jason_rubis

On a recent I-really-shouldn't-do-this-I-don't-have-any-freaking-money trip to Barnes & Noble, I was delighted to see that Walter Greatshell's excellent novel Xombies has been re-issued by Ace with a (slightly) new title (it's now Xombies: Apocalypse Blues) and new packaging that reflects its SF leanings (as opposed to pure Romero-esque horror, as implied by the original 2004 Berkeley edition).

This is a highly entertaining novel with a cool heroine, submarines, a trip to the arctic, the (sort of) walking dead, and for some reason I want to say there's a baboon in there somewhere.  I read it when it first came out; I loved it, passed it on to a similarly-inclined co-worker (who also loved it) but regretted how little stir it made.  Kudos to Berkely for publishing Greatshell in the first place, but BIG kudos to Ace for picking him back up and (even better) greenlighting a sequel; I see by my Amazon page that Xombies: Apocalypticon is forthcoming in February.  Buy it!  I sure will!

J
 

Northern Frights Publishing has just released Shadows of the Emerald City, an anthology that puts a horrific spin on L. Frank Baum's Oz universe.  Just coincidentally, it happens to include my story "Chopper's Tale," my take on the origins of the Tin Man.

Reviews so far have been ver' ver' positive!  Here's one with a good overview of the book's lineup: http://www.sensesfive.com/2009/10/15/shadows-of-the-emerald-city-review-by-greer-woodward/

This is a great start for NF; they've already announced a second anthology with an alien invasion theme that's got me scribbling down ideas.  Hopefully they'll be producing many more books in the future.

J

I've been hankering to see Stephen Frears' new adaptation of Colette's Cheri since I peeped a still in a recent Vanity Fair.  Good luck finding it at the massive Cine-Odeo-Plexitron that dominates filmgoing out here in the burbs, though.  I don't mean to be a snob; it'd be swell if you could choose vintage Bergman or a recent Brothers Quay or Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (which I'd also like to see--I like those marching Gummi Bears) but for that kind of variety you do have to go into the city.  Do not let me get started.

So anyway...Cheri.  Of course the idiot brigade is already out in force: I saw a review just now that calls Michelle Pfeifer's character "the original cougar."  I know, I know, "cougar" is a word that now has wide cultural currency, and since Lea is an older woman hooking up with a younger man (though personally--and no disrespect to a fine actor--I would have thought Rupert a little long in the tooth for the Cheri role himself), calling her a "cougar" is an easy way to convey the essence of the story to people who are looking for date-films on Kindle.  It's like "man-cave," which now seems to be dominating the HGTV and reality-shows my wife likes.  All the men on those shows are these rather pathetic fading-jock types who keep--I swear, they actually do say things like, "But there's no room for my man-cave!" when they go looking at overpriced houses with their relentlessly annoying wives.  A "man-cave" is apparently a "guy" room where "guy" stuff is kept and enjoyed.  And what "guys" enjoy, apparently, is sports, sports memorabilia, televised sports, and sports.  Guys apparently do not read books, listen to music other than Klassik Rock and white-boy pseudo-blues, or watch movies...at least not in their man-caves, which seem to be primarily places for socializing with other men.  "Socializing" as in bitching about the wife and engaging in mock-aggressive insult-fests. 

I don't mind my fellow mens wallowing in stereotypical "guy" behavior...actually, yes I do.  It's idiotic, and I despise it with my last drop of heart's blood.  I hate "guys," I hate their whiny, spoiled wives, and I hate "man-caves."  My "man-cave" is the laptop screen or printed page I'm looking at.  It's like...you know how in Hannibal, the novel where Thomas Harris revealed his (and an entire nation's) "man-crush" (DON'T GET ME STARTED!!!) on the good Dr. Lecter, we are told Lecter had a "memory palace?"  Well, I got one too.  That's my man-cave.  So fine.  Nyah.

We were talking about Colette, right?

My first encounter with her had been in the late 80s/early 90s when the First Girlfriend and I read a few of the early Claudine novels.  I liked the writing, but they didn't make that much of an impression on me.  It wasn't for another several years that I would discover a beat-up copy of The Ripening Seed in the Mt Pleasant library.  Something about it--the intensely visual nature of the writing and the descriptions of the beach--got to me.  Not long after I found an old paperback (with an Edward Gorey cover) of The Vagabond backed w/My Mother's House and I was hooked for good. 

My favorite Colette would probably be The Cat, a short novel about a spoiled young man whose marriage to a noveau riche beauty is overturned by his rediscovery of the intense, almost-loving, just-short-of-creepy relationship he had enjoyed as a boy with the family cat.  I love Colette best when she steps away from (admittedly razor-sharp) depictions of the hypocracies and game-playing found in society living (as in Cheri, now that I think of it) towards the inner lives of her characters and their relationships with nature.  The Cat has some remarkable moments in that regard.  It would make a hell of a movie itself, come to think of it.

How about it, Mr. Frears?  Somebody?  

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Another enthusiastic review of Circlet Press' steampunk antho Like Clockwork (which coincidentally includes my story "Nightingale")!  Go to http://obsidianbookshelf.blogspot.com/2009/08/review-like-clockwork-steampunk-erotica.html.

J

My story "Chopper's Tale" (see previous post, "On Again, Oz Again") has been accepted for publication in Shadows of the Emerald City, a new anthology of original Oz tales with a horror bent.  "Chopper" retells the tale of the Tin Woodman's origins with a distinctly nasty twist.  It's my first venture into horror in far too long, and I enjoyed the heck out of it.

The book will be the first offering from Northern Frights Publishing, a new Canadian-based horror venture.  Looks like their heart is definitely in the right place, and the line-up for this book looks great.  Check out NFP's website at: http://www.northernfrightspublishing.webs.com.

J

 

I got word this morning that the Baryon Review has just published an early (and very enthusiastic) review of Circlet Press’s Like Clockwork, a new e-anthology of erotic steampunk that follows on the heels of Like a Wisp of Steam.  Read the review at:  http://thebaryonreview.blogspot.com/2009/07/like-clockwork-review.html

The book has what looks to be a swell line-up of fiction & authors, and coincidentally features my story “Nightingale.”  This is my second foray into out-and-out steampunk – actually, the first story I published with Circlet, “Day Journey, With Stories” had a definite steampunk/pseudo-Victorian feel, but it took Cecilia Tan to clue me into that fact.  Back then (all the way back in the 90s), at least as I recall , attention to the genre was still focused on the big, seminal works: Gibson & Sterling’s The Difference Engine (still a huge favorite of mine), parts of Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age and Paul Filippo’s trilogy.   These guys established the basics: an alternate nineteenth century where high technology took off early (Gibson/Sterling), or a future setting in which a Victorian-like setting spontaneously evolved or was revived (Stephenson).  Either way, they took the basics laid down by old Jules and H.G. and knocked them headlong into a whole new age.

Since then, steampunk has grown – reading the blogs & stuff now, it seems all set to be the new hot flavor in sf, especially in e-romantica.  Phaze is doing an anthology of M/M /ménage steampunk, for instance, and I doubt they’ll be alone.  Part of this is undoubtedly the hunger for new tastes and sensations in a readership grown tired of the same-old same-old, but that’s not the whole story; the sf & fantasy readership has always been  young and most of these durned kids today can’t remember the Age of Shannara, when everything seemed to be either elves-n-dwarves or military sf, so I doubt you can put it all down to jaded palates.

There’s something about Victoriana, and I think it’s primarily an aesthetic appeal – think steampunk tech, and you think old, handmade, brass and sepia and mahogany.   It’s nothing like the clean, sterile image we normally have of technology; maybe that’s somehow reassuring to us, or exciting in an odd way.  And then there’s the sartorial aspect…yeah, I’m talking about fashion, as in clothes.  The ad copy for Circlet’s steampunk anthologies makes a point of the eroticism of Victorian clothes, and by gum, it makes sense.  Remember all those “Victorian erotica” novels Grove Press published in the 80s?  Corsets and starched linen, curled hair and buttoned-up boots; turns out clothing fetishists had the right idea; a woman so ferociously coiffed and clothed, so prim…is hot.  Or maybe it’s just that after years of losing our shame about our bodies, exposed flesh is getting ho-hum.  

Even Victorian men’s fashion was cool – and keep in mind, my dog probably has better fashion- sense than I do.   But those long coats and top-hats and mutton-chops whiskers?  I’ve always found that whole look very appealing, not that I’d look particularly good in it.   

So it’s interesting stuff, this steampunk.  I’m hoping to do more of it – “Nighingale” and “An Extemporaneous Romance” Like a Wisp of Steam share a common setting: an alternate nineteenth century in which Victoria died early and technology took some unexpected turns.  Chimerae – artificially bred, intelligent life-forms that can be created to order – form an underclass of servants and sex-slaves.  I’ve got several more stories in this series in the works and – who knows?  Maybe a novel eventually.   Like old Uncle Lin Carter used to say in his anthologies, wish me luck.