A Dozen Tough JobsHoward Waldrop ISBN 0-929480-01-5, 1989, Mark V. Ziesing Books, $16, hb, 135 pp. Translate the twelve labors of Hercules into the cultural climate of Northern Mississippi in the 1920s, and while you're there make some true insights...
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The Stress of Her Regardby Tim Powers ISBN 0-441-79055-0, 1989 Ace Books, $17.95, hb, 392 pp. If you have yet to discover Powers, what a treat awaits you! For those of you who have read his earlier work, such as...
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The Story of the Stoneby Barry Hughart ISBN 0-385-24636-6, 1988, Doubleday Foundation, $17.95, hb, 236 pp. For the most part, I could care less whether a book has won an award in the field. The Hugos and Nebulas et al....
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By Bizarre Handsby Joe R. Lansdale ISBN 0-929480-12-0, 1989, Mark V. Ziesing Books, $25, hb, 246 pp. Lansdale's world is filled with razors, bad boys, drive-ins, pain, unfulfilled desires, injustice, bigotry, preachers. But most of all, it's filled with energy...
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Patternsby Pat Cadigan ISBN 0-942681-07X, Ursus Imprints, $22.95, hb, 207 pp. Another first collection, Patterns collects almost half of Pat Cadigan's short fiction from the last ten years. Cadigan writes from the dark underbelly of society, and she usually works...
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Voyage to the Red Planetby Terry Bisson The library in the small Texas town (Gatesville) that I grew up in had a limited selection of books. It didn't take me long to work my way through the science fiction section,...
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I was attending a panel at WisCon entitled "Neglected Authors" or somesuch. Actually, I was supposed to have been on the panel (not that I'm neglected or anything, that's another story) having volunteered and been volunteered for it at dinner...
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Jeanne Larsen's Bronze Mirror is the story of Pomegranate, new maid to the Su household, brought (and bought) from her family to minister to Lady Phoenix, new wife to the head of the household. Bronze Mirror is also the...
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Highlights include:James Morrow's "Daughter Earth" -- I'm not a big fan of Morrow's short stories, and I've not read his novels, but this story astonished me with its audacity. Not just anyone could pull this off--I'm not even sure that...
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Track One: I Heard It Through the Grapevine I had been working late, coming home on the 605 Freeway, listening to SNAP (an alternative music program) on public radio station KCRW. The host, Deirdre O-Donahue, had just returned from a...
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by Iain Banks Banks' first novel, The Wasp Factory, was a surprise within a surprise--a well-written horror novel that was also a well-written "mainstream" novel. Since then, Banks has continued to surprise mainstream readers with surrealistic novels like Walking on...
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by Connie Willis I still haven't read Greeley's SF claim to fame's first solo novel, Lincoln's Dreams, but based on the quality of her short stories, and this, her second novel, I'm not upset at all that I sprung for...
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by Michael Bishop This one jumped off the shelf and into my hands. I'm a Bishop fan from years back--having read and loved books like Ancient of Days, No Enemy But Time, The Secret Ascension (aka Philip K. Dick is...
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edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling I read this collection in late 1992, but just recently, when I was flipping back through my Daytimer looking for some other information, I discovered that I had written notes on the stories....
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Fifth Annual Collection" »
by Carrie Fisher Many people, myself among them, were initially turned off by Carrie Fisher's Postcards from the Edge. Oh no, here comes another Hollywood star who thinks she can run the gamut of the arts. Even though the book...
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by James Crumley Gardner Dozois recommended James Crumley's The Last Good Kiss to me as the best hard-boiled detective novel written in the last ten years. With that kind of recommendation, I would have been hard-pressed to pass it up....
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Tom Sharpe A friend in Britain and I sent each other some favorite books. Since David hadn't read much SF/F, I sent him Jonathan Carroll's Bones of the Moon and James P. Blaylock's The Last Coin. In turn, he sent...
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I've slowly come to the realization that I'm addicted to comedy. Most of us are susceptible to some degree; I know of few people who don't enjoy laughing. But I'm an addict. Like that lover of fine cheeses in the...
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by Clive James This third volume of unreliable memoirs picks up where the previous volume (Falling Towards England) let off. James, in these books, is interesting, yet not as funny, at least to me, as it seems the things he...
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by Rita Mae Brown This is an excellent writer's manual in many ways--I particularly enjoyed the emphasis on reading classics for "what works," the reasoning behind why a writer should know Latin, among others--even while it is totally inappropriate in...
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A Different Kind of Writer's Manual" »
by Pat Cadigan The ending is what makes this book so satisfying. Fools is a novel about personality, how much is your own and how much is grafted on to you without your knowledge. Like Pat's other work, Fools is...
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The start of the "reading list" from Rita Mae Brown's Starting from Scratch, Caedmon's Hymn is a very small part of Venerable Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People (which, in its complete text, is later on Brown's list). The...
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by Ed McBain Typical early 87th Precinct mystery with a horrendous pun for the title (the "Boys" of the 87th find a large cut-off hand in the first chapter). McBain in this period has a horrible tendancy to overwrite (the...
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by Peter Mayle Mayle and his wife retire to a small house in Provence, and the ensuing book relates his trials and tribulations as an Englishman in a rural French setting. This is a wonderful book, full of pleasure and...
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by Karla Jennings A book about the folktales and legends of the computer world. Interesting for the various anecdotes and the clearly written history of the beginnings of computers and the society surrounding them....
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by Michael Swanwick The protagonist is a loner on the Moon who wants nothing more than to be left alone to commune with virgin territory, but circumstances throw him into proximity with others as well as wake him up to...
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by Carrie Fisher In Postcards from the Edge you could easily see that there was only a fine line dividing Fisher from the exploits of her main character, Suzanne Vail. After all, Fisher had been in drug therapy; so was...
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by Ian McDonald This is a collection of short stories from one of SFs brightest new hopes. I made notes after each individual story as I read it: "Gardenias" -- Fancifully written, but ultimately plotless. Interesting for the mix of...
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by P.G. Wodehouse A collection of short stories from 1910-1915, some with Bertie and Jeeves, some with "Reggie." Here Wodehouse is slowly devising the world of rich men in spats and avenging aunts that would make him a household name....
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by Larry McCaffrey Most of these interviews are dryly academic, as McCaffrey tries to relate this diverse group of SF authors into (or out of) the recently acceptable literary schools (mainly post modernism). There is some action--Sterling for most of...
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Interviews with Contemporary American Science Fiction Authors" »
Of course, this is not the first time I've read this classic. This time I was stuck by how similar the description of the wyrm (dragon) and its actions parallel Tolkien's Smaug. Tolkien was a scholar of Beowulf, so it...
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by Redmond O'Hanlon This was sent me by David Baboulene, who also sent me Mayle's A Year in Provence. Both of these books are considered humorous books on travel, but they couldn't be more different. Mayle's book is like a...
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by John D. MacDonald I'm constantly amazed at the hold that MacDonald asserts over me as a reader, certainly with this character. The beginnings always seem to jump right off, even when they also seem to ramble, like in...
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by Rex Stout Three novellas featuring Nero Wolfe, Archie Goodwin and the rest of the gang. What's new here is that Stout is beginning to speak forthrightly about sex. In earlier books, he'd been cunningly vague about sexual motivation or...
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by Tim Cahill This is a well-written collection of essays by Cahill, subtitled "Adventure is a Risky Business," that succeeds best when Cahill is trying to make due with human nature rather than mother nature. Or, possibly, that's just...
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by P.G. Wodehouse Wodehouse is finely honing the comical style that characterizes the later novels. This novel, however, is very dissimilar to Bertie/Jeeves. Instead, it's more like Damon Runyon, if Runyon had written a novel. The characteristic near-misses and misunderstandings...
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by Kim Stanley Robinson I like Stan's writing, even when I'm totally unsure of what it is I'm reading. He's one of the few writers I don't mind re-reading; if anything, I get more of what I like in...
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by S.J. Perelman There's only one thing worse than a new convert to science fiction--you know the type, 30 years old and just now reading Dune and Stranger in a Strange Land and Foundation for the first time and...
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by Royce Allen Ed Bryant compared this story of Royce's to Jim Thompson at our reading. I haven't read any Thompson, so to me what this read like was Joe R. Lansdale. Royce's poor white trash live in New Mexico...
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by Jon Bradshaw Not really a travel book, like the rest of the Vintage Departures line, but an examination of another culture just the same. Bradshaw profiles six men with something in common--they are all hustlers, that is, gamblers who...
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edited by Keath Fraser A collection of travel writing, mainly excerpts from longer works, although a few are short essays, describing those trips that--well, did not seem quite so fun at the time, but make for great reading. I...
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edited by Robin W. Winks A collection of essays by crime/mystery writers on writing, mysteries (writing and field), and their own experience. I found these to be genuinely motivating, very interesting and revealing. I've never thought to write a crime...
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by Vikram Seth Very well done travelogue around China. A perfect counterpoint to Salzman's Iron & Silk. Salzman stayed in one spot for his sojourn in China; Seth, although he spent two years at Nanjing University, here is concerned with...
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by Ed McBain 87th Precinct mystery. Steve Carella gets shot again, this time by the "Deaf Man." This is getting a little old, this constant use of Carella as a punching bag or the character around which the "mystery" is...
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by Eric Newby Quintessentially English bit of travel, with the ambitious idea of climbing Mir Samir in Afghanistan, but ostensibly to visit Nuristan next door. The English bit comes into play when you discover that Newby isn't a mountain...
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by Terry Pratchett Better than I remembered the only other Discworld novel that I have read to be (The Colour of Magic), but still not quite to my taste, and I'm not sure if this is entirely my taste,...
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by Ted Conover A travel book about America, except as seen through the eyes of a constant traveler, the railroad tramp. And, while it does indeed describe some of America, Conover's agenda here is more to understand hobo society. He...
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by Rex Stout A little stronger of a mystery this time. I would never excel as a solver of locked room mysteries, because I tend to enjoy the writing too much (when it is good) than I cultivate an ability...
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by Iain M. Banks If I ever write a critical summary of Banks' novels, I would have to title it "Beyond the Twist," for it is exactly that which is Banks' work. Where another author might come up with...
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by Bruce Sterling It would be hard for me to write an unbiased view of this book, so I might as well be up front with why I was predisposed to like it. One, I know Sterling, count him...
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Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier" »
by Neal Stephenson The last great hope of cyberpunk to visit us, and one of the best and funniest, Snow Crash walks on the wild side of fiction, and struts while doing so. From page one you know this...
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by James Tiptree, Jr. This is the Tiptree collection which contains the infamous introduction by Robert Silverberg in which he claims that Tiptree was not just a man, but indubitably a man, based on the text herein. Of course,...
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by E.F. Benson I was attacted to this book (and series by Benson) because Tom Holt has written sequels to these books, and I felt like I should read the originals before searching out Holt's pastiches. I was reminded...
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by Kim Newman Kim Newman acknowledges Howard Waldop (among many others) in the back of this book, with the note, "I'm not worthy." I disagree. Newman has his own take on alternate history, and there's room enough for him,...
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selected by the Editors of Mystery Scene Chalk another one up to synchronicity. Ever since reading Colloquium on Crime, I've been toying with the idea of trying my hand at mystery short stories. Although I read a lot of mystery...
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by Michael Scott Rohan A fun novel, recommended to me by Bob Gore, who knew that I liked pirates (especially as seen in Tim Powers' On Stranger Tides). Bob said that Chase the Morning wasn't as good, and he...
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by Josh Sugarmann I recently found myself in a gun control debate on co.general. Wishing to back myself up with facts, I started to delve into the books and journals dedicated to this only-slightly-less-hot-than-abortion debate. Josh Sugarmann's book isn't exactly...
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Money, Firepower, and Fear" »
by Ian McDonald After my review of McDonald's short story collection, Speaking in Tongues, several people, among them Michael Sumbera, recommended to me what they felt was McDonald's best novel, Out on Blue Six. There was also some attention focused...
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by James Crumley Crumley's an original who doesn't write enough. Like the characters of his books, he's a hard drinker, and it unfortunately affects the output. But would he be the same writer if he wasn't the same drinker?...
Continue reading "The Muddy Fork and Other Thigns:
Short Fiction and Nonfiction" »
by John D. MacDonald Another Travis McGee book. This one seemed to take forever to get going, to set up the problem, and then as soon as you understood the problem, MacDonald popped you a good one, and the...
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by John Crowley A collection of four novellas from John Crowley, perhaps best known as the author of Little, Big. I admire Crowley's writing, although, like Howard Waldrop's, I often don't follow everything that's going on. In particular in...
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by David Zindell Zindell's first, and so far, only novel, although his second is set to be released later this year. This is epic SF in the grand tradition. Epic? Yes. It is long (552 pages in the paperback edition),...
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by Hunter S. Thompson In an attempt to get culturally on-line, I decided to rectify a missing portion of influential pop culture in the form of the guru of gonzo, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. I realized that I had...
Continue reading "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas:
A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream" »
Pulphouse is the only fiction magazine that I subscribe to at the moment. No, that's not right. Try again. Pulphouse is the only fiction magazine that I receive by subscription, having received a free subscription to it after I sold...
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by Howard Waldrop and Jake Saunders As you can imagine from the title, this isn't a great work of literature. I remember a friend reading this book in high school around 1983 and thinking, even when I was a non-discriminate...
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by Donald A. Norman In a way, this is a self-help book. But to call it that is to damn it, so instead we must term it something else. The appellation, however distasteful, fits for POET (as Norman abbreviates...
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by William Tenn This novel recalled for me a Thomas M. Disch novel that I read back in high school. I'm not sure of the title at the moment, but I think it was The Puppies of Terra. Tenn's...
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by Rudy Rucker Thanks to Mike Sumbera, I'm another novel towards completing my Rucker collection. A weird one from Rucker, but then, that's kind of an oxymoron; everything from the mind of Rucker has a weird stance. This one...
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Okay, I missed the first issue. If somebody's got it, I'd like to have it. If somebody knows where to get one, please get one for me. I like this magazine. Sure, it's almost too hip for words. It definitely...
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by John Varley This has one of the most audacious beginning lines--an opening worthy of Harlan Ellison, famous for his eyeball-kicking first lines. "The penis will be obsolete within 5 years." What a great line. Unfortunately, Steel Beach is...
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Another issue of this trendy, hip 'zine that I almost hate myself for liking. Ah, what the hell, sometimes you're a leader, and sometimes you jump late onto the bandwagon. The big story this issue is interactive music videos, spearheaded...
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by Rex Stout A collection of three novellas featuring Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin. After awhile, there's not really much one can say about Stout's mysteries. They are always well done--I remember reading someone saying that Rex Stout never wrote...
Continue reading "Homicide Trinity" »
by Norrie Epstein Although this is billed as a book about Shakespeare and his work for people who don't like it (of which I am definately not numbered), I learned a lot about the plays and the periods in...
Continue reading "The Friendly Shakespeare" »
by P.G. Wodehouse Like the last Wodehouse I read, this is more like Damon Runyon than later Plum. I suspect that this was written when Wodehouse first visited America and was trying to break into the American markets (it...
Continue reading "The Little Nugget" »
by A.S. Byatt I am stunned. How often do you finish a book, slowly turning the back cover to close, as the hair on the back of your arms twitches upward with the electricity of mingled pleasure and sadness?...
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by Ed McBain The writing's still a bit purple, but finally we see a glimpse of the McBain to come--the McBain that knows what a mystery is and knows how to show it to us rather than tell it to...
Continue reading "See Them Die" »