Flashback by Dan Simmons - Reviewed by Gary Carden

Flashback by Dan Simmons
New York: Little, Brown and Company
$27.99 - 553 pages 2011

Well, Kind Hearts, I am a major Dan Simmons fan, but I had some reservations about signing on for this multi-layered, post-apocalyptic novel about life in the USA following The Day It All Hit the Fan. To tell you the truth, reading Flashback has been a hard jog down a rocky road. Simmons has never been a sunshine and roses author as those of you who read (and loved) The Terror and Drood well know. However, this time out, the author’s grim and daunting worldview plumbs deeply into the lower depths of human nature.

A devastating Islamic nuclear attack has reduced America’s major cities to radioactive rubble, and a brutal invasion quickly divides most of the Midwest and the western coast into isolated fiefdoms controlled by Muslims and Japanese warlords; Texas becomes an independent country with its own flag, militia and constitution; Mexico decides to “reclaim” all of the land that had been taken from them and begins an aggressive invasion of New Mexico and the adjoining states. Surviving Midwestern Jews are herded into a sprawling camp known as “Six Flags Over the Jews” (on the site of an old theme park) and a terrifying jihad destroys Israel and six million inhabitants. American military forces are retrained by Japan as mercenaries and sent to fight in a protracted war in China.

All of these radical changes are merely some twenty years in the future. However, even the most surreal conditions described by Simmons are the projected outcome of conditions that have their roots in 20011. In case you are wondering, the economy does not recover and Medicare bottoms out. Simmons’ characters deliver harangues about how the world’s greatest superpower was brought down by a combination of governmental incompetence and public apathy. Right-wing radio programs are filled with hysterical rants; drug-crazed teenagers vandalize and rob and America’sresources are being harvested by foreign powers. We have gone to hell. In fact, the Southeastern U. S. doesn’t even exist anymore - it is never mentioned in Flashback! (Perhaps it is a barbaric land filled with degenerate hillbillies.)

Up to this point, I have neglected to mention the significance of the title. Flashback is the name of drug to which 80% of the population is addicted. Although the drug is illegal, it is both cheap and available. In fact, there is evidence that suggests that major world powers will see to it that nothing interferes with the distribution of a drug that keeps the major part of America’s population dozing in thousands of flashback caves where they relive the past. Under the influence of flashback an addict can vividly experience the birth of a child that is long dead, honeymoons, athletic accomplishments and memorable/triumphant events - any action in which the addict felt vividly alive. Under the influence of flashback, death can be defeated ... for an hour or two.

The protagonist of Flashback is Nick Bottoms, an ex-cop living in an abandoned shopping mall in Denver. Nick, who occasionally encounters people who comment on the connection between his name and Nicolas Bottom, the weaver (and ass) in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” - this Nick has lost it all: Dara, his beautiful wife who died in a freakish car accident; Val, a son that he has abandoned (the embittered Val lives with his grandfather); a promising career as a detective ... and, yes, his self-respect. Now, he spends every available moment under flashback with Dara and his ten-year-old son.

Now, over five years later, Nick’s flashback sessions are rudely interrupted by Hiroshi Nakamura, a billionaire warlord who wants Nick to investigate the murder of his son, Keigo. Put under continual surveillance by an astonishing array of advanced gadgetry and Hiroshi’s security officer, Hideki Sato (who resembles Odd Job in the James Bond movie), Nick reluctantly agrees, hoping to finance a lifetime supply of flashback. Despite the fact that Keigo’s murder has been investigated repeatedly, Nick agrees to retrace his steps and re-examine the original witnesses - especially those who were attending Keigo’s opulent party on the night of his murder.

At the time of his death, Keigo was completing a documentary film on the use of flashback in America. Nick Bottoms begins to run into rumors of another drug more powerful than flashback that would enable users to manipulate and enhance the past. In addition, when Nick uses flashback to attend the Keigo’s party, he discovers an indistinct figure standing in the background of Keigo’s film ... a figure that he believes is his wife Dara. Why is she there? Nick’s determination to find the answer to this riddle provides the motivation that he needs to solve Keigo’s murder and return to a meaningful life.

However, in the process, Nick Bottom will descend into some of the most nightmarish landscapes ever described in speculative fiction. For example, Coors Field in Denver has become an open-air prison camp which houses the most dangerous criminals in America. Visiting the prison is especially risky for law enforcement personnel like Nick, but since one of his key witnesses is Delroy N. Brown (the “N” standing for the forbidden racial term that has been restored to conversation in Nick’s world and used by everyone) is in the Coors Field prison, Nick goes, clad in Kevlar-plus armor and an armed guard, plus a licensed sniper who does surveillance with a state-of-the-arts rifle ready to shoot any attacker. Simmons is at his best in suspenseful passages such as this one. There are other nerve-wrecking passages, including an assassination attempt at the Disney Center for the Arts ... the luckless, 16-year-old Val joins the flash gang that plans this ill-conceived venture and is the sole survivor. Along the way there is a trip to the Denver Landfill Number 9, the place where thousands of nameless dead are dumped each week.

Much of Flashback consists of following two journeys: (1) Nick’s search for answers to Keigo’s murder and his wife’s mysterious connection with this crime and (2) Val’s attempts to be reunited with his father (and perhaps kill him). In time, these two treks will converge and three generations (Leonard, the grandfather, Nick, the father and Val, the son) will join forces to face the “final conflict.” There are some surprises here and some of them may strain the reader’s “willing suspension of disbelief.”

Amid all of this darkness and subterfuge, there are patches of brilliant narrative. There are also an excess of deadly details about the power of automobile engines, the magnification strength of sniper scopes, and the marked improvements of military weapons (speed, destructive power, weight, etc.) All of this is verification of Simmons’ awesome research. Finally, I was pleased to learn that Nick Bottoms comments on the solving of the Jon Benet Ramsey murder in Bolder, Colorado (1996). Although Simmons does not reveal the identity of the killer, I was gratified to know that this crime will finally be solved.

The PASSAGE by Justin Cronin - Reviewed by Gary Carden

The Passage by Justin Cronin
New York: Random House
$27.00 - 766 pages

For quite some time now, the literary genre known as “science fiction/horror” has been undergoing radical changes. The “creatures of the night,” be they zombies, vampires or werewolves, have been transformed into either (a) terrifying creations (“Dracula 2000” and its clones) or (b) pouting Vanity Fair teenagers on steroids (“Twilight”). Bela Lugosi’s bats and cloaks are laughably out of fashion while today’s menacing creatures, endowed with astonishing powers, are running amok. Many critics of modern horror literature feel that the real, innate terrors of our modern science and technology require a more appropriate folklore - one that combines science and myth. For example, science fiction/horror classics like I Am Legend.

Frankly, this horror fan is feeling some nostalgia pangs. I am too old to be frightened (or aroused) by the cast of the “Twilight Series,” which in my opinion may inadvertently succeed in adding yet another baneful ingredient to the vampire legend: in addition to garlic, mirrors, sunlight and crosses, I suspect that vampires can also be destroyed by saccharine. I yearn for the return of the nightmarish world of Werner Herzog’s “Nosferatu.”

Which brings me to the epic (766 pages) vampire saga, The Passage. (Let me immediately note that Ridley Scott (director of Blade Runner, Alien and Gladiator) has already announced that he has begun filming this novel, and in a recent interview, Justin Cronin stated that The Passage is merely the first in a planned trilogy. Rest assured, the promotion for both Ridley’s spectacle and the anticipated sequels of this novel will be ... awesome.)

If there is an appropriate comparison for The Passage, it must be Stephen King’s The Stand (1978, revised in 1990 with a total of 1,153 pages) and Robert McCammon’s Swan Song (the 1987 winner of the Bram Stoker Award). All of these novels involve an epic trek (with mystical and apocalyptic motifs) to save the world.

Like a number of other vampire epics, The Passage opens with a covert project, originally designed to improve mankind, which goes awry. The original mission of Project Noah is to defeat disease and vastly increase intelligence, life expectancy and physical strength by stimulating the thymus gland (which becomes dormant or inactive in most human beings after adolescence). According to the theory expounded by the medical technicians in The Passage, the thymus - when injected with a virus (extracted from rabid bats!) will create astonishing improvements in humankind. In order to demonstrate the project’s benefits, Noah needs “guinea pigs” who are willing to be injected with a virus which will either kill them outright or convert them into a “new species.” The twelve selected participants are gleaned from a disturbing collection of murderers/sociopaths who are awaiting execution in maximum security prisons (mostly in Texas). Having given their compliance, the prisoners vanish into “The Chalet” which houses subterranean facilities, and which are staffed by a sinister mix of medics, military personnel, disconcertingly ruthless CIA agents and security guards.

In addition to the selected murderers, there is another participant: a six-year-old girl named Amy who is kidnapped, sedated and subjected to the same injections. Allegedly, the reason for Amy’s presence is to determine the effects of the serum on a pubescent subject. The result is the creation of a seemingly ageless child endowed with the power to "save the world."

Eventually, the bizarre and inexplicable behavior of the patients prompts the establishment of some rigorous security measures - especially after the patients begin to hang from the ceiling of their cells and whisper telepathic messages that suggest that they can function as a single unit - like bees in a hive. The inevitable disaster occurs. The patients overrun the Chalet, kill the entire staff and escape. In a period of thirty-two minutes, the world undergoes an apocalyptic revolution and author Cronin assures us that "life as we know it no longer exists."

At this point, The Passage abruptly moves forward almost a century, (With 500 pages of dense narrative ahead) into an embattled world filled with the relics of an earlier time: abandoned cities and interstates, rusting vehicles and millions of desiccated bodies (which the survivors refer to as “slims”). settlements of human beings still exist, but their numbers are few. Living in bunkers,they have adjusted to a daunting routine of constant vigilance.Their days are devoted to foraging and reinforcing their boundaries while their nights are spent patrolling the ramparts of their crude fortresses. High intensity lights burn all night.(Lights that are beginning to fail.) Their enemies are “the virals” who, in traditional vampire fashion, shun sunlight and bright lights, living mostly in dense forests and abandoned buildings. Like the inhabitants of a feudal city, the mortal survivors must defend themselves with swords and crossbows (although they occasionally discover caches of military weapons left over from “The Time Before.") Methods of communications, although forbidden, are being slowly rediscovered and individuals with a knack for repairing engines and electronic equipment are highly valued. The most protected area of the compound is "The Sanctuary" where the children are kept until they are adults.

The characters who live in this feudal compound are fascinating. Over the last century, their language and their customs reflect the rigors, anxieties and terrors of their existence. For example, there are numerous names for the virals, including “smokes” (their ability to appear and vanish suddenly) and “jumps” (referring to their astonishing speed when they attack). Watchers are constantly warned “You only get one shot” and they are trained to aim for “the sweet spot” which is the space immediately beneath the breastbone (the location of the thymus). Due to their stressful existence, all are haunted by nightmares (generated by the virals). The rigorous rules concerning the individual’s responsibility to the community often results in excessive feelings of guilt - a condition that results in frequent suicides.

The carnage in The Passage is excessive. To a certain extent the magnitude of violence in conjunction with the rapid passage of time seems to render character development irrelevant. No sooner do characters become interesting or endearing than they are vanquished like pieces removed in a chess game. This seems to be Cronin’s objective since his novel stresses preordained events. Individual lives are irrelevant and only exist (briefly) to move the action toward a predestined end. Whatever that end might be, it is never made evident in this novel.

The only abiding presence in The Passage is Amy. Time and again, when the characters are forced to abandon a refuge and venture into a bleak world fraught with danger, only Amy knows which direction they should go. Ageless (she seems frozen at 13 or 14), she is frequently (and infuriatingly) mute. When she finally speaks it is in order to provide information that is either vague or trivial. To tell you the truth, I didn’t like her much despite the fact that she is described as “the boat” on mankind’s journey to a safe haven.

Ah, but there fascinating episodes: a marvelous nightclub scene in Las Vegas with thousands of “slims” frozen around a roulette table; a terrifying train ride through viral country; an army base where movie night in the soldiers’ canteen is “Dracula,” and the fiery extermination of an underground viral bunker. Ridley Scott is going to stun us with special effects!

There is no question that The Passage is an entertaining journey with lots of “jumps” and “smokes.” Frankly I found that the “mystical themes”became a bit pretentious, silly and extremely vague, especially during the final chapters. Also the number of superhuman feats and miraculous escapes acquired a comic book quality that made the willing suspension of disbelief difficult to maintain. In addition, this novel is too long by about 300 pages. However, I’m looking forward to the movie.

One Second After by William R. Forstchen - Reviewed by Gary Carden

One Second After by William R. Forstchen
New York: A Tom Doherty Associates Book
$24.95 - 349 pages

“It is not a matter of “if,” it is a matter of “when.”
- General Eugene Habier USAF (RET.)
Former Commander in Chief
U.S. Strategic Command (May 2002)

Let me begin this review by confessing that I never heard of E.M.P. (Electromagnetic Pulse) and I was distressed to learn that its destructive potential has been readily acknowledged by both the Pentagon and the White House (Newt Gingrich wrote the forward for this novel). According to the author, the public’s ignorance of the threat posed by this silent enemy is largely due to the fact that the first information about the destructive potential of E.M. P. was released on the same day that the final report on the 9/11 catastrophe appeared in the media. In short, the horrors attending the fall of the Twin Towers so totally dominated the news (as well as the imagination of the American public) that readers paid scant attention to a new “theoretical danger.”

Briefly defined, E.M.P. represents a nuclear weapons strategy which would render an entire country helpless by simply destroying that country’s computer technology. In theory, a nuclear missile designed to detonate some twenty miles above the surface of the designated country (in this fictional enactment, it is over Kansas) would simply “erase” all computer-dependent technology. Within one second of the explosion, a shock wave would short-circuit every electrical device that it touched. In-flight planes would crash, all motorized vehicles would stop, and all communications (TV, radio, telephones) would cease. The country’s inhabitants would be unaware of what had happened until they encountered the consequences (stalled cars, dead phones and the silence attending the loss of mass communications).

In order to graphically demonstrate the devastation of such an attack,author Forstchen has created a novel in which the inhabitants of a small town (Black Mountain, N. C.) fight for survival in the aftermath of an E.M.P. attack. The first evidence that something is amiss is the stalled traffic on I-40. As the town ceases to function, the first causalities occur in hospitals where patients are on life support. Early fatalities include individuals with pacemakers and individuals dependent on dialysis. Diabetics and cancer patients are immediately “at risk.” Schools and nursing homes, now without air conditioning, electricity or refrigeration quickly become unsanitary and unsafe. As concerns about food and drinking water increase, looting and theft become commonplace. Within three days, the local stores have been raided and the desperate civic officials have implemented martial law. Money becomes worthless and Black Mountain gradually reverts to a barter system in which bullets, cigarettes and canned goods become mediums of exchange. (Ten .22 bullets for a rabbit, two bullets for a cigarette, etc.)

John Matherson, the protagonist of One Second After, (like author Forstchen) has military experience and teaches at Montreat-Anderson College. Matherson had given up a promising military career when he decided to bring his ailing wife home to Black Mountain. Following the death of his wife, this history instructor and veteran of Desert Storm had become one of the most popular citizens of the small town. When disaster strikes the town calls on him to assist in developing a survival strategy. In a matter of days, he and a few civic leaders are rationing food and water, patrolling the Interstate, collecting fire arms and mobilizing vehicles that function without computer technology (pre-1970’s). One of the town’s most valuable vehicles is a Ford Edsel!

The greatest threat to the town’s inhabitants proves to be the ignorance produced by the information vacuum. Although it is evident that the United States has been attacked, no one knows the identity of the enemy - Iran? North Korea? China? Unanswered questions include: Is the war over? Who won? What is going on in the rest of the world?

In conjunction with the unknown fate of America, Black Mountain and other small towns in the region find themselves coping with great numbers of people arriving from Charlotte, Winston-Salem and Atlanta. Within a matter of weeks, Old Fort, Marion, Morganton and Asheville are reduced to embattled fiefdoms that strive with little success to maintain cooperative relationships with other towns while attempting to deflect migrating hordes and protect their supplies, such as food and water and medication.

A sustained level of tension and suspense in One Second After is produced by Forstchen’s stark portrayal of the town’s speedy descent into brutal savagery. As John Matheson and the civic leaders of Black Mountain struggle to maintain the basic principles that created this country, they are repeatedly forced to acknowledge that civilization’s fragile veneer is being stripped away. Reports begin to arrive concerning murderous armies composed of thousands of armed and desperate individuals that are moving steadily toward western North Carolina. The largest group, called the Posse, are “practicing cannibals” and have left a terrifying wake of rape, murder and ruin behind them. According to rumor, a similar group (a self-styled cult) is approaching from Tennessee.

Before One Second After has run its course, John Matherson finds all of his most cherished principles challenged. Certainly, he had not foreseen the painful decisions he would face as the town’s military advisor. Not only does he condone the killing of “invaders;” he serves as executioner. In time he even assists in converting his beloved college into a military base where his former students serve as the last barrier between the Posse and his town. He watches loved ones die of starvation and implements policies that result in the willful withholding of food and medication for individuals who are fated to die anyway (triage).

There is a daunting message in this novel. One Second After is a cautionary tale. The worst horrors depicted here (and there are many) are simply projections based on countless studies of what could happen to the United States should it suddenly lose all of its complex technical advances in one blinding flash. We are a pampered country, says William R. Forstchen coddled by a great web of technical marvels. Take them away and we are heartbreakingly vulnerable - so vulnerable that 80% of us would perish before we could adapt to a world without technology.





HANDLING THE DEAD BY JOHN AJVIDE DLINDQVIST - REVIEWED BY GARY CARDEN

Handling the Dead by John Ajvide Lindqvist
London: Quercus Publishing
$16.49 - 364 pages

“Death makes strangers of us all.”

Dear readers, if you decide to purchase this amazing novel, please consider the following advice: Forget George Romero and the multitudes of lurching zombies that have become common fare in both films and novels. Purge your mind of ravenous, decaying flesh-eaters who crawl and stagger through cemeteries, suburban housing projects and shopping malls. John Ajvide Lindqvist has re-invented the concept of the undead (just as he re-invented the traditional image of the vampire in Let the Right One In). His “undead” are more docile, but frightening nevertheless.

Lindqvist’s tale begins with a breakdown in utilities service in Stockholm. During a heatwave, electrical appliances begin to malfunction. Televisions, vacuum cleaners and electric stoves can’t be shut off. In addition, the entire populace seems to be suffering from migraines and tempers are short. Then, the inconceivable happens: all of the dead in the local morgue get up and walk.Those that manage to escape before the police arrive (trailing sheets and revealing their autopsy stitches), begin a slow trek through the city, and many are giving a piteous cry: “Home! Home!”

David Zetterburg, a popular local comedian finds his life turning into nightmare when his beautiful and gifted wife is killed in an automobile accident. Called to the hospital to identify Eva, he arrives in time to witness his wife’s “reanimation.” Despite extensive, fatal injuries to her face and body, Eva’s corpse stirs, sits up and looks at her husband. ... Elvy Lundberg had dutifully tended her husband, Tore, in his final illness. After his death, she tries to put her life together again and find peace with her granddaughter with whom she shares a kind of telepathy and “second sight.” Then, Tore, who has been dead for over a month, comes home. Then, there is Gustav Mahler (He takes a lot of kidding about that name). He is an overweight journalist with a pacemaker and his life evolves around his new grandson, Elias. When the child is killed (he falls from the window of his parent’s apartment) Mahler is devastated. However, Gustav hears that the dead are awakening all over Stockholm, and he wonders about his grandson’s lonely grave. Although Elias has been buried for two months, Gustav unearths the coffin with his bare hands and brings Elias home ... if, indeed, the creature in the coffin is Elias.

Eventually, Stockholm’s hospital personnel, in conjunction with the police and the military, round up the dead who have now been christened the “reliving.” Totally at a loss as to what to do, the authorities confine the dead in the local hospital. The military dispatches special forces who are instructed to disinter all of the dead who have died recently (those who have died more than four months ago do not “awaken”) and a governmental announcement instructs the public to turn in their deceased relatives who return home.

Handling the Dead is not a horror novel in any traditional sense. Instead,
Lindqvist uses the folklore of the undead to develop a disturbing meditation on the nature of death, love and loss. Moving back and forth among his major characters, the author tells a dark, suspenseful story. David wishes to bring his “reliving” wife home, but her behavior becomes increasingly strange. Elvy sees a vision and is convinced that the world is on the brink of Apocalypse. Eventually, she begins to preach to her neighbors, citing the biblical passage about the dead rising from their graves. Flora, Elvy’s granddaughter takes up residence in a half-completed housing complex called Heath which is also inhabited by a large group of young dissidents. Gustav flees with his daughter and Elias to a remote cabin where he plans to rehabilitate his grandson.

Study of the newly-awakened dead by medical and psychological specialists reveals bizarre facts. When large groups of living people visit or attempt to converse with the “reliving,” they discover that they (the visitors) can read each other’s minds. The experience proves to be disorienting since they are hearing hundreds of voices and can no longer recognize their own thoughts. In addition, the awakened dead are incapable of individual thought and only mimic the wishes (spoken and unspoken) of those around them. Much of the time they appear docile; however they become angry or frustrated if these emotions are exhibited by those around them. The only objects that interest are wind-up toys.

Eventually, all of the awakened dead are transported to the Heath, with plans to develop it into a rehabilitation center. This move and the subsequent visits by relatives and the public proves to be disastrous. Belatedly, all of the relatives of the “reliving” realize that the beings that have returned bear no resemblance to their loved ones. David’s wife, Eva, once a gifted writer of children’s books, does not know her husband or her child. Although she can speak (which is rare among the “reliving”), she merely repeats variations of statements others make to her. When Gustav attempts to rehabilitate his grandson, Elias becomes violent and attacks him - a response that is prompted by the anger and frustration that Gustav is experiencing because his rehabilitative therapy is failing.

As all attempts by the authorities fail, the “reliving” are abandoned. Helpless and without defenses, they are attacked and killed by bands of marauding citizens who find them participating in a solemn dance outside the Heath. When Handling the Dead draws to an end, the fate of the “reliving” is uncertain. Perhaps, lie the disenfranchised aliens in “District 9,” they will end up living on government subsidies. Another possibility is Elvy, who comes to believe that she had misinterpreted her vision. Instead of saving the living, Elvy believes that she was meant to save the awakened dead. Now she wants to help them return home. Apparently, “home” is a second death).

Excluding the violence at the end of this novel (a bonfire of the “reliving” who all die a second time and a “zombie from the sea that acts like the undead in a Romero flick), Handling the Dead has no scenes of mass carnage. Instead, Lindqvist depicts a psychological horror which arises from the realization that nothing is beyond the grave except silence. In essence, that is the message that reawakened dead deliver. Although the novel ends with a reaffirming symbol - a white caterpillar that becomes a butterfly - it does little to erase Lindqyist’s images of what lies beyond the grave: a devastating silence.

SIGNS AND WONDERS AND THE BRIGHT FOREVER: OPENING NIGHT.

Kind Hearts, all of these photos were made by Carl Iobst during the three performances of my two plays (dramatic monologues) at the Martin Lipscomb Performing Arts Center in Highlands. My play, "Signs and Wonders," concerts tragicomic events in the life of Shelby Jean, a rural Georgia girl who has a fateful encounter with Darcy Montgomery, a Bob Jones minister.
"The Bright Forever" is the life of Fanny Crosby, a blind woman who allegedly wrote over 8,000 hymns and spent the latter part of her life preaching to "her boys" from the stage of a mission hall in the New York Bowery. I guess the two plays are a sort of "salt and pepper" set since both deal with religion.

DRESS REHEARSAL FOR "SIGNS AND WONDERS" AND "THE BRIGHT FOREVER" AT THE MARTIN LIPSCOMB PERFORMING ARTS CENTER

Kind Hearts, here are two remarkable actresses. That is Carla Gates in the church choir robe and Shirley Williams in the somber clothes and dark glasses. The play opens October 1 at 7:30, repeats on October 2 and closes on Sunday with a 2:30 matinee. Please check the details on the article below for ticket sales and telephone numbers. I am deeply gratified for these two actresses, a director like Ronnie Spilton and a place like the Martin Lipscomb Performing Arts Center. The photos are by Carl Iobst.

"SIGNS AND WONDERS" and "THE BRIGHT FOREVER" OPEN IN HIGHLANDS ON OCTOBER 1,2,3.

Kind Hearts, please click on the poster and he photo of the people who are doing my play. The lady on the left is Carla Gates and she is doing the role of Shelby Jean, a somewhat lusty Georgia girl who becomes involved with a young minister during a revival. The lady standing in the photo is Robbie Spilton, the director. The lady on the right is Shirley Williams who has the role of Fanny Crosby, the blind hymn writer in "The Bright Forever." The chubby old guy isn't in either of the plays but he insisted on having his picture taken. According to local sources in Sylva, he is a harmless eccentric who spends a lot of time on his front porch shaking his fist at the workers who are paving the road in front of his house. Please call 838-526-9047. The Highlands Performing Arts Center also has a website.

"SIGNS AND WONDERS" and "THE BRIGHT FOREVER"

KIND HEARTS, THESE FOUR PEOPLE STANDING IN MY FRONT YARD BROUGHT TIDINGS THAT MADE MY HEART GO PITTY-PAT.
These people are from the Highlands Performing Arts Center in Highlands, N. C. and they will make my latest play, "Signs and Wonders" a reality. In addition, they have decided to do another play of mine, "The Bright Forever." From left to right, Shirley Williams, who will portray Fanny Crosby in "The Bright Forever;"John Williams, sound engineer; Ronnie Spilton, Director, and Carla Gates, who will portray Shelby Jean in "Signs and Wonders." Both plays are dramatic monologues. I will discuss the subject matter if anyone is interested. Production is scheduled for October.

THE ANGEL'S GAME by Carlos Ruiz Zafon - Review by Gary Carden

The Angel’s Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
New York: Doubleday Publishers - 2009
$26.95 - 470 pages

“Do you want to set fire to the whole world and burn with it?
Let’s do it together. You fix the price.”
- Andreas Corelli, p.128

A few days after completing The Shadow of the Wind, I discovered a copy of Carlos Zafon’s new novel, The Angel’s Game. When I sampled a few pages to see if it had the same extraordinary imagery and cadence of its predecessor, I found that its setting was the same: Barcelona in the 20’s, a visit to the “Cemetery of Forgotten Books,” treks through fog-shrouded graveyards, and the wonderful Sempere Bookstore, the place where star-crossed love, madness and murder converge.

However, The Angel's Game is not a sequel. Daniel Sempere, the protagonist in The Shadow of the Wind is regulated to the role of a minor character in this tale of unholy alliances, paranoia and obsession. It is as though while Daniel Sempere’s anguished tale of love and redemption was unfolding, another doomed protagonist, David Martin (who just happens to lives nearby) is also beginning his own dark journey through “the city of the damned.” Although the two men are friends, they have very little in common ... except a love of books.

Zafon, a master of provocative beginnings, lets David tell his own story which begins with a badly beaten child who enters the Sempere Bookstore clutching a blood-stained copy of Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations. The child (David Martin) begs Sempere Senior to keep the book safe since Martin’s abusive father intends to destroy it. Sempere not only hides the book; he also becomes David’s protector and advisor, assisting the boy in achieving his wish to become a writer.

In time David Martin becomes a journalist and a successful writer of a series of blood-and-thunder pot-boilers, The City of the Damned. Although the books are extremely popular, David feels that they are cheap melodramas and dreams of writing a work that will win the respect of the literary world. David confides his dream to his friend, Pedro Vidal, a highly successful journalist, and in time, he begins work on his great opus, The Steps of Heaven.When he meets Christina, the daughter of Vidal’s chauffeur, David feels that he has an established career. He decides to terminate his contract with the shady publishing firm that distributes The City of the Damned and devote himself to his new friends and his writing. It is at this point that something goes terribly wrong with David’s life.

Within a few short weeks, David discovers the following: he is entangled in a lawsuit with his former publishers, Barrido and Escobillas; he learns that Christina is involved with his best friend, Pedro Vidal and when his new novel is published, the critics judge it to be a hopeless, amateurish work. At the same time, Vidal publishes a novel (written by David) and it is declared a literary masterpiece. Finally, when recurring headaches and nausea forces David to consult a doctor, he is told that he has a brain tumor which will kill him in a few months.

When David Martin is at his lowest point, he meets Andreas Corelli, a mysterious publisher “of religious texts,” who offers to solve all of David’s problems if he will agree to write a book in accordance to Corelli’s dictates. Martin agrees and suddenly, miraculously, the deadly tumor is gone. Corelli gives David 100,000 francs “as a starter.” Shortly afterwards, David learns that the lives of Barrido and Escobillas have been snuffed out in a mysterious fire which had also destroyed all documents and contracts. David moves into an abandoned but luxurious mansion in the heart of Barcelona... a house that he has always coveted, and begins work on Corelli’s book.

Obviously, David Martin has made a Faustian bargain, and although there is much is Corelli’s demeanor to suggest the demonic (he appears to be ageless and his eyes are reptilian), the division between Good and Evil wavers and changes frequently. In time, Martin discovers that he is only the latest of Corelli’s “authors for hire,” and that each of his predecessors has died tragically - In fact, one of them lived in the same house that Martin now occupies. Nor are the authors the only victims. All that they love, including wives, lovers and children are doomed.

But what about the book? What is the subject? The strange mythical tale that David creates is a kind of religious fable; the kind of “folk tale” that can serve as the basis for a religious belief that has the power to capture the imagination of millions. As David writes, he often appears to be a conduit, a mere instrument for verbalizing a fiendish tale that is being dictated by Andreas Corelli. At other times, Zafon suggests that perhaps Corelli exists only as projection of David Martin’s own corrupt soul. Regardless, David senses that the book he is writing may have the power to plunge the world into an apocalyptic war.

Regardless of who is responsible, someone is definitely creating havoc in David Martin’s world. The Angel's Game is filled with hapless victims who are driven mad or die in random accidents. In addition, as the action of this novel accelerates, the narrative is littered with corpses: murdered policemen, mutilated lawyers, drowned paraplegics and lovers. As this Grand Guignol of a novel winds down, the reader is left with a singular suspicion. Is it possible that David Martin and Andreas Corelli are one and the same? If not, is it possible that the protagonist is “becoming” Corelli?

Without a doubt, The Angel's Game contains one of the most remarkable “poetic chapters” that I have encountered in recent literature. This one deals with the death of Sempere Senior, the bookstore owner who is a major character in both The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game. As Sempere’s friends gather(mostly patrons of his bookstore), the funeral service turns into a kind of eulogy for all book lovers... those people who avoid churches and religious cant, but treat books with the kind of respect and awe that is normally expended in churches. Sempere is buried with David’s copy of Great Expectations beneath his clasped hands.

Although I liked this book tremendously, I was occasionally distressed by melodramatic passages characterized by a kind of hysterical rant that appears at odds with Zafon’s usually superb style. David Martin frequently shreds the scenery like a ham actor, posturing and proclaiming cliches. I was especially distressed by his constant use of the words “venomous” and “poisonous,” and the tremendous number of unpleasant waiters, desk clerks, and government officials that populate Barcelona. Given the remarkable quality of Zefon’s writing in The Shadow of the Wind, I can only conclude that the patches of bad writing in The Angel's Game is the result of a bad translation. I learned recently that The Angel's Game will be reissued with a new translation this year. I sincerely hope that is true.

SEASON OF ROT by Eric S. Brown

Season of Rot (Five Zombie Novellas) by Eric S. Brown
La Vergne, Tennessee: Permuted Press
$14.95 (paperback) – 240 pages

“In Eric Brown’s apocalypse, all we have left is each other…and that’s not always a good thing, either.”
-David Dunwoody, author of Dark Entities


If you are a fan of the apocalypse movies that are currently common fare in American theaters, you will immediately recognize the landscape of Season of Rot. From Cormac McCarthy’s classic, “The Road” to the endless clones of the “Mad Max” and George Romero’s “Day of the Dead,” this is a world of rusted wreckage, starvation and the smell of decay. There are still pockets of life – terrified colonies of beleaguered humans who spend each day in a desperate search for food and shelter. The prevailing atmosphere in these “latter days” epics is a kind of sustained despair plus paranoia. Eric Brown’s message, like the signs held aloft by the crazed prophets in cartoons is, “The End is Near.”

In Season of Rot, humanity is defenseless against the legions of “the undead” – millions of mindless, rotting corpses that suddenly, inexplicably crawled from their graves as though responding to a mysterious summons. Now, they shuffle through abandoned buildings, deserted homes and the barren countryside searching for food: living flesh. Earth’s survivors are dwindling while the ranks of the undead are growing. Eric Brown, the author of Season of Rot, frequently notes (with ill-concealed glee) that humanity doesn’t stand a chance.

Much of the action in Season of Rot resembles the plot of a graphic novel without the graphics (In fact, according to this book’s gutsy self-promotion, one of Brown’s novellas, “Dead West” is destined to become a graphic novel - It would make a good one). In most of the stories, the action has a “computer-game” quality with each plot presenting a series of predictable and interchangeable episodes and characters: (1) Beleaguered survivors flee; (2) find a temporary safe haven; (3) plan an escape to permanent safety (another country or an island), (4) are invariably attacked (hopelessly outnumbered), (5) die heroically, usually firing AK-47s as their intestines, hearts or heads are ripped away.

The majority of Brown’s characters suffer from minimal development since in “zombie world” the emphasis is on action, not introspection. Male characters are limited to: handsome and muscular or “scientific and eccentric” or military and short-tempered. Women are well developed, manipulative, sensual or nurturing. Everyone is well armed. The weapons of choice are AK-47s, shotguns and flame-throwers. Slaughter reaches epic proportions with the majority of characters in Season of Rot barely having time to acquire names and a presence on stage before they are swept away in a flood of gore.

Readers are rarely given the opportunity to learn anything about the background of the people who inhabit Brown’s five novellas. It may be that in this grim world where all humanity is as ephemeral as may flies, their personal dreams, hopes and aspirations are irrelevant. Sooner or later, everyone is “grist for the mill.”

Brown’s five novella consist of the following: The title piece, “Season of Rot,” which is set in a besieged hospital (with the obligatory snipers on the roof); “The Queen” which is the name of a ship – the crew of survivors are in search of an uncontaminated island; “The Wave” provides an original explanation for the “rising of the dead” – a wave of energy originating in outer space, that creates and manipulates the dead; “Dead West” which is set in the Midwest following the Civil War and presents “an alternate version of history,” and “Rats” in which infected rodents, in conjunction with “the dead,” have taken over the world, except for a secret military installation…

Two of these novellas, “The Wave” and “Dead West” actually contain viable characters, and in both stories, the plot unfolds with an imagination and a sense of suspense that is largely missing in the other tales. However, all of the stories suffer from stilted, awkward dialogue that is invariably delivered by characters that sound like posturing teenagers, ill at ease in the role of adults. Sexual activity seems more functional than erotic and the occasional introduction of gay and/or lesbian characters lacks credibility, depth or warmth. Possibly, they were added in an unabashed attempt to suggest sophistication and maturity.

What then, is the appeal of Season of Rot? Why are impressive numbers of teenagers addicted to “zombie? land” novels and film? Well, to quote one of R. Crumb’s characters, “It was ever so.” The excesses of violence and horror found in Brown’s novellas (disembowelments, beheadings, and an abundance of gore - geysers of blood, savage rapes, raining body parts and bone fragments and numerous intestinal tracts that are continually springing from ruptured bodies like Jacks-in-the-boxes – all of these shocking images have a famous precedent: The Grand Guignol theater in Paris in 1897 which became notorious for enacting scenes of graphic, amoral horror on stage. Due to the graphic realism of the action, members of the audience frequently fainted and/or vomited. Since that time, any work of horror (film, paintings, novels) that stresses excessive bloodshed over plotting, good writing and character development is called “Grand Guignol.” Season of Rot definitely qualifies.