Steel's "On the Salt Road"

Fair to say, Flora Annie Steel's short story "On the Old Salt Road" both surprised me and creeped me out. I've read a fair bit of Steel's work now and this wasn't like any of it. For one thing, it's a ghost story, which is not her usual fare but not that strange for the time. It even has the typical framing device of the main story being told to a group of people round the fire after dinner, one of whom writes the story we're reading. It's the story of the Major, from when he was a young officer in the Raj who had just buried his wife and child. Without telling you too much of the story, he falls into a suicidal depression and heads off on a "holiday" on an old salt road to do the deed. Salt roads were set up along trade routes and patrolled regularly to prevent smuggling, but had been abandoned by the time of the story. Some civil officers used them though when on tour. 

The ghostly experiences come upon the young man as if they were real, at no point does he think they're ghosts until a late discovery reveals the infant girl died years before. The bizarre part is when one of the figures in the vision is discovered to still be alive, but had herself recently felt like she was reliving the experience recently. Of course, the experience stops the officer's plan, so he can live to be the senior officer telling the story.

After one of the most awkward opening paragraphs I can think of, Steel produces one of her best stories. Once the Major starts his tale he manages to absorb you, so even though it's a long setup you feel for him. It helps that he is looking back with the wisdom of age, so the desperate feelings he was experiencing at the time are muted and left for the reader to imagine. 

The central "weird" moment is done brilliantly and evokes a mixture of fear and sorrow. This is not a scary ghost, but a tragic story playing out again. 

The main defects with the story, aside from that opening paragraph, are the infant girl's speech and the brief moment with the officer's servant. Steel has been criticised for her babyish children and this one is a classic example with her "Dot's un away" and "wants to make puff-puff-boom". Dot is also described in the most angelic terms as is Steel's want. It was a trend of the period but it doesn't help. The servant is thankfully mostly absent, he's only really included because to leave him out would not be realistic. So, the racist condescension he is shown by the Major, even in retrospect with the "wisdom"  of experience, also fits that realism. It's disgusting and stupid as always, but accurate and mercifully brief. 

Van Vogt's Supermind, or, It's Funny How Things Go

I don’t remember when I did it, but at some point in my childhood I gave Dad a book by A.E. van Vogt with a fuzzy green shape on the cover. For years I thought it was called The Green Brain and I carried an inexplicable pride in having given it to him. Mum had probably chosen it and she definitely paid for it, but it was my gift to Dad. He had five van Vogt novels, including that one, and somehow that name became a magnet to me so that when I had disposable income and easy access to second-hand bookstores I began building up my collection of his works. I’ve probably read more books by him than any other SF author, possibly any author, even P.K. Dick who I consider my favourite. Until last week, however, I hadn’t read The Green Brain.

Actually, I still haven’t since there is no A.E. van Vogt novel of that name. The real title is Supermind and it explores a galaxy where humans are a low-level species under the protection of the vastly superior Great Galactics, and under threat from the Dreeghs, a race of “space vampires” who can only survive a mysterious illness by draining the blood and life energy of others.

In typical van Vogt fashion the novel is a “fix-up” where he patched three shorter works together into one. The seams are distinct but he “fixed” it so they seem like logical progressions of one narrative. It would be interesting to read the originals to see how much he had to fix/change. There are some clashes, the first and third parts feature the Great Galactics while the second part declares that they don’t exist per se but are a freaks of the moment, but there are ways to forgive that and move on with the story.

I’d be overstating it if I called van Vogt a great writer, but he never fails to draw me in. The stories are simple, the characters forever trapped in the 1950s despite their futuristic settings, and the ideas can be a tad whacky, but he pulls them all together into a readable and fun package.

I doubt my dad, who loves the hard SF of Asimov and Clarke, was that into it – he did just give me all five of his van Vogt books – but somehow, this book, or its cover, combined with the childish joy of having given it to him myself, led me to read many books by someone I may not otherwise have read at all. Then I would never have travelled on the Space Beagle, visited the Weapon Shops, or marvelled at the many possibilities of the Reflected Men. And if I hadn’t read those books, what other authors might I have not read? Somewhere out there is a reflected version of me who never read any SF, and that is not the best possible me, of that I am sure.

Keep dreaming!

The Star of Fortune, Vol. 1 of 2: A Story of the Indian Mutiny

The Star of Fortune, Vol. 1 of 2: A Story of the Indian Mutiny by J.E. Preston Muddock

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This volume is the setup. The Romeo and Juliet romance that leads the lovers to be in India, the third wheel to try to steal Juliet. And a growing undercurrent of the coming uprising which will start in the second volume.

It's interesting from an historical point of view; in terms of late Victorian attitudes not the conflict in India in 1857. The story is weak however and overdrawn. It came out at the very death of the three-volume novel, and is only two volumes I know, but it bears the marks of a writer padding out a threadbare device to fill almost 300 pages.

I'll see how the second volume goes, it should at least have more action, if be even more bigoted and racist. It's hard to figure sometimes how they bought their own bs at times.



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The Scholar who came to Hobart

Why did Facebook suggest that page to me? If it hadn't I would never have known, never have seen ... it is useless to conjecture. I can only assume it was an algorithm and the rest was happen-chance. I mean, to suggest that some eldritch force was in play luring me to that place ... well that'd be crazy. You'd almost think ... I was using too many ellipses.

Fate-driven or otherwise it made the suggestion and, against my usual habit of not even noticing, I clicked the link. It was a bookstore, how could I ignore it? There on the page was the picture of a man. I could not see his face, it was hidden beneath a blue knitted mask covered with tentacles. Mad? ... I leave that to the ellipses to decide ... The man spoke of a gathering. An eminent scholar was coming to our city. I had heard of this gentlemen and read some of the Unutterable Horror he wrote. Why would someone so steeped in obscure lore come to our quiet city in the south? I had to know.

The gathering took place as the sun sunk beneath the mountain. Hobart plunged into twilight. I found the appointed place tucked away behind a church. Irony? I know not. It was a small room crowded with chairs. Books on child rearing were cornered one side. The man from the bookstore page was on the other, selling tomes of lore scribed by the visiting scholar or the madmen he studied. A dark-haired woman sold concoctions and brews to unwary patrons. Some were red, others white, still more came in cans. I knew only that drinking too much of any one of those elixirs would drive me wild. I'd probably end up laughing hideously in a corner.

The crowd that gathered was an odd mixture. Some older folk were there who could be termed "eccentric" by the undiscerning mind. Others wore flannelette shirts ... I feared these the most. A writer spoke first, he called himself Stephen Dillon, it is a name that irks me. I have seen it, I know I have seen it, but I cannot think why. He spoke of how he became involved with the tentacle-bringing prophet H.P. Lovecraft. The Call of Cthulu had reached him in a games shop in England in the 1980s. From there madness crept in. Now he writes tales of horror and insanity.

Next came a local man - one of the flannelette shirt wearers ... Andrew Harper his name was. He recalled a cartoon - one of which I was familiar - and told of an episode featuring Cathulu. He claimed the error in the name was because of a subeditor ... I was a subeditor. I also knew others, I let the insult pass. He spoke too of the past haunting the culture of the present. He spoke loudly. He ... gesticulated. He inspired ellipses ... He said the best Lovecraft was the Lovecraft that didn't try to be Lovecraft. And through the insanity that is context, that made sense to everyone present.

After a short interlude designed for patrons to imbibe the lady's brews or purchase the tomes of lore came the main act. The reason we were all there, the scholar took to the lectern. S.T. Joshi. There, I said it, that is his name. Be warned. He spoke of the tentacle-bringing prophet and his relationships with women. There weren't many so he could give a full history. His manner was friendly, his tone convivial. I tried not to be lured in, but found myself warming to his charm. I listened attentively as he shared his incredible knowledge about someone who, even as his tentacled creation grows famous in popular culture, remains largely obscure beyond the readers of horror and weird fiction.

The night finished with a "panel", where questions were put to the three speakers. They shared more information, joked, laughed and generally made for an interesting time. When that concluded I took out my copy of Joshi's Unutterable Horror to question his sense in publishing this madness. He smiled as I handed it to him and asked me if I wanted it personalised. His charm was too much. I said yes, told him my name. I confessed I had cited the work in my Masters thesis. He said that was interesting. Handed me back the book. I thanked him.

Next thing I knew I was outside, walking down near-abandoned streets in the middle of Hobart. It was after 9pm. If I went back, would that chamber be there ... I can't bring myself to look. Have I really used too many ellipses? Is that even ...

Keep dreaming!

The Broken Road by A.E.W. Mason - A Review

The Broken Road by A.E.W. Mason

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The Broken Road was sold to me as adventure fiction, but I’m not sure that’s a comfortable label for it to carry. It certainly bears a romantic air that fits the name, and there are moments which are ‘adventurous’, for lack of a better word, but overall there is no single adventure running through it. The hero, if he is one, does very little, while the villain is closer to an antihero in many respects, and is arguably the most sympathetic character for at least a portion of the book. Neither of them ‘get the girl’, who is clearly better off without them, and vice versa – although the ‘villain’ is ruined in figuring that out. Besides a somewhat illusory kidnap attempt, there is very little danger encountered and almost no hardships endured besides the psychological ones suffered by the erstwhile villain.

It starts well enough as an adventure, there’s a siege and a tough-as-nuts hero, but he dies of overexertion and the siege ends, and it’s all a prologue anyway. There’s the expected siege towards the end of the book, but it never happens, and the characters involved are asides, included more for completeness in the narrative than anything else. The war, such as it is, and the hunt for a fugitive across a remote alien land, are dealt with in summation, the latter in a portion of dialogue years after the event. The book is not about adventurous undertakings.

Instead, The Broken Road, is a novel about two young men filled with ideals, who learn through bitter experience that the world simply does not work the way they dreamed. That the main character, in terms of taking up most of the stage, is an Indian prince sent away to England to learn at Eton, gives the novel its central position as a colonial fiction. It is he who, if this were an adventure novel, would be the villain, and he is described as becoming one as events progress, but he is more pathetic in the end than villainous. A mere cog in the wheels of other people’s plans.
It is his progression from proud Oxford graduate who sees himself as White and better than his own people, to religious fanatic avowed to drive the English out of Chiltistan, his fictional home province, and ultimately to sorry drunk removed from any sense of home or identity he once had, that is the centre of the work.

There is much that can be made and said of the book in terms of colonialism and race, but the largely metaphorical nature of the three central characters and the Road itself means there’s no chance of applying a definitive reading on the book – thank goodness. It can be read as sympathetic to subject nations, or not. For my part, it seemed somewhere in the middle. That the British had a position of cultural superiority is not questioned, but that they should therefore force their will upon their supposed subjects – to ‘better’ them – is shown to be ill-fated at best.

Overall, despite some apparent sympathy for the ‘villain’, the sense of English superiority is too strong, and its surrounding narrative too weak, for this to escape the gravity of being ‘colonial’. That said, it is a fascinating read, with strong characters that can give much thought to an open-minded reader.




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The Merry Men and Other Stories by R. L. Stevenson - a brief review

The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


The stories in this collection are linked by being largely moral in nature. The Merry Men focuses on guilt, conscience and payment for sins; Markheim follows a similar line with a supernatural interference; Thrawn Janet is an episode of a priest and a possessed woman; Will O' the Mill is a contemplation on whether it is better to experience all the world or live a simple life; Olalla is a bizarre story of a fallen and ruined family and choosing to sacrifice personal happiness to prevent future evil; finally The Treasure of Franchard highlights the importance of family, simple things and the evils of money, at least too much of it in the wrong hands.

Despite that, none of them beat the reader over the head with didactic ramblings, and each story has a charm and character of its own to keep the reader intrigued. Olalla ends disappointingly to mine, but the hook of the secret was only just strong enough to keep me going with it anyway. The descriptions in The Merry Men, of the raging sea and the desolate land, are beautifully rendered in true Stevenson style.

In all, this is a pleasant and enjoyable collection, but not one of much mark.



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A Concise Review of a Concise History of India by Francis Watson

India: A Concise History by Francis Watson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book tackles its immense task admirably and gives a good overview of the historical movements, and some of the key figures within that. It, naturally enough, gets a bit clogged in names and places and events that it can't possibly spell out clearly, and could probably have profited by a few more maps to clarify. Nevertheless, given its scope it's an amazing achievement, that also highlights the importance of India in broader world history.



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Dinosaurs, telekinetic teens and horned youths

A couple of decades and four sequels late, I finally watched Jurassic Park the other day. I don't know why it took me quite that long but it did. Aside from being a bit dated, and screaming 'Spielberg directed this' from the first sequence (not in itself a bad thing), it was a good movie. I can imagine seeing it in the cinema in its day would have provoked the desired shrieks and gasps. I played the Lego game of the first four movies last year, so a few spoilers, but with some obvious gaps in my understanding.

What I found myself thinking about after watching it was the characters and how they might have been in the novel. One of the few things I know about Michael Crichton as a writer is that several of his books have ended up as movies, which he also writes the screenplays for. For some reason I cannot explain, that put me off reading anything he wrote. Some irrational bias I had I guess, tall poppy maybe. But from the movie I sensed a lot of depth to the characters which could only be achieved to a degree on the screen, which means in the book these scientists and moguls are much more detailed. I found myself wondering if the abortive love triangle is somewhat more considered, if ultimately as unsuccessful on the third spoke's part.

This led me on a dinosaur train (not the Henson Company variety), to Stephen King. Growing up a somewhat squeamish child of the 1980s the name Stephen King meant movies I didn't want to watch even if most of my friends kept telling me they weren't scary. As such, I had another of my irrational biases not to read anything he wrote. When I got married I found that my wife had a King section in her library, so during a test match I decided I should finally read one of his books. Carrie was thin so I went with that.

There is no way I will watch a movie of that book, I've seen pictures and know the idea, I wouldn't enjoy it. Nor do I feel it would do justice to what was an amazing book. I had heard that the schlock movies of his work were poor reflections of his skill, now I know it. Carrie is a harrowing tale, which manages to create tension and character in an economical way. I could empathise with Carrie, even when she was lost in her own destruction and rage.

A final stop on the train is Horns. I saw the movie starring Daniel Radcliffe a few years ago, and I highly recommend it for its dark humour and subtle humanity. It too is based on a novel, this one by Joe Hill. After watching the movie I decided the novel is probably very good, I predict Hill is witty, with good sense of character and mood. I guess in this case a good movie has recommended a writer to me, instead of bad movies turning me off one. My own maturity levels probably have something to do with it too.

Does this mean the book is better than the movie? No. They're distinct works, whether one is 'based' on the other or not. Saying the book is better is as good as saying apples are better than carrots. You may prefer one, but you can't judge them in the same way, they're completely different. That's why I can enjoy Wells' The Time Machine and still enjoy the 2001 film with Guy Pearce. It's its own work, an adaptation, not a translation. Try to remember that when watching different versions of things, they're different stories even if they're directly based on each other.

Keep dreaming!

The Way to Ascend

Today one of the Squid's old friends came by. He's a part-time archaeology teacher with a fedora and a bullwhip, you know the type. Nice abs. He taught me that X never marks the spot, but sometimes the Roman numeral for 10 may, but only in medieval European libraries.

Anyway, he told me he'd seen signs indicating there was a way to ascend buried in my backyard. Not one to scoff at the ideas of a friend of the Squid I joined him on an expedition. He told me he knew the best digging team in Cairo - of course, in Hobart that's not much use, so he let me do the digging.

Some blackberries had to die, but that had to happen anyway so it was a gain really. And after what felt like hours, but was probably less than one, it lay bare before us. The surface was still covered in dirt so we couldn't make out any secret markings if there were any, but the structure was plain, and from where I was standing there could be no doubt about, we had excavated a true way to ascend.

We did so. It was amazing, the view is slightly different from up there. Tragically, our mode of ascension had ceased to be so, and served only to take us lower. The Squid's friend said that was often the way with such artefacts, then he noticed the sun was setting, jumped on a horse and rode off, leaving me with so many questions, and these ...

A Sentimental Mug

I get sentimental about the most random objects. Recently, a mug got a crack in it, coffee leaking slowly out through the whole height of it. I liked that mug. It was a good size for a coffee, and a red colour that wasn’t too bold or too pink. It was a Kris Kringle present from years ago, the job before my last one. It came filled with Lindt chocolate balls. I used it at work for a bit then took it home where it became my main coffee mug after the tragic death of the blue funny face mug I’d bought to match my green funny faced tea mug.

Writing this I realise it’s mugs that seem to interest me, but I can’t say why. Right now on my desk are two mugs, both had coffee in them, I’m a slacker and forgot the first one. It’s a white one with the words ‘I’m silently correcting your grammar’. My niece gave it to me a few years ago, and everyone seems to find it most apt. I do do it silently. The other is a Star Wars mug with pretend posters based on The Force Awakens. It was from my wife and son.

Who’d have thought inexpensive mugs would make such treasured gifts? They’re impermanent, as the puddles of coffee under my red mug prove, but they last years, and with every sip there's a reminder that for a moment in some chain store someone thought of you.

Sentimentality is seen as a weakness at times. Certainly, if I actually cried over the mug there’d be reason to question things. But, if it is a matter of association and remembrance, perhaps it’s good to be sentimental, even over inconsequential things like coffee mugs.

Don’t get me started on teacups.

Keep dreaming.

Farewell Brian Aldiss, RIP

It is with a heavy heart that I bid farewell to Brian W Aldiss, a stalwart writer and scholar who passed away on the weekend aged 92.

I think the first book of his that I read was Billion Year  Spree, his history of science fiction. It's a fascinating read and influenced me greatly. I was doing my Honours at the time and his definition of science fiction, particularly that it is set in the Gothic or post-Gothic mould, shaped my thinking at the time and infiltrated my whole thesis, even if it was off topic. My ideas on genre have shifted in the last couple of years, and I do not hold so closely to Aldiss' own, but they're still influential, and I wouldn't be where I am without them.

I haven't read his most famous fictional works, the Supertoys stories that Spielberg's movie AI was based on, or the Helliconia series, but I have read a couple of others. The first was Frankenstein Unbound. It took me a bit to accept what was going on and for a while I probably would have said it wasn't that good. But, it stayed with me, I read it almost two decades ago but have clear memories of scenes within it. It wasn't what I expected, but it was good enough to get past my initial reaction and hook me.

Sadly, my memory of Moreau's Other Island is vague and of disappointment. The other book of Aldiss' that I've read is Nathaniel and Other Stories, an anthology of his early short stories. Off the top of my head I can only recall one. It was about a sentient bomb, sent across space. There was an alien world at war with Earth, and they sent a series of such bombs at a speed sufficiently faster than that of light to arrive on Earth before humans evolved, thus preventing their enemy from ever existing. Only, it turned out humans worked it out and the bomb wiped out its originating planet instead. That was just the meat of the story, the real flavour came from the bomb itself, its excitement and relief that its journey was coming to an end, its sense of purpose. And then it finds it's been tricked, and its whole reason for being flipped on its head. I'm not surprised it stays with me.

So Mr Aldiss, I say farewell and thank you. Stories and ideas are the most precious of gifts, and yours have proven very valuable already, and I can truly say they have changed my life. The good news is, though you may no longer be with us, your gifts are and there are more treasures for us all to unearth.

Keep dreaming my friends.

A Literary Ramble on Literature

In preparation for the next semester (or trimester as DU calls them), I read two introductions to books introducing the various voices within literary theory, both of which asked that essential question, what is literature? Of course, the answer is vague, partly because it's a debatable point and partly because they were introductions and they can't give it all away. But it made me think about what literature is or has been to me, which is something I probably should think about if I'm studying Literature.

The first thought I have is remembering the many times I rearranged my books in my teens. It was something I did at least once a year I think. I would take every book off the shelf and put them into piles according to how I wanted to organise them, then work out the best way to arrange them all on the shelves. I could make a joke here about how much of a nerd I was/am, but, as I think about it, I'm not going to wear that label over this - I love books, I always have and always will, that doesn't mean I have to wear some societal label.

I digress, the point is, and there is one, I typically sorted them back into 'genre'. Fantasy always had the largest piles, with science fiction next and horror a small pile that grew steadily, especially if you include the Gothic Romances. There were plenty of problems and 'ums' and 'errs' deciding which pile to put some books on. Star Wars novels got their own pile and took up a shelf of their own, so that avoided that one, but other books raised questions - which could be the origins of my thesis, but that's a topic for another blog. The point, is where Literature stood, and in terms of sorting - and cataloging - my books it meant, books that don't fit any genre I'm aware of. Mostly it contained books I'd read for English at school like Dickens' Oliver Twist.

Later, when I was doing some post-grad study in writing, I was talking to someone who'd finished her Masters at the same uni, and I mentioned I had contemplated doing the Novel Writing Workshop. She asked what my novel would be about and as soon as I described some vague notion I had she replied 'There's a Genre Writing Workshop too'. I was floored, poor naive fool that I was, it had not occurred to me that a fantasy novel was not really a novel, but a piece of genre fiction. To her defence, she meant no offence and didn't intend any disdain towards genre, and I wasn't put off by her attitude, merely that the distinction between 'literature' and 'genre fiction' was so well established as to be taken as part of the structure of writing and teaching writing.

These days I'm aware of the existence of such distinctions to some people, and of the mirrored snobbery within genre fiction itself, however it is eroding I'm happy to say. Which leaves the question - what is literature to me now? And the answer is ... I'm not entirely sure. In the end, I think it's any creative work which uses language and is approached by a reader as such - that is a creative work using words. So, a play is literature when approached as a script for reading and digesting, and a performance text when approached for mounting a production. A performed play is literature when approached by a reader/audience member from the point of view of the words being uttered and the context they are in (so scene/characterisation etc is part of it not just the words). So literature, I realise as I write this, is a relationship between the reader/watcher and the text.

That was a journey for me, I didn't expect that outcome. I hope, if you've stuck with it this long, that your relationship with this text has been enjoyable.

Keep dreaming!

Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I just spent the better part of two days reading this so I figure I should write something about it. I'd like to say I did that because it captured me completely, but the truth is I powered through it because of an assignment and because I'm not at work this week. Not that it didn't capture me and I'm glad I read it in such a consolidated period.

It's a very well written and quite sumptuous story cycle, the interconnections are laced through ever-so neatly down to a pair of pants I presume one character bought second-hand after another had given them to charity. Numerous lives are wound as threads through this tapestry, covering a good fifty or so years. It could be argued the last story ties up too many of those threads, but the resolution is still ambiguous and the way the characters come together is not convenient plot wrangling like a melodrama but a clever device, itself a metaphor for the interconnections and networks we create every day on social media.

I would have liked a little more playing with modality, not just the PowerPoint presentation and the blog-style interview piece. And it might have been nice if there were fewer doomed relationships and drug-ruined lives. Somehow the whole cycle became quite morose despite its more optimistic ending (in a ruined world where everything is still ruined). But that's part of the point too. The characters are cogs as much as individuals and the machine wears them out eventually.

Of course, as is plain in the book, the titular Goon Squad is time itself and its relentless march. Perhaps that makes the moroseness of the overall cycle inevitable too. But there are the pauses, the moments within the song that is an individual's life that we can grab, and there's always a chance for repeat refrain before the end.



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Keep Dreaming!

The Invisible Author - An Overblown and Somewhat Pompous Rant

I had some time to kill while near my local bookshop, so, like any sane person, I went in. I wasn't after anything but thought I'd see what H.G Wells they had. I didn't expect much, just the latest Penguin or Wordsworth edition of The Time Machine or The War of the Worlds tucked away in the Classics section, but there was always a chance of The Country of the Blind and Other Stories, which I'm considering buying in physical form. There was no trace of any mention of his name whatsoever. It had never occurred to me that there would be a bookshop without at least one title of his in stock.

This disappointment I could have borne if not for the second shock I received today. I went to the local library to pick up some reserved items, including two books on Mr Wells' life and work. The librarian, as she waited for the computer to catch up, looked over the covers then asked, in all seriousness, 'Who's he?' She had to repeat the question, I couldn't comprehend it. Who is H.G. Wells? You work among books every day and you ask who H.G. Wells is? I mentioned The Time Machine and got an 'Oh' of recognition, but nothing could erase the horror I felt inside.

I console myself that I now have the two books I sought, and, as a bonus, I picked up Terry Pratchett's The Illustrated Eric, (illustrated by Josh Kirby of course) in a good quality ex-libris hardcover for 20c.

On a side note, this year I'll be writing a thesis on H.G. Wells.

Thanks for letting me share my overreaction, I'll let you decide how far my tongue is planted in my cheek.

Keep dreaming!

In Memory of a Princess

I was four when Return of the Jedi came out. I don't remember seeing it, but I do remember Dad giving me a book with pictures of the characters in it. I remember being jealous of a kid with toy lightsaber I saw at Jenolan Caves. And I remember my Star Wars toys. I'd get some every birthday and Christmas for years. I still have them - to be honest I now have more than I did as a kid.

At the heart of all that was Princess Leia, a strong woman, born leader, attitude to spare and incredibly loving and compassionate. She'd get her hands dirty, take charge when needed, lend an ear. She was everything anyone could want to be.

Carrie Fisher brought Leia to life. Not just by playing the role, but in the script too. I recently saw a page of the screenplay for The Empire Strikes Back with handwritten edits she made. The scene is vivid in my mind and it's her edits that make it memorable. And that's the thing, Carrie Fisher was so much more than a fictional princess.

She was strong - she overcame addiction, lived with mental illness, and faced those things publicly with grace and humour. A lot of humour. It is perhaps more her wit and her writing skill that she should be remembered for, than a role she fell into so long ago. But she made that role her own, and made Leia such an icon, that she will always be associated with and as her.

I met her for but a moment as she signed a picture for me, and in those moments she made me feel that she was not above me, there was no ego, just a woman having a good weekend in Sydney and meeting fans. I described that meeting at the time, so I won't go on about it. But it confirmed to me the talk that she was an amazing and kind person.

The news of her death was the first thing I saw this morning when I looked at my phone over breakfast. Since then I have been forlorn and struggling to get going. I cannot mourn Princess/General Leia, she's not dead and will be on the screen again in a year. At the same time, the woman who breathed life into her is. The reverse of Han Solo in the trippy world of cinema. And a great writer, and wonderful woman who was a powerful and honest role model and advocate, has died. But I know one thing - she would not want someone who barely knew her to be sitting about moping over her death. She might well, and probably would, understand why I grieve, but she would not want that to hold me back. She fought, even in her last days she fought, and she created. She achieved through perseverance and determination and not giving in to dark thoughts and maudlin feelings.

So I won't either. Let's all honour the real life woman behind the icon and not give in to the darkness. Let's stand up, speak up, and make art.

Keep dreaming

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close - A Micro Review

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I can see why this book is divisive in the reviews. It's well written, but it's over the top. If it was just Oskar, it'd be okay I think, not great cause he's a pain a lot of the time, but better. It's the grandparents and their storylines that sink it for me. Thomas was interesting for a chapter, but I couldn't take him as a sustained character, and Grandma just needed to - I don't know what but ugh.

The idea is great, the people left behind dealing with the spaces in the landscapes of their lives. And there's some powerful writing in there. But overall, the characters and the total story, just don't carry it for mine.



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Breathing Pure Imagination - RIP Mr Wilder

I'm sitting on a train with tears in my eyes. Gene Wilder died. I didn't know him. I believe he was a good man. He was old and unwell, now he's at peace. He's passing is therefore sad but well earned. Not enough for me to be near tears for a stranger. So why am I?

While he was brilliant in all the roles I've seen him in, I think my grief stems from Willy Wonka. Gene Wilder was not Willy Wonka, he didn't write his dialogue, and through technology Willy Wonka will always roam the chocolate factory, but Gene breathed life into the character. He took the words on the page and made them live. That breath is gone. Perhaps it is that I mourn.

I don't remember when I first saw the movie. Its images and scenes have always floated in my mind. I didn't really remember the kids or the sentimentality of Charlie and his family. I remembered the man in the purple suit with the top hat. He was wise, he knew how things worked. And he lived in a factory where things were not as they are in the rest of the world. He walked corridors that shrank without appearing to, had wallpaper you could taste, and there was magic at every turn. And all with the underwritten air of menace.

Later, in my 20s, when in one of my darker periods, there were two parts of the movie that meant so much to me. The first and most important was the song Pure Imagination. I knew there was no life like it, and I clung to the idea that my imagination was something important. If you listen closely to the tune, there is that tinge of melancholy, or maybe that's just for me. But under the wonder is the reality that it is lost on so many people. Willy knows the children will fail, that they do not understand what he is singing about.

The second part is one line of dialogue which to me is a reminder, not only of the power of the message of the song, but of our responsibility to live it. 'We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams.'

Gene Wilder understood that. He lived it. And he breathed in the words and exhaled the vision. It will last, but there is one less dreamer of dreams in this world. May you view paradise Mr Wilder. And you, whoever you are reading this, whatever you do in life, always -

Keep dreaming!

Bernhard Schlink's The Reader - A Micro-Review

The Reader by Bernhard Schlink

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


What to say about The Reader? Unsettling, thought-provoking, uncomfortable. They all come to mind as ways to describe it. It's also well written, compelling and convincing; while I know the line between truth and fiction is always blurred and especially so in historical fiction, there was a need to remind myself this is not autobiography. Not directly anyway.

But even now as I sit here, having finished it 12 hours ago, I don't know how to feel. But, that's the point isn't it? Schlink has thrown out the rule book on how to feel about such a sacrosanct subject. I do not know Hanna, cannot know her, the narrator in the end does not know her and he knew her better than anyone else. We don't know what she did, why she did what she did or anything else. Only that what she did was, by usual standards unconscionable. Should I even want to understand what can only be condemned?

There are no answers here. Only the questions, and are they not the same questions we must ask ourselves? Are not the same atrocities being enacted around the world on differing scales right now? Do we not ignore, allow, condone such acts? Should we seek to condemn wholesale, or do we try to understand?

The novel suggests that history seeks to build a bridge between the past and the present and the historian must therefore be an active participant in both. In telling of the past here, Schlink builds that bridge, and in crossing it to see the past the reader must confront questions of the present.



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Suicide Squad - A Review

With the success of superhero movies of the past few years mostly down to Marvel, it was important for DC to do something to level the playing field and, Suicide Squad, the third movie in its series, certainly sets itself apart. First, there are the heroes, a group of infamous villains co-opted to work for the ‘good guys’; it’s the old Dirty Dozen concept but with meta-humans, as characters with super powers are called these days. That in itself can be a tricky task for a story in any medium but Suicide Squad does it well by humanizing the meta-humans in simple but effective ways, Killer Croc, for instance, is the downtrodden outsider, the mistreated freak with an understandable grudge against everyone, rather than simply a mutant killer who lives in the sewers.

Second is the movie’s place in the current DC film universe. Not only is it a notably darker universe than Marvel’s, or most versions of DC’s own, it’s a series that focuses not on the real-world potentialities of meta-humans. Most notably, the threat of Superman in Man of Steel as opposed to the instant adulation he usually receives. His arrival, and the appearance of meta-humans has created a shift in the way the world works and Suicide Squad explores the human face of this. Hence, Killer Croc’s mistreatment in prison, and the utter criminal lunacy of the Joker and his addled paramour Harley Quinn.

The main way the film explores this however is through the squad’s manipulation by the government, in particular, Amanda Waller, a shadowy high-ranking official who’ll kill her own staff to protect information. Her ruthlessness and role as puppeteer, next to the squad’s humanized qualities, effectively question who the ‘bad guys’ really are in this scenario. This is especially successful through the character of Deadshot, an assassin for hire, who’s also a father who misses his daughter. Despite the advertising for the film suggesting Harley Quinn and the Joker were the main characters, it’s Deadshot that Suicide Squad is hinged upon and it’s for that reason it works as a film. Will Smith gives him enough depth for us to root for him, even though we know he’s actually a murderer for hire with little regard for human life.

The film’s weakness is in its tendency to have spontaneous scenes for no good reason and some whacky editing. Harley stopping the action to steal a handbag might be in character but it only really served to interrupt the flow of the story. Rumours of studio interference might explain that but we’ll never really know.

The Enchantress, the nominal villain of the film, is arguably a weak-spot too. Her scheme is almost fully fledged before the heroes are even aware of what’s happening and there is little conflict with her or involving her at all. This breaks from the Hollywood playbook and probably has some in a flutter, but the film is not about the heroes saving the world; it’s about a group of troubled – and troubling – characters being played by a government. In the end, the Enchantress is a plot-device to bring them together, which some may not like but is an age-old storytelling device. Besides which, her own powers mirror Amanda Waller’s creation of the Suicide Squad and her use of leverage by knowing as much as possible about the individuals.

In all, Suicide Squad is a good movie, with a strong cast that explores a dark and violent world on a human level. It balances action, drama and comedy well, with occasional disruptive moments seemingly designed for fans of specific characters. Well worth a watch.

The Lover - A Micro Review

The Lover by Marguerite Duras

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This is a book I wish I could have read in one sitting. I think it needs that to achieve its full effect.

The fragmenting of time is what made this book for me, seeing the scattered memories come together had its own special fascination. Unfortunately, possibly because I did read it in a number of sittings, it lost my interest toward the end.



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