Three Philip K. Dick Award nominees

Three Philip K. Dick Award nominees

The nominees for the Philip K. Dick Award for Best SF Novel first published in paperback were announced the other day. They are:

The Book of Etta by Meg Elison (47North)
Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty (Orbit)
After the Flare by Deji Bryce Olukotun (The Unnamed Press)
The Wrong Stars by Tim Pratt (Angry Robot)
Revenger by Alastair Reynolds (Orbit)
Bannerless by Carrie Vaughn (Mariner/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
All Systems Red by Martha Wells (Tor.com)

I confess I had had heard of neither The Book of Etta nor After the Flare before this nomination – which is, to be sure, one of the good things about awards! I had heard of both Six Wakes and Revenger – both look interesting, in fact – but I haven’t read either of them. I have, however, read the other three, all of which are good books, so I’ll review them in brief here.

Bannerless, by Carrie Vaughn (Mariner, 978-0-544-94730-6, $14.99, tpb, 275 pages) July 2017

This is the first novel set in Carrie Vaughn’s post-Apocalyptic sequence. That sequence already includes some excellent short stories (“Amaryllis”, “Astrophilia”, and “Bannerless” (a sort of beta version of the novel). One did wonder if she was going to do an alphabetic tour …) Technological civilization has collapsed, and, decades later, on what seems the California coast, a loose society has formed, built around essentially green principles, most notably an insistence on families earning the right to have children. This right is indicated by banners. So a “bannerless” child invites punishment for the parents, and often social ostracism for the (obviously blameless) children.

The novel is a mystery in form. The protagonist is Enid, an investigator, someone who travels among the local towns when something suspicious occurs. She is new at her job, and when a suspicious death is reported in Pasadan, her mentor, Tomas, suggests that she lead this investigation, with Tomas’ support. So, the main thread follows Enid and Tomas through their investigation, which concerns the death of a man. This man lived alone, perhaps due to his nature, but perhaps because he was a bannerless child. There is considerable political pressure to have the death considered an accident – and indeed, it seems, perhaps it was – but there are curious elements. And complicating factors – a connection to a prosperous local family, the general dislike of the victim – and, even, the presence of Enid’s former lover, Dak. (Not the Dallas Cowboys’ quarterback!)

The second thread begins in Enid’s childhood, and follows her life up to the novel’s present. This thread allows us to see even more of the structure of this future society – including the families, which are extended in nature, and only partly based on genetic ties. We also see some hints of the time of the collapse – Enid has an “aunt” who is one of the few people still alive who remember the world before. And we follow Enid’s romance with Dak, a particularly talented musician (who ends up acting like a certain common depiction of contemporary rock stars).

It’s very fine work – building an interesting society, and at least suggesting some flaws in what at first glance seems a near-Utopian adaptation to post-Collapse conditions. (“Astrophilia”, in particular, is even better at poking at the complacent beliefs of that society in its virtue. It is an abiding fault of post-Apocalyptic writings (I’m looking at you, Edgar Pangborn!) to take a certain glee in the collapse of civilization, allowing its replacement by the author’s preferred social forms.) The murder mystery is solved plausibly (if not terrible surprisingly, but that isn’t necessarily a fault), and its solution also shows stresses in the society’s underpinnings. I liked the book a lot. A sequel, The Wild Roads, is due in 2018.

All Systems Red, by Martha Wells (Tor.com, 978-0765397539, $14.99, tpb, 160 pages) May 2017

I’m going to be a tad coy here, as my capsule review of this will be in the February Locus. So all I’ll say here is that I recommend this highly. I think it’s a long novella, by Nebula/Hugo rules, but perhaps it’s a short novel instead. (Either way, it’s definitely eligible for the Philip K. Dick Award.) This is great fun, about an android employed as security for a scientific team investigation an alien planet. The android, which calls itself murderbot, for reasons tied to its past, really just wants to watch old television, but it finds itself forced to deal with a real threat to its clients. Funny, thoughtful about AI rights, and good solid adventure. Tremendous fun, really. Two further stories in what is being called collectively The Murderbot Diaries are due in 2018.

The Wrong Stars, by Tim Pratt (Angry Robot, 978-0-85766-709-0, $7.99, mmpb, 396 pages) September 2017

This is really cool Space Opera, again lots of fun. As with most Space Opera, some of the science bits are a whole lot handwavy – and maybe that’s just fine, because, really, is present day science the be all and end all of reality? In some ways this reminded me of Becky Chambers’ A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, and I thought maybe some more stories as well, which makes me think I ought to examine further and decide if there is now a popular subgenre of Space Opera concerning the almost soap-operatic interactions of a small varied spaceship crew.

One viewpoint character of The Wrong Stars is Callie, Captain of a spaceship, the White Raven, that does solo work and also occasionally works for the Trans-Neptunian Authority, in a future in which humanity has just stepped back from the brink of species disaster, having nearly ruined the Earth. Partly or perhaps mostly because of tech bartered from aliens called the Liars, Earth has been restored to a gardenlike state, and humans have occupied most of the Solar System. They have also colonized 29 planets, via wormhole bridges sold them by the Liars.

The other viewpoint character is Elena Oh. She was a crewmember on a Goldilocks ship – one of a number of starships sent to likely looking star systems in a Hail Mary attempt to save human civilization before the Liars appeared. These ships were slower than light, with the crew in suspended animation. Elena’s ship, the Anjou, has been found by the White Raven in Trans-Neptunian space, and it has been weirdly altered. Elena is the only person on board. And her memories are fractured, but they suggest that something very strange occurred in the system they finally reached … leading to Elena being sent back to the Solar System alone.

There is immediate sexual attraction between Elena and Callie (who are both recovering from relationships or crushes with men). This complicates their future interactions. But things are complicated anyway, with Callie’s crew consisting of a motley arrangement of folks, including an AI whom we soon gather is based on the personality of Callie’s ex. Elena’s memories of what happened on the system her ship had reached are critical as well – they seem to have encountered aliens unrelated to the Liars. Aliens who seem ready to forcefully modify the humans they encounter. Elena insists on trying to rescue her fellow crewmembers. And the tech Callie recovers on Elena’s ships seems gamechanging, and very scary – especially to the Liars.

The resolution turns on spectacular revelations about the nature of the Liars, and their true motivations, and about what Elena and her fellow crewmembers encountered as well. And the resolution is quite satisfying, and sets up some really interesting subsequent volumes. This will be at least a trilogy, I believe, with the next volume, The Dreaming Stars, due in 2018.

In summary, I have to say, I don’t have a strong preference for a winner of this award. I’d be happy with any of the three books I’ve read winning, and I trust that the other nominees are similarly good. All I can say is – do read these books! There are all both fund and intriguing.

An Obscure Ace Double: The Winds of Gath, by E. C. Tubb/Crisis on Cheiron, by Juanita Coulson

Ace Double Reviews, 25: The Winds of Gath, by E. C. Tubb/Crisis on Cheiron, by Juanita Coulson (#H-27, 1967, $0.60)

One of my goals in this series of reviews is to cover at least one book by all the more prolific Ace Double Contributors. E. C. Tubb was one of these, with 12 "halves", that appeared in 11 separate books (one Ace Double consisted of a Tubb novel backed with a story collection), as well as 1 Ace Double reprint recombining two Tubb halves that were originally published separately. The Winds of Gath is about 50,000 words long. The other half, Juanita Coulson's Crisis on Cheiron, is perhaps 52,000 words.

(covers by Jerome Podwill (left) and Kelly Freas (right))

Tubb is a British writer, born 1919, died in 2010. He published something over 100 SF novels, and about as many short stories, under his own name and a variety of pseudonyms. One pseudonym was the memorable "Volsted Gridban"! His best known pseudonym was probably "Gregory Kern", under which name he wrote the "Cap Kennedy" books for DAW in the early 70s. (I have not read any of that series.) But he is by far better known for his long series of novels about Earl Dumarest and his search for his lost home planet, Earth. These were published first by Ace, then by DAW, from 1967 through 1985, with a final book showing up only in 1997 from a small press (apparently having been published sometime earlier in France, and presumably having been rejected by DAW). This series runs to 32 books, of which I have read 25 or so. They constitute a rather guilty pleasure -- very formulaic, very repetitive, sometimes downright silly -- but I found them enjoyable mind candy.

The novel at hand, The Winds of Gath, is the first of the Dumarest novels. It opens with Earl Dumarest, a tough loner, probably about 40 years old. (His age is never specified, and doesn't seem to change. A rigorous timeline of the books and implied travel times and mentions of his past would, I'm guessing, imply an age of well over a century, but I don't think Tubb cared much about that sort of internal consistency.) Dumarest is revived from traveling "low" (i.e. in suspended animation, with a 15% risk of death -- something Dumarest defies countless times in the series) only to find that instead of the planet he intended to reach his ship was diverted to Gath at the whim of the powerful Matriarch of Kund. This is bad news for Dumarest, because he is out of money and Gath offers no good prospect of making enough money for passage to another world.

The Matriarch of Kund has come to Gath to listen to the famous winds blowing through a rock formation during a periodic storm: supposedly the rock formation allows hearers to hear almost anything they desire. She is accompanied by her ward, the lush and beautiful Seena Thoth, whom she may designate her successor, as well as by the Cyber Dyne, one of the red-cloaked Cyclan, castrated cybers with enormous analytical abilities.

Dumarest, after some death-defying adventures, stumbles into a staged fight with another nobleman's trained killer, and due to his incredible reflexes and his superior tactics, he wins, gaining the notice of the Matriarch. He and Seena establish a doomed relationship, as once Seena becomes Matriarch, she must forgo all lovers and the chance of children. Dumarest fends off an attempt on Seena's life, presumably by a jealous rival for the Matriarch's position, and he accompanies them to the rock formation to wait out the storm. And during the storm various plots and counterplots come to life, and Dumarest is fortuitously in a position to thwart the secret goals of the Cyber, and also to fend off certain other people with less than good intentions.

The novel introduces a number of ongoing themes and tropes of the series. There is an example passage describing the Cyber going into rapport with the greater Cybernetic mind, via the implanted "Homochon elements": a passage that Tubb pretty much cut-and-pasted into each of the Dumarest novels. There is Dumarest making money by fighting -- something that happens in at least half of the books. There is only a hint of the quest that will dominated much of the series: Dumarest's search for his lost home, though there is also a blatant hint of something important about Earth that I only figured out after reading several of the later books (I read those books I read in pretty much random order). The Cyclan, in this book, are not yet alerted to search for Dumarest, something that happens, as I recall, because of a discovery Dumarest makes in book 4, Kalin, so that subplot is not present.

It's not really one of the best of the Dumarest novels, in my opinion, turning on some really grossly silly pseudo-science -- not that Tubb ever bothered much with plausibility in that area. And the plot is a bit incoherent -- the ISFDB labels the British edition, entitled simply Gath, as a revision. I wonder if it's actually a restoration of the original text, and if this version is cut. Anybody know? Still and all, it's fast moving and has plenty of action -- on OK way to spend a couple of hours.

Juanita Coulson is a fannish legend. She and her husband, the late Robert "Buck" Coulson, edited the fanzine Yandro, which was nominated for a Hugo 10 years in a row, from 1958 through 1967, winning in 1965. (This made her one of the first women to win a Hugo, as far as I can tell: the only previous winners being Elinor Busby and Pat Lupoff, both also for fanzines co-edited with their husbands (I presume).) Juanita Coulson is also a very well-known filker. And she had published more than a dozen novels, and a number of short stories, beginning with "Another Rib", a collaboration with Marion Zimmer Bradley in which she used the pseudonym "John Jay Wells", which appeared in F&SF in 1963. (Robert Coulson himself published several novels and a few short stories, often in collaboration with Gene DeWeese.) Juanita Coulson's best-known novels are probably the Children of the Stars series, which as I recall was a family saga, published by Del Rey in the 1980s.

Crisis on Cheiron was Coulson's first novel, one of two Ace Doubles she wrote. Her other Ace Double, The Singing Stones, was also paired with an E. C. Tubb novel, Derai, the second Dumarest novel.

Crisis on Cheiron opens with Carl Race, a young ecologist for the Terran Survey, arriving at Cheiron, a planet newly opened to trade with Earth. The corporation controlling that trade, Consolidated Enterprises, has called in Carl and his boss, Donovan Petry, to investigate the sudden crop failures on Cheiron.

The natives of Cheiron are mostly friendly centaur-like people. But it soon becomes clear that there is a faction which may be under the influence of Consolidated's rival, the sneeringly evil Trans Galactic. And if things don't go better, the Ethnic Protection organization may shut down Cheiron altogether.

Race and Petry, with some help from a beautiful schoolteacher named Marcy de Laurent, and a precocious adolescent Cheironian named Nubi, quickly realize that the problem is that bees and butterflies have been disappearing, making pollinization impossible. But what could be causing that? Complicating matters is an 8 day deadline imposed by one of the Matriarchs of the Cheironians. (I note that both halves of this Double feature "Matriarchs".) There follows an attack of bees, nearly killing off all three humans, and a fire at Marcy's schoolhouse, and then Petry is murdered. Obviously, the villains, whoever they are, mean business.

Rather inexplicably, the authorities immediately decide that Race is guilty of murdering his boss. So he is forced to escape, with Marcy's help. Fortunately, he has a brilliant idea as to what the problem is, helped by Nubi's non-humans range of senses. The three are able to make their way to the lair of the villains ...

Well, you knew it would all work out well. It's fast-moving and kind of exciting, but at bottom it's a touch too silly. The central scientific notion is ludicrous. The villains are just too evull for words -- way over the top. And the plot is driven by implausibilities such as the authorities jumping to conclusions about Carl's guilt in killing his boss. Also, the budding romance between Carl and Marcy is hinted at but never developed, and at the end just sort of allowed to slide. I was happy to have read it, but it's pretty forgettable stuff.

A Classic Ace Double Pairing: Star Guard, by Andre Norton/Planet of No Return, by Poul Anderson

Ace Double Reviews, 27: Star Guard, by Andre Norton/Planet of No Return, by Poul Anderson (#D-199, 1956, $0.35)

a review by Rich Horton

This Ace Double features an SFWA Grand Master writing each half. Noticing this, I decided to see how many Grand Masters wrote Ace Doubles. The answer is, most of them. Indeed, 18 of the 33 SFWA Grand Masters were featured in at least one "classic" Ace Double (i.e., the ones published between 1953 and 1973 in dos-a-dos fashion). (One of the others, Lester Del Rey, had a quasi Ace Double published in 1977.) The numbers were 18 of 30 when Samuel Delany became a Grand Master, and I'm pretty sure he'll be the last Ace Double writer to become a Grand Master. In my estimation the only remaining writer of the "Ace Double Generation" who might be named a Grand Master is Kate Wilhelm, and she never was in an Ace Double.

Three of the Grand Masters are also among the most prolific Ace Double writers: Andre Norton, Jack Vance, and Poul Anderson. The other Ace Doubles I can find quickly to feature two different Grand Masters were #D-61, from 1954, L. Sprague de Camp's Cosmic Manhunt backed with Clifford Simak's Ring Around the Sun; and #D-110, from 1995, featuring Anderson's No World of Their Own backed with Isaac Asimov's The 1,000-Year Plan (yes, a retitling of Foundation).

Star Guard is the longest Ace Double half I have yet seen, at 68,000 words. It is a reprinting of a 1955 Harcourt, Brace hardcover. As with many Norton novels, a hardcover marketed to the Juvenile segment was followed by a paperback marketed to adults.

(Cover by Ed Emshwiller)

The book opens with a brief prologue explaining that after reaching the stars humans encountered an existing Galactic civilization. The rulers of this civilization decided that humans were too aggressive for full membership, but that their aggression could be put to good use by making them mercenaries. Some mercenaries become "Mechs", who serve on relatively higher-tech worlds, using tanks, airplanes, blasters and such. Others become "Archs", who serve on low-tech worlds using swords and rifles.

The hero of this book is Kana Karr, a newly-hatched Arch specializing is "Alien Liaison". His first assignment is to the planet Fronn, taking one side of a dispute between twins over which is the rightful heir. But things go horribly wrong when someone armed with a blaster kills the twin Kana's group is backing. This is evidence of a rogue regiment of Mechs illegally operating on a low-tech planet.

When Kana's Horde (as they are called) tries to peacefully leave the planet, they find their escape routes blocked, and more treachery ends in the murder of the Horde's leaders. It is up to the survivors to make their way through the hostile outback of Fronn, dealing with natural obstacles such as the mountains, dangerous animals, and a weeks long storm; as well as more sophisticated obstacles presented by the three indigenous sentient species of the planet. Their goal is to report the rogue Mechs to the authorities, but as time goes on evidence mounts that this conspiracy way be more wide-ranging than they imagine.

It's pretty decent adventure SF. The aliens are fun in a classic 50s manner. The action is well-handled. The plot is twisty enough to hold the interest. The final resolution perhaps doesn't quite convince, but it is in its way satisfying, and it resolves this book's action while certainly leaving room for a sequel or sequels.

(Cover by Ed Valigursky)

Planet of No Return is about 33,000 words long. It is a reprint, unchanged as far as I can tell, of the serial "Question and Answer", which appeared in the June and July 1954 issues of Astounding. This story was written to be part of a Twayne Triplet. The Twayne Triplets were to be a series of collections of three novellas. Each book would be introduced by an article by a scientist, describing a world and a situation he had created. The three stories would all be set in that world. Thus it was, as far as I know, the first use of a concept which became the "Shared World", and which was later used for such anthologies as Medea: Harlan's World. (Although in the case of the Twayne Triplets, the stories would not be set in a common "future".) The first group of stories was called The Petrified Planet, and included pieces by H. Beam Piper, Fletcher Pratt, and Judith Merril. Some other stories were commissioned, for different worlds, but the only other Twayne Triplet to be published was Witches Three, featuring stories by Pratt, James Blish, and Fritz Leiber. Witches Three may not be a canonical Triplet anyway, as the stories included were not commissioned expressly for the series (for example, the Leiber story is Conjure Wife, from way back in 1943).

(Cover by Kelly Freas)

Isaac Asimov's "Sucker Bait", which had been serialized in Astounding earlier in 1954, was written for the same setup as "Question and Answer". (Other stories that were apparently written for other Twayne Triplet commissions were "Get Out of My Sky" by James Blish, "Second Landing" by Murray Leinster, and "First Cycle", an unfinished H. Beam Piper story that Michael Kurland completed in 1982. Blish's original "Case of Conscience" novelette may also have been intended for a Twayne Triplet.)

The basic setup is a binary star system with a twin planet at one of the Trojan points. The planet seems earthlike -- all other planets humans have found are either unsuitable for human use, or previously occupied. One expedition has been sent from Earth, and has failed to return. Now a second expedition is going. Anderson populates his ship with an ill-mixed mixture of men, and he portrays an expedition in financial peril, and facing apparent sabotage attempts. This is the last chance for Earth to finance a ship to another star system -- unless this expedition proves successful. But on arrival they find a native race, previously unsuspected. Is Earth's star travel doomed? or is this race willing to share? There is a bit of a twist ending, though really it's pretty easy to figure out what's actually going on. The story is a pretty good read, and Anderson spends some time contemplating the central "question" of his story -- is humanity ready for the stars? Not bad stuff.

Old Bestseller: Lieut. Gullivar Jones: His Vacation, by Edwin L. Arnold

Old Bestseller: Lieut. Gullivar Jones: His Vacation, by Edwin L. Arnold

a review by Rich Horton

(In a completely unplanned coincidence, this book was also covered by Jerry House as his contribution to Friday's Forgotten Books.)

This wasn't really an Old Bestseller, but it was a piece of popular fiction by a writer who wrote some good selling novels. That said, at least according to Wikipedia, the failure of this novel to sell very well caused Arnold to cease writing. (Though John Clute points out that each of his books came out from a different publisher, with this last from quite an obscure house. (The other three came out from reasonably prominent firms.) This could well be an indication that each firm was not too pleased with sales.)

The other thing this book is is a once-forgotten, but fairly significant, work of proto-SF. It was rediscovered, it seems, by Richard Lupoff, a fine SF and mystery writer who is also an expert in comics and pulps -- and on Edgar Rice Burroughs. (Lupoff wrote a book called Edgar Rice Burroughs: Master of Adventure, which was first published in 1965 and has been reissued with additional material at least three times.) In 1963 he was the editor-in-chief of the hardcover reprint edition of Edgar Rice Burroughs' novels, and when collector Stephen Takacs decided to sell his collection, he let Lupoff have a look at Lieut. Gullivar Jones, telling him it was a "Burroughs-type" novel. And, indeed, Lupoff upon reading it realized it was a direct ancestor of the John Carter novels, in featuring an American military man traveling by essentially magical means to Mars, encountering Martians of multiple races, and marrying a Princess. There seems little doubt that Burroughs read this novel, though it must be said that A Princess of Mars and its sequels are ultimately much different from the Arnold novel -- and, indeed, it must be said that Burroughs deserved his success, and that the failure of the Arnold novel, if not exactly deserved, is not much of a surprise.

Edwin Arnold (1857-1935) was the son of a poet, Sir Edwin Arnold (NOT Matthew!). He was English, of course. He had some success, it seems, with his first two novels, The Wonderful Adventures of Phra the Phoenician (1890) and Lepidus the Centurion: A Roman of Today (1901), both of which have fantastical aspects, mainly in the long lives of their protagonists. Lieut. Gullivar Jones appeared in 1905. Though there were other works set on Mars before it, the Science Fiction Encyclopedia calls it the first true planetary romance.

The novel was first published by S C Brown, Langham and Co., and in the US by George Bell and Sons. Lupoff suggested to Don Wollheim at Ace Books that he republish it (Burroughs was having something of a revival at the time. due to Lupoff's efforts to some extent). Ace published the paperback in 1964, Wollheim choosing the corrupted title Gulliver of Mars (note the misspelled first name). The cover is by Frank Frazetta. Since then it seems to have remained to a small extent in people's memories, aided by a comic book series (one of the writers of which was George Alec Effinger), by a New English Library paperback in 1977, by a Bison Books reprint in 2003, and even by the appearance of Gullivar Jones (along with John Carter) in Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. My copy is a rather shabby example of the Ace edition that I found in a quite nice used book store in Tempe, AZ, run by a former Arizona State Professor and his wife, with whom I had a nice talk.

Spoilers abound ahead, though I really don't think this is a book that depends for its effects on plot.

As for the book itself, I have to admit I found it slow going at times. Gullivar Jones is a Lieutenant in the U. S. Navy, upset at not having received the promotion he feels he deserves (and thus unable to ask his Polly to marry him). In a bad mood, he by happenstance is on hand when a strange man falls to the ground wrapped in a carpet and breaks his neck. Jones ends up with the carpet, and, feeling terribly used by, wishes himself on Mars. At which point the carpet wraps him up and takes him there.

On Mars Jones falls in with a race of beautiful but terminally lazy people. His first friend is named An -- an androgynous person who turns out to be a woman, one of a race of slaves who thus cannot have children. An takes him eventually to the palace -- and tells him that a special ceremony is due, whereby the non-slaves draw lots to determine who they will marry. Jones spies the Princess Heru and falls desperately in love with her. (Alas for An, who seems all along a more worthy person.) Heru requites his passion, and arranges to fix the lottery so that Gullivar will become her husband. However, this race, which Jones calls the Hither people, are under the domination of another race, the Thither people, who demand a tribute each year, of among other things a beautiful woman to become their King's slave. Naturally, Heru is chosen and taken away.

Jones attempts to follow, and ends up on a desperate boat trip across a sea to the Thither land. By happenstance he ends up instead on the river (or canal) of the Dead (one of the more striking passages in the book), and upon escaping, falls in with some of the Thither people, finding them, on balance, much better people (harder working, more energetic) than Heru's people. He is taken by them for a ghost, and he manages, with a couple more adventures on the way, to make his way to King Ar-Hap's city. Here he demands Heru's return to him -- but a crisis intervenes in the shape of a slow meteor (don't ask!). Eventually he steals Heru away and escapes back to her people -- but Ar-Hap follows, and all seems lost.

Well, Gullivar Jones lands on his feet, and gets back to Earth and Polly -- and I suppose Heru turns out as well as she might have expected to also. And what of An? Well, neither we nor Gullivar ever find out.

Much of this is fairly light satire. Gullivar Jones isn't really much of a hero -- he's a bit obtuse, and he's not terribly successful at most of his adventures. Jayme Lynn Blaschke points out that the Hither and Thither folk seem based on Wells' Eloi and Morlocks (absent the cannibalism). As I said, I found it tedious at times, though there are some good bits as well. I'm glad to have read it, if mostly for historical reasons.

Some Thoughts on two celebrated Black Mirror episodes

(I'd posted this on Facebook, and I've migrated it here for something a bit more permanent.)

Some thoughts on the two most celebrated (as far as I can tell) episodes of BLACK MIRROR ("San Junipero" and "U.S.S. Callister"). First thing is -- yes, I enjoyed them both, especially "U.S.S. Callister". But, I have some quibbles wtih the reactions I've seen to both, in one case on moral grounds, in the other simply a feeling that the story is a bit overpraised... I'll expand after some

SPOILER SPACE ...

.
.
.
.
.
.
.

Ok, "U.S.S. Callister". As those who have seen it know, the episode is about a creepy technology officer for a company that has created a really impressive virtual game space. He -- who has been cheated by his partner, and who is a useless loser with women -- has created a private version of the game space, modelling it on a show obviously based on STAR TREK, and he has created versions of a number of his fellow workers (using their DNA via some unconvincing magic tech) and imprisoned them in that game space eternally. The women are creepily "enhanced" for, apparently, his sexual excitement (though no one has genitals -- his hangups obviously include fear of actual sex), the men are humiliated, any of them are changed into monsters if they cross certain lines.

OK, so far so good. This guy is pretty creepy (though his worst "real life" sin seems to be that he is "too starey" at times), and what he has done to the virtual copies of his co-workers -- "copies" which are conscious and feeling and, and which change based on their "virtual"experiences -- is horrible, and deserves punishment. And, a punishment is devised -- his virtual copy is enslaved in some sort of isolated bubble universe, while (most of the) rest of the crew is freed to the open network, on a version of the starship that might be able to do real cool stuff.

What's the problem? Well, the real life version of the bad guy, as far as I can tell, is essentially murdered. (He's stuck linked into the game space, can't get out, and so will die of thirst/starvation in a little while.) And nobody seems to care. What he needs is some psychological treatment. Murder seems a long step too far.

That moral objection aside -- and I should note that the episode itself doesn't necessarily endorse his murder -- viewers, I think, are supposed to notice what's been done, and check their own reactions.-- the whole thing is very well done, and the final jump into a virtual space that seems like a fun and expansive universe is pretty cool.

Now, "San Junipero". The title space, which strongly resembles Santa Cruz (as hinted by the movie poster for LOST BOYS in the opening scene) is actually a virtual space, where people can visit for a few hours a week; and where people who are dying can upload themselves and presumably live forever. That's a fine idea, but it's a VERY OLD idea, treated in too many SF stories to enumerate. There are obvious issues to consider, and they've been considered, again and again. In this episode, the central story is about two people, a Lesbian woman who we eventually learn has been confined to a hospital bed for decades after she became paralyzed in an accident resulting partly from her parents' terrible reaction to her coming out; and a bisexual woman who had had a long happy marriage to a man who had objections to "passing over" -- being uploaded in San Junipero. This woman -- Kelly -- resists the other woman's plea to join her in San Junipero after she -- after both of them -- die.

The thing is, the objections to uploading are given very short shrift. And San Junipero -- to my mind -- is portrayed as a very shallow place. All you can do there is go to bars, have sex, and drive cars too fast (because after all you won't die permanently if you crash). Doesn't that seem like kind of a thin life? And don't the 20 year old bodies everyone has seem kind of a cliche?

Mind you, I still liked the episode, and thought it very slickly done, very well executed. But kind of shallow.

Film Review: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, Missouri

We finally saw Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, Missouri yesterday. This is the much praised new film by Martin McDonagh. This is McDonagh's third feature film. We saw the first two: In Bruges (2008) and Seven Psychopaths (2012). (Thanks to our son Geoff for pointing us at In Bruges.) Those films, particularly In Bruges, were both excellent -- twisty and blackly funny and intelligent and involving. Three Billboards is also brilliant -- indeed, it's his best film, I think. It can be described in the same terms I used above except it's not twisty -- and it is emotionally stunning in a way the first two films really aren't.

Some of this is acting. Three Billboards stars Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson, and Sam Rockwell. McDormand is getting tremendous Oscar buzz, and she deserves it, but one shouldn't slight Harrelson and Rockwell, who are both exceptional. (I should mention that McDormand and Rockwell, in particular, are two of my favorite actors.)

The story is in its way fairly simple. McDormand plays Mildred Hayes, whose daughter Angela was raped and murdered some months prior to the film's action. The crime is unsolved, and she decides to put up a series of billboards near the murder site, stating: "Raped While Dying"/"Still No Arrests"/"How Come, Chief Willoughby?". Her grief and rage are understandable, but her placement of blame is utterly unfair -- the police department has done their best (possibly somewhat limited by small town resources), but the crime is simply one of those that may be beyond resolution.

The story turns more on the local reaction to the billboards, which is mostly negative -- indeed, as much an overreaction as Mildred's blame of Chief Willoughby. Willoughby (played by Harrelson) is an honorable man, with a beautiful Australian (?) wife and two young daughters. And he's dying of cancer. His reaction to the billboards is composed partly of anger at Mildred's unfair criticism of him, but it's blended with compassion for her situation, and a lot of tolerance for her actions (which include some outright criminality). The rest of the town is less forgiving, harassing her teenaged son, harassing her African American boss -- and her dentist even tries to pull her teeth without novacaine. The hostility extends to the advertising firm that rented her the billboard space. Mildred's husband, who had left her for a 19-year-old not long before Angela's murder, is also upset at her -- for a constellation of reasons that go beyond the billboards, of course, and that intersect in ways that cause intense guilt in both of them -- Mildred especially.

I haven't mentoned the imost important character besides Mildred -- Jason Dixon (played by Rockwell) -- a frankly and violently racist cop. Willoughby doesn't approve of his actions, and reins him in when he can, but seems a step too tolerant, too sure he can bring out the good he's convinced Dixon has in him. But we learn, over time, that Dixon is a loser six ways from Sunday -- with the help of his quite awful mother. It's obvious that he takes out his personal shortcomings on anyone he can -- and somehow, between the writing and Rockwell's acting, we feel a bit for him -- even though we cheer his (much earned) downfall.

The movie has a couple of turning points -- an intensely moving development in Willoughby's life -- terrible crimes committed by both Jason Dixon and Mildred Hayes (in both case somewhat unpunished, at least by the justice system) -- and what seems a promising break in the Angela Hayes case. But it doesn't offer any easy answers, nor any real redemption or cathartic resolution. We are, it seems, urged to cheer for Mildred, but it becomes clear that she is essentially broken, simply too obsessed with revenge, and too willing to let her obsession smash anyone around her -- the basically good, like Willoughby and like her son; and the not so good, like Dixon and her ex-husband. Dixon is even more broken, and with less reason, but they end up literally in the same place, looking for someone to take their hate and anger out on who just might deserve it.

Are there faults? Of course there are. The biggest fault, I think, is the unconvincing portrayal of (fictional) Ebbing, Missouri. I'm a Missourian, so maybe I notice more -- but the location doesn't look like Missouri. (I would guess it's supposed to be set in the Ozarks, in a town maybe like Dexter or perhaps more like West Plains.) That's a nitpick (I believe the movie was shot in North Carolina, and it does look like that). But otherwise the town doesn't quite hold together -- the High School looks too big, the police station too small and old. There's a point where Dixon tries to explain to his Mother why white people can't just order blacks around like they used to -- "The South has changed", he says. But no one from Missouri would call it part of "the South". None of these faults really harm the overall movie -- but they do make it clear that it was written and directed by an Irishman who has possibly not even been to the state.

One thing that's really important in movies is music, and the music here is wonderful. (The music was coordinated by the great Carter Burwell, probably best known for his work with the Coen Brothers.) Best of all is the song that both opens and closes the movie: "Buckskin Stallion Blues", one of the incomparable Townes Van Zandt's greatest songs. The opening version is Van Zandt's original, the closing version is a lovely cover by a singer I had not known of before, but will listen to more now, Amy Annelle.

Bottom line: this is a wonderful, wrenching, movie. It had me in helpless tears at least twice. Granting that I haven't seen all the most praised movies of the year, I have this at the top of my list of 2017 movies (though The Shape of Water is pretty darn close).

Old Bestseller: The Social Secretary, by David Graham Phillips

Old Bestseller: The Social Secretary, by David Graham Phillips

a review by Rich Horton

Sometimes the author's life story is far more interesting (and shocking!) than the events of their novels. So it is with David Graham Phillips, who was murdered, at the age of 43, by a man who thought one of Phillips' characters was based on his sister, in a libelous fashion. (The killer then committed suicide.)

David Graham Phillips was another of a long string of influential and popular novelists from Indiana who were active around the turn of the 20th Century. (Others include Booth Tarkington, Meredith Nicholson, Charles Major, George Ade, James Whitcomb Riley, and Theodore Dreiser.) Phillips was born in 1867. After college (Asbury College in Indiana (now DePauw) and then Princeton) he worked as a journalist in Cincinnati before moving to New York. He had much success in this field, and was considered one of the important "muckrakers", notably publishing an article called "The Treason of the Senate", which was one impetus for the eventual passing of the 17th amendment, which allowed for direct election of Senators. His first novel, The Great God Success (1901) sold well enough that he quit his newspaper position and concentrated on freelance investigative journalism as well as novels. He eventually published over 20, written over about a decade. It seems that most of them dealt with significant social issues, particularly the social and economic position of women. (He never married, living with his sister Carolyn until his death in 1911. She prepared his last novels for publication, and I wonder if she had a hand in writing them.) His most famous novel might be Susan Lenox, not published until 1917, which concerns a prostitute.

(Cover by Clarence F. Underwood)

In this context The Social Secretary seems an outlier. It is very short (about 25,000 words) and very light. It was published in 1905 by the Indianapolis firm of Bobbs, Merrill, though my copy is a Grosset and Dunlap reprint, from about the same time. It is illustrated by Clarence F. Underwood, with "decorations" by Ralph Fletcher Seymour. (I am not quite sure what the "decorations" are meant to be, unless that's a credit for the design of the book.)

The story is told via the supposed diary entries of Augusta (Gus) Talltowers, a young woman of a very good Washington, D.C. family that has fallen on hard times. Forced to get a job, she becomes the social secretary for Mrs. Burke, the wife of a new Senator from a Western State. The Burkes are relatively uncultured, "common", and Gus determines to use her knowledge of the social ways of DC, along with the Burkes' money, to establish them in society, to the political benefit of Mr. Burke.

Along the way Gus takes very much to Mrs. Burke -- "Ma" as she insists on being called. Gus doesn't take as easily to Bucyrus Burke, the eligible and appropriately aged scion of the family, though her friends try to persuade her to set her cap for him -- he'll have enough money to solve her family's financial problems. But "Cyrus" just seems silly to Gus. Gus has a suitor of her own, a Colonel Lafollette, but she finds him boring. She is more interested in the impoverished Robert Gunton, a friend of the Burkes.

However, as Gus's efforts on behalf of the Burkes are a smashing success, Robert falls for Nadezhda, the dangerous sister of the Ambassador of an Eastern European nation (no name given, I suppose "Ruritania" will do). A mild diplomatic incident is threatened. Also, Ma Burke has something of a nervous collapse from too much partying. And somehow Cyrus seems less annoying than he had ...

Well, of course, all works out swimmingly. Robert Gunton's masterly ways tame Nadezhda and charm her family. Ma Burke pulls through just fine. And Cyrus finally figures out how to properly court Gus. It's a very slight book, pleasant enough but really a bit less fun than I had really hoped. It is worth noting that besides the romance plot there is a bit of neep about the social world -- and how that affected the politics -- in Washington at that time -- it's minor stuff, but it's of some interest.

Old Bestseller Posts on this Blog

My final (I trust) organizing post lists the posts I've made about what I consider for the purposes of this blog to be "Old Bestsellers". In its simplest sense I mean books that were on bestseller lists in roughly the first half of the 20th Century, but I extend things to include books by writers who had major bestsellers, and bestselling books from somewhat earlier (at least to the middle of the 19th Century) and a bit later, and occasionally books of a popular sort, in the right time frame, that were by a writer who never quite made it big.

As this sort of book was the first inspiration for this blog, such books make up the largest portion of posts here. (Granted, I stretch a point in including certain books here, but so be it.) So this will be a longish (and ever-growing) list. As of now, there are 94 entries on the list. The best book here is certainly Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth, and the worst is undoubtedly the pirated Count of Monte Cristo faux-sequel Edmund Dantes, by Edmund Flagg.

The Social Secretary, by David Graham Phillips (1905);

The Auction Block, by Rex Beach (1914);

That Girl From New York, by Allene Corliss (1932);

Under the Red Robe, by Stanley J. Weyman (1894);

The Octangle, by Emanie Sachs (1930);

The Lonely, by Paul Gallico (1947);

Under the Rose, by Frederic S. Isham (1903);

The Road to Frontenac, by Samuel Merwin (1901);

The Leopard Woman, by Stewart Edward White (1916);

Castle Garac, by Nicholas Monsarrat (1955);

Rodney Stone, by A. Conan Doyle (1896);

Casuals of the Sea, by William McFee (1916);

The Fortune Hunter, by Louis Joseph Vance (1910);

Penrod, by Booth Tarkington (1914);

Within the Law, by Bayard Veiller (and Marvin Dana) (1913);

She Painted her Face, by Dornford Yates (1936);

The Helmet of Navarre, by Bertha Runkle (1900);

By the Good Sainte-Anne, by Anna Chapin Ray (1904);

Tides, by Ada and Julian Street (1926);

The Siege of the Seven Suitors, by Meredith Nicholson (1910);

Guard Your Daughters, by Diana Tutton (1953);

The Visits of Elizabeth, by Elinor Glyn (1900);

Their Husbands' Wives, edited by William Dean Howells and Henry Mills Alden (1906);

The Blue Flower, by Henry Van Dyke (1902);

Favorite Stories by Famous Writers, edited by Harry Payne Brennan (1932);

Stamboul Nights, by H. G. Dwight (1916);

Black Rock, by Ralph Connor (1899);

The Romantic Comedians, by Ellen Glasgow (1926);

The City of Lilies, by Anthony Pryde and R. K. Weekes (1923);

Coronation Summer, by Angela Thirkell (1952);

Peter, by F. Hopkinson Smith (1908);

Two Black Sheep, by Warwick Deeping (1933);

The Perfume of the Lady in Black, by Gaston Leroux (1909);

The Van Roon, by J. C. Snaith (1922);

Enchanting and Enchanted, by Friedrich Wilhelm Hacklander (1870);

The House of Mirth, by Edith Wharton (1905);

The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne, by William J. Locke (1905);

Marietta, by F. Marion Crawford (1901);

The Count's Millions, by Emile Gaboriau (1870);

Dora Thorne, by Charlotte Mary Brame (1871);

The Vanishing Point, by Coningsby Dawson (1922);

The Maid of Maiden Lane, by Amelia E. Barr (1900);

Guys and Dolls, by Damon Runyon (1932);

The New Arabian Nights, by Robert Louis Stevenson (1882);

Ellen Adair, by Frederick Niven (1913);

The Lion's Share, by Octave Thanet (1907);

Love Insurance, by Earl Derr Biggers (1914);

Bound to Rise, by Horatio Alger, Jr. (1872);

I Love You, I Love You, I Love You, by Ludwig Bemelmans (1942);

The King's General, by Daphne du Maurier (1946);

The Great Impersonation, by E. Phillips Oppenheim (1920);

Piccadilly Jim, by P. G. Wodehouse (1916);

Stormswift, by Madeleine Brent (1984);

Edmund Dantes, by "Alexander Dumas" (1878);

A Princess of Mars, by Edgar Rice Burroughs (1912);

Finnley Wren, by Philip Wylie (1934);

When Knighthood Was in Flower, by "Edwin Caskoden" (Charles Major) (1898);

The Bondage of Ballinger, by Roswell Field (1903);

The Adventures of Richard Hannay, by John Buchan (1915-1919);

A Fool There Was, by Porter Emerson Browne (1909);

The Sheik, by E. M. Hull (1919);

Duchess Hotspur, by Rosamond Marshall (1946);

Random Harvest, by James Hilton (1941);

The Night Life of the Gods, by Thorne Smith (1931);

The Black Flemings, by Kathleen Norris (1926);

Princess Maritza, by Percy Brebner (1906);

The Man From Scotland Yard, by David Frome (1932);

You Know Me Al, by Ring Lardner (1916);

Cleek of Scotland Yard, by T. W. Hanshew (1914);

The Queen Pedauque, by Anatole France (1892);

Scaramouche, by Rafael Sabatini (1921);

Ladies and Gentlemen, by Irvin S. Cobb (1927);

The Haunted Bookshop, by Christopher Morley (1919);

The Night of Temptation, by Victoria Cross (1912);

The Woman in Question, by John Reed Scott (1909);

Rogue Male, by Geoffrey Household (1939);

The Man in Lower Ten, by Mary Roberts Rinehart (1906);

The King's Jackal, by Richard Harding Davis (1898);

Laughing Boy, by Oliver La Farge (1929);

Portrait of Jennie, by Robert Nathan (1940);

Beau Sabreur, by P. C. Wren (1926);

The Changed Brides, by Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth (1869);

Eben Holden, by Irving Bacheller (1900);

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, by Anita Loos (1925);

Sylvia Cary, by Frances Parkinson Keyes (1919);

The Stone of Chastity, by Margery Sharp (1940);

The Adventurer, by Mika Waltari (1948);

Captain Dieppe, by Anthony Hope (1899);

Guyfford of Weare, by Jeffery Farnol (1928);

Graustark, by George Barr McCutcheon (1901);

Half a Rogue, by Harold MacGrath (1906);

Brood of the Witch Queen, by Sax Rohmer (1918);

The Green Hat, by Michael Arlen (1924);

A Perhaps not Forgotten AH Mystery: Point of Honour, by Madeleine E. Robins

A Perhaps not Forgotten AH Mystery: Point of Honour, by Madeleine E. Robins

a review by Rich Horton

I had planned to review a 1905 novel this week -- it's been a while since I covered a true Old Bestseller -- but the exigencies of the Christmas season intervened: Christmas itself, plus things like finally buying a new sofa, not to mention the end of the year deadlines for the Best of the Year book and for Locus. So I didn't finish the book. That leaves me an opportunity to cover a book I really liked when it came out in 2003. This review was first published at SF Site.

Madeleine Robins wrote several straight Regency novels between 1977 and 1985. She has also published a number of enjoyable stories in SF and Fantasy markets, and a couple of Fantasy novels, perhaps most notably The Stone War. Her most recent novel, from 2013, is an Historical novel, set in 13th Century Italy: Sold for Endless Rue, which looks like, from one angle, a Rapunzel retelling.

I have enjoyed many of her short stories over time, but my favorites among her work are the two Sarah Tolerance novels, Point of Honour from 2003 and Petty Treason from 2005. I only recently learned that she finally was able to publish a third: The Sleeping Partner, from the independent house Plus One, in 2011. That's good news, as I had really regretted that the series hadn't continued. These books are mysteries set in a somewhat alternate history Regency.

(I will include a link to Robins' page which itself includes links from which you can buy all the books.)

Here's my original review of the first volume:

The time is 1810. The Queen Regent is clinging to life while her children, the ineligibly married Prince of Wales and the scandalous Duke of Clarence scramble for position in the event of her death. Sarah Tolerance is a Fallen Woman -- when a teen she fell in love with her brother's fencing instructor and ran away to the Continent. But her lover has died, and she has returned to England. Her reputation is ruined, her father has repudiated her, she is an ancient 28 years old. What can she do? She is taken in by her Aunt, another Fallen Woman, who runs a very successful house of prostitution. But Sarah has no interest in being a whore, so instead she sets up as what we would call a Private Investigator, often turning up evidence for Society women of their husbands' infidelity.

Sarah receives a new commission from a certain Lord Trux, asking that she retrieve an Italian fan, that may be in the possession of a retired whore named Deb Cunning. Trux's unnamed boss is willing to offer quite a bit more than the fan is worth for its retrieval. Sarah's job is complicated by the fact that retired whores generally change their names, and that nobody is sure where Deb Cunning has retired to. But Sarah starts sifting through known haunts of older prostitutes, soon finding some interesting leads. However, her job is quickly complicated, as it soon seems that this fan is of considerable interest to both sides in the current political wrangle. Worse, a couple of people involved in the search turn up dead -- one is a close friend of Sarah's, the other is a woman she has visited to ask for information -- her visit timed to make her a suspect in the murder.

Sarah finally learns who her real client is -- the handsome, youngish, Earl of Versellion, who is in line to be Prime Minister if the new Regent chooses to back a Whig government. Sarah finds herself greatly attracted to Versellion, all the while exasperated by the paucity of information on the importance of the fan. This attraction deepens when she and Versellion have to go on the run in rural England, apparently under threat of murder by his Tory rivals -- or by who?

The novel nicely intertwines political intrigue, an interesting mystery about the real nature of the hidden fan (with a guessable but satisfying solution), romance, action, and a nice ending with an extra twist or two. Sarah herself is an interesting heroine, and I'm glad to know that at least two further novels are planned. [As noted above, only one more came out from the original publisher, but the third appeared in 2011.]

The SFnal elements, as mentioned, are contained in the AH nature of the setting. Many people will have immediately gathered that there was never a Queen Regent in 1810. Robins has altered English history just slightly, presumably for two reasons. One, it allows her to get away with a somewhat implausible position for her heroine: one presumes that the Queen Regent's influence, and other modest social changes, have allowed women in this 1810 just a bit more freedom (but not a whole lot!) than they had in our timeline. Two, it allows her to suggest ahistorical political intrigues as plausible, unpredictable in outcome, plot elements. (And there is a slightly more SFnal aspect to her AH: she has a minor character be part of a group of scientists who seem to be anticipating Mendelian genetics by several decades -- with a bit of actual plot relevance, even!)

Still, the main appeal is likely to mystery readers first: particularly those who enjoyed the late Kate Ross's Julian Kestrel stories, or those who enjoy Anne Perry's Victorian mysteries. Secondarily, readers of Regency romances may enjoy the book, though it does not follow standard Regency plot conventions, it does have a nice romance at its core. SF readers will like the book not as much for the relatively minor SF aspects, but for its real virtue: it's a fine historical mystery story. Or, if you will, as Robins has described it, a "hardboiled Regency".

Hopefully Not Forgotten Stories and a Novel by Carol Emshwiller (Report to the Men's Club and The Mount)

Hopefully Not Forgotten Stories and a Novel by Carol Emshwiller (Report to the Men's Club and The Mount)

a review by Rich Horton

I don't have a forgotten best seller or an Ace Double to write about this week (I spent the past 10 days in Mesa, AZ, on business, and the reading I did was mostly focussed on end of the year short fiction catchup). So I'm turning to a post about one of the great SF writers of her time -- and a long time it has been. I first wrote this for SF Site almost 15 years ago, in 2003.

Carol Emswhiller was born in 1921 in Ann Arbor, MI. Her father was a Professor of English and Linguistics (at, of course, the University of Michigan). She herself took degrees in Music and in Design, and was a Fulbright Fellow in France. She spent a good deal of time in France while growing up as well. She married Ed Emshwiller, the brilliant SF illustrator and experimental filmmaker, in 1949. (Many of the women featured in Ed Emshwiller's illustrations bear a certain resemblance to Carol.)

The review below is from 2003, as I've noted. Since that time she continued publishing exceptional short fiction until about 2012, and two more novels (Mister Boots in 2005 and The Secret City in 2007). I understand that she has ceased writing, due to her health (eyesight, perhaps?)

Carol Emshwiller's first SF short story was published in 1955 in Future Science Fiction. (Two earlier stories appeared in other genres: a crime fiction 'zine and a contemporary fiction magazine. (Thanks to Todd Mason for the information.)) Her early work was published mostly in Robert Lowndes's magazines (Future and Science Fiction Quarterly, as well as some crime magazines) and in F&SF. She continued to publish short fiction through the 50s and 60s, achieving at least some notice with stories like "Hunting Machine" (1957), "Pelt" (1958), "Day at the Beach" (1959), and "Chicken Icarus" (1966), each of which was chosen for a Best of the Year anthology.

Much of this early work was clever but light, as with that first story, "This Thing Called Love", a 50s social satire in the mode pioneered at H. L. Gold's Galaxy. The narrator's husband wants to emigrate to the stars, but she refuses to accompany him: why should she abandon her crushes on the robots who star in TV shows, and who could love a real human anyway? Her slightly later story, "Idol's Eye" (Future, February 1958), is perhaps more characteristic of her later work. An apparently ugly, near-blind, young farm woman is being crudely courted by a brutish neighbor, but she discovers a special "sight", that makes her the appropriate consort for a mysterious man brought by aliens.

In the mid-60s, Emshwiller's work became odder, deeper, more experimental. Many of these stories were collected in the 1974 book Joy In Our Cause, including "Sex and/or Mr. Morrison", one of the creepiest and most memorable stories in Harlan Ellison's landmark anthology Dangerous Visions. There followed two more collections, Verging on the Pertinent (1989) and The Start of the End of It All (1991), the strange feminist fantasy Carmen Dog (1988), and two novels set in the American West, Ledoyt (1995) and Leaping Man Hill (1999).

In 1999, her stories began appearing again in F&SF, and she has published a generous helping of new fiction in the past few years, in F&SF, at SCI FICTION, and in anthologies such as Leviathan Three and The Green Man. [As noted, she continued publishing short fiction in the following years through 2012, much of it in Asimov's.] And here are two new books: a story collection, and a novel, both published by Gavin Grant and Kelly Link's worthy effort, Small Beer Press.

Report to the Men's Club and Other Stories includes 19 pieces, seven of them new to this book. The reprints include seven from her recent in-genre outburst, with the other stories dating as far back as 1977. Throughout Emshwiller's lovely wry voice is evident, as are her quirky imagination, her warm regard for her characters: women, men, and other creatures, and her passionate interest in the relationship between the sexes.

Several of the stories reflect her interest in the Western landscape. (Emshwiller lives part of the year in a remote Western area.) Often these stories feature independent women coming to cautious accommodations with similarly independent, often mostly silent, men. The settings may or may not be the actual American West. (I have not yet read her Western novels, but I gather that this might describe these novels as well.) Thus vaguely SFnal stories like "Water Master", about the man who controls the allocation of water to a generally dry village, and the woman who becomes fascinated with him. Thus also "The Paganini of Jacob's Gulch", about a lame violinist from Scotland who moves to the American West and gets beat up for playing too well. And "Desert Child", about an old woman, an old man, and a near-feral child who end up together.

Emshwiller's range is wide, though. "Acceptance Speech" is one of the strangest and most SFnal of her recent stories, about a human kidnapped by aliens to write poetry. "Foster Mother" and "Creature" are related stories about a genetically engineered war-fighting monster who is also a child in need of love. The longest story here is "Venus Rising", originally published as a chapbook in 1992. It tells in Emshwiller's oblique, submerged, way of intelligent water creatures and their reaction to the arrival of a castaway, apparently a man, in their midst.

Other delights include "Prejudice and Pride", a striking and moving meditation on the sexual life of Elizabeth Bennett and Fitzwilliam Darcy; two stories about yetis and other mysterious creatures: "Abominable" and "Overlooking"; and "Grandma", a look at a female superhero in her old age. This is a wonderful collection of short fiction, marked by tremendous variety, a wonderful, funny, knowing, and sympathetic voice, and a truly off-center imagination.

Emshwiller's new novel is The Mount, and unlike any of her previous novels it is fairly straightforward science fiction. In simplest terms, it tells of a revolution against alien invaders. These invaders, called "Hoots", are physically weak and small, but over generations they have bred humans to serve them as "Mounts". The humans, then, become essentially pets to the aliens, treated a great deal like horses are treated by present-day humans. Thus the novel explores, quite thoughtfully, human/pet relationships, master/slave relationships, and the question of freedom versus comfort.

There are a few different viewpoint characters, but the story is mainly told through the eye of Charley, an especially prized young Mount who is the property of the son of a very high-ranking Hoot. Charley is extremely proud, to the point of vanity, of his abilities as a Mount. And his relationship with his Hoot, who he calls "Little Master", is complex but largely loving. Loving, though, in an almost creepy Master-Slave fashion. Charley, it turns out, is the son of a rebellious human, who has gone off to live in the wilderness, and who plots to free all humans, but particularly his son. The novel's main action turns on the initial success of this scheme, and then on the ambiguous results. Charley is by no means sure that freedom is all it's cracked up to be, and moreover he misses his "Little Master". He's also jealous of his father's relationship with a woman not his mother -- his mother, of course, being basically a brood mare chosen by the Hoots.

The plot twists a couple of times from there, coming to a moving, thoughtful, and balanced resolution, if not exactly a terribly original one. The storytelling is clear and interesting. The age of the protagonist, the theme, and the relatively simple storytelling make this novel, I would think, appealing to younger readers, but it certainly will satisfy adults as well.

Carol Emshwiller is a real treasure. She still seems underappreciated to me, but this late burst of productivity may help remedy that situation. Both The Mount and Report to the Men's Club are first rate books. I think I'd choose the story collection as the better book, for its range, complexity, and wit. But either way, I'm thrilled to see these books, and I look forward to many more stories from this writer. [And, as noted, we got many more stories, and two more novels, through 2012.]

A Recent Crime Novel: Texas Vigilante, by Bill Crider

A Recent Crime Novel: Texas Vigilante, by Bill Crider

a review by Rich Horton

Bill Crider (b. 1941) is best known to me as a serious book collector with great knowledge in genres close to me -- pulps and mystery primarily, but also some interest in SF and Fantasy. He was a long time English professor. He is a life-long Texan. And he also has written a great many novels, mostly in the mystery/crime genre. He has won two Anthony awards, and been nominated for several Edgars, for his mystery fiction.

I had known Bill on a mailing list for some years, but I met him first just a few weeks ago at the World Fantasy Convention in San Antonio (not far from where Bill was born). We spoke only briefly. And just recently I heard that Bill has gone into hospice. It was clearly time for me to remedy a longstanding lacuna in my reading, and get to one of his books. (Bill was also a regular contributor to Patti Abbott's Friday's Forgotten Books.)


I chose Texas Vigilante, the second of his novels about Ellie Taine. Both books were published by Dell in 1999. The first of these is Outrage at Blanco, in which, I deduce from Texas Vigilante, Ellie is raped, and her husband murdered, after which she chases down the perpetrators and kills a couple of them. Texas Vigilante is set a year or so later. (Some time in the past, it seems, based on the lack of automobiles, which makes the ebook cover picture to the right not very accurate.) Ellie has inherited a ranch in Blanco, TX, from her friend Jonathan Crossland, and she is running it with the help of Lane Tolbert, his wife Sue and their young daughter Laurie. Meantime, Sue's brother, Angel Ware, is in prison. He's guilty of a whole raft of crimes (including burning down his parents' house with them in it) -- he's a pure sociopath. The prison guard is a sociopath himself, fond of torturing Angel for no apparent reason, and one day Angel takes the opportunity to escape while on a work detail. He is accompanied by another sociopath, the teenaged Hoot Riley (who seems a bit too interested in girls even younger then he is), as well as a professional criminal (Abilene Jack Sturdivant) and an unfortunate loser (Ben Jephson). Angel is the brains of the outfit, so they stick with him, even as his obsession to find his sister and her family seems dangerous.

Lane's brother Brady is a Texas Ranger, the one who actually arrested Angel, though Sue had turned him in. Obviously, Angel wants revenge on Sue and on Brady. The story then follows Angel's path to finding Sue; Brady's attempts to track down the escapees, and Ellie and her fellow ranchers as they worry about the danger posed by Angel. There are a variety of viewpoint characters, noticeably including a couple of less influential figures: Ben Jephson, the hapless prisoner dragged along on Angel's quest; and Shag Tillman, a lazy and cowardly but generally good-hearted Sheriff at Blanco.

The story is crisply told and fast-moving. There is a fair amount of mordant humor; and a lot of glimpses on the mental processes of some evil people, as well as some good people. Angel's plan is to kidnap Laurie -- who actually seems to like Angel, and seems to be one of the few people Angel has any concern for. That goes smoothly enough, followed by an obvious attempt to lure Brady and Lane Tolbert into an ambush. He doesn't count on Ellie Taine, however ... Nor, perhaps, on the unreliability of his fellow criminals. Nor on the Texas rain.

The book delivers on what it promised -- lots of action (and violence), lots of tension, really bad guys and competent good guys. It's a fun read (for values of fun that included spending a lot of time with some nasty people). It is, as I mentioned, the second book about Ellie Taine -- as far as I can tell, however, it was also the last, which is a shame. It seems at least one more book was potentially in the offing -- though the thought of another horrifying crime perpetrated against those close to her is a bit hard to take!

It's a shame we won't have Bill Crider -- and his writing and his knowledge -- for much longer, but I am glad I had the chance to meet him once, and to know him online for longer.

Old Bestseller: The Auction Block, by Rex Beach

Old Bestseller: The Auction Block, by Rex Beach

a review by Rich Horton

It's been a while since I published a review of an Old Bestseller of the sort that I feel is the core mission of this blog: forgotten popular fiction from the first half of the 20th Century. But here's a very good example of that sort of thing. And it's published on an auspicious day! (No, not Pearl Harbor Day. Instead, the 68th anniversary of the author's death!)

Rex Beach (1877-1949) was born in Michigan, raised in Florida, and went to law school in Chicago. He prospected for gold in Alaska (unsuccessfully), and he won a silver medal as part of the US Water Polo team in the 1904 Olympics in St. Louis. He turned to writing about this time, and his second novel, The Spoilers (1906) was the 8th bestselling novel of that year (according to Publishers' Weekly). He had the second, third and eighth bestselling novels of 1908. 1909, and 1912 as well. The Spoilers (based on his experiences in Alaska, and on a true incident of corruption) was made into a movie at least 5 times, once starring Gary Cooper, another time John Wayne.

Beach's novels were generally adventure novels, of the "he man" school of literature, often set on the frontier. In this context, The Auction Block (1914) is an outlier: it is to an extent (if not all that successfully) a "social" novel, it is set in New York society (and the demimonde), it is a love story, and it features relatively little action (though there is some gunplay, fast cars, and fights, just not a whole lot).

My copy appears to be the First Edition, from Harper and Brothers (in fair condition, no dj). It is copiously, and quite nicely, illustrated by the famous illustrator Charles Dana Gibson (of the "Gibson Girl").

It opens with the Knight family, from Upstate New York, in some trouble. Their father, Peter, a very weak man, had lost his bid for re-election as Sheriff, due to his corrupt actions. The son, Jim, is lazy and morally degenerate. They are to move to New York City, where a political mentor of Mr. Knight has found him a patronage job. But, led by Mrs. Knight and Jim, they hatch a plan for greater riches, unbeknownst (mostly) to the daughter, Lorelei, who is beautiful and innocent and morally upstanding. This plan is to have Lorelei go on the musical stage and lure a rich man into marriage.

Lorelei agrees to the stage part of things, to help support the family, which becomes particularly important after Peter has an accident and loses his job. Lorelei is quite a hit from the start, because of her beauty, though she is a mediocre singer and actress. She soon learns that a big part of the job is to "entertain" the rich men who come to see her. She maintains her moral standards to a degree: she eats with the men and goes to parties, but doesn't drink, nor does she allow the men further liberties (though that would be more lucrative).

She impresses a cynical critic, Campbell Pope, with her freshness, and she becomes a friend to a dyspeptic middle-aged banker, Mr. Merkle, who gives her plenty of advice about steering away from the worst elements of her milieu. Her dressing room mate is Lilas Lynn, a somewhat coarser character who has become the mistress of a married steel magnate, Jarvis Hammon. Lorelei also makes a surprising friend: the notorious Adoree Demorest, regarded as the wickedest actress on Broadway. About this time, Bob Wharton, the dissipated son of another steel man, Hannibal Wharton of Pittsburg (as it seemed to be spelled often those days), falls head over heels for Lorelei, but she rejects his advances.

Lilas has plans to to trap Hammon into marriage. (Part of her motivation is revenge: she is the daughter of a steelworker who died in an accident in one of Hammon's plants.) To do so she needs to cause a scandal, and unfortunately her machinations enmesh Lorelei and Mr. Merkle, who are together only because he was rescuing her from Bob Wharton's importunings. Jim Knight, now a small time gangster, is involved as well. Before long Lilas's plans are coming to fruition; and in addition, Lorelei's nasty family is trying to blackmail Mr. Merkle. But Jarvis Hammon and Lilas Lynn have a shocking falling out, which leads to Lilas killing Hammon (in self-defense, to be fair), and Bob Wharton and Mr. Merkle help the dying Hammon hush up the scandalous aspects.

Desperate for money, the Knights scheme to trick Bob Wharton into asking Lorelei to marry him. She is completely against this, but her vile brother tricks her into an ambiguous situation, and Lorelei, not feeling well anyway after witnessing Hammon's murder, against her better instincts accepts a drunken proposal from Bob.

The marriage (due to brother Jim's plotting) happens immediately, and the Knights begin to work on Hannibal Wharton for a payoff in exchange for a divorce. But Lorelei will have none of it. She tells Bob that he can have the divorce no strings attached -- but he begs her to stick with him: he truly believes he loves her. She agrees on one condition: that he quit drinking.

The rest of the novel concerns Bob's fitful efforts at reform, with plenty of backsliding. He is pushed to get a job, and after his father (who has cut him off without a penny) blacklists him from any job with his associates, Bob has to come up with something on his own. He has surprising success, but every step forward is the occasion for a disastrous step backward, usually due to falling spectacularly off the wagon. Things come to a terrible head when they attend a country house party, and Lorelei is disgusted by the immorality of the "Society" folks on hand, especially when one man attempts to rape her. She is ready to break off with Bob completely (he was drunk and thus unable to protect Lorelei), but then she learns she is pregnant.

It's easy to see the resolution: the child helps Bob to truly face his responsibilities, and also eventually melts the hearts of Bob's parents. There is still the Knight family to deal with: they are still trying to extort money from Hannibal Wharton. And there is another crisis when Lilas Lynn, now a desperate cocaine addict, returns and tries to cause more chaos. Not to mention Jim Knight's mob connections ... But there are plenty of dei ex machinae to go around and solve all these problems. And there's a sweet if silly subplot involving Adoree Demorest and the cynical critic Campbell Pope.

It's really not a very good novel. Its attempts at social relevance: dealing with the problems of steelworkers, police corruption and mob violence, drug addiction, alcoholism, and the abuse of the showgirls working on Broadway, are decidedly clumsy if somewhat well-meant. It has all too typical racist bits, and especially anti-Semitic aspects (Lilas Lynn, the villainess, is Jewish, and described in quite absurd terms). The working out of the plot is terribly convenient.

And for all that, I kind of enjoyed it, and was even rather moved at the conclusion. As with so many of these Old Bestsellers, it's really not a mystery that it sold well -- even though I really see no great reason for a revival.