Alan Moore: Storyteller preview

portrait by Danny North

Gary Spencer Millage, writer of the wonderful Strangehaven has just completed work on his next book, Alan Moore: Storyteller.
Gary writes about it on his blog, which you can find HERE.
The book will be published in the UK in May by Ilex Press.

Alan's parents wedding: 1952

We've been lucky enough to see a preview of some of the book, and if what we have seen is anything to go by, you are in for a treat. It is full of fascinating snippets- everything from early family photographs to some of his first published cartoon work to thumbnails for the world changing graphic novel From Hell.
All this is accompanied by in depth interviews with the Man Himself and information about his many landmark series.

This illustration of Elvis Costello was Moore's first professional sale

We'll keep you up to date with any new info about this wonderful looking book, and bring you a full review nearer the time.

And by the way, in searching for a picture of Mr Moore for the top of this page, we found this wonder, which it too good not to share:

Songs of the Wolf review

Before I begin, I should point out that I am not a fan of what you would call the ‘fantasy’ genre. Perhaps I should revaluate this position, because as with Engineering Infinity where I discovered that I actually did like hard sci-fi stories, I found myself enjoying this book a great deal.

I should also point out that this is not actually one novel but a collected edition featuring two novellas: The Wolf’s Sister and The Wolf’s Mate. In reality though, they are both chapters in the same tale.
One of the things that in my experience destroys the experience of reading a novel in a fantasy setting is the lack of world building, or too much world building for that matter. Some fantasy writers are too interested in the wonderful universe they have created and spend more time explaining their clever back stories and the history of their races than on little things like character and plot. Obviously, I’m not naming anyone here, but we all know who I’m Tolkien about...

Where was I? Oh yeah- world building. It’s something that RF Long does with an admirable skill and subtle touch. There is not too much detail or dense background provided (the whole book runs to a slim- for a fantasy book- 240-odd pages) and what detail she does provide is inserted well, so that it does not come over as exposition.

The characters are also very well realised, with the arc of the main protagonist, Jeren, particularly well written and enjoyable- her frustrations, her feelings, her fears- they are all communicated expertly- again, without the need for clumsy exposition. If I keep going on about this, it is because it is a skill a surprising number of writers do not seem to be bothered with.

Things I didn't like? One of my other problems with fantasy books are the character names. I find loads of apostrophes and the like in names to be distracting, and Long does employ them here sometimes, but she has the sense to shorten character names to make them easier to digest.

Something I thought I would not enjoy was the prospect of reading a romance story. But breathe easy men! I have to confess that my expectations on this front were not high, but again, Long deals with the relationship between the two main characters in such a way as to have the romance and their growing feelings for each other a constant part of the story, but not overpowering the plot in any way. And, I should add that there is plenty of action in here too- and it is written in a lovely fluid style.

All in all, this is well worth hunting out, but it does end at exactly the wrong moment (or, rather- exactly the right moment)- there is still much of the story left to tell, and I hope she returns to it soon.

Songs of the Wolf is available from Samhain Publishing.

Engineering Infinity Review

I have to confess that when I hear the term ‘Hard Sci-fi’ I usually give a bit of a shudder.

I'm not, as a rule, a fan of this subgenre. To me, the name Hard Sci-fi conjures up pages of long dry discussion on the physics and science of FTL and time travel. These are things that I am interested in, I’m just not interested in reading about them in a novel- I like hyperspace and flashing purple laser beams in space!
This is not to say I don’t read any. I am a big fan of Clarke, for example, and his ability to communicate astonishingly complex science in a few simple words is wondrous in itself.
But reading this collect has got me re-evaluating what I think of as Hard Sci-fi. There are tales in here that I wouldn’t have classed as such- but on reflection, of course they are. If you take hard Sci-fi to be any story that has real science as a base to it, then you’re opening the market up to almost anything short of Star Wars and most of Doctor Who.

So, on to the collection.
Editor Jonathan Strahan has assembled quite a formidable roster of writers for this Solaris book- most eye catching among them being Stephen Baxter and Charles Stross. Actually, Stross is another writer we can add to the list of Hard Sci-fi authors I have enjoyed reading previously.

As with all collections, this is a mixed bag. There were some stories I didn’t enjoy as much as others, and even one I’ll hold my hands up to admitting I didn’t understand at all.

I suppose you’ll be wanting a blow by blow account of the various stories? Well, I’m not going to. I’ll mention a few though.

The opening tale, Malak by Peter Watts is an interesting, if downbeat, opener, telling the story of an automated flying weapon in war in the Middle East. Thought provoking stuff, as good sci-fi should be.
Some are brilliantly character driven, in a way that some readers (yes- I mean me) don’t usually associate with Hard Sci-fi. Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Charles Stross and John C Wright provide tales that are pretty heartbreaking in their own way.
The Server and the Dragon by Hannu Rajaniemi is a nice modern, well not modern, future fairy tale.

Actually, looking through the book again to write this, I can honestly say that almost every tale hit the mark for me, apart from the aforementioned one I didn’t understand. And that is, of course, not to say it was badly written. It clearly wasn’t.

Ahhh... I was about to launch into another paragraph mentioning story after story again! I shall limit myself to two more, and two more only.
The Invasion of Venus by Stephen Baxter. I like stories that remind us of our place in the universe, and this is one such tale. We had a similarly themed alien invasion of Earth tale in a recent issue of FutureQuake (I hasten to add that the stories are in no way similar- they just explore the same themes).
And finally, possibly my favourite tale in the book, The Birds and the Bees and the Gasoline Trees by John Barnes (not the ex-footballer, I’m guessing). I loved this for two reasons. Firstly, it got me with a marvellous semi-twist. I saw where things were going with this narrative and he outfoxed me by not only changing the tack of the tale and having one of the characters address it.
The other is the sheer scope of the idea driving the story. Seriously, it is massive and thought provoking and, of course, this being a Hard Sci-fi book, all too plausible. I say ‘all too’ as if it’s a bad thing, but the bigger part of me would think it really really cool if something like the events depicted in this story actually happened. Again, as with the Baxter story, this one really puts us in our place as a species.

All in all, an excellent collection of stories, and one that will have me seeking out more work from the authors featured here. One thing though- an inordinate amount of them seem to live in Edinburgh...