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OtherRealms Issue 18 Part 07
Electronic OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Part 7
Loose Ends
Reviews by
Alan Wexelblat
wex@mcc.com
Copyright 1987 by
Alan Wexelblat
You know how it is. I try and find some common thread, some theme to
tie together the books I read. Sometimes it's easy -- they're all part
of a series. Sometimes, it's not so easy. And sometimes it's just
downright impossible. This was one of the downright impossible times.
This month we have a mixed bag -- a John Crowley novel, a Frank Miller
graphic novel, a shared-world anthology I promised to get to some
months ago, and a new novel by an old master. Let's start with the
Crowley this time, instead of leaving it for last.
Engine Summer
[****+]
John Crowley
Bantam, 209 pages.
I had just started reading Crowley's Engine Summer when Chuq blessed me
with a copy of AEgypt, which I reviewed in my last column. Then other
things came up and Engine Summer was forgotten for a while. I've
finally gotten around to reading it, and I'm glad I did.
Regular readers of this magazine have heard me rave in the past about
Crowley's skill -- his mastery of the language. He has a rare ability
to put words together in almost magical combination. Sentences of
thirty or forty words are not uncommon. And his descriptions are
excellent, giving just enough detail to evoke an image without
overpowering the reader.
As I've reviewed his works, I've seen his mastery of this talent grow.
Engine Summer is not Crowley's best work; published in 1979, it is
obvious that Crowley was still learning. However, Engine Summer is a
fine story.
Unlike Crowley's other works -- notably the award-winning Little, Big
which came immediately after Engine Summer -- this book has a basically
linear plot. It is the story of Rush that Speaks, told in the first
person in a straightforward earliest-to-latest manner. The basic plot
is a timeless one: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy seeks girl. But
Crowley's telling makes the ordinary plot a special one.
Like Beasts and Little, Big, Engine Summer takes place in Earth's
future after the fall of the old civilization. Reduced population
allows the survivors to live off the land in small agricultural
communities with low technology levels. In this case, the title of the
novel tells a lot; it is the "engine summer" of the world, before the
descent into true winter.
Little Belaire is the community where Rush is born and where he meets
Once a Day, an older girl whom he grows to love. When she leaves the
community in search of her destiny, Rush feels compelled to follow. The
story of their meeting as children, growing up together, and Rush's
search for her and for his true self make up the body of the novel.
Rush tells his story to an 'angel.' This allows Crowley to
unobtrusively explain details which might otherwise have confused the
reader. The story is filled with "snake's hands," little side detours
that flesh out the basic plot line and give it the reality of a
person's life. The presence of the angel also allows for an unexpected
but very interesting ending.
Crowley has done a good job telling this story. The futuristic setting
'feels' right. The reader can play guessing games with the author,
trying to figure out which icons of the future are which symbols of the
present. As with many future-set stories, it is interesting to see
which ideas the author thinks will survive the fall of civilization.
In addition, Crowley gives the reader a good sense of how the society
that Rush lives in developed. We see how the pieces fit together, and
how the people of the future deal with the memory and aftereffects of
the Storm -- the cataclysm that destroyed the old society.
As always, Crowley's writing is a joy to read, though not as smooth-
flowing as his later works. I recommend Engine Summer highly to those
of you who have not yet been introduced to John Crowley. For
Crowley-lovers, this is one not to miss.
Ronin
[****+]
Frank Miller (creator, author, artist); Lynn Varley (paints);
John Costanza (lettering)
DC Graphic novel
ISBN 0-930289-21-8
This year, Frank Miller is causing quite a stir. With his innovations
he is turning heads all through the comic-book world and the ripples
have even reached the world of science fiction. Miller's Batman: The
Dark Knight Returns will be talked about for years to come. But when I
sat down to write about it, I found myself using words like
'misanthropic,' and in general writing a review that reflected the
unpleasantness of the work.
So I decided to go back a few years to 1983-84, when Frank Miller was
still developing the style and techniques and gaining the experience
that would later allow him to create Dark Knight.
In '83/'84, DC published a five-issue limited series that told the
story of a ronin (a masterless samurai) and the demon he hunted. This
hunt, which should have ended in the Japanese Middle Ages, is carried
by the demon's magic into the twenty-first century. There, the
experiments of a scientist on the ronin's magic sword allows the
trapped spirits to escape and to resume their battle. The five original
comics are now collector's items and are hard to find. However, DC has
recently republished the story in a five- chapter softcover book which
is a must for any fan of the graphic arts.
Miller is infamous for the bleakness of the future he painted in Dark
Knight. In Ronin, he shows a bleak world, but the New York he creates
is not irredeemably lost. Much of the city's population lives in dull
middle- class fear as wage slaves to large corporations like Aquarius,
the battleground chosen by the freed spirits of the demon and ronin.
As with other Miller tales, a large segment of the population lives in
a blood-spattered struggle for survival in streets which know only the
law of the gang. The gangs are punk and brutal, engaging in casual
murder, watching and laughing as rival gang members are eaten alive by
cannibalistic sewer-dwelling people.
In addition to the middle class and the gangs, there is a privileged
upper class, traveling far above the filth in aircars or armored tanks.
Miller draws people from all these segments of his society well; they
are not uniformly good, nor uniformly bad. During their battle, the
demon and the ronin come into contact with many of these people.
The spirit of the ronin inhabits the body of Billy, an adolescent boy.
Billy was born with no arms or legs; however, he has unusual mental
powers, the extent of which is not truly known. Billy is in the care of
Virgo, the intelligent computer that runs the Aquarius complex in New York.
Aquarius's security chief is Casey McKenna. She starts out disbelieving
in the ronin when it manifests. She scoffs at the magic and the
legends. But as the story progresses, she becomes increasingly caught
up in the ronin's struggle. Partly this is out of necessity, as the
battle poses a direct threat to Aquarius. However, her interest grows
beyond the professional.
In addition, Virgo is involved in the ronin's fate in some strange
way. Early on in the story, she risks self-destruction in order to
save him from Agat, the demon. But her ultimate loyalty is not so
simple, and as the battle between the ronin and the demon continues, it
becomes increasingly clear that she has her own agenda.
Miller tells this story with both broad and subtle styles. Paint and
color are spattered and carefully stroked into the scenes. Violence and
love are depicted explicitly, but with rare style and craftsmanship.
Miller also plays with a variety of techniques in each issue, making
each one different from all the ones that came before. This process is
fascinating to watch.
It is particularly interesting to see how he uses the black inks - they
are at times both background and foreground. They are used to represent
pain, and to show the grime of the city air. Miller is also a master of
the use of pastel colors. Usually, pastel hues are used to show
softness and to take the edge off a scene. Miller, however, turns this
idea on its head, giving his pastel colors a bite I have not seen
before.
I liked Ronin; I think it's better than Dark Knight. Both present a
very bleak picture of the future. But where Dark Knight is
unremittingly negative, Ronin shows the positive side of humanity as
well. Love, loyalty, honesty, and more are all present and play their
part in the ronin's tale, as well as the darker side of humanity.
I won't say which triumphs in the end, but I will say that the ronin is
as engrossing as any character in an 'ordinary' SF novel, and Miller's
graphics give the book a level of intensity not often found in the
pure-print medium.
Bordertown
[***]
Emma Bull, Will Shetterly, Midori Snyder,
Bellamy Bach, Ellen Kushner
Signet paperbacks, 251 pp
A couple of months ago, I reviewed Borderland, the first collection in
this shared-world series. I found it to be lacking something which, for
want of a better word, I called continuity. Bordertown is better, but
not much. It also lacks the togetherness that characterizes successful
shared- world series, such as the early Thieves' World books.
Bordertown has better stories, but that's about all.
Bordertown is the name of the city that exists in the Borderlands, the
area between the normal, technological World and the strange, magical
Elflands. Bordertown is home to gangs of elves, humans, and 'halfies.'
Life for these gangs revolves around punk rock dance clubs and the
bands that perform there. One of these clubs is Danceland, the title
club of the first story, written by Emma Bull and Will Shetterly.
"Danceland" is the best of the four stories in this volume. Bull and
Shetterly tell a story of murder and intrigue. They fill "Danceland"
with interesting characters and set them in a whirl of action. This
leads to a fast-paced story which sweeps the reader along.
Someone in Danceland has bloodily murdered an Elf. Not just any elf, he
was clearly someone of some importance in the Elflands. Which means
that the police cannot afford to overlook his murder. Unfortunately,
most of the people with the best motives are the good guys, friends of
Orient, the narrator. Most of the story revolves around their attempt
to clear their names and to find the real murderers.
The action ranges across most of Bordertown, giving Bull and Shetterly
an opportunity to show the reader around. The action continues at a
fast clip until the climax, which is handled quite well.
The second story, Midori Snyder's "Demon," is the worst of the four. It
is the story of a young girl's struggle to control a magically-enhanced
demon within herself.
The idea is good, it's just not carried off well. Too many extraneous
elements are introduced and they clutter up the story. In addition, the
climax is a real letdown. Snyder seems bent on developing certain
themes and introduces whatever he thinks he needs to that end. The
characters and the story both suffer as a result.
"Exile," by Bellamy Bach, is third. It's a strange story of a woman
exiled from the Elflands to Bordertown and the man she takes up with.
The story is strange in part because Bach deliberately makes Hector --
the narrator -- and Dez -- the elf -- distant. They never get close to
each other emotionally; consequently, the reader is held at arm's
length throughout the story.
Also, Bach seems to be writing something of a parable. The action in
the story centers around a hunt for a 'monster' from the Borderlands
that has, supposedly, wandered into town. We see several minor
characters preparing for and engaged in the hunt, while Hector and Dez
are mostly spectators.
Bach seems to want to point out that we are all, to some extent,
monsters. Most of the minor characters are pretty dislikeable. Some are
thrill freaks, some are cowards hiding in the 'bravery' of a crowd, and
some are just out to see something bleed.
Bach plays up these weaknesses and the reader is left wondering who the
real monsters are. All in all, "Exile" is well-written, but doesn't
draw the reader in the way "Danceland" does.
The last story is "Mockery," cowritten by Ellen Kushner and Bellamy
Bach. As with "Exile," the characters in this story are cold and hard
to like. The story starts off slowly, but picks up as it moves along.
I am not familiar enough with the authors to say which parts were
written by whom, but based on "Exile," I'd say that Kushner mellows
Bach quite a bit.
"Mockery" is a tale told by Hale, a now-famous painter, about the wild
and wooly days of his youth. It is a sad story of struggling artists
and their inability to handle success. It is made even sadder by its
remoteness in time. The reader knows from the start that he's getting a
"history lesson," to use Hale's term. Thus, when things go wrong, we
know there is no way to go back and fix them.
Still, Kushner and Bach make a good team. When the action starts to
roll, the reader is drawn in by the cleverness and determination of the
struggling artists. For a brief while, the characters open up to each
other and allow the reader to like them. Unfortunately, it is all over
too soon.
However, "Mockery" leaves many loose ends. Some of the characters in
the story are said to be still around. The fate of others is clearly
left hanging. I hope that these authors decide to write the stories
that will tie up at least some of the loose ends.
It is hard to sum up Bordertown . As I said before, it lacks the
continuity I like to see. Each author seems to want his or her own
corner of the city to write in. Some characters cross story boundaries,
but they don't make much difference when they do. It's a mediocre
collection, but it still shows a great deal of promise. Should there be
a third volume, I will probably buy it.
Pyramids
[**+]
Fred Saberhagen
Baen Books, 311 pages
How do you go about saying bad things about a good author? Is everyone
entitled to have a bad day, or should big-name writers be judged by a
higher standard than the rest? Fred Saberhagen has, in the past,
written some very good and very successful stories including the
long-running Berserker series and the recently revived Swords series.
Pyramids is supposed to be the first of a new series centering around
Pilgrim, one of the major characters in this story. I can only hope
that the the other books will be better than this one.
Pyramids is a science fantasy about time travel between modern Chicago
and ancient Egypt. The protagonist, Tom Sceffler, is given access to a
time lock that transports him between his strange great-uncle's strange
apartment and Egypt during the building of the great Pyramid at Giza.
The story suffers from an excess of irrelevant subplots. There are Set-
worshipping tomb robbers, whose daily lives are described in far too
much detail. There is a totally superfluous female body named Becky who
sleeps with Tom a couple of times and ends up stuck in ancient Egypt
with him. There are the bizarre aliens who travel with Pilgrim who
never speak and who perform no important function that I can see.
In addition to the extraneous subplots, Saberhagen has littered the
book with detailed bits that seem designed only to show that the author
has done his homework. For example, we are told at least four times
that five thousand years ago, the stars are in unrecognizable
configurations. I don't know if this is true or not and since it
doesn't matter at all to the story, I don't care.
The main thread of the story concerns the attempts of the Set
worshippers, with the help of the time travelers (including Tom, his
great- uncle, his great uncle's brother, and Pilgrim) to rob Khufu's
tomb in the pyramid. Each player has his own reasons for wanting to rob
the tomb. Saberhagen shows great skill in that he manages to
manipulate so many separate actors at once, though why he tries to is
beyond me.
The last major problem with the book is the ending. It is, first of
all, a major letdown. After a protracted chase and battle sequence, the
location suddenly shifts and 'poof' we're home again. It's almost as
though Saberhagen ran out of steam at that point and so decided to stop
writing. The objective of the chase remains uncaught and uncatchable.
No explanation is given for why things end this way.
And, speaking of explanations, Saberhagen would have done better not to
have had Pilgrim explain what was going on. I can't give details
without spoiling the entire book, but I found my credulity quite
strained. It's not just bad mumbo-jumbo, it's bad mumbo-jumbo combined
with characters acting in stupid ways.
All in all, a big disappointment. Two stars for being a Saberhagen
effort; he is a good writer. An additional plus if, like me, you are
fascinated by ancient Egypt and its myths, mysteries, and lore.
Publishing Notes
Arbor House has become an imprint of William Morrow rather than in
independent publishing operation. Both are owned by Hearst
Corporation, and after cutting their titles from 70 to 40, it no longer
makes economic sense to keep the lines separate. Arbor House is one of
the premier SF Hardcover publishers -- what this will do to the field
is unknown.
New Infinities Productions has been created by Gary Gygax, founder of
TSR and creator of Dungeons & Dragons. The new venture will be
producing books, games, and gaming accessories. Gygax and TSR has
severed relations -- New Infinities will not deal with TSR products,
and TSR will not be handling any future work by Gygax.
The fall line for Franklin Watts publishers includes Warhaven by M.
Elayn Harvey, a first Science Fiction novel (October, $15.95); The
Haunted One by Jay Bennett, a Horror/Suspense Young Adult novel
(October, $11.95); Alqua Dreams, a Science Fiction novel (November,
$16.95); and Merlin by Norma Lorre Goodrich, a historical view of the
man beside the King (January, $24.95).
Melissa Scott and Lisa Barnett have sold an historical Fantasy novel
The Armor to Baen Books for the Baen Fantasy Imprint. Melissa Scott's
The Kindly Ones will be a Science Fiction Book Club Main Selection,
with the Baen edition published in September. The final book in the
Silence Leigh trilogy, Empress of Earth, will be published by Baen in
November.
Fantasy Review, a literary journal of Science Fiction and Fantasy, has
announced that it is folding as of issue number 103 due to financial
reasons. Editor Robert Collins reported that his publisher will be
replacing the monthly with Annual Review, a clothbound book that will
attempt to review the entire field each year. The first issue of
Annual Review will be published next May, and Fantasy Review
subscribers that have issues left will get a copy. Annual Review is
aimed at the library market and will list at $57.50 a copy.
The Pinnacle Books bankruptcy problem seems to be solved, as Zebra
books has agreed to purchase the remaining assets of the publishing
house and has announced a plan to get the works back into print. What
this means for authors who have works tied up in the proceedings isn't
completely clear, although getting them away from the court will give
them a chance to get them into circulation or have their rights revert
so that they can be remarketed.
St. Martin's Press has signed up K.W. Jeter for Farewell, Horizontal,
the first book of the Cylinder trilogy, to be published in the Fall of
1988. Also due from St. Martin's: Kate Wilhelm's latest, Crazy Time;
Interzone The 2nd Anthology of material from the British magazine, and
The Journal of Nicholas the American by Leigh Kennedy.
Ginger Buchanan has been promoted to Senior Editor of Ace Science
Fiction and Fantasy. Lou Aronica has been named Publisher of
Bantam/Spectra books, and will also retain his title as Senior Editor.
Donning/Starblaze has announced a new imprint: Starblaze Classics. The
first book published will be The Thief of Bagdad, illustrated by P.
Craig Russell, to be published in October. Following that, Mike Grell
will illustrate The Adventures of Robin Hood and his Merry Men for
Summer 1988.
Also at Donning/Starblaze: a art book from the worlds of Pern by Anne
McCaffrey and artist Robin Wood. Phil Foglio has signed a six book
contract to adapt the works of Mark Twain in a graphic novel format.
Kevin Anderson has sold his first novel, Resurrection Inc. to
NAL/Signet. Richard Curtis was the agent.
David Keller has joined the staff of Donning/Starblaze to edit the
Starblaze Graphics Fantasy and Science Fiction graphic novels. Kay
Reynolds has left Donning to freelance full time, after seven years as
an editor.
OtherRealms #18
Fall, 1987
Copyright 1987 by Chuq Von Rospach.
All Rights Reserved.
One time rights have been acquired from the contributors.
All rights are hereby assigned to the contributors.
OtherRealms may be reproduced in its entirety only
for non-commercial purposes. No article may be reprinted
without the express permission of the author.
