. The stories introduce the two main characters: the dwarf troll-slayer, Gotrek Gurnisson, and his human partner, Felix Jaeger. The novels fall within the genre category--sword and sorcery--and share many similarities with the Gray Mouser stories of Fritz Leiber. If you like the pulp fiction of Leigh Brackett, C.L. Moore, and Fritz Leiber you will enjoy these stories. More to the point, Nathan Long, perhaps, more than any of the other Black Library writers--most of whom seem to embrace the Gothic and horror aspects of the Warhammer universe--seems to channel the sword and sorcery style of the American pulp writers of the fifties and sixties. His prose, as well as his plotting, seem lighter and more pulp-ish than some of the other fine novels from Black Library. This is not to say than Long cannot describe the macabre and the dark, which seems to be de rigueur in the Warhammer universe; he can. He did an especially ghoulish job in his Black Heart series.

Long joined the series with Orcslayer and in Zombieslayer and Shamanslayer, he has hit his stride:the two books, although stand-alones, are seamless in their presentation.

At the end of Shamanslayer,the necromancer Heinrich Kemmler reveals himself and unleashes his zombie army against Gotrek, Felix and soldiers of the Empire. Zombieslayer begins with a retreat from the onslaught of the living dead to the Castle Reikguard, where a disparate band of troops defend the Castle against the invasion of the Kemmler's army.

Although Kemmler and his zombies launch attack after attack against the defenders, the novel's real strength lies in the interplay between the various factions,the leaders that control them, and an underlying mystery that does not involve the zombies. There is also an internal dispute between the dwarfs: Snorri Nosebiter can no longer remember his shame and therefore cannot meet his doom. Consequently, Gotrek has asked Felix to accompany Snorri to Kadrak Kadrin on his pilgrimage to the shrine of Grimnir. It looks like the fellowship might be broken.

Long is particularly good at creating stories within stories, complications upon complications. And in the Warhammer tradition, the novel rests upon the truth that corruption is everywhere. As the problems multiply, Gotrek's plan fails and it appears that he may meet his doom in the castle.

Without giving any more of the plot away, the strength of the novel lies in the conflict between the men and dwarfs. Additionally, on the basis of a siege novel--which almost seems a genre in itself--Long has done his homework. He has obviously studied how to take a castle and those scenes are realistic and vivid. I also like the character Kat. Kat first appeared as a child in Trollslayer, reappearing in Shamanslayer, as a quintessential hunter/warrior.

Finally, it is quite obvious that the novels are working toward a climax of sorts and Long does a good job making each novel independent but also fulfilling the series' mandate to move toward the conclusion, toward Gotrek's doom. All-in-all a good fast read.

Harry Turtledove's "Give Me Back My Legions"

2011-02-11T13:51:00.000-08:00

Harry Turtledove is known primarily for his alternate history novels. In fact, he may be one of the most qualified writers in the world doing it: he holds a Ph.D. in history from UCLA. However, in Give Me Back My Legions(St. Martin's Griffin 2009), he eschews alternate history and plays it straight down the middle, writing a novel about Publius Quintilius Varus' defeat in Germany in 9 A.D. at the hands of the German chief Arminius. Arminius, known in Germany as Hermann, was a Roman citizen of the equestrian class, and an officer in Tiberius' auxiliary in the war against the Pannonians on the Balkan Peninsula. Because of his familiarity with the Roman Legions and the trust he engendered in Varus, Arminius was able to deceive Varus and trick him, destroying three legions in the Teutoburg Forest (some say Teutoburg Pass).

Turtledove's stylistic choices make Give Me Back My Legions an interesting example of historical fiction: he does not try to create a fictional milieu in which one feels he or she is inhabiting a historical period; instead, he ignores the anachronisms of style that are almost inevitable when writing historical fiction and embraces them. Examples of this type of approach can be found in the BBC production of I, Claudius, where legionaries speak in cockney accents, or in Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette, where the nobility dance to rock music. Ironically, through this blatant disregard of anachronism something new emerges that seems both fresh and exciting.

Although Teutoberg Forest has been listed as one of most significant battles in history and its conclusion resulted in a freezing of further expansion of the Roman Empire across the Rhine and Danube rivers, there is surprisingly little written material on it. Additionally, although Varus was quite visible in Roman history, primarily because of his role in what Josephus called the Varian Wars, the facts surrounding the battle are sketchy at best. It was not until the British soldier, Tony Clunn, an amateur historian, discovered the actual battleground in the 1980s that our understanding of what happened to the three Legions began to gel.

The source material includes the work of Velleius Paterculus, a retired military officer, in his Epitome of Rome, brief sketches in the work of Florus, Suetonius, and Cassius Dio, and three historical studies in English: Tony Clunn's The Quest for the Lost Roman Legions: Discovering the Varus Battlefield (Savas Beattie; New York 2005), Peter Wells'The Battle that Stopped Rome (W.W. Norton & Company: New York and London, 2003), and Adrian Murdoch's Rome's Greatest Defeat: Murder in the Teutoburg Forest (The History Press 2009). Of the three, I found Murdoch's the most informative because he traced Varus' life and placed the battle within a political context. However, his work would not have been possible without Clunn's.

Unlike Harry Sidebottom or Simon Scarrow, Turtledove does not create any new or fictional characters; he uses the real actors to analyze the facts. His artistry arrives in the answers he propounds: why did Arminius betray Varus; was Varus incompetent; how long did the battle last; why did Varus wait three years to attack; did Augustus use the battle to achieve political ends; what was the importance of wine. By asking these questions and many more like them in his narrative, based on the actual chronology, and actually providing plausible answers within that same narrative context, Turtledove delivers an entertaining novel.

Although it is quite entertaining, the novel lacks one of the four legs of historical fiction. Stephen Pressfield states in the preface to Wallace Breem's Eagle in the Snow that historical fiction involves a "four-part hat trick;" the fourth part is that it has to "mean" something. Telling a story or enumerating the facts is not enough to elevate the novel into the higher echelon of historical fiction. However, sometimes you just want a good, fast read on a subject that fascinates you; that is what Give me Back My Legions is to me.

Harry Sidebottom's "Fire in the East"

2011-02-10T12:33:00.000-08:00

Fire in the East (Overlook 2008) is the first book in a new series, entitled Warrior of Rome, by Dr. Harry Sidebottom. The story takes place in A.D. 255 during the dual reign of Valerian and Gallienus and concerns a siege of a city on the Euphrates called Arete. Arete is based on a real city, Dura-Europos, which was besieged by the Sassanid-Persians in AD 256, and which has been the subject of a great deal of research and excavation.

The novel begins with Marcus Clodius Ballista, a former war leader of the Angles and now the Dux Ripae, appointed to defend Arete from the Sassanid and traveling by trireme to the east. As Ballista journeys from city to city, Sidebottom introduces us to the Roman world, its subjects and its enemies.

Much better than most novelists writing historical fiction, Sidebottom is soaked in the details and workings of the ancient world. This lends a certain and solid verisimilitude to the novel and satisfies one of the criteria of historical fiction: we want to learn something new. In Fire in the East we do learn things, many things, quite interesting things about late Rome.

In addition to being an interesting read, it is also an exciting read. The majority of the book involves the preparation of the city for an attack and the attack itself. Consequently, there is a similarity in narrative structure to popular books and films on last stands. I could not help but compare the work to John Wayne's The Alamo, Cy Enfield's Zulu and David Gemmell's Legend. Nevertheless, even though the end is known, Sidebottom keeps the suspense taut and the action fresh.

If you are fan of Simon Scarrow, Bernard Cornwell, or Patrick O'Brian you will like Sidebottom. I like him and his characters a great deal and I have started the sequel, King of Kings. But my enjoyment of it is based on its appeal as an action-thriller, as an escape into an exciting past, not as a historical novel.

As I say this, I have to ask: Has there ever been a man better trained to write a historical novel about Rome in A.D. 255 than Harry Sidebottom? He is a Fellow of St. Benet's Hall and Lecturer in Ancient History at Lincoln College, Oxford, author of Ancient Warfare: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford 2004), and an avid student of historical novels. His favorite writers, he states in his appendix, are Cecelia Holland and Mary Renault, and in an interview he referenced Alfred Duggan and Patrick O'Brian as influences. However, as I read the very entertaining Fire in the East, I found myself continually thinking about Jorge Luis Borges' short-story, "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote," where Borges writes that Menard abhorred "these useless carnivals, fit only ... to produce plebeian pleasure of anachronism or . . .enthrall us with the elementary idea that all epochs are the same or different." More precisely I realized that even though Fire in the East is heavily-researched, it is a very modern novel, which cannot help but be, in essence, an entertainment filled with anachronisms, not anachronisms in detail, but anachronisms in spirit, tone, and plot. The question then is: can anyone really write a historical novel that captures the essence of the epoch in which it chooses to imitate. In other words, can an author find a method to cause (or trick)the reader to feel (more important than thinking in this context) as if he or she is situated in a certain historical period or, at best, hope that through the willing suspension of disbelief the reader will not suspect he or she is simply reading (watching) a book (film) that purports to be set in a historical period. The answer is "yes" an author can accomplish this Herculean task; an author can overcome the anachronism of modernity but only through a trickery of technique and probably at the expense of popularity. Sidebottom is a very talented entertainer, who is going to be very successful, but he fails to compose the Quixote itself.

What are the anachronisms in the novel: foremost, it is a trilogy (perhaps it will be a series, almost de rigueur in a modern genre series; it includes an elite team of warriors; it employs memes from detective fiction, fantasy fiction, as well as thrillers; it describes graphic sex acts; and it elongates the action and maintains an overarching arc to sustain the novel through several books ( à la O'Brian, Cornwell, and Scarrow). But is it so wrong that the novel is anachronistic? No, especially if you want an adventure story that causes you to read throughout the night and then hope they print the sequel soon. But if you want to sink into the slough of the past and smell its pungent odors, it may not be your best choice. I, for one, sometimes just want a great adventure story (most times in fact). But every once in a while I am surprised or seduced by an author that drags me into a world that seems authentic, dark and dank. Four novels that have seemed to capture and re-create a certain time for me and in fact avoided the anachronisms of modern adventure fiction are Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridien, Pressfield's Gates of Fire, William Faulkner's The Unvanquished, and John Williams' Augustus. Interestedly, Sidebottom states in an interview that he has just discovered the novels of Cormac McCarthy and I suspect that the historian/novelist is growing and changing. No writer worth his or her salt is not constantly studying the technique of other writers.

Finally, if you like adventure tales situated in Roman antiquity, I recommend: Rosemary Sutcliff's Frontier Wolf, Alfred Duggan's Family Favorites and Wallace Breem's Eagle in the Snow.

Twitter Reviews

2011-02-03T08:53:00.000-08:00

I swore that I would never use Twitter but I have decided because of the height of my to-be-read and to-be-reviewed piles to use Twitter to do mini reviews. So I now have a presence at RedRookReviews on Twitter, where I intend to note observations and mini-reviews. May God protect us all from technology (cf Heidegger).

Ian Watson's "Space Marine"

2010-12-27T08:55:00.000-08:00

Black Library’s novels situated in its 40K universe are dark, claustrophobic, mesmerizing, habit-forming, and purposefully Gothic. Over the last twenty years it has gathered some of the most talented young writers in the intellectual property arena to develop its mythology and fluff; however, before William King, Dan Abnett, Graham MacNeill, and Gav Thorpe penned a word, Barrington J. Bayley and Ian Watson forged through the Warp to create a mythos.

Watson, one of Britain’s most creative science fiction authors, birthed the puissant and baroque world of 40K in his novel, Space Marine, by reading Game Workshop’s table-top games’ manuals and rulebooks. A decade after its release, in an interview with Attila Galambos, Watson testified that in order to make the book believable “he hallucinated himself into the characters.” He imagined the 40K universe as a “place of madness,” ruled by a psychic corpse, and a world, where in order to survive one had to go mad. He likened the 40K universe to a dream world that one escapes to experience a transformational reality, akin to the trance-like states of a shaman.

Although Watson was very proud of his work, the novel went out of print for many years. As a result, a robust market in used copies developed on e-Bay and even I found myself shelling out seventy-five Australian dollars to a bookseller in Sydney many years ago for a ragged copy of the book. But now Black Library has re-issued the novel in an attractive POD (print on demand) edition which cost me considerably less than the used paperback.

Upon re-reading the novel, I must say it is one of the strangest, most bizarre examples of psychotic poetry to emerge from a genre revered and distinguished for its ability to generate unique images and fantastic ideas. Watson writes that David Lindsay’s Voyage to Arcturus is his literary lodestone and its influence is felt.

Unfortunately, I will wager that some of the current die-hard 40K fans will be disappointed because Watson’s fluff does not fit the current mythology and perhaps is more literary than they would like (i.e. poetic). Ultimately, true aficionados of 40K and mainstream science fiction should embrace the novel as a classic and enjoy it for its strengths and inventions.

The novel begins with three young protagonists, citizens of the Trazior Hive, an arcology on the planet Necromunda, engaged in gang warfare. In a spare three pages, Watson introduces his three young protagonists: Yeremi Valence, the son of a technician, Biff Tundrish, a scumnik, and Lexandro d’Arquebus, son of the Calculator Maximus. Each protagonist belongs to a gang and the novel begins with the collision of three levels of the hive, represented by three young gangs, battling each other in brutal warfare.

Because of a trade war between rival hives, the Planetary Defense Force dragoons the gangs to serve in the PDF and, as Watson puts it, fortuitously brings the three warriors within the purview of the Imperial Fists Space Marines. The Imperial Fists are sine qua non of the space marine mythos. Their primarch, Rogal Dorn, during the rebellion, was assigned to guard the Emperor; and, as such, they developed their abilities for defense and attack. They fortified Terra and defended the earth and the Emperor. In the 41st millennium they are based on the Phalanx, a gigantic space ship, and their task is to defend humanity against the incursion of vile aliens and the daemons of Chaos.

From their induction into the Imperial Fists, the three youths struggle to survive and succeed. However, they bring with them their antipathy against the other, although as citizens of Necromunda they are more alike than different. Through the catalyst of marine induction, a bond develops between the three in which they each assume a role in an odd triumvirate and learn that their respective survival depends on the other. Remembering Watson’s analysis of the 41st millennium as a time of madness, the bond between the three men is dysfunctional and psychotic. It is this fact, this psychological nuance, which raises Space Marine from the ranks of space opera to literary science fiction.

In addition to the novel’s psychological complexity, there is also exquisite language. Each sentence is poetical and rigorous. At times, I found myself reading the prose as if it were poetry. Some of the sentences actually scan and Watson uses alliteration to dramatic effect. Here is just one of a myriad of examples: “The triple, bleached spires of Trazior arose from deep drifts of desiccated industrial excrement to pierce foul clouds on the far southerly fringe of the Palatine mega-cluster.” The sense of literariness continues through his use, like Gene Wolfe, of obscure vocabulary and technical terms from science and philosophy, as he quickly follows the three men’s rise to become battle-brothers.
Within the story of their maturation, Watson introduces the reader to the world of 40K. In his mythos, though, orks, the signature villains of the current crop of 40K novels, are simply space-faring pirates, and squats (dwarfs) are minions of Chaos, while the true enemies are the daemons oozing out the Warp and the ruthless Tyranids, who manipulate genes of sentient creatures to create monstrous armies of illimitable size.

Watson’s novel is a thrilling foray into the beginning of the 40K mythos and its literary prose, its psychological underpinnings, and its fantastic images of gore and mayhem make it a fun and unnerving read.

Ultimately, Space Marine contains the gene-seed of all later 40K space marine novels and can properly be called the godfather of its genre. On a literary historical level, it stands with Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, J. G. Ballard’s High Rise, and John Steakley’s Armor and illustrates most definitely that the Black Library franchise is one the most literary of the intellectual property imprints. Watson’s pioneering efforts marked the trail for the likes of Abnett, MacNeill, King and Thorpe.

As a companion to Space Marine, I also recommend Deathwing, a collection of 40K short stories, and Gav Thorpe’s Angel of Darkness.

"Corvus" by Paul Kearney

2010-12-14T08:38:00.000-08:00

My review is in Issue 133 of Hub Magazine. You can access it here: www.hubfiction.com.

"Corvus" by Paul Kearney

2010-12-07T10:31:00.000-08:00

Hub Magazine has accepted my review of Paul Kearney's Corvus. It should be available this week. By the way the novel is fantastically good.

"The Wall" published in Issue 132 of Hub Magazine

2010-11-19T13:05:00.001-08:00

You can download it here. http://www.hubfiction.com/

Kirkus Review on "Cave Gossip"

2010-11-10T14:42:00.001-08:00

You can read Kirkus Review's take on my novel Cave Gossip here. http://keithharvey.blogspot.com/2010/03/kirkus-review-of-keith-harveys-cave.html

Rebecca Levene's "The Infernal Game: Ghost Dance"

2010-11-08T11:51:00.000-08:00

I had never heard of Rebecca Levene until I stumbled onto Pat Kelleher's Black Hand Gang (Abaddon Books 2010), one of my favorite reads of the year. In that novel there is a reference to the croatoans and Dr. John Dee, which, of course, I am very interested in because of my abiding interest in alchemy, Jung, and depth psychology. So, I googled "croatoan" and "Doctor John Dee" and up pops Levene's The Infernal Game: Ghost Dance (Abbadon Books 2010) and I knew I had to check it out.

I was pleasantly surprised: Ghost Dance is a mixed-genre feast of action, horror, spy-craft, true crime, the supernatural, mythology, time-travel and Christianity. It's all there wrapped up in a nice prose package, tightly plotted and briskly presented.

Levene sets the novel in San Francisco and London, with a sojourn to the Mojave desert. In order to stay true to her settings she also incorporates images from American Indian mythology, along with some of its major memes: tricksters, spirit walking, and spirit animals.

The novel involves three point-of-view characters, with two taking the lead as protagonists: Morgan, a member of the Hermetic Divison of MI6 and Alex of the CIA.

The novel, however, begins with a mass murder committed by an American teenager, named Coby, and the visions of Alex, who has a pre-vision of the killings. Coby's acts become the exciting force that ultimately, years later, set Alex, Morgan, and Coby on a collision course.

Morgan is an assassin without a soul, literally, and he appeared in the first volume of Levene's new series: The Infernal Game: Cold Warriors (Abbadon Books 2010). The title, of course, is a pun because Morgan's partner in Cold Warriors was a zombie. Alex is a rich young woman, recruited as agent in the CIA because she can spirit walk. Her recruitment, however, is really a kidnapping; the CIA press-gang her into the service through blackmail and intimidation; consequently, she is never a willing participant and her participation has to be forced and her powers jump-started through drugs.

Two separate investigations proceed through parallel narratives. Alex investigates a cult based in San Francisco called the Croatoans. The Croatoans have gotten their hands on a shofar, a sacred ram's horn, that belonged to Doctor John Dee, and are using it in some bizarre ritual, which the CIA is interested in stopping. Morgan, in England, is tracking the killer of Dr. Granger, one of the foremost authorities on Doctor John Dee. Her murderer is a Mossad agent, who seems intent on killing not only Granger but her graduate students. Through his special talents Morgan quickly ascertains that Granger seeks an artifact, belonging to Dee, that grants eternal life: a philosopher stone, as it were, that is in the hands of a cult in America--the Croatoans.

As the actions unfolds, the two plots intertwine and then join in the spirit world, where good and evil struggle for control of the shofar and the ability to live for ever. However, in Levene's world, the so-called good is not necessarily good; she seems to adopt Rilke's belief that ein jeder Engel ist schrecklich (that every angel is horrifying/terrible).

My conclusion is that the novel is just downright fun to read. Levene throws almost every meme, metaphor, and trope available into the narrative, even pulling off a nice time travel sub-plot that ties everything together. Alex and her bouts with the trickster reminded me of the novels of Charles de Lint; however, where de Lint's novels are kind-hearted, Levene's are tough, sassy, rugged, and brash. And, frankly, I think that is what she intended.

Gav Thorpe's "The Crown of the Blood"

2010-11-01T10:21:00.000-07:00

Gav Thorpe, along with Paul Kearney, Stephen Pressfield and David Drake, writes war as it should be written: brutal, dark, bloody, treacherous, confusing, and insane. In The Crown of the Blood (Angry Robot 2010), his first independent novel, Thorpe breaks away from the Warhammer universe and paints his own created fantasy world with a broad brush, so broad in fact that at the end of the novel you feel as if you just began your exploration of the brutal and warring world, controlled, dominated, and threatened by the Empire of Askh.

This broad scope, of course, is what the epic fantasy reader wants and Thorpe sets up the pieces on the board to be played through what will either be a trilogy or a series of books. However, and this is important, in the setting up of his universe, through his own unique creation process, Thorpe employs and distorts the usual fantasy tropes (no elves, wizards or haflings here) to provide a somewhat familiar (but not really) psychological as well as realistic view of a bronze-age world at war, where magic is dark and dangerous--horrific really--and warfare is waged on an epic scale: tens of legions square off in gigantic set pieces involving hundreds of thousands of men across a universe. And the result is that Thorpe writes in a vein closer to Gemmell than Tolkien and, as a result, he seems less interested in the glory of the hero than in the psychological underpinning of the combatants, which provides a view of their inner workings and thereby making the novel seem harder, truer, and grave. The result of his method, of course, is a sense of weight, which is necessary for epic fantasy: epic fantasy must have a sense of psychological depth, as demonstrated through well-rounded characters,operating in a unique universe, and a sense of tragedy.

Thorpe provides the elements of tragedy through his depiction of the machinations of the Bloods: the members of the royal family who rule the Empire with the help and guidance of the Brotherhood, a cult of priests, who use alchemy and astrology to manipulate and control their fate. The chief protagonist, although I would argue that there are several because Thorpe uses multiple points of view to describe the workings of the Empire, is Ullsaard, a native of Enair and a young general, commanding several Askh Legions. It is Ullsaard whose arc provides the tragic theme of the novel and it is Ullsaard, who first demonstrates that Thorpe is not interested in providing us with a epic fantasy stereotype. Ullsaard is a complex man, full of pride and ambition, who, at times, is not particularly smart or honorable. It is his story that propels the plot but he is not always a hero or heroic. Sometimes he is pitiful, cowardly and vainglorious, asking others to do his dirty work or betraying life-long allies, even brothers. In fact, I would argue that there is no real "hero" in the novel; instead, Thorpe provides us with a myriad of flawed individuals, who blindly grope for power on various levels in a brutal world. However, Ullsaard, of course, carries the plot and it is his fortune that furnishes the exciting force of the novel and provides the elements of tragedy.

With tragedy comes complexity and Thorpe has arranged his novel to include characters from every stratum of the empire. In this, you can see either Tolkien's influence or Shakespeare's (take your pick). In fact, there is a beautiful scene near the end of the novel where one of the POV characters, Gelthius, opts out of raping and pillaging and decides to have a bit of drink, food, and sleep, instead. When the conquering Ullsaard enters the city, he finds the tipsy and drowsing Gelthius on the steps leading to the ramparts. The scene illustrates the common legionnaire interacting with the great general and brings to conclusion the multiple points of view approach that allowed us to see the working of the Legions. A nice touch to a book full of nice touches.

In the final analysis, a created world must have created beings; and, although Thorpe has avoided the usual fantasy tropes, he does provide us with some interesting creations: the officers of the legions ride giant cats called ailurs; the cavalry ride Kolubrids, large snake-like creatures; the warriors of Mekha ride reptilian creatures called behemodon; while slavers travel in landships, propelled by oarsmen. The sine qua non of fantasy tropes--the horse--is no where to be found. He also has created a unique social world, where polygamy is the norm, bastards of the Blood are hunted down by the Brotherhood; and debtor prisons common. The magic, too, is different, it seems based on human sacrifice, alchemy, and astrology.

All in all, the novel is well-written, with a complex plot that promises additional books, ruthless, fully-developed characters, and a penchant for psychological realism that makes the book an adult read rather than a childish escape.

Ian Whates' "City of Dream and Nightmare"

2010-10-26T11:34:00.000-07:00

Hub Magazine, Issue 131, contains my review of Ian Whates' City of Dreams & Nightmare. You can find it here. http://www.hubfiction.com

Pat Kelleher's "Black Hand Gang"

2010-10-18T14:07:00.000-07:00

Recently, just last week in fact, I was browsing Barnes & Noble when I spied Kelleher's Black Hand Gang (Abaddon Books 2010), a World War I horror/military/fantasy novel, with an arresting cover by Pye Parr. However, a cover does not make a book so I gave it my patented first line test: "there was a Front, but damned if we knew where." Good, I am interested. From the cover I could tell the story takes place during the first Somme offensive and there are giant worms and tanks, and from the first line I could sense the exciting force percolating away, drawing me in to a distinctly unique, created world, so I read on.

The book begins as many novels of the great pulp fiction era do: with a pseudo- history based on some real events; however, here there is more "real" history than usual and this history does not just start with the first world war but goes back even further, raising the specter of other disappeared colonies and a surprising, but believable tie-in, to my old friend, the alchemist and Queen's Conjuror, Doctor John Dee. Curiouser and curiouser, I thought.

Additionally, as I read I determined quickly that the prose is tight and well-honed, and that this guy Kelleher, who I have never heard of, has the chops. I surmise this isn't his first time out.

So I buy the book and read it quickly over the weekend because it is simply one of those books--a page turner--and, once finished, I am not disappointed.

First, it is well-crafted, as I said; Kelleher structures each chapter to create suspense and take us onto the next, and the research spot-on. I believed the early chapters in no man's land implicitly, just as I did later when the situs morphs onto a new world and the heroes find themselves in a hostile environment. This bump, this movement from the known world of France during World War I to the secondary world, makes the novel ultimately a portal novel in the grand tradition of Edgar Rice Burroughs, John Norman, David Lindsay, and even C. S. Lewis. Further, the novel is more; it reveals all those earlier influences but it also shares similarities with H.P. Lovecraft, H. G. Wells, and Jules Verne. In fact, during the reading I thought of Verne's Mysterious Island several times, as well as Wells' dystopian novels.

Although there seems to be a resonance of pulp and a direct lineage to the novels of the early 20th century, the novel has its own, post modern sensibility, as it employs pulp, horror, and military tropes to create a cohesive work that stands alone.

There is even a hint of steam punk. By choosing the first world war, which happens to be the situs of many early pulp novels, the novel has at its disposal a plethora of punky weapons, including a Flammenwerfer

Second, when we get to the novel itself, Kelleher has accomplished something that is quite difficult to do. He has given us an entire company of soldiers that we like, hate, or feel despair. Not since First and Only, the debut novel in Dan Abnett's Gaunt's Ghost series, have we had as intimate a view of the quotidian operations of a company. To juggle these characters is a task that only an experienced writer can accomplish and Kelleher does it well.

In summary, the novel involves a company of British soldiers on the western front that, through some apparatus (magic or alchemical), are transported to another world where they battle to survive its hostile environment and its strange sentient beings. The steam punk elements (biplanes, tanks, Flammenwerfer, gas, and trench warfare itself)and the historical accuracies, along with the Edwardian behavior of the men and women, create a unique reading experience. More particularly, the novel is action-packed; the world upon which the characters land is a brilliantly created "death" world that portends other books and adventures, evidenced by several plot lines left unsolved: a reference to the god Croatoan (which ties this novel to the mystery of the disappeared Roanoke colony in 1590), an escaped magus, not to mention an entire stranded company, and some crazy gods--alluded to and worshiped but not seen, yet.

"Zoo City" by Lauren Beukes

2010-10-11T12:01:00.000-07:00

In August 2009, Red Rook Review highly recommended Ms Beukes' first book, Moxyland. Moxyland is just now appearing in the United States to high acclaim and you can read my review here: http://redrookreview.blogspot.com/2009/08/moxyland-by-lauren-beukes.html.

Her second novel, Zoo City, which will soon be available in the United Kingdom, however, is a better book for reasons that might confuse some of the die-hard urban fantasists but will please those readers who yearn for well-written, thoughtful, and reality-based fantasy.

To begin, Beukes just writes well. Her novel is a first-person narrative that shares and incorporates most of the tropes of noir fiction but also possesses a well-thought-out and heavily researched psychological underpinning, which elevates the novel from the category of simple noir to psychological noir with an element of the uncanny (using Freud's definition of "uncanny" here). If we put these elements together to categorize the novel, it is a psychological thriller based in the present with an underlying theme of the uncanny that approaches the horrific. And because of the the uncanny elements, which function both literally and figuratively in the tale, it falls within the category of urban fantasy on the one hand but it also demonstrates elements of a 19th century romance (cf: The Scarlet Letter and The Woman in White)on the other. Her facile mixture of genre types, of course, makes the novel post-modern in a very literal sense and as a result of her genre-bending and exquisite prose, Ms Beukes must be taken seriously, not only as an urban fantasist but as a serious writer of ideas.

Irrespective of the literary impulses that inform the novel and raise it, in my eyes, above the usual fare we find in the science fiction and fantasy ghetto of our local bookstore, Zoo City is on the most fundamental level a fun read. The characters are interesting, the setting unique, especially to Western eyes, the mystery is really a mystery, and the magic is based on existing human belief systems.

In regard to characters, the protagonist, rather than a down-on-his-luck PI, is a twenty-something black woman by the name of Zinzi December. Zinzi is an ex-journalist, drug-addicted, convicted felon, who uses her uncanny skill to track down lost objects in Johannesburg. Zinzi lives in a neighborhood called Zoo City and Zoo City is, in reality, a ghetto, where aposymbiots congregate. Aposymbiots possess mashavi, which is an African word that describes both the preternatural talents of a aposymbiot and the aposymbiot's familiar. An aposymbiot is a sinner (felon), whose sin is manifest in the literal form of an animal, who lives symbiotically with the human. The animal, in effect, makes tangible the tort and is to be seen like Hester Prynne's "A" as a sign of her penance and a warning to all others. In other words, the greater the sin the more dangerous the familiar animal. Zinzi's animal is a cute sloth, whereas other possess much more formidable creatures: crocodiles and buzzards. The animals in Zoo City, however, are not figurative as in Pullman, nor are they to be seen as a part of the soul; they are living, breathing creatures that are connected intrinsically with the the physical body of the sinner.

The novel begins with Zinzi being asked to find a ring. She takes the job because she is in debt to some loan sharks, who are running an internet scam, and forcing her to use her journalist skills to write copy for their schemes. Because of her past crime and her animal she is unable to find legitimate work.

The job of finding the ring brings her into contact with members of the music business, who hire her to find a lost teenage singer. The singer is a twin and Zinzi's search allows us to see the inner workings of the South African music business, the world of nightclubs, and the workings of Johannesburg. It is here that the novel feels very real. Ms Beukes is a journalist and she creates a vivid picture of present day Johannesburg. We see the crime on the streets, the rich in their protected environment, and the every day lives of the poor. Hers is a world new to most Western eyes. Just her literal description of an existing milieu makes the novel unique. However, within this context, she also serves up the magic of Africa, the folklore and the witchcraft. This underlying texture of the uncanny hardly intrudes on the fictional realty of the present day world until the very end.

As in all crime fiction, we soon learn that Zinzi is being used and that there is more going on than just the search for a lost girl. This plot device creates suspense and surprise; and, when the denouement comes near the end of the novel Beukes does not serve up a rosy ending; instead, she writes a brutal conclusion, which in its internal logic, is satisfying but horrific.

Finally, Beukes' characters are hip and sexy and her protagonist acts like a real woman. The sex scenes are believable, just as the action scenes are taut, believable, and bloody. Zinzi December is a keeper. Maybe she will appear again with the sloth. I hope so.

At this point I usually recommend other books similar to the author's. Strangely, the two books I thought of while I was reading the novel were Bernard Malamud's The Tenants and China Mieville's Perdido Street Station. You figure it out.

Issue 125-Hub Magazine

2010-08-16T08:17:00.000-07:00

Issue 125 of Hub Magazine contains my review of Michael Moorcock's Hawkmoon: Amulet of the Mad God"s Amulet. Check it out at http://www.hubfiction.com/

"The City"

2010-07-15T09:44:00.000-07:00

The City is now available in Issue # 124 of Hub Magazine.

"Border Princes" by Dan Abnett

2010-06-21T09:12:00.000-07:00

Almost smack middle in the Border Princes, a BBC Book, featuring the team from Torchwood, Dan Abnett, author of the Gaunt's Ghosts series for Black Library, various comics for Marvel, and Triumff from the British imprint Angry Robot Books, demonstrates his greatest strength: the ability to present a scene of horrific violence without actually describing the violence. The trick, of course, is that the reader imagines the horrific machinations that occurred offstage and fills in the details, thereby heightening or magnifying the sensation of violence. Here is a portion of the scene: "The bodies--there were no whole bodies, just pieces--had been scattered in front of his shed. It looked like a direct hit by an 88 round, except there was no crater, no litter of cordite ash. The poor bastards looked like they had been pushed through a wood chipper. Bits of bone and half-limbs, some still partly clothed in meat, protruded from the soil as though they were heads of celery, carefully planted. (p. 148)"

Border Princes is a Torchwood novel, and Torchwood, of course, is the BBC series featuring Captain Jack Harkness. Harkness appeared originally in several Doctor Who episodes and who, through the actions of Rose Tyler, is now immortal and heading up the Torchwood team guarding Cardiff against the denizens and riff-raff that enter our world through the Rift. The Rift in the Doctor Who universe is located at Cardiff Bay, Wales and acts as a generator of stories. It has been defined as a wormhole but it acts as portal contacting various universes. The Rift appeared initially in the Doctor Who episode, entitled "The Unquiet Dead," starring Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor. In that brilliant episode, featuring Simon Callow as Dickens, a rift opens in Victorian Cardiff and allows the Gelth, gaseous humanoid organisms to pass into a funeral parlor, where they inhabit corpses. Additionally, the Rift releases radiation, which grants people psychic powers, including Gwyneth, a servant in the parlor. Gwyneth in the episode is played by Eve Myles, who later plays the current day policewoman Gwen in Torchwood and perhaps is a descendant of the first Gwyneth. In the Doctor Who episode Gwyneth saves humanity by the forfeiture of her life. In Abnett's Border Princes, the modern Gwen is also at the center of the action. This time her forfeiture involves the loss of a lover.

Abnett's novel contains the usual suspects but at the same time it shares and demonstrates all the Abnett tropes and devices. First, Abnett uses multiple points of view. That works well with this novel because it is really about the team. Second, Abnett is the master of delay and suspense. He carries us along to the end by slowly dribbling out the clues. Intertwined with the mystery of the sixth member of the Torchwood team, James, is numerous other stories of Rift mishaps and mayhem. Third, no one writes combat better than Abnett and there is plenty here. His alien creatures sizzle with hardware and battle expertise, causing us to want to know more about them. Fourth, surprisingly, Abnett writes domestic scenes well. My fantasy was that his well-crafted scenes between James and Gwen were echoes from his own relationships.

Needless to say, the novel is well-written, exciting and true to the Torchwood IP. However, it is almost impossible to discuss the plot without giving something away. So I won't. Instead, I will just say that if you like Torchwood, you will like this novel. If you like Abnett, you will be pleased because you get the usual Abnett--plus. The plus is the way in which he describes domestic scenes and relationships. In the Border Princes, Gwen is having trouble with Rhys, her boyfriend. The number of incursions through the Rift has increased her workload and is interfering with her personal life.

Finally, if you haven't read Abnett, I recommend the following novels: the omnibus volume from Black Library, entitled The Saint; the Warhammer novel Riders of the Dead, a personal favorite, and Triumff from Angry Robot.

"The City"

2010-06-21T08:01:00.001-07:00

Hub Magazine has accepted the short story, The City, for publication. I will alert you to its appearance.

Review of Nathan Long's "Bloodborn"

2010-06-02T11:42:00.000-07:00

Issue 122 of Hub Magazine contains my review of Nathan Long's Bloodborn. You may read it here:

http://www.hubfiction.com/2010/05/issue-122/.

This is the second of five reviews that I have written for Hub Magazine.

Mark Chadbourn's "The Ice Wolves," a Hellboy Novel

2010-04-27T11:40:00.000-07:00

Hellboy has waged war against diverse antagonists, including Nazis and the witch Baba Yaga, over the years. In Mark Chadbourn's turn at the intellectual property created by Mike Mignola in 1993, Hellboy is pitted against an army of werewolves on the snow-covered streets and hills of Boston.

Because of Guillermo del Toro, Hellboy is almost a household meme; everybody thinks they know Hellboy, although they actually usually know only del Toro's version, as embodied by Ron Perlman.

Chadbourn's Hellboy seems different to me and the novel's setting is pure Chadbourn: haunted houses, ancient races, archetypal creatures, running amok in the major cities of the world. In The Ice Wolves, the eponymous wolves are more the incarnation of the dark, primal instincts of man, released into the modern world through the operation of two occult devices created by a shaman to save his tribe from ravaging wolves in a pre-historical world of Eastern Europe. Through magic, the wolves are absorbed by man and their murderous instincts internalized to lie dormant until their release during the Time of the Black Sun.

The novel begins with Kate Corrigan at the folklore department of New York University, awaiting Hellboy. Through her research, she has determined that certain periods of history have witnessed epidemics of lycanthropy and that these occurrences involve a prophecy of the coming of the Time of the Black Sun. She and a colleague have discerned a pattern of movement and mayhem that indicates that there is a modern epidemic and that the wolves are converging upon the United States.

Hellboy's arrival coincides with the appearance of the wolves in the United States and the death of Kate's colleague, Daniel. Daniel's last act is to materialize to Kate and Hellboy and warn them that the wolves have activated the Heart of Winter and are headed to Boston to retrieve the second relic, the Kiss of Winter, in order to initiate the Time of the Black Sun. Daniel informs them that the Kiss of Winter is hidden in the Grant Mansion in Boston, a house rumored to be the most haunted house in New England.

With the introduction of the Grant House, Chadbourn leads us into H. P. Lovecraft territory. He also delves into several sub-plots: the story of Brad Lynch and his estranged father, now owner of the Grant Mansion; the story of the Grants and the origin story of the Kiss of Winter; the birth of the lycans and their involvement with and search for the two relics; a haunted house story; time shifting and time travel; and a pastiche of Gothic elements that align the novel with the works of Poe, H.P Lovecraft, and Henry James.

Chadbourn handles each narrative level competently; however, sadly, I did not find the parental tales particularly interesting, although they are integral to the plot and must be developed in order to resolve the conflict. Nevertheless, Chadbourn shines when dealing with mythic and archetypal elements and action.

Ultimately, the two stars of the novel are Hellboy and the haunted house and these two characters are worth the journey through the work. Chadbourn writes a smooth crystalline prose and he knows how to tell a story. The Gothic aspects of the novel are true to the genre and the pastiche of Lovecraftian elements is convincing.

I was particularly intrigued by Chadbourn's recreations of the past and the origin of the wolves and the two relics: the Kiss of Winter and the Heart of Winter.

The novel is a fast read, loyal to the genre and its hero--Hellboy.

"The King of the Fields" by Isaac Bashevis Singer

2010-03-29T13:38:00.000-07:00

Singer in his novel The King of the Fields, written in 1988, just three years before his death, examines religions (Christian, pagan, Jewish), myth, male-female relationships, sex, politics, and man, through a purported history of pre-medieval Poland. The novel is basically an existential examination of man and his beliefs positioned in a fairy-tale world. In many ways it shares themes with the Book of Job and possesses slipstream qualities similar to those in William Golding's The Inheritors and Jack London's Before Adam. But even this comparison is not accurate. Perhaps, a better comparison would be to Kafka's The Castle, Hesse's Narcissus and Goldmund, Bergman's The Virgin Spring, or Camus' The Plague. All of these books are philosophic texts examining belief and philosophy. Each of these books illustrates how a novelist can write a philosophic text without sacrificing the essential qualities and pleasures inherent in a novel.

The story is set during the emergence of Poland approximately three or four centuries after the death of Christ, a time when the hunter-gatherers are beginning to cultivate the fields and missionaries from Rome are arriving in the Northern woods to convert the pagans to Christianity. In his created world of the forests near the Vistula, Singer demonstrates dramatically the interaction and absurdities of religion as exercised by untutored, unlettered men, struggling for supremacy and survival in a state of nature. Like Hobbes, Singer shows man in this fantastic world as brutish and deadly; with his survival depending upon strength, intelligence, guile, and luck.

Iron men ravage the land, destroying, murdering and raping; however, our protagonist, Cybula, although a skilled hunter, is not a hero or a warrior. Instead, he seems to be a precursor to the Singer nebbish. He assumes control when fate demands it but he is never comfortable with the mantle. Women control his life, although he seems to have an inordinate success with them. He is not comfortable with the change from hunter-gatherer to sower, farmer, villager, although he quickly sees its advantages.

The action begins when a group of Poles take control of a tribe of Lesniks; hunter-gatherers living near the Zakopane mountains. The Poles led by Krol Rudy, the Red King, descend on the Lesniks like wolves on sheep. They murder the men and rape the women. Some of the Lesniks, led by Cybula, flee to the forests and the mountains but most of the survivors--women and children--fall under the control of the Poles. Eventually, Krol Rudy makes peace with the Lesniks because he needs workers to harvest his wheat. He, then, makes Cybula his head-man and marries his daughter to tie the Lesniks and the Poles together through marriage.

On one level Singer uses this story to study the transformation of the Lesniks from hunter-gatherers to town dwellers and farmers. On another level he follows the progression of man's beliefs in the gods. First Ben Dosa, a Jew, arrives in the village, and he brings the message of the one God. Later, a priest arrives and he preaches Christ and accuses Ben Dosa of killing God.

Suddenly, religious prejudice arises and hatred of the other fills the villagers with rage. The women attack a Mongol woman for her slanted eyes and they beat Ben Dosa for trying to protect her. Within the context of the novel, Singer works in the theme of the scape-goat and hatred of the Jew, as other.

We quickly realize that Singer is using the historical novel to comment on the present, on the way the world is now. Although, the Jew, Ben Dosa, is a decent and moral man, Cybula is the protagonist and the one who carries Singer's ultimate message. Cybula worships only one God and that God is death. Singer's conclusion is:life is short and brutish and the only tangible, living God that man can expect to speak or reveal himself is death. For Cybula there are moments of passion and happiness but these moments are short and rare. There is always another Krol Rudy who wishes to take control and dominate.

Ultimately, the novel is existential in theme. Cybula is a loner, who leaves the village and lives in exile in the woods with his young wife, Kora, and waits for death, which he expects to arrive shortly. Ben Dosa seems to experience a bit of happiness in Rome with his people but even his happiness is overshadowed by superstition and emanations of fate.

Although the themes of the novel are dark and man's future bleak, it is an amazing book. Singer translated it from the Yiddish and the prose is precise and lyrical. He carefully describes the society and its inhabitants. Each character is delineated and articulated. And even though it is a complete fabrication, more a fairy-tale, than a realistic rendition of a historical period, it is so well-wrought that you believe in it and its characters.

Singer's novels, like the novels of Kafka, always seem to have a quality of otherness to them. When the villagers talk about the witch god, Baba Yaga, you expect her to appear. Mystery and magic seem to lurk around the edges, although the novel is meant to be realistic. It is this magical realism that raises the book in my esteem.

My Review of Michael Moorcock's "The Jewel in the Skull" in Hub Magazine

2010-03-24T12:10:00.000-07:00

Issue 115 of Hub Magazine not only contains an interview with the great Texas writer Joe. R. Lansdale but also my review of Michael Moorcock's The Jewel in the Skull. Please check it out.

www.hubfiction.com/2010/03/issue-115/

Rebecca Newberger Goldstein's "36 Arguments for the Existence of God"

2010-03-11T13:24:00.000-08:00

As a novel of ideas, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein's 36 Arguments for the Existence of God succeeds magnificently but as a novel of manners, a Jewish novel, or just a novel it fails to reach its potential.

There is a story or stories lurking underneath or behind the action of Rebecca Newberger Goldstein's new novel that she does not explicitly present but which I think she consciously alludes to: the story of the search for God in the seventeenth century. The players or protagonists of this hidden story are Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Malebranche, Arnauld, and Newton; but Ms Goldstein keeps this story on the low down, even though she has written one of the best books around on Spinoza, a thinker who is emerging as one of the seminal thinkers of the modern age. There is also another story, just as important as the first, which she doesn't explicitly refer to and that is the role that mathematics and logic play in the theories of God and human understanding. Here too her true protagonists--Wittgenstein, Godel and Newton--are also hidden, although she does create several characters who are mathematicians and she has Cass Seltzer, her revealed protagonist, repeat some of the same conclusions as her hidden protagonists.

What she does reveal on the surface is her dependence or I should say Cass Seltzer's dependence on the writings of William James and Sigmund Freud. And even though Cass Seltzer states that he is indebted to James' Varieties of Religious Experience and Freud's The Future of an Illusion, I would argue that it is really Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise that we should look to understand Cass' position.

But Cass is not just concerned with the arguments for the existence of God but also the psychology of the religious function in man, because he knows that in the long run that it does not matter if we say, like Nietzsche, that God is dead and believe it, the truth of the matter is that man created God and he will resurrect him in one form or another every time that someone buries our God or the current version of our God. The idea of God is immanent in man and cannot be overcome, so we must say, like Rilke, that we are bees producing the honey of god. It is through us that God comes to know himself.

Consequently, I believe that from the standpoint of a book of ideas, Ms Goldstein's book achieves its purpose brilliantly; however, as a novel it fails to achieve its potential. And when I say fails to achieve its potential, I don't mean to say it is uninteresting because it is nor that is not a page-turner because it is. What I mean to say is that it fails as a novel in the sense that it fails to develop its characters and plot fully. There is so much here and yet so much that is undeveloped or ignored.

A story can be illustrated like this: the king dies and the queen dies, while a plot can be illustrated like this: the king dies and the queen dies of grief. I feel that we get a good story filled with fascinating ideas but we don't get a finished and polished plot.

Ms. Goldstein creates several characters, most of whom are full of potential as characters, but then she lets them wander out of the novel without dramatizing their exit. Her most successful character is Roz Margolis, an anthropologist, and ex-lover of Cass Seltzer; her most unsuccessful characters are Lucinda Mandelbaum and Pascal Puissant, who seem to be caricatures. Two characters that should have dominated the book but seem almost, at the end, as add-ons are Azarya, the Rebbe of the Valdeners, and Jonas Klapper, the maniacal professor, who envisions himself as the latest messiah. Interestedly, both Klapper and Azarya are gaons, geniuses who become to their followers and in the case of Klapper to himself, messiahs. This is an interesting idea and as a theme, perhaps one of the most interesting in a book choc-a-block with interesting themes and ideas. However, it is not fully developed, just mentioned.

Cass, in my opinion, is the weakest character in the novel. His motivations and beliefs should have been our main concern. His conflicts arising from his Hasidic heritage should have been the main thrust. Instead, we get a weak-willed man wandering through Boston, manipulated by wives, lovers, and despots.

Nevertheless, in the final analysis, we must judge a novel on how much we think about it after we put it down and how much it disturbs us at night as we try to fall asleep. In the case of Rebecca Newberger Goldstein's 36 Arguments for the Existence of God, I am still thinking about it days after I finished and I am still arguing with Cass Seltzer.

"Rynn's World" by Steve Parker

2010-01-26T13:45:00.000-08:00

The 2010 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest is now in full swing and I recently downloaded one of their presentations, which purported to break down the difference between genre literature and general fiction or literary fiction. In their view, genre fiction concentrates on plot, whereas literary fiction is about the prose and the character development.

You know, maybe they are right, but if I read a "genre" novel with poor prose I usually throw it down. It is true that we want strong plotting in our mysteries and our science fiction but we also want strong prose, well-developed characters, and emotion. I for one want to feel something and since I have been reading science fiction and fantasy fiction for over forty years I also want something new, not re-warmed beans.

I picked up Rynn's World last Thursday and since my to-be read stack blocks my view of the sun, I didn't anticipate getting to it right away. However, I decided to have a coffee at Barnes & Noble and maybe browse through my purchases, which consisted of James Swallow's Black Tide, a new edition of Robert A. Howard's The Hour of the Dragon and, of course, Rynn's World.

While waiting for my coffee, I found my interest piqued by two things in the Parker book. First of all let me say that I really like its new, larger format. It is easy to read and it just feels good in your hands. And when you are a myopic old guy, the bigger the print, the better. Second, as an amateur military historian and military science fiction fan, I appreciate the colored maps in the center of the book.

Needless to say, I found myself just peeking into the book. After a few moments, I said: a little taste won't hurt me. I will go back home and finish Abnett's Triumff this evening. Forty pages later, I said: damn this is a good book. I guess Abnett will have to wait.

Don't get me wrong, I like Abnett but Steve Parker's new novel is an exciting, bold read. It is not cluttered with a lot of tired psychology; instead, he gets to it. As we said at the beginning, genre fiction runs on plot and Rynn's World is as tightly plotted as a military campaign. There is a clear logical flow to the story and it makes sense militarily.

But it isn't just all action either. The characters are drawn carefully and fully executed.

The story concerns the Crimson Fist chapter of the Adeptus Astartes based on Rynn's World. The Crimson Fists are an off-shoot of Rogal Dorn's Imperial Fists.

The action opens en medias res with an active Waaagh! (an invasion of orks) in full swing and heading toward Rynn's World. Pedro Kantor, the Chapter master, must devise a defense for Rynn's world with his small force of space marines. With this premise, the novel promises lots of action; however, Steve Parker is a brave writer. He shakes things up early. One of the best scenes in the book concerns a sniper. From his actions a host of bad things evolve:

It was happening exactly as Captain Drakken had anticipated, and, for the first time since the ork vehicles had shown up, Mishina started to feel truly confident that everything would go according to plan.

That was when he heard Kennon on the comm-link again.

"The warlord is moving, sergeant. I can't wait any longer. I am taking the shot!"

Without giving too much away this is an exciting, well-plotted military science fiction novel about space marines. I frankly feel that the novel will appeal to any science fiction reader, irrespective of the fact that it is a Warhammer novel and that it contains the requisite amount of fluff to satisfy any Warhammer fan.

After three novels Parker seems to be a budding master of what I call a "I hear the pipes, laddie" sequence. The best way to explain this phenomenon is to refer to an old Cecil B. Demille film Unconquered, where just the sound of the pipes and drums raises the spirit of the embattled pioneers at Fort Pitt during the French and Indian War. Many times in this novel, I heard the sound of the pipes and a tear formed. Good writing, sir. Good writing.

Finally, I want to say something about Mr. Parker and orks. I think he might have the flair and the sensibility to write the first Ork novel for Warhammer. In each of his novels, he seems to reveal a little more about the culture of the greenskins. I hope that he continues to think about them and , hopefully, the warlord Snagrod will receive his due. I'm just saying.

"Reiksguard" by Richard Williams

2010-01-11T09:21:00.000-08:00

Reiksguard by Richard Williams is one of the first books in Black Library's new series-- "An Empire Army Novel"-- and as such follows like a good trooper all the requirements, tropes, fluff, and alignments necessary to fit within the parameters of the for-hire IP(intellectual property)novel. It is also a contestant in the Dave Gemmell Legend Contest.

The novel concerns the exploits of several characters; there is no one central protagonist in the novel. Instead, it is a ensemble piece, like most "military" novels. Instead, of the lone hero, Williams focuses on the group--the Reiksguard. The novel begins with a new class of inductees to the Reiksguard, an elite order of knights, based in Altdorf and led by Marshall Kurt Helborg. Williams focuses on the group of young nobles who arrive to train during a major war in the north. The enemy is bleeding the knights of their men and replacements are necessary. Consequently, the initiates' training takes on not only a sense of urgency but also one of intrigue and danger. This tension is underlined by the appearance of a vivid group of mercenaries led by the uncle of one of the major characters of the novel Siebrecht von Matz.

The first part of the book concentrates on the training of young nobles from all the regions of the empire and the petty disputes born of nationalistic prejudices that those young men bring to Altdorf. The second part of the book concerns an expedition in the south to free up supply routes choked by an infestation of goblins led by a mutant goblin by the name of Thorntoad. Thorntoad, like all great villains,almost steals the show from the Reiksguard.

The strength of the novel lies in Williams' faultless prose, his understanding of military actions and behavior, the vivid battle scenes, and the well-described world of the goblin invaders. Additionally, the novel presents a certain psychological complexity: the young nobles are purblind, obstinate, ignorant, and petty; the politicians manipulative, cunning, and cruel, and the generals (except for Helborg) foolish and ambitious. The battle scenes are well wrought and explicit. Williams seems to understand the use of his military arsenal and he describes action scenes in a facile, believable way.And finally, the novel moves organically; every action seems to grow out the scene before it, which makes for an enjoyable, seamless read.

The one problem I had with the book was the conflict or mystery concerning Delmar von Reinhardt; it was one of those problems (so common in genre fiction and the mainstay in romance fiction) that could have been solved simply by having a meaningful conversation between the parties involved.

Reiksguard is a flawless military fantasy novel that involves a well-described, interesting, ensemble cast. However, sometimes the epithet "IP" spells doom to the writer who wants to attract a larger audience; that larger audience being, of course, the general fantasy reader who desires new worlds, new monsters, and new adventures. The moniker "IP" also has a chilling effect for judges of contests like the Dave Gemmell Legend Award. However, in the case of Reiksguard, I hope the readers avoid the stereotype. Yes, the book fulfills its pedigree; it is a Warhammer novel and the fans of Warhammer will enjoy it and applaud the "fluff." However, irrespective of its setting and pedigree, the novel is also a rousing military yarn with interesting, complex characters, operating in a well-wrought fantasy universe, which qualifies it to stand with the other non-IP novels in the Legend contest.

The strength of Gemmell's novels lies not only in his settings and characterization but in his pacing and narrative; he could also describe a fight (any kind of fight--from siege to knife fight) vividly. Further, he had no qualm about letting a character face his fate. Many brilliantly wrought characters died within the narrative structure. Williams has this same talent. There is a scene late in the novel where two characters, who had been enemies, fight back-to-back to survive an onslaught of goblins. It is a touching and at times humorous scene; well executed. As I read it, I felt the Gemmell touch (influence). I think that it is this kind of emotion and execution that the Gemmell reviewers are looking for and will find in Richard Williams' Reiksguard. Because ultimately emotion is what sets the Gemmell novel apart from most fantasy literature.

Regression within Progression: A Review of Colin Harvey's "Winter Song"

2009-12-28T14:38:00.000-08:00

Several critics have pointed out a similarity between Poul Anderson's The Long Night Series and Colin Harvey's first novel for Angry Robot, Winter Song. I certainly thought of Anderson, who happens to be one my favorite pulp fiction writers from my youth in the fifties, but I did not go there immediately. Instead, I was reminded instantly of the landfall novels of Marion Zimmer Bradley (Darkover Landfall), L. E. Modesitt, Jr.'s Fall of Angels, and the novels of Iain Banks and Larry Niven. There may even be a hint or shall I say a scent of Asimov here (more on this later). However, curiously, I found the most resonance in a comparison between the science fiction novels of Modesitt and Harvey's; I felt this resonance or perhaps echo not because of content but because of the tone. Modesitt's novels fascinate primarily because of their firm grasp of the way things work: politics, economy, and science. I felt that same attention to world-building in the myriad of details that Harvey sprinkled within the text to intimate or to suggest that a larger canvas, a more complex super-structure of culture, was operating somewhere behind the action of the characters of his novel on the icy world of Isheimur.

The novel concerns a space-trader from the planet Avalon by the name of Karl Allman, who while crossing the Mizar B2 system, is attacked by three Traditional ships. The Traditionals are un-enhanced humans, whereas Karl is a hybrid, an augmented human. With his ship damaged and dying, he ejects into space encased in a "quivering blue jelly, three metres high, and stuffed full of nanos." Before he goes, the ship's computer downloads a plethora of information into Allman, which creates one of the major conceits of the novel. Allman enters space no longer a single entity; instead, he is two beings: one personality is Karl; the other is the ship's computer's download of information, a sentient entity occupying Karl's body and forming its own personality. And whereas Karl is unconscious and asleep at landfall, the other entity is alive and becoming conscious.

Karl floats toward Isheimur, a terraformed world settled before the falling of "the Long night," by Icelandic peoples, seeking to maintain their cultural identity. Two centuries have passed since their arrival and Karl does not know whether any of the settlers have survived; however, the planet is his best bet for survival and he aims for it and lands in a fury of flames. Thus we "fall" into a medieval culture, which for the most part has forgotten modern life. There are computers called "oracles" and a form of the world wide web but for the most part Isheimur is a pre-Christian medieval society, governed by Gothis.

Karl falls to earth near the village of Skorradalur and is discovered by the Gothi Ragnar. Ragnar and his men bring the burnt and unconscious Karl back to the village, unperturbed by the fact that a spaceman has fallen onto their world. This fact is one of the unusual factors of the novel. Even though the settlers have regressed to a primitive state they are cognizant of spacemen, computers, and modern weapons. While they believe in the Norse gods, ghosts, shape shifters, and holy men, they also rely on computers to supply them with parts for their equipment and information. This schizophrenia is one of the major themes of the novel and Harvey consistently develops it throughout his tight narrative. Schizoid behavior underlies the cultural structure of the planet and the personality of the inhabitants.

Once Karl lands, he loses consciousness and the other entity that inhabits his mind, the artificial intelligence from his ship, takes center stage. The natives christen the other being, Loki, and thus begins the schizophrenic struggle between the two beings encased in Karl's body.

During his stay Karl hears of a legend of an ancient ship called the Winter Song and decides to set off on a journey. However, Ragnar declares that Karl is indebted to him and must work off his debt. Karl escapes and Bera, an orphan and dependent of Ragnar, accompanies him; together they uncover several secrets about the colonization of the planet.

In conclusion, I was duly impressed with Winter Song. The prose is direct, strong, and serviceable; the characters are clearly drawn, the world of Isheimur completely realized, and the narrative convincing and satisfying. Ultimately, I was struck by the complexity of the novel. Its complexity, however, does not arise from the plot; it is rather simple. Instead, it is the magnitude of detail that supports the world-building. Harvey has succeeded in creating a fascinating planet with a unique environment, exotic fauna and flora, a medieval culture with its social constructs, traditions, and structures, and three humanoid species, not to mention several off-world cultures.

Finally, at the beginning of this review I suggested that there was a scent of Asimov here and in the preceding paragraph, I said that the "prose is direct." There is a point, a sore spot as it were, that I want to make. There seems to be a tendency in speculative fiction these days to attack the serviceable prose. This same criticism has also been directed against Asimov; however, I for one find the more fantastic the voyage the more material, direct, and clear should be the prose. This is a lesson I learned from studying the surrealists and I think it applies in speculative fiction. Harvey seems to follow the Asimov model. That is he describes the most fantastical things in a clear precise way; he uses short declarative sentences to tell a most outlandish tale.

As a result I found Winter Tale quite convincing and entertaining.

"As Above, So Below," a Review of James Lovegrove's "The Age of Ra"

2009-12-09T12:25:00.000-08:00

Carl Jung believed firmly in the ancient expression, "as above, so below," from the alchemical text, The Emerald Tablet. For the follower of ancient hermeticism this expression holds the key to all the mysteries of the universe. Jung used the formula to explain the relationship between the unconscious and conscious mind, whereas Hermes Trismegistus, the author of The Emerald Tablet, saw it as a key to open the magic inherent in the world.

The ultimate meaning of the adage is that the macrocosmos is mirrored in the microcosmos and that God is the same as man.

James Lovegrove uses this formula as the organizing principle of his tightly-crafted novel, The Age of Ra, to create two worlds: earth far in the future, where the Egyptian gods have defeated all other gods and divided the earth into warring factions, each aligned with a god from the pantheon; and the pantheon itself, with all its petty struggles and jealousies.

Lovegrove, therefore, tells four tales with four parallel arcs within this format: (1) the story of the gods and their movement in the pantheon; (2) the personal tale of the godly struggle between Set, Osiris, Isis and, Set's wife, Nephthys; (3) the war between the worldly factions and their struggle for dominance; and (4) the personal struggle between Lieutenant David Westwynter, a British soldier, and his younger brother Steven.

Ultimately, the novel is about fratricide and sibling rivalry, both on earth and in heaven.

The novel begins as military science fiction. David Westwynter and his paratroop unit drop behind enemy lines in the Arabian desert to rendezvous with an American unit. The British Commandos, commanded by Westwynter worship Osiris, whereas their American counterparts follow Horus. Together the two factions are waging a secret war against the Nephthysians.

Lovegrove is a good writer and he immediately establishes the rules. The novel is told from the point of view of David Westwynter; it is a tightly-constructed narrative with a no-nonsense prose style. The British commandos are an elite fighting group and we are on solid military science ground here, following the team to the rendezvous point. However, Lovegrove quickly lets us know that he is not writing a standard military science fiction novel. Our first clue is that the men carry Ba weapons and the battle locations are ancient locations, re-animated to a future context. And by the end of the chapter, the mummies arrive.

Even though Lovegrove clearly employs elements of myth, horror, and science fiction, the novel doesn't feel like a post-modernist romp. Instead, it reminds me of the movies and novels I liked as a kid. More particularly, the story of David Westwynter and his brother Steven is reminiscent of films like "Beau Geste," "The Charge of the Light Brigade," and "The Four Feathers." The difference here, of course, is the blending of three speculative tropes with the traditional British romantic novel of the early twentieth century: military science fiction, Egyptian mythology, and horror (more specifically--the mummy as horror).

The strength of the novel lies in its traditional underpinning and Lovegrove's thorough understanding of myth. To give just one example: David Westwynter rebels against his rich upper-class British family and joins the army when his younger brother dies in a sea battle. After his capture and escape from the Nephthysians, Westwynter is rescued by freedom fighters from Freegypt. The leader of the fighters is a young woman, who tells him that they are followers of the Lightbringer. The Lightbringer is an enigmatic man, who wears a mask to hide his disfigured face. After the protagonist meets the charismatic Lightbringer, he decides to join the Freegyptian's cause to throw off the rule of the gods and to abandon his allegiance to Osiris and England. This is the stuff of British romantic fiction. One novel that I read over and over as a kid was Thomas Costain's The Black Rose. In that novel a young Anglo-Saxon lord flees Norman rule to win fame and fortune in Cathay, find true love, and return to England. A similar plot is working here.

However, this is not to be interpreted as a criticism of Lovegrove's novel. If you like historical adventure stories, with a touch of the British Empire, à la Kipling and Costain, then this book is for you. Additionally, Lovegrove follows the Aristotelian verities throughout to create a well-written, tightly constructed novel.

The only criticism that I have of the novel is that the gods receive short shrift. However, they are so annoying in their childish displays that, ultimately, I was glad to be rid of them.

In the final analysis, The Age of Ra is a tightly-crafted novel, loyal, to the Aristotelian verities, a strong narrative, with well-developed central characters, and a nod to British adventure stories of the forties and fifties.

Andy Remic's Use of Pastiche in Kell's Legend

2009-11-30T10:42:00.000-08:00

Kell's Legend is Book I of the Clockwork Vampire Chronicles and Andy Remic's sixth novel. Andy Remic sees himself as one of the successors to the Dave Gemmell tradition and, in one interview, talks about meeting Gemmell, his admiration of the writer, and his ultimate friendship with the man. The novel has recently been nominated by Angry Robot for the prestigious Dave Gemmell award.

To appreciate fully Kell's Legend we must first look at the rhetorical device of pastiche and its use and efficacy in science fiction and fantasy,examine the schism which exists between the heroic fantasy of J.R.R. Tolkien and that of Michael Moorcock, and then decide whether Remic accomplished his goal--to compose the Gemmell itself.

Even though, Andy Remic acknowledges his gratitude to and admiration of the works of Dave Gemmell, Kell's Legend demonstrates a firmer grounding in the American pulp fiction of the fifties, filtered through the work of Dave Gemmell but ultimately derived from Michael Moorcock, H.P. Lovecraft, Jules Verne, and Robert Howard.

Pastiche is a novel, poem, or painting that incorporates several different styles or is made up of parts drawn from a variety of sources. With this definition in mind, it is safe to say that nearly every fantasy novel is a "pastiche." Every science fiction author or fantasy writer has borrowed heavily not only from the writers that preceded him or her but from myths, legends, fairy tales, sagas, ballads, and history. It is the nature of the beast to borrow and incorporate the themes of the cultural Geist(socius) that swirls within the genre. However, in the case of Kell's Legend, Andy Remic has consciously acknowledged that he is writing a pastiche and that he owes and admires several specific practitioners of heroic fantasy. Through his acknowledgment, adoption, and amalgamation of their styles, themes, images, and even syntax he pays homage and creates pastiche; the result is a creation of something new, startling, crude, and iconoclastic. In many way his narrative is like one of the clockwork beasts that stalk his protagonists--the cankers. The text is chaotic, Dionysian, and drenched in literary testosterone. It is visceral, angry, mean-spirited, and exciting.

The conclusion, then, is that through his use of pastiche Remic has consciously or unconsciously contributed something new to heroic fantasy and widened the split that exists in heroic fantasy between the followers of Moorcock on one hand and the fans of Tolkien on the other. The novel will have its enemies because it is not Tolkien-esque in its themes or obsessions.

Kell's Legend flows from the Moorcock vein and will ultimately widen the psychic split between the gnarled limbs of Tolkien and Moorcockian fantasy.

This schism is not Remic's doing, of course; it began with Moorcock and his gang back in the fifties but they weren't the perpetrators either; they were simply the followers of those other mad iconoclasts: Robert Howard, Edgar Rice Burroughs and H.P. Lovecraft. Perhaps, Tolkien himself through his use of deep structure and underlying myth really caused the schism. Nevertheless, the split exists and continues to evolve; the two branches grow apart and one day they may have separate spaces on the bookshelf or in the library.

Pastiche, of course, has come to mean a use of variety of styles and sources to ridicule a particular genre. However, in Kell's Legend, Andy Remic has not chosen to use pastiche to ridicule but to praise or, at least, pay homage to one of his favorite heroic fantasy authors--Dave Gemmell. But a close reading of the text does not only reflect an homage or a wink at Gemmell: the book itself is replete with a resplendent adumbration of his favorite genre authors. This is evident through his use of theme, characters, and settings.

Remic's themes in Kell's Legend mirror those of Gemmell's "Druss" and "Waylander" series; more particularly, a flawed hero, under the influence of a daemon, weighs-in against an invading army to bolster the backbone of an out-manned out-classed innocent culture (cf Moorcock's Elric series). The protagonist is usually accompanied by a small group of professionals who are doomed to die with the hero. However, somewhere there is a deus ex machina moving the heroes across the board of fate. Additionally, Gemmell's novels are materialist and realist within the confines of the text. Although, the hero is sentimental and ultimately a moral soul, living by his own set of mores, he does the practical thing: he kills with impunity and battles wholeheartedly. Gemmell was an unabashed admirer of John Wayne and John Ford. His Druss and Waylander are, ultimately, Indian fighters. There is a literary strand in Gemmell that leads directly to James Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales and Remic, by absorbing Gemmell, has tapped into that brutal and realistic strain of American Romanticism.

In Kell's Legend, Kell is an aging warrior, who lives in Jalder to be near his grand-daughter Nienna. From her perspective he seems to be a lonely but kind man, who is supporting her and paying for her education. Kell, however, has a blood-bond with a daemon and a history that includes murder, mayhem, alcoholism, valor and adventure. He is not a Tolkien-esque character; he falls squarely in the Moorcock camp of flawed heroes. The other main characters include Nienna, the granddaughter, Saark the thief and rogue, and Illanna, the daemon in the ax. In that Kell is like Druss, Saark is like Sieben in The First Chronicles of Druss the Legend, and Illana like Snaga, the resonance with Gemmell is evident and palpable.

The characters and themes are played and moved across a grand landscape; and, within that world, the sides are aligned. To the north, lie the home of the clockwork vampires; to the south Falanor. In between lies the mysterious and magical Black Pike Mountains, home of the insidious and odious engineers.

It is in his creation of the north that Remic shines. Here the clockwork vampires reside. These creatures seem new to me and non-derivative; however, even here there is a sort of pastiche. On one hand there is a definite wink to the Death Dealers of Harry Potter and to the steampunk novels of Tim Powers, S. M. Peters, and Jules Verne; and on the other there is a similarity to the sado-masochistic vampire novels that clog the fantasy and horror shelves of Barnes & Noble. Nevertheless, in Remic's hands, his most vivid characters emerge from the north: Anukis, the clockwork vampire, Graal, the general of the albino vampire army, the cankers, destructive clockwork monsters that are reminiscent of the Black Library's chaotic beasts, the Elric-like albino army, and the Engineers.

Within this fantastic world, the two forces collide and within that collision lies a quest. The quest, of course, will take us to the underworld.

So, in conclusion, Kell's Legend is an iconoclastic melange of themes that incorporates devices from various genres--Moorcock/Gemmell heroic fantasy, steampunk, and horror. It is an exciting, brutal novel, soaked in testosterone and paced like a roller coaster. The sex and violence is visceral and the action is non-stop. It is not your grandpa's heroic fantasy; it is something else: cruder, rougher, more violent, realistic and materialistic. In other words, it will be addictive to the modern reader with a taste for Moorcockian fantasy.

I want to close with an address to those who are criticizing Remic for not being Gemmell or trying to be like Gemmell. First of all, all writing is pastiche. Remic, like Babe Ruth, signaled to the reader where he intended to go--straight to Gemmell country. He then hit the ball:a scorching line drive to center field. Whether it is a home-run depends on the subsequent book; however, he is definitely a player to watch and read. I imagine him scurrying around second base, heading toward home, yelling obscenities like a banshee, and peeing his pants with glee. Second, any material in the hands of another is going to be different. As Borges said in Pierre Menard, Author of Quixote, "he did not want to compose another Quixote--which is easy--but the Quixote itself." To paraphrase, Remic did not want to compose another Gemmell; he wants to compose the Gemmell--the work--he loves--itself. It will be different from Gemmell but it certainly seems Gemmell-like. And that is a good thing.

Quaternity in the Works of Dan Abnett

2009-11-19T09:12:00.001-08:00

He is bounden to beleue in ye trinite. And ye felowe beleueth in a quaternitie: Sir Thomas More

Dan Abnett's "Blood Pact" is the twelfth novel in his Gaunt's Ghost series and, in my mind, his most intimate investigation into the psyche of Gaunt. For the nervous, superstitious, conspiratorial among you, let's add another "Double Eagle," to make the series contain thirteen.

So there are thirteen novels in the series to date. However, Mr. Abnett tends to write quaternities with a single over-arching arc, so that brings us to two completed quaternities, a trilogy, and two extras--"Blood Pact," and "Double Eagle." Of these two, one is hors série--"Double Eagle"--and the other, "Blood Pact" is the beginning of a new quarternity.

The last quaternity began with the novel,"Traitor General" and ended with "Only in Death." In "Traitor General" an Imperial General, who is condemned to death, is captured (rescued)by the Chaos equivalent of the Imperial Guard--the Blood Pact--and taken to the planet Gereon. Gaunt and a select team travel to Gereon to assassinate the general.

Gereon is one of Abnett's greatest creations. It is here that Abnett begins to show what happens to a planet that is conquered by Chaos. Of course, we have seen the images of conquered planets before through the battles but we have not seen the day-to-day existence of those who live under the rule of Chaos before nor have we seen the chain of command of Chaos or its administrative echelons to the degree that we now do.

In "Traitor General,' Abnett begins a descent into detail and world-building that he carries through to the last book in the quaternity--"Only in Death." The third quaternity now called the "The Lost," contains some of the best writing that Abnett has done. Not only does he envision several remarkable worlds but he creates languages and cultures in way that would make Ursula K. LeGuin smile. He also begins to transform Gaunt.

To be true to the Aristotelian verities Gaunt must grow and change. In that Abnett has an almost limitless space in which to develop his story arc, the changes are slow. At book eleven, we reach the tale-tell sign of conversion--blindness. Book eleven is the pivot; the book of changes. The story must change and in "Blood Pact" it does.

"Blood Pact" is a different type of book than the others. Of course, it contains all the usual suspects; however, it is smaller in scope. This novel begins two years after the horrendous battles on Jago. The Ghosts are on Balhaut, an important location for Gaunt. This is where it all began, where things went bad for Gaunt. In fact, the people of Balhaut celebrate the bravery of the "dead" hero Gaunt. So, in effect, Gaunt is a ghost of sorts. Abnett is telling us that before "Blood Pact" Gaunt was a ghost, lost in the campaigns and blind to his greater role. Now, in this new quaternity, things are changing; Gaunt can see again; and, as is usually the case, in this most literary of tropes, Gaunt can see what other men cannot. He has a second sight. He sees the future and he sees into others.

The plot of "Blood Pact," revolves around a "pheguth," a traitor, just as "Traitor General" revolved around a "pheguth." This time, however, the "pheguth" is a member of the Blood Pact, and unlike Sturm, the traitor general, Mabbon is a good man or at least that is what we are told.

A Blood Pact unit, along with a warp witch, is sent to Balhaut, like Gaunt was sent to Gereon, to assassinate the pheguth. So the plot focuses on a battle between a small specialized force of Chaos assassins and Gaunt. Because the battle field is small and intimate, the novel feels different; and it is different in some fundamental ways. It does not have the sweeping battles of "The Lost Quaternity;" however, it does set the ground for the next arc and it continues to enflesh the series with new themes and revealed characteristics of the major characters. It also foreshadows the death of several characters and points to a Gaunt reborn with an enhanced reputation among his commanders.

The series has always been dialectical: good versus evil; light verses dark; twins--Rawne verses Gaunt; Blood Pact versus Ghosts--and Chaos versus Order. However, Abnett is the most material of the Black Library writers; he does not go easily into the horrible wastes of the warp. However, with Blood Pact he seems to be saying--all right--there is something supernatural out there and now I see it. With Maggs and his visions of the old dam and Gaunt's pre-conscious sight, Abnett is leaving his material universe and stepping over into the world of Chaos. Is he tainted or is he able to mediate between the forces of good and evil? And, of course, there is always that ultimate question: what is the good?

So, in conclusion, "Blood Pact," is an intimate transitional novel, focusing on Gaunt, his past, and his present. It also further develops the character and humanity of the forces of Chaos and through this enfleshment ennobles them to an extent not seen before in Abnett's work. This ennoblement then deepens the themes and enriches the texts that have preceded the novel. For instance, when we read "Double Eagle," and we read of the dog fights between the Blood Pact pilots and the Imperial pilots, we can now imagine them as corrupt but human, both brave and ruthless.

Roberto Bolano's "2666"

2009-09-08T13:01:00.000-07:00

Bolano's 1100 page (Spanish Edition) magnus opus is mesmerizing and hypnotic; full of magical stories, violence, sex, meta-fiction, and lies--a lot of lies and a great deal of misdirection.

When I finished the novel I started again; it was the only thing to do; there was too much to absorb on the first reading; too many themes--writing, violence, detectives, murder, identity, travel, death, books, libraries, biographies, success, failure, race, fascism, Nazis, and war.

The writing in itself is beautiful, a poet's book, written by a poet, and translated beautifully by Natasha Wimmer.

The story, in a nutshell, is the life story of a German soldier by the name of Hans Reiter, who, in mid-life in the bombed-out city of Cologne, after the Second World War, changes his name to Benno von Archimboldi and writes his first novel. This story seems to be a conflation of several writers' biographies--Heinrich Boll, Gunter Grass, and surely Prince Hermann Ludwig Heinrich von Pückler-Muskau (I don't think you will see this in any other critique of the book but Bolano gives a brilliant clue at the end of the novel and the parallels between Benno and Prince Herman are quite interesting to trace. Why did he chose him? Because he is better remembered for the ice cream named after him than the books he a wrote and the life he lived.)

From this brief synopsis grows a story of the world in the Twentieth Century. It begins with Reiter's birth in Prussia and ends in the present day. The book contains hundreds of characters and their stories, each told by the same voice, a narrator, who Bolano once said was the fictional poet, Arturo Belano, a character in his brilliant novel--"The Savage Detectives."

So, we have a story told, not shown, which covers eighty years.

The novel contains five parts, which are almost self-contained, but when read together fit perfectly. The five parts are: (1) The Part about the Critics; (2) The Part about Amalfitano; (3) The Part about Fate; (4) The Part about the Crimes; and (5) The Part about Archimboldi.

Part One tells the story of four academics reading, studying, and writing about the reclusive Archimboldi, who is being considered for the Nobel Prize. Their study leads them ultimately to Sonora, to Santa Teresa (a conflation of Jaurez and Heroica Nogales), where a serial killer is operating.

Parts Two, Three, and Four take place in Sonora and involve--a university professor, an American journalist, and many detectives. These three sections all involve the killings in Santa Teresa from one view or another.

Part Five is a chronological telling of the life of Archimboldi, which precedes the action in Part One.

Throughout the telling of the story hundreds of books are mentioned and discussed. Some are real books; some are made up; and others are simply conflated. However, ultimately, it is a writer's book or perhaps just a book for readers, real readers, readers interested in mystery and games, language games, and ghastly murders.

The plot of the novel is driven by mysteries: where is Archimboldi, who is Archimboldi, who is killing the women of Santa Teresa? However, the beauty of the book is in the slow telling of the stories and the minutia of the details.

I cannot do the novel justice; it has to be read closely to appreciate it, but there is a clue to its most fundamental theme: throughout the novel people are buried in mass graves, the graves are hidden because more often than not the murderers are trying to hide their crimes. However, in each instance, the graves are discovered and the bodies uncovered; just as stories are told and the secrets revealed. And herein lies the meaning of the title and I think the fundamental theme of a book full of themes and ideas; it arises or it is hidden in a quote from the "Savage Detectives:" "Guerreo, at that time of night, is more like a cemetery than an avenue, not a cemetery in 1974 or 1968, or 1975, but a cemetery in the year 2666, a forgotten cemetery under the eyelid of a corpse or an unborn child, bathed in the dispassionate fluids of an eye that tried so hard to forget one particular thing that it ended up forgetting everything else."

In other words, our world is more like an uncovered cemetery of the future, full of violence and death. The science of the Twentieth Century devised ways to systematically kill thousands of people. But even now, after the war, the killing continues in the bizarre nightmare milieus of border towns, the situs of the maquiladoras, in refugee camps in Africa, in race wars all over the war, the Fifth Ward, in Compton, in our back yards.

Santa Teresa is supposedly modeled on Juarez where there are 340 maquiladoras operating. Here is the future, stranger than we can imagine, which makes the book in my mind slipstream and connects it to "Moxyland," one of the novels I reviewed last month.

Moxyland by Lauren Beukes

2009-08-24T09:34:00.001-07:00

While reading "Moxyland," Lauren Beukes' dystopian fantasy, published by Angry Robot, I kept asking myself, where are the "parents," the serious people who will take charge and protect these four dysfunctional children; and, therein, I think, lies the rub or at least the theme of the work. The four protagonists, who tell the story in alternating first person segments, are children without supervision in the literal and figurative sense; they are orphans, cut off, without father and mother.

Oh, don't misunderstand me, they have supervision all right, in spades, dealt to them electronically by some disembodied corporation that employs them as consumer fodder; however, in truth they are castaways in a world where the "virtual" and the "real" have converged and melded. They are children, like those of Golding's "Lord of the Flies," left to their own devices or the vagaries of fate within a virtual universe controlled by an unseen hand.

In thinking about the book over the last week, I have concluded that "Moxyland" can be read as a prequel to "Brave New World" or "1984." High praise indeed, I whisper, and yet I think the work deserves it. In that regard, I would not place the book in the science fiction section of my local Borders; instead, I would set it near Huxley and Orwell or maybe next to Sartre's "Nausea" or Camus' "The Plague."

Are you crazy, you might ask. Have you lost your mind? I don't think so but if you insist it is science fiction, then I must conclude that the book is really a book of ideas like John Brunner's "Stand on Zanzibar" or Harry Harrison's "Make Room Make Room." Nevertheless, even here I have trouble, because Beukes' book is more grounded in the here and now and consequently does not amaze as much as Brunner and Harrison; but, instead, warns and points at a near future, almost on our doorstep, that we should take heed of (even though we might be helpless to stop it).

In a nutshell, "Moxyland" involves four protagonists, who tell their stories in the first person. They live in Capetown, South Africa, approximately ten years from today; and, although apartheid is not mentioned, its effects seem obvious.

The protagonists are: Kendra, a young photographer; Tendeka, an activist and would-be terrorist; Lerato, a corporate employee and computer programmer; and Toby, a rich kid, working on his master degree in literature at the local University. Each one is connected to the virtual world and tangentially to each other. However, each one is disconnected from family and friends. Instead, they inhabit the virtual universe, where avatars could hide a fourteen year old or a corporate boss.

As I said above, they are orphans in both literal and literary sense. For instance, Toby's mother cuts off his stipend and he is forced to make money as a "gonzo" reporter; Lerato is an aids baby, raised in an orphanage as a ward of a multi-national corporation.

Beukes sets the four off on a collision course, which ends in disaster for some of the participants.

One of the most telling images in the book is a self-portrait done by Kendra. It is a photograph of herself. Because she uses old, analog equipment and antiquated film stock, the image is black--not blank, black. An interesting image, especially, when the author tells the story in the first person. Here the "cogito" fails; the "I" of the persona refuses to reflect the vision of the constructed other. In other words, no images come to the viewer to instruct or inform the viewer. Isn't that a bit like the avatar of the other in a computer game?

In that regard, another major theme of the novel is the way that the virtual is bleeding into the real. Toby plays various games in which, through his first-person-narration we are not sure if he is in a game or in life. The reader has difficulty determining what is real and what is not and eventually so does Toby.

As the virtual seeps in and absorbs the real, human beings become consuming fodder and living advertisements for certain global products. Within this context, the orphan, un-weaned from the real mother, continues to imbibe the corporate milk, which results in addiction and infantilism.

As I said at the beginning I think "Moxyland" can be read as a prequel to "1984" or "Brave New World." If we project the story line into the future and I think the book invites it; either, a fascistic Big Brother will arise, probably a virtual one, like the Wizard of Oz, or an unseen manipulative hand will continue to control and manipulate as in the Huxley novel.

In conclusion, the novel is a book of ideas; well written, edgy, and prescient.

Chris Roberson's "Book of Secrets"

2009-08-17T08:30:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend I received and read two books from Amazon.com.uk: Chris Roberson's "Book of Secrets" and Lauren Beukes'"Moxyland."

Both books are from "Angry Robot" and both books are supposedly science fiction. However, no two books could be so different and yet inhabit the same "genre" space. Roberson's book is a look-back at the glorious age of pulp and therefore a meta-fictional exercise in types and sub-categories of genre; whereas Beukes' novel is a peek into a dark and perilous near-future.

Let's say at the outset that I enjoyed both books. Irrespective of the readability of the books--they were both fast reads--I was more intrigued by how different two books in the same genre could be. Their contained and inherent dissimilarity inhabits the same shelf space, so, of course, they begged the question--what is science fiction?

I will review Beukes in a later review and start with Mr. Roberson's novel.

"Book of Secrets" is (1) a crime novel, reminiscent of the noir fiction of the thirties; (2) a meta-fiction celebrating American genre fiction of the thirties, forties and fifties; (3) a bildungsroman about the spiritual journey of a young man; (4) a portal fantasy.

As you might glean from the previous paragraph, Mr. Roberson tells several stories in several forms. If we look for "the figure in the carpet" imagine an "x." One bar of the "x" progresses chronologically; that is the first person narrative of an investigative reporter by the name of Spencer Finch. Spencer Finch is on an assignment for the magazine "Logion" to reveal the nefarious dealings of a Houston bigwig by the name of J. Nathan Pierce, known as "Nez."

From this initial information, however, we are alerted that this is not your usual hard-boiled fiction based in the hard-scrabble world of reality. First, "Logion" is an online magazine and its name alerts us (perhaps warns us) that we are in "metaphysical" country. "Logion" refers to the traditional maxims and proverbs told by a sage or prophet. In most instances it is used to describe the maxims of Jesus. So, our protagonist is writing for a metaphysical or a religiously oriented virtual magazine, although that is never stated.

Next, Mr. Pierce, our unseen or barely seen subject, is called "Nez." This is obviously a reference to the Indian tribe--Nez Perce--who not only had their own unique language but a highly developed mythology. Languages and mythologies become a theme and Mr Roberson introduces us to various mysteries revolving around a mysterious book written in many hands and many languages.

Situated in the metaphysical world, we are now alert to possible puzzles of meaning. After all, it is a mystery or is it?

Not to put too fine a point on it and not to scare off any reader, the novel is also a bildungsroman. A bildungsroman is a novel that has as its main theme the formative years or spiritual education of one person. The one person in this case is Spencer Finch and the purpose of the first leg of the "x" is to take the reader on a chronological journey through his spiritual development.

The second leg of the "x," however, is the fantastical element of the novel. Its narrative moves in reverse toward the past. Just as a good metaphysical investigation, the reader must follow the past through a series of short stories about a family of do-goers named the Black Hand to the “happy” origins of humanity.

Mr. Roberson uses these stories, short stories, to educate the reader, solve the mystery, and display the various genres--short story, pulp fiction, tragedy, etc--that were used in pulp fiction. Additionally, and this is very important because it elevates the novel, Roberson, by actually including the stories rather than describing them, inducts and educates the reader into the pleasure of pulp. This not only shows his versatility and enriches the text of the book but also reveals his inherent connection to the pulp tradition.

Before I move on I think we should illustrate our point and reveal Roberson's genius in actually writing the stories and including them in the narrative. Upon the death of his grandfather, Finch inherits a box of pulp magazines. The first story he reads is "The Talon's Curse" by Walter Reece. This story is the closest in time to the action of the novel and begins the count-down to the journey backwards toward the beginning of man. "The Talon's Curse" is a noir/mystery situated in San Franciso in the thirties. The next story is a Western written in 1918. Each story elicits the qualities and the identity of the members of the Black Hand.

The backward progression through the use of genre ushers the reader ultimately into the "original" world of myth and religion. This point is the intersection of the "x," and to punctuate the point, Roberson takes us through the looking glass to another world, to a world of crystal populated by angels and demi-urges.

Herein lies the fantasy and the speculation that earns the book its classification as "slipstream". If we sub-categorize it, this portion of the novel is a "portal" novel, in the vein of David Lindsay (Voyage to Arcturus) and C. S. Lewis (Perelandra).

So once we parse the pieces and put them back together, we discover that "Book of Secrets" is a book of genres. In other words, it is a celebration of the age of pulp with a meta-fictional slant. It moves in two directions--a very readable first person narrative in the form of a crime novel that progresses to the conclusion of the mystery and a fantasy novel that moves in reverse to disclose the nature of the universe. The two stories collide at the portal and the protagonist falls through it into a world of angels and gnostic demi-urges. This is the denouement and the moment of fantasy.

In conclusion I will summarize some other things I liked about the novel.

Roberson situates the action in my place--my physical space. I went to school in Houston, practiced law in Austin, and now live in Dallas. I know El Paso like the back of my hand. These western spaces plus New Orleans is Spencer's place and that in itself endeared the novel to me. Roberson described them clearly and truthfully and I felt and saw each city in the telling.

Second, Roberson is just a damn fine writer. He writes a good sentence; the novel is structured like a Swiss watch and paced like a Tennessee walker.

Third, in the time of the post-Tolkienians and the novel as brick, "Book of Secrets" is unique, refreshing, breezy, and fun.

Eric Brown's "Kéthani"

2009-07-30T11:37:00.000-07:00

My first three impressions in reading "Kéthani" were: (1) this is a collection of short stories, written in the style of Bradbury's "Martian Chronicles"; (2) this is a pleasant, mellow read; and (3) these characters drink a lot.

Upon finishing the book my impression had not changed much, except I realized that for all of the book's genuine "gemutlichkeit," it was a serious meditation on mortality, religion, and ethics. I further realized that the Kéthani for all their apparent benevolence and understated drive, supported by an unspoken belief in manifest destiny, were sinister.

The sinister nature of the mysterious aliens and the underlying sense of danger only surface one or two times in the novel and are quickly ignored or brushed away through the characters' rationalizations. And yet, upon completion of the novel, the feeling remains that the humans have been tricked or duped in some way. In fact, our protagonist, Khalid, says in the final chapter that "I wondered whether to tell Sam and Stuart that we had been lured to the stars by an. . .an impostor." Further, in the epilogue, Khalid says cryptically that "the reason our benefactors selected us for the task was a little more complex than than we first thought." This is the extent of our illumination. At he end of the novel we know no more about the aliens than we did at the beginning. But this of course is the point because ultimately the book is a meditation on religion and life.

As Tolkien pointed out in his short story "A Leaf by Niggle," we are on a journey to death. In "Kéthani," however, the aliens interrupt that journey and substitute a possibility for immortality. Humans with their complex and innate capacity for religion are disturbed by this interruption and thereby have to re-boot. Some incorporate the Kéthani into their religious framework; others de-construct or react violently. The Kéthani could be angels or devils or simply higher sentient beings. We don't know and Brown does not provide an answer.

I recommend the novel but I do have a few reservations. First, the book feels like a collection of short stories. As a result there is a lot of repetition. This repetition arises from the fact that the author has to apprise new readers at the beginning of each story where we are each time he starts a new "story." Second, the author does not give you any answers to your questions for the simple reason that the protagonist does not have any answers. And since the work is a first-person narrative, we only know what the protagonist knows.

All in all, the novel was a pleasant experience; a welcome respite from the hardware of science fiction, with its incipient violence. In some ways the work is a throwback to the science fiction of the fifties and sixties, when science fiction was a place of ideas and we could easily compare the novel with Clarke's "Childhood's End," Bradbury's "Martian Chronicles," or the original "The Day the Earth Stood Still."

Nick Kyme's "Honourkeeper" and the post-Tolkien Dwarf

2009-07-28T08:35:00.000-07:00

There will be dwarfs and all types of orcs and elves, too, in the post-Tolkien world but will they be good books?

There are plenty of dwarf books available. Dragonlance novels are replete with dwarfs of various types and flavors and every would-be Tolkien populates his or her epic fantasy novel with them. Some attempts are successful, others are not.

Nick Kyme's dwarf novels are the most successful exemplars of post-Tolkien dwarf-craft and dwarf-lore on the book stand.

Dwarfs, of course, are archetypal and existed before Tolkien. Whenever they appear they grab the imagination or, at least, they stimulate mine.

I have been a fan of dwarfs for over fifty years but my interest didn't begin with Tolkien. Disney's "Snow White" ignited the spark and then Wagner's Alberich and Mime sealed the deal.

In "Das Rheingold" and "Siegfreid," the dwarfs Alberich and Mime function as "shadow" characters that, through their lust and greed, initiate the events that lead to the finale.

In Wagner and in the early fairy tales and legends dwarfs are dark, primal creatures; however, in modern epic fantasy they have evolved into something quite different. Tolkien is responsible for the movement toward the light, even though he mined his dwarfs from either the "Ruolieb," a German poem of the twelfth century, or the Elder Edda, and brought them gingerly into the modern age. Perhaps, the coup de grace was Peter Jackson's version of the lovable Gimli in his film version of "The Lord of The Rings."

Nevertheless, as I said, I have always been interested in dwarfs and that interest was, of course, fanned into a white hot heat when I read Tolkien's "The Hobbit" in 1965. From that point on I wanted more dwarfs. However, I found subsequent books featuring dwarfs, not written by Tolkien, disappointing. I was particularly bothered by the dwarfs in the Dragonlance and Forgotten Realm books. What I desired was a dwarf book that could stand on its on.

A few years ago, I was working out of my Frankfurt office and I took a detour through the Hugendubel Bookshop downtown and discovered "Die Zwerge" by Markus Heitz. I thought I had found a book divorced from the Tolkien influence that tried to situate the dwarf in an epic fantasy setting. However, when I finished the first book I was disappointed. Heitz's book seemed too similar to the Dragonlance/ Forgotten Realm type; it was not serious or dark enough for my taste. The archetypal resonance of the dwarfs was fading in the light of modern publishing. I wanted a good-old Anglo-Saxon beastie that could stand square with Beowulf or the Green Knight and swing a mean ax. I yearned for a pre-Tolkien dwarf.

Nick Kyme, Gav Thorpe, and to a certain extent Nathan Long have created from a post-Tolkien model a pre-Tolkienesque dwarf. Through the combination of the Gothic background of Warhammer and its underlying mythos, a dwarf-type has arisen that I believe is close to the early renditions of dwarfs found in the English, Norse, and Germanic fairy-tales. I began to notice this trend in Nick Kyme's "Oathbreaker" and Gav Thorpe's "Grudge Bearer." However, my theory didn't gel until I read Gav Thorpe's "Malekith." In that novel, he brought the dwarfs to life through a sustained tour-de-force of what Tolkien would call subcreation. This realized dwarf world appears again to great effect in Nathan Long's novel, "Orcslayer."

However, Kyme's "Honourkeeper" is the near masterpiece because he situates his novel in a completely dwarf world. Yes, there are elves and men but the book focuses on and is unified through his disciplined use of a multiple point of view from the major dwarf characters. Within this framework, he explores the Warhammer mythology concerning the dwarfs and their elaborate civilization. Additionally, Kyme presents a rigid and structurally sound plot. In essence, the story is simple: tricky elves deceive dwarf king into warring Norscans on their behalf. When the story is distilled, it falls into four parts: (a) meeting with elves; (b) deceived by elves; (c)war with Norscans; and(d)revelation of deceit and revenge. Within that simple plot, Kyme explores the dwarf environment, the dwarf culture, and even the dwarf language.

"Honourkeeper" transcends its genre through its seriousness. In fact, many of the new Warhammer novels seem imbued with this sense of seriousness; and, ultimately, that is what makes the Warhammer IP series so successful and readable.

Steve Parker's "Gunheads"

2009-07-27T12:01:00.000-07:00

In Steve Parker's short story "Mercy Run," anthologized in the Warhammer 40,000 collection entitled "Planetkill," we meet Sergeant Wulfe of the Cadian 81st Armoured Regiment and the crew of the "Last Rites," his Leman Russ tank. Wulfe is a cross between Humphrey Bogart in the World War II film "Sahara" and Marvel Comics' Sergeant Fury of The Howling Commandos. He is a tough and savvy veteran, who in many instances knows more than the officers who command him.

In "Mercy Run," Wulfe escorts sisters of Sororitas to save Captain Waltur Kurdheim before Orks destroy Palmeros; however, as in all 40K novels, the Sororitas' agenda is more sinister and treacherous than immediately apparent.

Time clicks ponderously away as three tanks and the Sisters' Chimera rush across the world in panic. Death awaits them at every corner. The story is a nail biter to the final page and its end sets up the premise of the novel, "Gunheads."

In "Gunheads" Sergeant Wulfe has a new tank; he is haunted by a psychic vision, and he has a new nemesis, one corporal Lenck. This time out the 81st Cadian Armoured is dropped onto Golgotha, a death world inhabited by hundreds of thousands of Orks. Their mission is to retrieve the "Fortress of Arrogance," a battle tank that belonged to Commissar Yarrick, hero of Hades Hive. Yarrick is an Ork fighter extraordinaire and, in fact, is one of the only humans to master the Ork language.

Once again unscrupulous men and machines manipulate the Imperial Guard to achieve their ruthless ambitions. In "Gunheads," the Adeptus Mechanicus deceives both the Imperial Guard and Yarrick by dangling Yarrick's massive baneblade tank and glory before their eyes.

To achieve the retrieval of the legendary and sacred tank the Adeptus Mechanicus choose General Mohamar Antonius deVries, Supreme Commander, 18th Army Group Exolon. Imagine Henry Fonda, playing Lt. Colonel Owen Thursday in John Ford's "Fort Apache" and you will understand deVries' motivation and madness. Both men are looking for glory and they are both willing to sacrifice the lives of their men on the battlefield to get it. It is in this dynamic that Steve Parker excels. He captures the rigid, unforgiving organization of the Imperial Guard and the vagaries of the military life of the rank and file.

This ability to capture the day to day life of the military is Parker's strong suit (just as it was Ford's). However, we also know that as soon as he sets his pieces on the board of battle there will be blood.

In the case of "Gunheads," the playing field itself is dangerous. Golgotha soon begins to devour the men sent there. It is red planet, devoid of water and plants. The only life forms are poisonous and ultimately fatal to the guard. Expect good friends to die.

Additionally, just as Thursday in "Fort Apache" goes against the Sioux Nation with a pitifully small force, so too do the Imperial Guard, when they encounter the hundreds of thousand Orks inhabiting the planet. It is immediately evident to the rank and file that the guard is on a suicide mission.

"Gunheads" contains numerous set pieces of thrilling military science fiction. These scenes are the ones that make your scalp tingle. A primary example is at the beginning the novel when Colonel Tidor Storm and his 98th Mechanized Infantry Regiment find themselves surrounded by hundreds of thousands of Orks. Parker movingly describes the pathos of battle and captures the beauty of the futile gesture. That early battle scene is just one of many but it is fine piece of writing that immediately hooks the reader.

But let's not forget that this is a Warhammer novel so there must be treachery, deception, and evil. In this regard, Parker creates two stories: on a larger scale there is the deception of the Adeptus Mechanicus but on a smaller level there is the personal struggle between the luciferian Lenck and our protagonist, Wulfe. Lenck is an opportunist and a barracks rat. Wulfe immediately sizes him up and conflates Lenck with a past nemesis. Bad feelings and suspicions abound until the two clash in a final violent struggle for survival.

In concluding I want to note Parker's rendition of the Orks. Frankly, his description of the greenskins is one of the best in the Warhammer mythos (As a side note Chris Roberson has also created a realistic view in his short-story "Gauntlet Run"). In looking at Parker's oeuvre (yes I said oeuvre) to date, Orks appear again and again. They are the xeno foes of "Rebel Winter," "Head Hunted," "Mercy Run," "Gunheads," and I suspect in the forthcoming "Rynn's World."

Parker seems to be slowly sussing out the inner workings of the green brutes and in a sense I see him ultimately embracing them in the same way that Abnett has fleshed out and made real the "Blood Pact" in his Gaunt's Ghosts series.

All in all "Gunheads" is a satisfying novel with brilliantly drawn characters that convincingly present us with a dynamic rendition of military life in the far Gothic future of Warhammer 40K.

Wulfe is a strong character that could carry his own series. Let's hope we see more of him and the Orks.

Sins of the Father-A review of Gav Thorpe's "Malekith"

2009-06-02T10:31:00.001-07:00

I was very anxious to read Gav Thorpe's new novel "Malekith." In fact, I haunted the bookstores until I found one in Austin at Book People. I quickly started it, although I was already two-thirds through a biography of Robert Frost. It was a good read and I quickly submitted a review to Amazon.com. Here is the review.

Although Gav Thorpe's new novel is entitled, "Malekith," its scope is greater than the story of one man. Instead, it delineates the development of the Warhammer world as we know it and recounts the rise and fall of Malekith. In a sense, the story of Malekith is a tragedy rather than an epic. Although the novel has "epic" qualities--the expansion of the elves and the exploration of the unknown world--it is ultimately the story of one man's greed and lust for power. Like Macbeth, a great warrior is lured from the light to the dark by greed and the ministrations of a woman. In Malekith's case it is the greed and ambition of his Mother, Morathi, that taunts him, goads him, and tricks him. Thorpe's Malekith, however, is not one dimensional. Throughout the novel, the reader feels that the means, no matter how despicable, have within Malekith's twisted thinking a logical and noble end--to protect the elves from the Chaos gods. It is this element that raises Thorpe's novel from simply being a good Warhammer story to being a great Warhammer story.

The first novel of the planned trilogy begins with the end of Aenarion and concludes with the death of Bel Shanaar, the Phoenix King. The narrative involves four major set pieces: the expansion of the elves in the east and the alliance with the dwarves; Malekith's exploration of the west and the Chaos waste; Malekith's war against the cultists in Nagarythe; and the betrayal of the Phoenix King.

Thorpe handles the exploration of the east and the establishment of the elven colonies in the old world brilliantly. His description of the dwarven cities is meticulous in its detail. However, the dwarven segment is not simply a side show; it is important to the development of Malekith's character and to the reader's understanding of that character. Although Malekith's anger and ambition are apparent from the beginning of the novel, Malekith truly respects the dwarves and their king. At the end of Part One, Malekith mourns for his lost friend and intends to honor his oath to the Snorri Whitebeard. However, the next section of the novel finds Malekith on his way to the Chaos wastes in the west, where he discovers an ancient city of the Old Ones and discovers a magic circlet that imbues him with new power and insight into the threat of the Chaos gods. From this point on, Malekith moves toward his inevitable fate. His hubris ultimately leads him to the Shrine of Asuryan.

As I read the novel I was struck by several things: the psychological complexity of Malekith's character; the clear detailed descriptions of all the locations; the distinct personality and character of the various Warhammer races; an abiding continuity to Warhammer lore and fluff; and the lucid prose. I have read most of Gav Thorpe's work and I think this may be his best. I am quite anxious to read the second volume of the trilogy.

I highly recommend this novel to both fantasy lovers and gamers. The Warhammer intellectual property is so rich and so developed that it transcends tie-in fiction. With the Time of Legends series, it seems Black Library has decided to up the ante; to create epic works that can proudly compete with any non-IP fantasy fiction. As a companion piece to this work I recommend Graham McNeill's "Guardians of Ulthuan," and "Heldenhammer," Mike Lee and Dan Abnett's Malus Darkblade series, Mike Lee's "Nagash the Sorcerer," and Nathan Long's "Elfslayer."

Review Of Steve Parker's "Rebel Winter"

2009-06-02T10:18:00.000-07:00

I rarely cry. It is usually at the end of a war movie where a person has given his or her life for the good of the squad and bagpipes are playing. Like at the end of "Gunga Din" or "Wee Willie Winkie," or even "Saving Private Ryan," although there were sadly no pipes.

While reading Steve Parker's first military science fiction novel, Rebel Winter, I found myself tearing up several times. Each time a well-drawn character sacrifices himself for the unit or a group of men die in a burning Chimera or a beloved colonel runs pell-mell into a mass of orks I felt a tear rolling down my cheek. Consequently, I have to say early in this review that the writing is damn good, the characters are well-drawn, the battle scenes are intense, and Parker's knowledge of Warhammer 40,000 fluff is dead-on accurate.

The novel involves a regiment of Vostroyan Firstborn fighting both rebels and orks on the ice-crusted planet Danik's World. The Vostroyans are similar to Russian Cossacks and their culture is tribal and militaristic. According to their laws, every firstborn son of every household serves in the Vostroyan regiments. Vostroyan soldiers and officers maintain an archaic appearance and their history can be traced back to the Horus Heresy. They pass their weapons down from firstborn to firstborn and are usually worth more than the guardsmen who carry them. They serve ten-year terms but most re-enlist because their persona is based on their identification with the regiment and the company in the regiment in which they serve.

In Rebel Winter Parker plays with the Vostroyan "fluff." First, the Vostroyan leadership is picked from the nobility. Our protagonist Captain Grigorius Sebastev is not a noble; instead, he is a sergeant, elevated to leadership on the battlefield. Second, Vostroyans pick the first-born son to serve the Emperor; Stavin, another important character, possesses a secret, which haunts him: he is a second-born son. Third, the Vostroyans are a close-knit tribal unit. The Commissar of Fifth Company is not a Vostroyan but from Delta Radhima. He is dark and tall and obviously a foil for the short and stocky Sebastev.

Parker begins the novel with a framing device: Captain Sebastev is on trial in the Exedra Udiciarum Seddisvarr for some unspecified crime. The story, then, is a remembering rather than an unfolding. In my opinion, a framing device is a two-edged sword. It either creates suspense by engaging the reader with the question: why is this man on trial, or it dissipates suspense because the reader knows the protagonist will survive. In this novel, the framing device accomplishes three things: one, it is simply a sketch and does not explain who any of the bizarre characters in the courtroom are; therefore, it creates an element of suspense and expectation; two, it begs the question of why this captain is on trial; and, three, at the end of the novel it provides the springboard for a sequel (which I suspect is its primary purpose).

Once, we enter the "remembering," we are plunged head-first into the action. The Vostroyans are fighting a battle of attrition against both rebels and orks. Here is where Parker shines. The battle scenes are brutal and beautifully constructed. Very rarely is an author able to manipulate a squad, let alone a company, and Parker does it well and efficiently. Something else that he does well is to describe the strategic elements of a battle. I particularly appreciate the map at the beginning of the book. By referring to it during the reading I was able to see and understand both the strategic and tactical decisions made by the combatants.

In conclusion, I found the novel a brilliant first effort. I enjoyed the mixture of pathos and bravura in the characters and when I say characters I mean many characters, each one is well-drawn and memorable. I have two minor criticisms though: one, the framing device distracts from the strength of the plot and, two, in an attempt to fully handle his "company" of characters, Mr. Parker switches point of view several times, which I found disturbed the smooth progression of the narrative. In that regard,I prefer either a single or at most a double point of view.

As a final word, I would recommend this novel to both Warhammer fans and military science fiction readers. I think Steve Parker now shares the stage with other great military science-fiction writers like Dan Abnett, Andy Remic, Paul Kearney, Chris Roberson, and Steven Pressfield.

I am looking forward to reviewing his latest novel--Gunheads.

Bolano's "The Romantic Dogs"

2009-04-30T10:14:00.000-07:00

With "2666," Roberto Bolano is now a sensation in the United States. "2666" is a remarkable book, full of engrossing narratives; however, I find "The Romantic Dogs" in some respects more satisfying.

It is common knowledge that Bolano considered himself first and foremost a poet and I believe he is right, although his fame here in America will derive from his fiction.

Many reviewers have spent all their time talking about Bolano and Chile, as if "The Romantic Dogs" is only a political book. However, I wonder if the reviewers made it past the first poem. Yes, there are poems that make reference to political events but how can a Latin American not be political. However, politics are only a part of the soup of existence. Bolano writes about being in the sense that a philosopher writes about being.

"The Romantic Dogs" is an amazingly cohesive work. This is not a collection of poems written as one-offs. Instead, the poems hold together through various rhetorical devices: repetition of images, symbols, and themes.

The overall theme of the work is the shortness of life, the cruelty of illness, the fragility of existence, and the the beauty of poetry.

Unifying images are dreams, blackness, white worms, snow, cars, motorcycles, burros, films, detectives.

Bolano announces in the first poem of the collection that the dream of poetry opened up the void of his spirit and accompanied him through his life.

The first poem of the collection, "The Romantic Dogs," announces this theme. "I'd lost a country/but won a dream." He adumbrates the importance of poetry in the penultimate poem of the collection "Muse:" "she's the guardian angel/ of our prayers./ She's the dream that recurs."

"The Romantic Dogs" presents a brave story--because ultimately Bolano is a dramatic poet--of a dying poet fighting to remain here in being "with the romantic dogs."

Chris Roberson's "Set the Seas on Fire"

2009-04-07T11:10:00.001-07:00

Early in Chris Roberson's "Set the Seas on Fire" (Solaris 2007), an intellectual debate breaks out among the crewmen regarding the question: is there one ocean or many on this watery planet of ours? The protagonist of the novel, Lieutenant Hieronymous Bonaventure, takes the position that "There is, I put to you, but one ocean, around which the lands we know are arranged like a necklace of stone and tree. A true orbis terrarium, the circle of lands of which the ancients spoke, and which we are just now rediscovering to be the truth." Later, at the end of the novel, Bonaventure speaks again of the watery world: "Bonaventure knew well that there was but one sea, vast and unending."

Within the image of the "unending sea" we have the metaphor of the novel. Bonaventure as hero is, in a sense, "unending." As he should be, because, after all, he is a "pulp fiction" hero. However, there is another more important meaning in the image of the unending sea--a literary conclusion about the nature of genre, which I contend is Chris Roberson's true subject. In other words, in his literary weltanschauung there are no boundaries between the various genres. A historical novel can easily morph into a tale of horror and a hero in a tale of horror can step through a portal into another world. So "Set the Seas on Fire" is a "genre" bender, a mélange of pulp fiction tropes.

Chris Roberson, like Robert E. Howard and Michael Moorcock, is working within the confines of pulp fiction. Pulp fiction arose in inexpensive magazines in the 1920s and continued through the 1950s in mass market paperbacks. Pulp fiction contained a wide variety of genre topics: fantasy, detective, western, science fiction, adventure and westerns. Some writers of pulp mixed the genres, creating some of the more exciting and enduring stories. Additionally because the stories were short, the pulp writers learned how to tell an intriguing story concisely. Within a sentence or two the writer was knee-deep in the action.

In the first and last analysis, then, "Set the Seas on Fire" is a pulp fiction/heroic fantasy, tending toward horror, and should be read as such. And Chris Roberson is a meta-fictionist skillfully playing with the genre tropes. His precursors, on one hand, arise from film and horror, history and adventure, fantasy and science fiction; and on the other, there seems to be a hidden alliance with Jorge Borges and Paul Auster. To read the novel otherwise is to cause confusion.

Although the uninformed reader might stumble onto the book and think it was historical fiction, which it masquerades as, it is only historical fiction to the extent of setting and costumes. Its true progeny lies closer to the works of Robert E. Howard. In fact, I found myself several times as I was reading remembering Howard's stories of Solomon Kane, the 16th century Puritan adventurer. Roberson even goes so far as to name an island warrior and Bonaventure's adversary in love--Kane. There is also a conscious nod to Michael Moorcock and his von Bek novels.

Yes, it is true that Roberson grounds the novel in facts but that is only to heighten the vertigo you feel when the horror arrives.

The novel begins on a clear day in 1792 in England in one genre--the adventure tale. Children play on a majestic estate, an opening similar to the beginning scene of William Wellman's 1939 production of Beau Geste, which situates us in the world of Wellman and Curtiz. This is the tale of the hero arising from modest circumstances to become a hero. In chapter two, however, we are on a ship in the South Seas. Now we are in the world of the Bounty, on a British frigate, or maybe sailing with Sabatini's Captain Blood. I am sure that many readers compared it to Patrick O'Brien's "Master and Commander." Ah, we say, it is a nautical adventure.

Later the hero lands on an island paradise but there are rumors of monsters and demons. Eventually, Bonaventure falls in love like Fletcher Christian but he encounters grotesque beasts like Howard's Solomon Kane.

So, I think the pleasure of "Set the Seas on Fire" lies in four things: first, the convincing historical setting; two, the purity of the prose and the movement of the plot; three, the mixing of genre; and four, the expectation of surprise that arises from the knowledge that Roberson is playing with genre.

Of these four, I want to expand on the element of surprise or suspense. Roberson establishes the expectation of horror early with Bonaventure's encounter with the two Spanish castaways. From that point on the reader knows the other genre shoe will soon drop. But the question is how soon and exactly when. Roberson leisurely lead the reader down many paradisaical paths.

In conclusion, as a fantasy reader and a fan of pulp fiction, I found "Set the Seas on Fire" satisfying. However, if you are seeking another "Master and Commander" you may be disappointed. But if you like Solomon Kane and von Bek you will be happy with your choice.