Holiday hours: CLOSED on Sunday Sept 1 for Labor Day!

Labor Day is upon us! This is just a quick note to say that the shop will be CLOSED on SUNDAY SEPT. 1 for the holiday, and will resume regular hours after that. Hope you all had a great summer!!! :D

Come see us for First Friday Artwalk at the end of the week on Sept 6th, when our exhibit of Eric Hou's newest series of work will be opening, from 5:00-8:00pm!

Our regular hours are:

Tues - Fri 11:00am-6:00pm
Saturday 11:00am-7:00pm
Sunday 12:00pm-5:00pm

ReaderCon 2013: Fredric Brown panel

As I did last year when I attended ReaderCon (http://readercon.org), a speculative-fiction focus convention in Burlington, MA, I attended quite a few interesting panel discussions, during which I took notes. In case any of you might be interested in what some of the current discussions among authors and editors are like in the field, I’m going to post a series of my notes here on the blog! Enjoy…!

The second panel I attended was on Friday, July 12, at 11:00am when I sat down to be schooled on The Works of Fredric Brown as discussed by the panel of:
-- Eileen Gunn (leader)
-- Donald G. Keller
-- Diane Weinstein
-- Jacob Weisman
-- Gary Wolfe


The premise of the panel was this:
“Fredric Brown, the winner of the 2012 Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award, is remembered largely as a mystery writer, but his influence on SF was immense. His story “Arena” was adapted on Star Trek and paid homage to by Joanna Russ; his mordant short shorts like “Knock” and “Answer” have entered the folklore of the field; and his novels What Mad Universe? and Martians, Go Home pioneered comic SF. He was perhaps the only SF writer of the early 1950s to predict, in The Lights in the Sky Are Stars, that a successful space exploration program in the 1960s would be virtually abandoned by the 1990s. This panel will explore his achievements and lasting legacy.”

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I attended this panel because I know little about Fredric Brown, but he was definitely a blip on my reading radar. One of the first large lots of books I bought for my shop was from Ronnie Bennett, who was packing to move back to the other Portland (OR). Even though she ruthlessly culled hundreds of books from her extensive personal library for the move, I vividly remembered her adamant refusal to part with her copies of Fredric Brown novels, including her longtime favorite, Martians Go Home! I had always dismissed Martians Go Home as some sort of flimsy Disney romp, and was surprised by Ronnie's attachment to the novel. She explained to me that the book was wonderful, the author brilliant, and I nodded and filed away the information until I stumbled across this panel discussion listed on the ReaderCon agenda and realized that now was the time I could illuminate myself on the topic of Brown and his works!

Eileen Gunn (SF author and editor) led off with a brief introduction to Brown, who died in 1972. While notable for his science fiction work, Brown's avid fans knew that he also wrote excellent mystery novels as well, striding between the two genres with aplomb. And with his ability to switch between genres, he also possessed a deeper ability to flip between the light and dark side of his work.

Donald Keller (SF&F editor and critic at the New York Review of SF and elsewhere) pointed out that Brown's first novel was published in 1949.

Jacob Weisman (editor, founder of Tachyon Publications) told us that there is a daffiness to Brown's work that explodes off the page, like a modern Lewis Carroll. (NOTE: This is a very apt description, since the first Brown book I read after this panel was a copy of Night of the Jabberwock, one of his mysteries, which is laden with Lewis Carroll chapter epigraphs and textual references. I picked it up at Bob Eldridge's table, and when I mentioned that I had never read Brown before, he pushed it at me and said, "Take it! Read it!")

Diane Weinstein (previously longtime Weird Tales assistant editor, art editor at Space & Time) mentioned that Brown always posed questions in his stories -- what if? He excelled at puzzle stories and wordplay.

Gary Wolfe (SF editor, critic, and biographer) discovered the works of Heironymous Bosch via the first Fredric Brown paperback he read, Honeymoon in Hell. He felt that Brown possessed a dark, pre-Dickian view of the world. (NOTE: a.k.a. Phildickian, referring to the tandem playfulness and paranoia found in the SF worlds of Philip K. Dick)

Brown was one of the first authors to talk about the eventual abandonment of the space program.

The panel highly recommended Brown's "Nightmare" series of short stories.

Eileen Gunn talked about how Brown's work was deceptively simple. (NOTE: After reading Night of the Jabberwock I can testify to this!)

Jacob Weisman mentioned Brown's tendency to write about ordinary people, again like Philip K. Dick's use of the "average Joe."

Diane Weinstein talked about Brown's direct style, and his use of color (many of his Nightmare series have color themes)

Gary Wolfe recommended a biography of Brown by Jack Seabrook, although it focuses more on Brown's mystery ouvre. (title: Martians and Misplaced Clues: The Life and Work of Fredric Brown)

Donald Keller described Brown's tendency to open books with a very everyday feel, and no real hint of later complexity in the plot.

Diane Weinstein mentioned that the Twilight Zone TV show used a lot of variations on Brown's stories (and I think someone else mentioned that the Outer Limits did the same).

His most famous television trope is the "Arena" episode of Star Trek, which was based on his short story of the same name.

Eileen Gunn expressed that Brown’s work for her embodies the SF of the 1930s and 1940s.

At this point the panel kindly related their favorite Brown titles for our benefit.

DW: “Something Green,” “Arena,” What Mad Universe (very PKD).

JW: Martians Go Home!

DK: The Lights in the Sky Are Stars (which he read as an absolute tragedy from the human point of view)

EG: Martians Go Home! had a delicate premise. "He goes away when you push him," Eileen said. She reiterated her fascination with his stories about linotype machines. (NOTE: which detail of course made me NEED to read him ASAP!)

Eileen Gunn wanted to know -- did the panel think that Brown was responsible for the way people view science fiction today?

GW: His fiction was ABOUT fiction! Meta-fiction! (e.g. Martians Go Home!). He did hang out a lot with mystery writers.

DW: He was not a mingler, though.

JW: He hung out with Mac Reynolds.

DW: He influenced Sturgeon and Bloch especially.

DK: The Prisoner television series was influenced by his work.

JW: Brown has permeated the culture so completely that most screenwriters, etc., don't necessarily realize that they are being influenced by his existing ideas.

GW: He wrote the shortest SF story ever: "Knock." This is a two sentence story, placed within the framework of another short story. Quite simply:
“The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door...”
Proto flash-fiction!

JW: Michael Swanwick is the current author best at dropping you right into the story ("the hook" is right there at the start). He says he has so many stories he wants to write that he doesn't have time to mess around writing drawn-out fiction.

EG: Eileen said that she herself doesn't write with the knowledge of what the end of her stories are. The story passes the "how am I going to get out of this?" point and somehow resolves itself as she writes. Knowing the ending would mean she is then bored and won't bother to finish writing the story, as it's moot!

JW: Brown had a short active career, then health problems set in during his 50s. He started writing in his 30s for trade publications, etc.

(NOTE: His bibliography can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fredric_Brown_bibliography)

NESFA (New England Science Fiction Association) has published an anthology of his complete SF stories, From These Ashes:
http://www.nesfa.org/press/Books/Brown-1.html

Q&A

An audience member asked if the panel had any recommendations for fans of Brown who were looking for similarly interesting fiction:

Michael Swanwick’s short story collections (Cigar Box Faust et al) were suggested.

Also, some of Brown’s mystery stories have been collected by Bruin Books in an omnibus edition titled Miss Darkness: The Great Short Crime Fiction of Fredric Brown, and Haffner Press http://www.haffnerpress.com/) is taking pre-orders for 2 mammoth volumes of Brown’s non-SF short stories and novels, which will arrange all these mystery, horror, noir, western, and detection tales in chronological order.

Swanwick’s The Periodic Table of Science Fiction was also recommended, as well as his collection The Sleep of Reason, which is based on Goya’s Los Caprichos etching series.

NOTE: Two of Brown’s pieces that were recommended at some point during all the discussions which sounded particularly interesting to me were 1) the short story “Nightmares in Yellow” and 2) the novel The Lights in the Sky Are Stars.

In a Hautala Vein

I have two announcements to make for fans of recently-lost Maine horror author Rick Hautala.

First of all, I have copies of Rick's autobiography The Horror -- The Horror available in the shop now, for those of you (like myself) who prefer ink and paper to electronic books. This book is only available by a fluke -- according to Rick's wife Holly Newstein Hautala, "He wrote it in 2009, unbeknownst to me, and I found a hard copy with his hand edits after he died. Characteristically, he must have decided nobody would want to read it and deleted it from his hard drive. It’s reminiscent of King’s ON WRITING, but with that special Rick Hautala perspective."

I can testify that, especially for those of you who knew Rick, reading this book is like being able to have one last conversation with him. His voice comes through on every page, with typical humor and openness. Thank you, Holly, from rescuing the pages from the recycling bin, and thank you to Crossroad Press as well for bringing this into print! It is an unexpected gift that drives back the shades of mortality a wee bit.

If you're not in the area, and you prefer an electronic version (a steal at $2.99), please order directly from Crossroad's website:
http://store.crossroadpress.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=696

In addition, the folks at JournalStone Publishing are releasing a 2-volume anthology titled Mister October, dedicated to the memory of Rick Hautala. 100% of the profit generated by book sales will go to the family. Please consider ordering a copy for yourself if you're a horror fan!

You can pre-order directly through JournalStone's site:
http://journal-store.com/fiction/mister-october-an-anthology-in-memory-of-rick-hautala/

The collection looks great. It is tremendously heartwarming to see so many folks in the horror genre, big and small, set ink on the page in memory of a friend we all miss so much and lost so suddenly. Here's a list of all the great contributors, including among their number Rick's widow, Holly Newstein, and his son Matti Hautala:

Volume I Contributors:

Neil Gaiman – FEEDERS AND EATERS, Graham Joyce – UNDER THE PYLON, Matthew Costello – A GUY WALKS INTO A BAR, Michael Marshall Smith – HELL HATH ENLARGED HERSELF, Chet Williamson – FIGURES IN RAIN, Elizabeth Massie – AS YOU HAVE MADE US, Peter Crowther – THOUGHTFUL BREATHS, Matti Hautala – NEVER BACK AGAIN, Mark Morris – A GIRL, SITTING, Richard Chizmar – BLOOD BROTHERS, Stephen R. Bissette – LITTLE BROTHERS—PORTFOLIO, Joe R. Lansdale – TIGHT LITTLE STITCHES IN A DEAD MAN’S BACK, Yvonne Navarro – CRAVING, José R. Nieto – lXCHEL’S TEARs, Duane Swierczynski – LIFE DURING DEATH, Gary A. Braunbeck – AFTER THE ELEPHANT BALLET, Craig Shaw Gardner – OVERNIGHT GUEST, Jack M. Haringa – SPRINGFIELD REPEATER, Tom Piccirilli – CONJURER—BOOK I: THE GRIEVE, F. Paul Wilson – THE YEAR THE MUSIC DIED, Jonathan Maberry – PROPERTY CONDEMNED—A Story of Pine Deep, John M. McIlveen – PLAYING THE HUDDYS, Weston Ochse – CRASHING DOWN, Glenn Chadbourne, Morbideus W. Goodell

Volume II Contributors:

Clive Barker – TOM REQUIEM, Peter Straub – LITTLE RED’S TANGO, Jeff Strand – HOLOGRAM SKULL COVER, Thomas F. Monteleone – LUX ET VERITAS, J. F. Gonzalez – DEVOTION, Stephen R. Bissette – INN CLEANING, Christopher Golden – BREATHE MY NAME, Lucy A. Snyder – MAGDALA AMYGDALA, Sarah Pinborough – THE BOHEMIAN OF THE ARBAT, Brian Keene – JOHNSTOWN, Kevin J. Anderson – ROAD KILL (A Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. story), Tim Lebbon – JUST BREATHE, Nancy A. Collins – CATFISH GAL BLUES, Kim Newman – ILLIMITABLE DOMINION, Sarah Langan – INDEPENDENCE DAY, Rio Youers – THE GHOST OF LILLIAN BLISS, Jack Ketchum – HOTLINE, John Skipp – THE LIGHT OF ALL POSSIBLE WORLDS, James A. Moore – WAR STORIES, Amber Benson – IT’S…, Nate Kenyon – THE DREAMCATCHER, Holly Newstein – KRISTALL TAG, Rick Hautala – GHOST TRAP, Cortney Skinner, Glenn Chadbourne

ReaderCon 2013: Alien panel discussion

As I did last year, when I attended ReaderCon, a speculative-fiction focus convention in Burlington, MA, I went to quite a few interesting panel discussions, during which I took notes. In case any of you might be interested in what some of the current discussions among authors and editors are like in the field, I’m going to post a series of my notes here on the blog! Enjoy…!

The first panel I attended was just after arriving on Thursday, July 11. At 9:00pm I entered the realm of The Endangered Alien as discussed by the panel of (from left to right):
-- Andrea Hairston
-- Alex Dally MacFarlane
-- Phoebe North
-- Bud Sparhawk
-- Robert Killheffer (leader)

The premise of the panel was this:
“Science fiction sometimes becomes enamored of a theme for several years and then nearly abandons it for various reasons: microcosms in the 1920s, psionics or mutants in the 1940s and 1950s, etc. In recent years, aliens seem to have become less common. Novels by Paul McAuley, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Alastair Reynolds, and anthologies like Jonathan Strahan’s Edge of Infinity, confine their action to the solar system, with little credible possibility for intelligent alien life. The classic alien-as-hideous-enemy and alien-overlord tropes have largely migrated to movies and TV. When aliens do appear, in novels like China Miéville’s Embassytown, Peter F. Hamilton’s Great North Road, and Malinda Lo’s Adaptation, how are authors treating them? What purposes do they serve and what roles do they play?

First of all, the panelists were asked if they thought the premise of the discussion was correct: are aliens disappearing from science fiction books? How are aliens used by today’s authors? Author Bud Sparhawk reported that he often uses the alien as "other." As he recently sold half a dozen stories involving aliens, to him the subject matter of aliens appears to still be selling, and if it's still selling, then it still works as a trope, in his opinion.

Phoebe North writes as a YA author, and in her market, she has been told by agents and other industry authorities that "you can't do aliens." It's a generally unwritten rule that the YA market is not open to alien stories. If there are aliens in your story, they have to be predominantly humanoid, and cannot be too weird.

Alex Dally MacFarlane is an editor, and she finds no lack of alien stories are being submitted to her for anthologies.

Andrea Hairston is an author and a teacher, and her young adult writing students still want to write about aliens. She hasn't noticed any shift except in what the agents are interested in.

Robert Killheffer, the panel leader, asks: "Are the established SF authors avoiding alien fiction?"

He mentions the Mundane Manifesto, which emerged from a 2002 [Correction: 2004] Clarion workshop with Geoff Ryman. The authors involved were determined to get rid of extravagant or otherwise unlikely devices in their work -- things they felt were distracting writers and readers from our more likely futures, those based strictly on extrapolating possible outcomes of the world of today.

You can read the text of the Manifesto here: http://sfgenics.wordpress.com/2013/07/04/geoff-ryman-et-al-the-mundane-manifesto/

Was the Mundane Manifesto able to create a visible trend on industry output? Or did it simply create a vocal minority in the SF/speculative community?

Bud Sparhawk feels it's a vocal minority. His recent non-alien fiction is driven by the fast-advancing technology of today and the near future, things like exploiting the Jupiter system, etc), but he’s not writing this material because of the Mundane Manifesto.

Phoebe North talked a little bit about how in Young Adult fiction, the expected alien is someone who looks like us, but makes the reader feel different, and is different themselves. It equates with real teen problems.

My note: This exposes them to the idea that other people may be coming from other viewpoints, from national heritage to sexuality, or reiterates their own experiences with the difficulty of communicating personal differences to others.

Alex MacFarlance thinks that the Mundane Manifesto hasn't affected her. She believes that in the field as a whole (as there has been for years), there is simply an awareness of current problems of near future Earth.

Andrea Hairston declaimed against hubris! To believe that we (humans alone) are the gauge of the rest of the universe is appallingly narrow-minded. Andrea also mentioned Carl Sagan, and how other scientists barred him from professional scientific organizations at various points in his career, accusing him of "poetry." !!!

Alex MacFarlane took the opportunity to mention that labeling your aims "Mundane" makes them sound “so boring.”

Rob Killheffer commented that “you cannot draw a line (like the Mundane Movement) across things we don't know yet. This is foolish and depressing.”

My note: It is initially perplexing that in a field dedicated to speculation that the need for limiting and curtailing that very speculation is embraced.

Bud Sparhawk asserted that all writers, no matter how future-focused, are always writing about right now whether they mean to or not. The elements may be buried or cloaked under other names, consciously or subconsciously, but the present day lies at the core of what authors write.

Phoebe North returned to the idea that restricting the use of a metaphor doesn't make any sense in fiction. Metaphors are tools. Use them or not, but don’t insist on their elimination.

Rob Killheffer commented that the atmosphere we're in right now seems in some ways to exert a conservative influence on fiction, even though the visible and vocal social world is trending toward more liberal/tolerant viewpoint (gay rights etc).

He inquired of the panel: What about the use of the alien as a racial stereotype replacement?

Andrea Hairston commented that often when aliens are present, the only other characters present in the story are white. In other words, the aliens provide “color” and contrast.

My note: This seems to be a simplistic mechanism, a black-and-white (if you will) approach, while the actuality would be a reality with plenty of grey areas. Not all authors slack on this front. C.J. Cherryh’s “Chanur” worlds, for instance, have no lack of variety in their peoples, alien or human, and it is obvious that she has not tried to simplify any of her peoples’ alienness.

Robert Killheffer commented that “the alien as racial underdog stand-ins for the oppressed minority is the lazy route (think Avatar, Jar Jar Binks).” He believes that in really good science fiction, the alien should make you uncomfortable in their alienness.

My note: Or even in their akinness, they should make you uncomfortable!

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Audience Q & A

Audience member (male): Back 30+ years ago, kids reading science fiction were outcasts -- no one cared what they read. Now SF is more mainstream, so the industry wants to control it more (specifically the juvenile/YA fic genre).

Another male commenter: In werewolf fiction, werewolves being another popular “other,” the common pattern is that a community emerges that's been there all along and wants to join "regular" society. Now vampire fiction is doing the same thing.

Bud Sparhawk: “We need new outskirts!!!”

Another audience member: Superman was an early fictional alien, but think of it – this alien was an attractive 6-foot tall white hunk from Kansas! The tradition of "human" aliens is long established in the industry. Sexy aliens are okay by the editors.

Female audience member: Another new alien/other in current fiction is represented by an increase in the use of transcendent human evolution as an alien form.

Andrea Hairston: If the "other" is too dangerous we sanitize it and make it safe, like the Disney treatment of fairy tales.

Another commenter: With our current knowledge we realize aliens will be so alien as to be unrecognizable. Peter Watts’ story Blindsight features VERY alien aliens. Read online or download here! http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm

Another commenter: Society is so fractured today (in spite of its so-called globalization) that the idea that we can communicate with seemingly alien culture is very important.

My note: Agreed. The idea that communication is possible with some effort on the part of both sides is tremendously important. It’s too easy to throw up your hands and huff about not understanding what the other person wants and simply walk away. It would be great if we could get everyone to grasp this in a long-term sense. This is a vital idea for humans to embrace, especially in today’s culture of immediacy.

Another commenter: It is rare to find alien fiction without any human characters.

Alex MacFarlane: What will our science fiction be in 300 years time? How different from our conceptions today?

Andrea Hairston: Mentions the Mundane Manifesto's reference to authors’ and readers’ desire to meet extraterrestrials as an "adolescent fantasy."

My note: The Mundane Manifesto does say: “The Mundanes recognize: That interstellar travel remains unlikely. Warp drives, worm holes, and other forms of faster-than-light magic are wish fulfillment fantasies rather than serious speculation about a possible future.”

Curiosity & fascination

Here's a little article in which I consider some of the little sub-sections of the shop, and how they came to be.

People often ask me how I pick the books that I put out onto the shelves at the Green Hand. One of the major tenets in the assembly of my bookshop's stock is whether or not a book evokes curiosity. It seems a reasonable hope that if a book looks interesting to me, it will look interesting to someone else as well.

Of course this selection method has its hazards for those of us who are nuts about books. The other thing that people ask me is how I avoid the temptation to bring everything home with me. Working at the library for a while helped. It gave me a greater appreciation for the resources of interlibrary loan, which allows me to read books I might never otherwise see -- but not everything is in library lending collections, and I'm one of those people who likes to own books that they love. In answer to that craving to stash book treasure at home, I had to come up with a back-up plan to outsmart myself. To whit, my epically long "to read" list is formed in a large part by titles that have come into the shop. I find it a little easier to convince myself to put the books out on the shelf for sale to your guys if I can at least write down the author and title so I can find another copy of the book later. This way I prevent a massive book logjam forming at home, which is an uphill struggle, I can tell you!

While I do sell a lot of fiction, the non-fiction categories in the Green Hand are many and varied. The big ones, like history and biography and art, are obviously present -- but what pockets in the shop are stocked and cultivated purely out of a joy in their existence? There are some funny little sections that are tucked in between the more general ones. Sometimes they linger, mostly intact and slowly growing, until an annual visit from one person or another occurs, and half of the books get wiped out in one fell swoop.

Magic and illusionism, circuses and sideshows, for instance, is a section particularly prone to this behavior pattern. Part of the problem is the lack of people willing to relinquish their stage magic and midway related books. Really, why would you want to? This is a regular state of affairs for a used bookshop -- we depend on people being willing to give up their good books. The odds are against us, but we're willing to keep trying!

Within the true crime section the smaller historical criminology and forensic sections keep a certain amount of space for themselves, where these books wait for the day when they will find their own regular patrons. The Pinkerton Detective Agency history, Scotland Yard, and early criminologists are favorite topics for this area.

Books on calligraphy and their companion volumes on illuminated manuscripts (a personal passion) wait in an array of sizes below the illustration section (another personal favorite). There is something about the dedicated combination and labyrinthine arrangement of image, text, and borders on those pages that draws me in. Someday a person as obsessed as I am with illuminated manuscripts will stumble across this shelf, and it will make a delight of their afternoon.

From The Story Bag, a
collection of Korean folk tales

Other favorite sections ebb and flow every week or month as folks discover them for the first time or return for their regular inspection of the shelves. My folklore and mythology section threatens to overwhelm the bookshelf it shares with books about psychics, dreams, dowsing, and out-of-body experiences, even though it is one of the liveliest for browsing and buying. I stuff it with as much as I can, moving beyond the basics by Bullfinch, Joseph Campbell, Andersen and Grimm to turn-of-the-century Asian folklore, early American folklore, and dictionaries of symbols.

Dinosaurs and other paleontological matters take up part of a shelf in the natural history/biology section, near books about evolution and Darwin, waiting for their fans to find them, while kids' dinosaur books sell in a slow but steady flow. I'm still waiting to stumble across a mother lode of paleontology books so the section can achieve the breadth and strength I would like it to.

Some sections come and go like the seasons. My beekeeping section sometimes doesn't even exist, but it always pops up again eventually. Likewise my books on clocks and watch repair, or knot tying, or those about the nitty-gritty of raising chickens.

In other words, the shop's collection is like an organism. It adapts and changes, every growing, occasionally sloughing off extra or worn books via the $1 bin, adding new shelves where they're needed, and within its greater body creating sub-sections of itself as books collect and different subjects gain cohesion within the larger general subjects. I hope that is the sign of a healthy bookshop -- changing, growing, adapting, and responding to the needs of its customers on a daily basis! A bookshop in fine fettle should always be fun to explore, and give its regular visitors pleasant surprises when they think they've seen everything it has to offer. Come see!

The 2013 Reading List so far...!

At the beginning of 2013, the irony of being a bookstore owner who had very little time to read books was wearing thin. With that in mind, I resolved to READ MORE. Apparently it worked.

Here is my list of Books-I-Have-Read for 2013 so far! This does not include books I am part-way through (of which there are many); these are all books that I have finished reading. Whoo!

Superluminal by Vonda McIntyre

Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates

Mollie Peer by Van Reid

Dark Twilight by Joseph Citro

Embassytown by China Mieville

Theodosia and the Staff of Osiris & Theodosia and the Eyes of Horus by R.L. LaFevers

Starkweather: The Story of a Mass Murderer by William Allen

When Findus Was Little and Disappeared by Sven Norqvist

Cannery Row by John Steinbeck

The Beginner's Handbook of Dowsing: The Ancient Art of Divining Underground Water Sources by Joseph Baum

The Magic Circle by Jenny Davidson

The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov

Georgia: In the Mountains of Poetry by Peter Nasmyth

Blessed and Cursed Alike by Kiarna Boyd

As a whole, the list contains an overwhelming number of books which I found to be very good, and several that were outstanding. Some were classics I'd been meaning to read FOREVER, and gosh darn it, now I have.

Review: Blessed & Cursed Alike by Kiarna Boyd

BOOK REVIEW:
Blessed and Cursed Alike
by Kiarna Boyd

The pulse of any city flies fast and rides hard if you know how to hang onto it. A good story is the same way. Blessed and Cursed Alike is the first novel by author Kiarna Boyd, and in its pages a spell is cast on the reader.

I wasn't sure what to expect when I first picked up the book, except there was bound to be magic, and that the plot was driven by motorcycle couriers. I knew it was likely the magic would attract me, but so far as motorcycle couriers go, my only exposure to them had been in Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash, and from time spent hanging around the hard-riding bicycle couriers that were a brief phenomena during the 1990s here in Portland, Maine.

I read a couple of chapters, and put the book down until I had more time. On my next day off, I picked it up again. I didn't put it down again until I'd read the whole thing. In other words, I spent my single day off of the week immersed in the world of the city, the city of Zade and Otter and Dis. And it was good.

In any city, there are the ways that are heavily trafficked, and there are the ways in between them. Those who know the city on the ground level know and use the between-ways automatically, threads of a map long-woven into their heads. The shortcuts, the favorite graffiti tags that mark a particular post or corner, the dark places to avoid. It's all there. This book travels those ways.

Something is going on in the city. Couriers are dying at an alarming rate. Strange murders and deaths are occurring every day. Granted, that's pretty normal in a big city. But these deaths are piling up way beyond normal. They are pushing towards something big and strange, something marked large on a powerful and unknown agenda. The couriers keep pushing through the traffic, all praying for luck as Dis attempts to get them where they need to go, on time, and now more importantly, while keeping them safe. Unable to name what enemy is pushing the city towards the brink, he does his best to protect his own.

Overlooking the city from its benevolent perch, the towers of St. Anna's cathedral form a graceful fortress from which Mother Ida shines as another beacon of support to the couriers, mourning with them as their friends die, one by one. She blesses their bikes in the hopes of preventing more tragedies, and behind the scenes she and Dis fight over what is the best way to keep everyone safe -- her somber, churchly ways, or his centuries-older pagan ways. When murder reaches into the safety of the churchyard, and a friend disappears, the stakes are raised. How much sacrifice is too much?

Meanwhile, the wheels of the couriers' motorcycles continue to crisscross and weave through the streets of the city, with less of them on the road every day.

As Dis attempts to unravel the patterns of death and influence, the cords tighten around his adrenaline-bound clad of riders, until it finally becomes evident that what is manipulating this modern city towards cataclysm is a much, much older history than most of them know.

As well as having a terrific cast of characters which I spent most of that Monday off hanging out with, this book touched a few long-languishing heartstrings for me. It reminded me of the raw frontier feel I got from reading the Borderland/Bordertown series (brought to life by Terri Windling, Will Shetterly, Ellen Kushner et al back in the 80s, recently revived in the new collection Welcome to Bordertown). Unpredictable and charged with magic, but very, very human. It also reminded me of the shadowy powers-at-work feel of another great piece of early urban fantasy, Emma Bull's Bone Dance.

Another good crossover comparison would be Charles de Lint's books, where everyday people grapple with extraordinary things on the threshold between now and a much older world whose lingering magic weaves through the edges of ours, alternately burning and blessing those who find it.

I highly recommend this book. It is well-written, from setting the scenes to dialogue to pacing. Even the cover design is sharp. Most of all, I feel like I know the characters after reading it. I suspect they'll be hanging around in my head for a good many years to come.

I'm tremendously glad I chose to read this book. As laden as the story is with death, it's a reminder that you get one life to live -- live it to the hilt, and then when Death comes, as it does, for Blessed and Cursed Alike, have no regrets.