Synopsis
First edition. A fine copy in fine dj.
Reviews
Fourteen speculative stories, 1981-92, from the author of Good News from Outer Space, (1989), with the emphasis on allegory and unlikely juxtapositions rather than ideas or invention. Thus: amoral time-hopping immortals; winning is losing; a Big Sleep variation, wherein Raymond Chandler meets his own characters; an allegory on the impossibility of meaningful communication, featuring a lecturer who never ceases; memory erasure; Faust meets the Marx brothers; a post-nuclear variation; an allegory on the futility of modern existence, cast as an endless drive to nowhere; a sort of ``Down and Out in Beverly Hills'' doppelg„nger; Pizarro, the Incas, and coke-addicted aliens; baseball; an allegory on imprisonment; a commodities broker who swaps metaphysics with Captain Ahab aboard the Pequod; and an H.G. Wells meets the author's father. Philosophy swamps originality: readers irritated by allegory- -by stories written primarily for effect and top-heavy with significance--will find little diversion here. Of course the converse is true, too. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Kessel is hardly prolific--since 1980 he has produced perhaps two dozen short stories, written one novel ( Good News from Outer Space ) and coauthored another ( Freedom Beach , with James Patrick Kelly)--but his work always has a powerful emotional kick and a sharp postmodern edge. This first collection of his stories showcases his talents in wildly diverse forms. "The Big Dream" neatly critiques the disturbing subtexts of hard-boiled detective fiction by presenting a bitter, frustrated Raymond Chandler who imposes his fevered visions on the people around him. "The Pure Product" features thoroughly amoral time-travelers from the future who are seeking thrills in the present day. A young stockbroker finds himself inexplicably transported into Moby-Dick , as a deckhand on Ahab's Pequod, in the Nebula Award-winning "Another Orphan." The brief but powerful "Mrs. Shummel Exits a Winner" suggests that sometimes dreams are better not attained. The final tale, "Buffalo," best epitomizes Kessel's grace and sensitivity: in it he tells of his father's meeting with H. G. Wells, "which never took place," and along the way illuminates the complex moral forces that affect working men like his father. Witty, daring and intelligent, Kessel produces some of the best science fiction in the genre.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
The author of Good News from Outer Space ( LJ 9/15/89) displays his literary approach to speculative fiction in this collection of 14 stories including 1983 Nebula award winner "Another Orphan."
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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