gengelcox's reviews
2010 reviews

When I Was Miss Dow by Sonya Dorman

challenging medium-paced

2.0

A new wave story in which aliens take on the forms of humans. The protagonist loses her—him—itself in the process, becoming connected with the scientist it works with. There’s lots of metaphor and analogy going on here, like any good New Wave story, but I’m old school and while I appreciate the style and the idea, the execution didn’t excite me much. 

Slow Tuesday Night by R.A. Lafferty

adventurous funny lighthearted fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

I usually don’t understand Lafferty stories. But not this one. It’s absurb, but absurb with a point. If the pace of progress increases, then, Lafferty says, eventually it will be so fast that someone could make and lose a fortune multiple times a night. While this is not a realistic story by any account, it’s amusing for what Lafferty points out as the preoccupations of humans freed from the constraints of time. 

Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand by Vonda N. McIntyre, Vonda N. McIntyre

challenging hopeful sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A

5.0

We talk a lot in SF about worldbuilding, the creation of a unique setting for a book that is different from the world we live in. Of course, there’s always some connection to our world, for it would be impossible to understand a world that was completely new, but good worldbuilding is about changing enough for us to find a new way to examine our own thoughts and beliefs. This story by McIntyre does that splendidly and does it by showing you the world, never telling you. When writing teachers advise students to “show, don’t tell,” they should use this story as an example. Snake, the protagonist, is a healer, but of a different group than the family and sick child, and that means they struggle to understand even though they’ve asked for her help. Highly recommended. 

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos

funny lighthearted fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

 

The book came first, and then the play featuring Carol Channing as Lorelei, and then the movie starring Marilyn Monroe, and those things created the earworm “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.” But the book established all that, and while it may not have the same qualities as a song, it has plenty of charm. Written as if entries into a diary, it’s all told in Lorelei’s breathless prose, which often runs on for longer than it should, complete with misspellings and repetitions that makes it seems she’s talking directly to you. You quickly discover that Lorelei isn’t as naîve as she portrays herself, but it’s her friend Dorothy who steals the show with her one liners rendered faithfully by her friend. 

 

This is comedy in the style of P.G. Wodehouse or Thorne Smith, although favoring the latter in its playful sexual implications. (Wodehouse’s characters aren’t sexless, but sex is only a way to differentiate the characters rather than imply any kind of bedroom sport.) Lorelei and Dorothy, sometimes in their “negligays,” are much more up front with their gentlemen, although Lorelei only describes talking late into the night rather than anything more amorous. But they are somehow able to wheedle dinners, shows, nightclubs, and gifts of all kinds from their admirers. From New York to London to Paris to Vienna and back, the two girls live a life of Riley on their ability to be “charmant,” as the French say. Along the way, many “instants” happen to keep you smiling. 

 

There’s something revealed in the book about Lorelei’s past that presages the story of the musical Chicago, in about the same manner when she describes her experience in the courtroom. And the ending is kind of a surprise but flows naturally (I won’t spoil it) from what went before. I’d hesitate to call this great literature, but it was more than a pleasant diversion and really shows Loos’ ability to construct comic scenes. 

Yours Truly, Jack The Ripper by Robert Bloch

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

A classic twist on the idea of Jack the Ripper, excellently written by a master of both horror and the twist story.  Basically, the protagonist John Carmody is a psychiatrist who is approached by a British man who swears he’s figured out the reason why Jack did his killings and believes that it’s been to prolong his life and that he is still killing. By his calculation, the next will be in this town in two days. And the story proceeds from there. 

The Green Hills of Earth by Robert A. Heinlein

hopeful informative medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0

***** "It's Great to Be Back!" • [Future History] • (1947) • short story 

** The Green Hills of Earth • [Future History] • (1947) • short story 

** Logic of Empire • [Future History] • (1941) • novella 

*** We Also Walk Dogs • [Future History] • (1941) • novelette (variant of "—We Also Walk Dogs") [as by Anson MacDonald] 

*** The Black Pits of Luna • juvenile • [Future History] • (1948) • short story 

**** Delilah and the Space-Rigger • [Future History] • (1949) • short story 

** Gentlemen, Be Seated! • [Future History] • (1948) • short story 

**** The Long Watch • [Future History] • (1949) • short story 

*** Ordeal in Space • [Future History] • (1948) • short story 

*** Space Jockey • [Future History] • (1947) • short story 

 

"It's Great to be Back!" — First published in 1947, while the technology depicted here is outdated or simply wrong, the psychology is perfect. After three years on the moon, Allen and Jo are happy to get back to Earth, where they can see blue skies and walk on grass and feel the rain on their faces. But three years can change people and a place, and that’s really the point of this story, although Heinlein was good about trying to capture the details of what a moon colony might resemble. It could have been titled “You Can’t Go Home Again,” but Thomas Wolfe had already grabbed that one in 1940. Recommended. 

 

"The Green Hills of Earth" — There’s not really a lot of plot to this story; instead, this is as sentimental as anything Heinlein would write. It celebrates the kind of perfect Heinlein character, a man who is both expert and rough, who doesn’t suffer fools but is willing to give up his life to meet the needs of an emergency. It’s Heinlein trying to make a mythology about space, and succeeding to some extent. I’m too cynical now to enjoy it, too critical. For me, this story doesn’t reveal so much about the future, but about Heinlein’s need to make a hero of the man in the trench, and perhaps that’s because that’s who he assumed as his audience. 

 

“Logic of Empire,” Robert A. Heinlein — I’m sure I had read this story before—I pretty much binged on Heinlein when I discovered him as a teenager—but I didn’t recall any of it as I re-read it recently. That’s probably for the best, as it definitely is not one of his better stories. In fact, the logic proposed here is pretty insidious, if I’m reading this right, in that Heinlein’s saying that slavery—or indentured servitude that for all it is based on economics is basically slavery—is a normal result of exploration and colonization. Given the recent furor over John W. Campbell’s beliefs about the same, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that this was a story that he bought and published first in Astounding. Outside of the questionable logic, the plot and adventure of the story works to some extent, as the main character ends up exploring the nature of that indentured servitude by entering into it himself. Not recommended. 

 

“—We Also Walk Dogs” — The company is called General Services and that’s what they do, anything for anyone as long as its legal (and then, as one character says, that’s a matter of interpretation). Heinlein foresaw Amazon before it existed, although even Amazon doesn’t quite match the concierge options provide by General Services. The plot isn’t really that exciting: once Heinlein establishes what the company does, a government official comes to ask for the seemingly impossible, which of course the company is able to provide. What element of interest in all of this boils down to a piece of art that both the purchasers and the acquirers find stunning, and thereby give them an appreciation of each other. All in all, though, that’s pretty small stakes, and with all the characters seemingly like each other already, hardly a shift that is noticeable.  Pass. 

 

"The Black Pits of Luna" — A decent story from the point of view of a young boy on a trip to the moon where his little brother gets lost while on a surface tour. What made this story good at the time was how Heinlein could portray the elements of the science (trips around the moon, the weightlessness, etc.) and combine them with the mundane (kid brothers, mother and father unable to handle their children, etc.). It’s kind of like how Stephen King can ground you in the details of his everyday characters before hitting you with the otherworldly. That said, I’m not sure this story has much more than that going for it now. 

 

"Delilah and the Space-Rigger" — First off, you have to know this was published in 1949. When you realize that, you start to understand just how ahead of its time it was. This is basically a case for non-gender discrimination. The way it’s told is somewhat awkward, but that was the style of the time. The basic story principle is sound; the protagonist has had to deal with all the kind of trouble that comes up in construction sites—booze, gambling—and then thinks he’s got the worst trouble imaginable, a woman in a group of all men. What Heinlein does is show that the individual, the woman, is competent, knows how to handle the situation (in a true Ginger Rogers fashion of having to be even better), and the problem gets resolved through a community response. I was just reading Dan’l Danehy-Oakes comment on a new study of Heinlein that pointed out his viewpoint characters are often sidekicks rather than the main protagonists, and that’s the case here. The protagonist is the construction foreman, Tiny, but the point-of-view of the story is from his number one man, Dad. By doing it this way, Heinlein doesn’t have to tell you the thought processes of the protagonist (or the antagonist), but show them by relaying what Dad hears and sees. It’s a good trick, and one I’ll need to remember. 

 

“Gentlemen, Be Seated!” — A cute tale about how to use your tail in a bind. Accident happens while in a tube on the moon and the three protagonists have to solve the problem of losing their air, including a fairly large hole. The plot and engineering is fine enough, and Heinlein had an understanding of the working man (it’s all men in this story), but for all of that, this story feels slight and less insightful than some of his other moon stories written around this time. 

 

"The Long Watch" — Heinlein was very concerned about the potential of an atomic war. Given his understanding of that, he wrote a number of stories that tried to convey the absolute pointlessness of pre-emptive strikes and other crazy ideas that ran through the political mindsets of the 1950s. And, in the end, he believed he failed—that nothing he had written had quite captured the minds or opinions of those in charge of the launch commands. I’m not sure what he attributed our ability not to blow ourselves up, as a human race, but I doubt he would have put it under our intelligence. This is a story of a single man who decided to avert the use of those weapons. It’s dated now, but there’s still a power to it, akin to Kim Stanley Robinson’s “The Lucky Strike,” in that the decision has to be made by an individual who realizes that if he doesn’t do this alone, something much worse will occur, even suspecting that making that decision spells doom for the individual even if it saves many more people. That kind of heroism is hard to come by, which may be why it’s often in stories. 

 

“Space Jockey” — It’s got a great first line, which was really futuristic for its time, but works even today: “Just as they were leaving the telephone called his name.” The story hinges on the costs of space travel, which Heinlein explains to the reader by using an Earthbound analogy of using only one type of vehicle to transport goods rather than the combinations of “a ferry boat, a subway train, and an express elevator.” Heinlein also set his space force in Colorado Springs, as a military man, but uses a ramp created on the slope of Pikes Peak to launch his rockets into space, something I don’t ever see happening for many reasons. A lot of the story is mechanics, which Heinlein excelled at, making space travel seem believable to his 1950s audience. The plot, as it is, concerns what happens when a cockpit tour goes wrong and a reckless boy hits the jets midflight, wasting fuel and resetting the careful course calculations. But the point of the tale is to glorify pilots, in Heinlein’s case, rugged individuals who take on the difficult task of guiding spaceships. Oh, there’s computers, and autopilots, but it comes down to the skills of one man. (And, in a subplot, the wife back home supporting him, in the gendered roles Heinlein was known for, reflecting the 1950s.) Interesting for the details; cringe for the role stereotypes. 

Snow, Glass, Apples Chapbook by Julie Dillon, Neil Gaiman

4.0

This is similar to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked in its ability to reframe a couple of well-known fairy tales so that the reader discovers that history is written by the winner.

Proof by Induction by José Pablo Iriarte

challenging medium-paced

3.5

For me, the math in this story got in the way, but that’s likely because I’m not a math person. The idea of a static copy of someone’s brain could still “think” and provide input is unique, though, and Iriarte compounds that with a father-son relationship that’s strained to provide an emotional context to the story. I think there’s more to the idea of induction, which is never defined in the story, per se, but is alluded to in the idea at the end that if the son inherited math skills from the father, than his daughter likely inherited those same skills, but the flip side of that would be to imply that the son would be as bad a father as the father and that’s not the case, as the son is able to learn from the mistakes he perceived in his father.  

For Lack of a Bed by John Wiswell

lighthearted

3.0

A cozy fantasy about friendship and hardship, in equal parts, with a bit of drama around a succubus-turned-sofa. Reminded me a bit of something Nina Kiriki Hoffman might have written. Somewhat amusing and definitely heartfelt, but overall I missed something from this: more tension, more stakes, I don’t know.  

Dinosaurs by Walter Jon Williams

5.0

A wonderful depiction of what humans could become in the far, far future. So far in the future the aliens seem more human than the human diplomat arrived at the alien planet to discuss a peace treaty. This story is a perfect example of what science fiction does best: questioning human motivations in the present by imagining a future possibility. Highest recommendation.