Rogue's Gallery Garycon 2026

 Well, now that Gamehole 2026 is right around the corner, I probably ought to post my Garycon 2026 Rogue's Gallery. I played a lot of great characters this last time around. My game count was:

Traveller - 2

Call of Cthulhu - 2

Empire of the Petal Throne - 1

Riverbank - 1 

Shadowdark - 1

DCC - 1

War of the Ring - 1

And not a bad game among any of them. Except War of the Ring, the miniatures game, where I got my butt kicked. But that was just me. Oh, and there was one person at that table who was behaving like a jerk. Even the game master and the people on his team apologized to me for his behavior. He never did. Whatevs, angry nerd.

Here's the TLDR version in two pictures:

Let's go second pic first: War of the Ring miniatures game. This was bad guy vs bad guy, goblins on goblins, warg riders on giant spiders, all the kinky stuff. Besides Wanker McJerkface (pretty sure that was his name) I had a great time getting my butt kicked. For the record, in the photo above, I'm the wargs, the other team is the giant spider. I was able to wax that spider, but lost the battle overall. Took too much time to "form up". Lesson learned.

Okay, so on to the characters, in no particular order:

Geran - 2nd level magic user, Empire of the Petal Throne.

Ksenia Krishko, M.S., Associate Astronomer - Traveller. This was a "hard scifi" Traveller game I really liked. Little action, but lots of problem-solving, which I love in my RPGs.

Romi Cohn - Call of Cthulhu. Funny, I don't remember much about this adventure, which is very odd because it was run by You Too Can Cthulhu, who usually run the most memorable of adventures. I lost sanity and burned a LOT of luck, which means my rolls sucked, which is probably why my brain won't recall the game very well.

Ivan Ragsnub - Half-orc ranger, Shadowdark. My first time playing Shadowdark. Reminded me a lot of old skool AD&D/2e. Shot a lot of arrows at undead. I liked it. 

Dick K. Philip - Scoundrel, Wiener Guy, DCC. Very cool murder mystery as a DCC game. All taking place in a large mansion. I really liked this game. Playing a sneaky thug helped, for sure. 

Eight Forenti-Massbach - Combat Bot, Rhees Gholnik - Gunner, and Captain Screel - Uplifted Dolphin (in an aqua tank on the bridge). Yes, that's three characters, one game. I loved this one. Essentially we went pirate hunting for a group that had taken a drug-production facility hostage. Gholnik and Screel were on the ship, where we started, in spaaaaaaaace . . . I really enjoyed playing Captain Screel (complete with dolphin squeaks and squeals). Going planetside, I played Eight Forenti-Massbach. Now, I don't play fighter types like this very often at all. But this guy was almost a literal tank. It felt good to lay waste to bad guys, especially when I did it in front of a group of terrified hostages, spraying enemy blood all over the walls . . . and the hostages. I didn't say I was tidy. After that charnel house, we got back on ship, where I reverted back to Gholnik and Screel. Seriously, this game was an absolute blast. I wanted to get into part 2 for Gameholecon, but it conflicts with my You Too Can Cthulhu Black Letter game, so choices had to be made.

Now, on to my two favorite characters in my Garycon 2026 Rogue's Gallery:

Arzach. Yes, THAT Arzach. I played in a Call of Cthulhu game based on one of my all-time favorite movies and magazines, Heavy Metal (or Metal Hurlant). Arzach is the creation of comic genius Moebius. No, he didn't appear directly in the movie, but he appeared many, many times in the pages of the magazine. Other characterd included Den, Barbarella, and Stern. It was a great romp through several universes/realities, all in the chase of the Locnar and accompanied by a great soundtrack that was, at times, too loud for us to talk, but I didn't even care. And why was this done in Call of Cthulhu? Go watch the movie. And pay attention. Say some names from the movie backwards and you'll figure it out.

My favorite: Mr. Edmund St Andrews, a Bachelor Fox, aesthetically-inclined, for Riverbank RPG. I was excited to try this game out before I ever played. It's a "cozy" RPG with little violence, but all kinds of complications one must negotiate, many of them based on the maze that was Edwardian English society. I fell in love with the game and I fell in love with Mr. Edmund St Andrews. After playing the game, I immediately bought it. I've only done this once before (with Vaesen). And I am registered to play it again at Gameholecon. I want to really learn this game, because I want to run it. I don't want to go into all the mechanics, but suffice it to say that no game will ever repeat itself, even if played with the exact same characters in exactly the same setting. There is a winsomeness to the system itself, which appeals to me a great deal. And being able to play an intelligent, socially-saavy, nature loving, race-car driving Fox who loves poetry - how do you top that? I very much look forward to the next time I play Riverbank. I strongly recommend it if you want a breath of fresh air, an escape from dungeon dust, decaying bodies, and terror. I can breathe playing this game. You can, too. 

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A Forest with its Mouth Open Wide & Other Stories

 

A Forest with its Mouth Open Wide & Other Stories by Adam S. Cantwell
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Full disclosure: Adam Cantwell and I are what was historically-termed "pen pals". Or at least we've written a few letters to each other. If you can't handle the fact that this review is likely biased by our correspondence, then maybe you should just bugger off. I like Adam. And I like his writing. There, I said it.

In my miserable berth I grew deathly ill. The cold and torpor drew what was left of me to my low-lying parts; here my pain and ennui sloshed and settled and was distilled. The whispering proximity of the lethal sea called these dregs down ever further, and day after day my spirit seeped through tar and pitch and blackly down.

My liquid remains decanted through desert voids of seawater. It was an alien medium, primal, its essence was not the tang that clings to the red flesh of salmon or the morning chill borne on the fog but the dead-cold and salt of bones and freezing stars. My nothing-substance popped and dispersed, particles radiant from the dumb core, shreds of lost desire given over to huge black currents.

This quote, from the opening story "Orphans on Granite Tides" should give you a notion of the solace and comfort you'll find within the pages of A Forest with its Mouth Open Wide & Other Stories, i.e., none. I've earlier reviewed this story (I have the original publication from Les Editions de L'Oubli (aka Mount Abraxas Press), though this is the revised text as it originally appeared in Bastards of the Absolute , which I have not read. I don't know what the exact revisions are, but this version seems a hint darker than the Mount Abraxas version. Maybe I'll ask him in my next letter. I seem to owe him one, especially since his last mailing was a short stack of vinyl records from his musical projects Spaceboy and Villains.

The second story, "Black Chroma," is set in what seems to be a post-apocalypse, though it may be the structure of the narrator's mind that is collapsing (this may be the case with many of the narrators in this volume), rather than civilization. Paranoia and agoraphobia combine to expose (him?) to the bright pinpoint lights of the cosmos, a nakedness only occulted by self-burial.

Profoundly existential, yet hopelessly defiant (I am reminded of one of my favorite poems, William Ernest Henley's Invictus ), "The Chamber in the Universe" examines monuments, devotion, power, hope, and death. The temple representing as empty vessel exposing the hollowness of existence, while being the instrument by which the common-builder nudges the cosmos, even a particle's-width; one of the most human of desires: to matter, even when nothing matters. To make one's mark forever in the void.

"The European Monster Part Two" is dark and obtuse, much like the philosophy of Emil Cioran, the inferred inspiration for the story (first published in a volume of stories dedicated to the Romanian philosopher). Here the narrator finds himself in a labyrinthine situation, becoming a part of a (political? criminal?) machine at the heart of which is the titular monster, perhaps a modern Minotaur.

"Torso in Shadow" puts the baffled and baffling narrator in the subways beneath NYC, which may or may not be disintegrating above. Surely it is convulsing, socially or physically. Amidst these convulsions, in the underground, the narrator meets a woman. Perhaps this is Adam and Eve witnessing the birthing pains of a new world. Difficult to tell. But the attempt must be made. An ouroboros of a story, eating itself.

Originally written for a tribute anthology to Borges, "The Bow, the Arm, the Arrow" echoes the Argentine writer's sometimes-journalistic style, but with a tonal nod to Millhauser, as well. The story reminds me of a long-form vlog I recently watched about the composer Penderecki (a favorite of mine), but with the narrator experimenting with literature, rather than music. Sometimes experiments go wrong.

The titular story in the volume actually appeared alongside one of my own stories in the Mount Abraxas anthology Frostsigils , an homage to Paysage d'Hiver. As one would expect, it is dark, downright Gothic, and one can feel the cold sink into one's bones while reading. It's all about atmosphere, and it delivers that in shadowed robes with the deep moaning toll of an immense black iron bell.

With "Vod the Wrecker," I again find myself as "TOC mates" with Adam in the Raphus Press anthology Ghost Trains. But where I treated the train in question as a haunting presence, here, Vod is the brooding master, a near-god, over the twisted metal entrails of what was once the most powerful force in America. Vod destroys, remakes, and rides the bones of the ur-train like a pyrrhic steed, into oblivion.


In the amber-filtered urine-gray aged-out green glass of insulators, crystallizing dumbly over centuries, he saw an enviable solitude and immobility. The enamel of insignia and livery, some burned to peacock craquelure; the bent-blue of sulking steel glazed over with a million dullnesses of black and charcoal.

Transformation of the individual and of the world are the subject of "The Oligomancer". Here a migrant child of an itinerant oil-platform worker watches the world turn inside out from a privileged (so to speak) observation point on the derelict platform. A slowly unfolding apocalypse gives indicators from the horizon about the collapse of the outside world, which can't help but affect his own inner world. Again, the line between psychic and physical reality is not only blurred, it is completely shattered.

And, finally, "The Hag, the Cutthroat, the Amputee" is the musing of a being who, like Charon of Greek myth, ferries the dead across to their final destination, particularly those whose demise is caused by war. He(?) is very adamant to note that he is not Charon, and his thoughts regarding the dead make it clear that he does not share the detached observations of his more famous counterpart.

Those are the stories and my skewed observations of them. You want objectivity? Good luck finding it in this universe. But I will end by deferring to one of the great nihilists of our age, Thomas Ligotti, who stated, quite correctly:

The stories of Adam Cantwell's . . . could be fairly equated with the works of Kafka or Borges if their prose were not so luxuriant and surprising at every turn.

I have nothing more to add.


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The Silver Surfer: Parable

 

The Silver Surfer #1 "Parable" Part 1 of 2 by Stan Lee and Moebius by Stan Lee
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

[This review is for both volumes of the mini-series combined]

I've been a Silver Surfer stan (pun intended) since the early '70s when I first encountered the character on the news-stan(d) - okay, I'll stop.

I had spotted "Parable" when it was first published, but I was out of high school and trying to be "cool" by ignoring comics at the time. What an idiot I was. A few years later, I realized the error of my ways and got back into comics but had lost track of this mini-series until a few years ago. I'm not quite sure how that happened. Moebius is one of my favorite artists and The Silver Surfer is one of my favorite Marvel characters.

In this treatment, the art, as one would expect, is absolutely amazing. Moebius' Galactus, sans-crackle, would still warm Jack Kirby's heart, I would think. I wonder if anyone interviewed him about this miniseries before he passed away? One is quite curious what his thoughts would be. And Moebius' style lends itself to the sleek action sequences one would expect in such a tale.

But the action only catches the eye. It's the philosophy and psychology underneath it all that holds the reader's attention. The writing is not perfect, by any means - at times it sounds like it's trying too hard to be "wise" and "insightful," which lends a sort of hokeyness to some of the dialogue, sometimes to the point where it is downright painful. But if one can look beyond the treacle, there are some solid pearls of wisdom and insights into human psychology that would explain the current socio-political mess we are in. This miniseries was so prescient it could have been written today, this very hour, without skipping a beat. And I fear that it will always be applicable, no matter what happens in the political landscape. It is a parable that sees beyond its years, a sort of cosmic-action scripture, if you will. It is so accurate that it's scary. I'm afraid that Norrin Radd's near-nihilism is very, very close to a bigger truth, and we can't handle that truth.

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The Shub-Niggurath Cycle: Tales of the Black Goat with a Thousand Young

 

The Shub-Niggurath Cycle: Tales of the Black Goat with a Thousand Young by Robert M. Price
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I read this years ago, about twenty years ago, in fact, when I was finishing graduate school. I'll be honest, I don't remember if I owned the book and got rid of it or if I got it from the library, but, in any case, I didn't have my own copy for a long, long time. So, when I spotted this at a local antique store for a pittance, I just sprang for it. The question is, would it live up to my now-higher expectations of writing craftsmanship?

Lewis Spence's "The Horn of Vipula" was pulp as they come, with everything that implies: predictability, a not-so-surprise ending, plot "reaches" like miniature deus-ex-machina, and language that strives to be better than it really is. Meh. Not a great start to the anthology.

M.P. Dare tries to channel M.R. James in "The Demoniac Goat". He's largely successful but lacks the full gravitas of the master of the ghost story. Still, a decent enough story about an ostensibly dead priest and his pet goat. Well, who was the pet, really?

Even the editor notes the hackneyed subject matter of J.S. Leatherbarrow's "The Ghostly Goat of Glaramara". I agree with the editor's assessment. Ostensibly, he put it in the anthology for historical reasons. But some history is best forgotten.

I've read and enjoyed Ramsey Campbell's "The Moon-Lens" before, and while many consider it something akin to juvenalia, with a structure that pastiche's Lovecraft's own, I still find something intriguing here. It bridges the gap between folk horror and cosmic horror in a way that highlights the strong points of each. Maybe I just have a soft spot for it, as I would likely rate it more highly than others.

Careful restraint is not the watchword in John Glasby's "The Ring of the Hyades". Lovecraft's greatest folly: naming the un-nameable, describing the indescribable, leaks into Glasby's writing like a Rorschach test of purple prose. The story is alright, but rather predictable for anyone even vaguely familiar with the Mythos. I suppose that makes it a safe read for fans, but it would be jarring for newcomers.

During my years as an editor, I had an unbreakable rule that I would never publish my own work in an anthology I was editing. Price, in his . . . uh, work(?) "A Thousand Young" provides a shining example of why every editor should take this ethical stance. I hated this story. It was a twelve-year old's darkest sexual fantasy. Oh, and trigger warning: R**E. Yeah, no. No stars, not even one. Just . . .don't.

Odd that a story so poor as Price's should be followed by a sandal and sorcery story so nearly perfect as Richard L. Tierney's "The Seed of the Star God". Price can't write them, but he can pick them! Now I'm wondering if there is a full collection of Simon of Gitta's tales. I would read that! Sword, sorcery, and sacrifice in the decadence of the Roman Empire. SPQR!

It's not the story that sang to me. Glen Singer's "Harold's Blues" is an old tale, a very tried and true tale, about selling one's soul for music. You already know the story, from start to finish. But the register in which this was sung . . .well, that's where the magic lies. That old, dark magic that brings songs and storms and screams in the night. Familiar, but unsettling.

Lin Carter may have been a better writer of Lovecraftian tales than Lovecraft himself. "Dreams in the House of Weir," a story steeped in the mythos, but with just a modicum more of restraint than HPL lacked, teases the horror out instead of bashing readers over the head with it. There's a slow pull on the thread of cosmic horror here that unwinds one's sanity. If your dreams become wondrous, you should start to fear.

. . . and Carter further demonstrates his skilled pen by way of the poem "Visions from Yaddith," which is quoted in the previous story. I'm rather curious which came first? The story? Or the poem? Each path carries some interesting implications about the writing process that I need to ponder on a while. I could see each having its benefits, and I've done both, but without much intentionality. I must think on this. It's been a while since I've tried my hand at poetry.

I wavered on M.L. Carter's "Prey of the Goat". It swung from interesting to hackneyed, back to good, then to trite, wallowing in mediocrity. In the end, I'm in the "meh" camp, with a slight twinge of "interesting," but not interesting enough to take me beyond a bland assessment. Could-have-beens and all that rot.

"Sabbath of the Black Goat" carried a not-so-surprising ending. Add to this the hyper-compressed, yet somehow thin info dump by Stephen M. Rainey and you have a rushed, middling story. I suspect there was some word count restriction on the story, but whether the story should have been longer or shorter is difficult to say. It's clear, though, that the pulp suit just doesn’t quite fit right.

Another Price story, but this one co-authored with Peter H. Cannon, "The Curate of Temphill" reads somewhere between M.R. James and Umberto Eco; meaning I quite liked it. I have to attribute this to the co-authorship(?), something I've done myself with good results (with author Brendan Connell, whose work I continue to greatly admire). This tale of Templars and heretical prophecies is an unexpected and welcome find in such an anthology. No Old Ones here, but they are not needed.

David Kaufman's "Grossie" might be the most effective story of this anthology (and also has the worst title, though it fits). It's as subtle as Lovecraft is unsubtle. There is a menace of place here and the faint aroma of ancestral evil, just enough to pique the imagination, just enough for the reader to really feel the underlying horror without facing it directly, an underlying genius loci with inimical intent. Don't be fooled by the puerile title. Another tale where the Old Ones don't make a direct appearance, and they don't have to. In fact, having an "unspeakable" horror show its face would have destroyed this beautiful (but dark) story.

"To Clear the Earth" is a story lost and found to me. I remember, in the mid-90s, reading a mythos story that made a deep impression on me. It was cosmic horror writ-large, on an Earth-ending scale, but in more of a science fiction paradigm than horror. The setting was Antarctica (which makes me wonder why it wasn't in the Antarktos Cycle). And here it is, by Will Murray (also the author of the Doc Savage and Destroyer series). It doesn't resonate as much now. I was surprised by the ending (which I had forgotten), so that wasn't the problem. I think it might be the pulp-adventure tone of the second half of the story, or maybe it was the info-dumping that took place throughout. I guess it was needed back in the day, but nowadays the Mythos lore is so common as to be trite. Or maybe I've just played so much Call of Cthulhu that I recoil at explanatory passages, especially ones about the Necronomicon. In any case, the story, while good, didn't have the same magic (nefarious or otherwise), as it did last century.

So, alas, the me of twenty years ago enjoyed this anthology far more than the me of now does. Age happens. Experience happens. Nostalgia happens. And sometimes, nostalgia is deceptive. Live and learn.

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Garycon 2026 Preview

 Here's what's coming my way at Garycon 2026 (presuming it's not cancelled due to WWIII). Shadowdark, Traveller, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Empire of the Petal Throne, Riverbank (I am VERY excited to play this!!!), Vaesen, War of the Ring, and, of course, Call of Cthulhu:

Addendum:

A spot opened up on one of the games I wanted to get in, but couldn't at first, so I took it. It's another Traveller game, which means I'm not going to be playing Vaesen this time around. There are typically more Vaesen games offered at Gameholecon, anyway, so I'll pick one up then. Just couldn't pass up the chance to pick up a mercenary ticket!!!

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Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

 

Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said by Philip K. Dick
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This may be my favorite Philip K. Dick novel to date. It's got all the "typical" trappings of a Dick novel: Dystopian setting, drugs that really do alter reality, flying cars, synthetic humans - but the sappy title isn't just treacle. There is some real emotional depth to this story. Even more so than The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. This is one of his later novels and one wonders, after this foray, what emotional depths he might have plumbed had he lived longer.

This work is, as one would expect from Dick, complicated, mystifying, even misleading, at times. But here, I'm not just referring to the plot, I'm referring more specifically to the characters. All of them evoke sympathy, pity, and annoyance, at the least, downright loathing, at worst. There really is not one "stock" character here; even the most "vanilla" of the bunch, Herb Maime, shows an underlying depth of psychological complexity burbling under his seeming obsequiousness. And though the action largely follows along with the actions (and inactions and reactions) of Jason Taverner, one might argue that the real central character is Police General Felix Buckman. Or perhaps it is Buckman's sister-wife, Alys, who we learn has perhaps inadvertently caused the reality-shift that Taverner suffers. Honestly, it's difficult to tell who the "main" characters are, as all have a level of complexity and plot-involvement that might argue for their position as protagonist.

If this seems like a hopelessly-twisted story of hopelessly-twisted people . . . it is! And the strangest thing of all: Dick claimed that most of this book was non-fiction. Yes, you read that correctly. Now, Dick's psychosis is well-known, as is his chronic drug use. So, you might just blow this statement off as crazy-talk. And maybe it is. But if you are one of the many people who suspect that there just might be something to the Mandela Effect, well, you can see how the author could have viewed this book as largely non-fiction. Of course, the Mandela Effect had not been named as such when Dick wrote the book (Mandela was imprisoned on Robben Island at the time the book was written), but the idea of multiple universes laying one on top of the other, or side by side, with the possibility of a cosmic slip in-between realities and timelines, is one of the foremost features of Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said. In essence, it is the plot.

Furthermore, the emotional depth and complexity of these characters were not created at an intellectual remove from the pen. They seem to emerge as organic, living beings, people, or at least reflective of people, who Dick knew and loved (and lost). Really, the science fiction here is merely a (multidimensional) doorway into a world of love, pain, guilt, self-doubt, and forgiveness, with spaces of emotional numbness in-between. Here, the inner world is what matters, and the outer world, or, more appropriately, outer worlds (and the slippages between them) is merely a catalyst for human emotion, a window into the soul.

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Metal Hurlant

 

Metal Hurlant: Old Dreams, Young Visions by Brian Michael Bendis
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

If any one piece of media informed my teenage years, it was the movie Heavy Metal . Now, 43 years after I first watched that movie on HBO late night as a early teen (the perfect target for the movie at that particular time), I can honestly say that it still carries a heavy influence on my tastes in art, music, and just plain attitude. It was a significant blip on my cultural radar, but it was, in all honesty, just a blip. I watched it twice on HBO and then . . . the movie just disappeared. Vanished. I looked for news of a videotape release everywhere: magazines (remember, there was no internet back in 1982 - at least none that the military was sharing) such as Starlog or Fangoria , at obscure corners of videotape stores , libraries - wherever. I asked about it a lot. And whenever I asked, I either got a blank stare, or the person's face lit up, then quickly sagged with "Man, I wish. No one can find that." It wasn't until the very late '90s that the movie was released on DVD. There was some kind of legal kerfuffle about the use of the music, if I remember correctly, which prevented its release after the movie was shown on HBO.

But, though the times were dark, they weren't empty. I could always turn to the pages of Heavy Metal magazine, a number of which I usually shoplifted, and sometimes bought, from the gas station down the road from my house. Marvel comics also published a competitor in the form of Epic Illustrated , their first adult-themed publication. I could also rely on my old copy of Mechanismo (which I bought in the 1979, before I even knew about Heavy Metal) for a fix of cutting-edge scifi art. While in those "lean years" I also heard of a magazine titled "Metal Hurlant". It took some asking and researching (again: no internet) to figure out that this was the French version of the English "Heavy Metal". But it wasn't until 1985, when I moved to England, that I saw a copy of Metal Hurlant in the (paper) flesh. Sadly, the magazine ceased publication in 1987. A TV series, "Metal Hurlant Chronicles" emerged in 2012, but to be honest, it had little of the flair of either the original Heavy Metal movie or the magazine Metal Hurlant.

The English variant, Heavy Metal, had a series of misfortunes, mostly caused by abysmal customer service and poor money management, in the last couple of years. A kickstarter was done to re-release the magazine, which I've seen on bookstore (remember those?) shelves, though I hear there were also hiccups involved in getting copies to kickstarter backers.

At the same time, Metal Hurlant was kickstarted by a completely separate entity from Heavy Metal magazine. I did not back the kickstarter, as we were saving for a trip to Europe at the time, among other things. But I book-marked it as something I would look into. Lo and behold, my oldest son bought me a copy of Metal Hurlant for Father's Day. I raised that boy right!

With that long history lesson behind us, let's turn briefly to the book itself. And it is a book, at 267 pages of content. It's a mixture of old, classic pieces that debuted in the pages of the original Metal Hurlant back in the '70s, and newer material that explores contemporary approaches to science fiction illustration. Interspersed are several excellent essays that cover the history of Metal Hurlant, introductions to the newer artists in the volume, and sometimes delve into the punk attitude that informs the art, stories, and even the publication itself of what might be considered a counter-cultural manifesto, as well as an expanded artistic view of possibilities.

Of course, my own attitudes toward art have changed since I was a young teenager. Back then, I was clearly focused on the violence, crazy vistas, and . . . other biologically-driven interests. While those things are still of interest, I've upped my reasoning and critique since those testosterone-fueled halcyon days of yore. It's not enough to be "gonzo," and frankly, I am oftentimes put off by "gonzo for gonzo's sake" in my media consumption. Yes, I'm currently listening to the Heavy Metal soundtrack as I'm writing this review (duh), but my "favorite" songs on this wildly-eclectic album have shifted over time. I like some songs better than I used to and others have grown moldy (though there is one exception that has always been on steady footing for 43 years now - though I prefer the live version to the album version).

The wonder of the current incarnation of Metal Hurlant is that it has chosen "classic" reprints of the highest quality. There are no "dumb" stories in this volume (unlike, for instance, the "snow time" vignette in the Heavy Metal movie - ugh), except for the one overly-indulgent story about Arzach's mount pooping out copies of Metal Hurlant - that was admittedly pretty dumb.

The new stories also create a sometimes subtle sense of wonder at small things and gentle turns of story, among the awe-inspiring and more visceral emphasis of others. "Catching the Wave" and "You Will Remember Me" are downright poignant. Dare I say that I have found a new level of sophistication in the pages of this historically irreverent, "punk" magazine. Yes, yes I dare. I am eager to see what the next volume brings (subscriptions are available). All-in-all, I am rather ecstatic of what we've got here in the "new" (but also old) Metal Hurlant, and I am optimistic about its future, which will contain many futures that we can't even yet imagine.

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Agent of the Imperium: A Story of the Traveller Universe

 

Agent of the Imperium: A Story of the Traveller Universe by Marc W. Miller
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I make no bones about it: The Traveller RPG and it's primary setting, The Third Imperium, is one of my favorite places to take my imagination and has been since the early '80s. As a young child, I always wondered who the creator of the game, Marc Miller, was. As an adult, I've had a chance to meet him, game at this table, and really get to know him in a different way than just being a star-struck 12 year old fanboy. Marc is not just a creative genius, he is a gentleman and a kind, benevolent person, politically active in calling out racism and prejudice, just a general all-around good human being.

Back in 2023, after a very long conversation about politics and gaming (I'll spare you all the details), I bought this book from him at the gamehole convention. Of course, I asked him to sign it. He was very excited about the premise, wherein the main narrator has his consciousness loaded into a "wafer" that allows his personality and experiences to be plugged into a host body. He acts as a spokesperson who speaks as if the Emperor or the Empress (depending on when the narrator has been activated) and makes the most difficult decisions, often sacrificing thousands or even millions to save millions or billions. He is the one who makes the difficult decisions, acting, in ways, as a sort of god with the fate of the (known) universe in his hands. It's a tough job, but someone's got to do it. And these are not decisions that are made lightly. There is a pathos to the power, with some degree of regret and the haunting of the ghosts of the past that one might expect in such a situation.

But the central conceit of the book allows a broad view of a large universe. It is a rather brilliant mechanism, and one that requires a delicate balance between the vast and the personal.

In what could be a sanitized, clinical exposition on the setting of the Traveller RPG, Marc Miller takes a different tack, posing questions about what one would do if one had uninhibited authority, including the ongoing questions about the needs of the many versus the needs of the few. The humanity here is never lost, with all the attendant good, evil, and indifference that this infers.

I don't have time to go into details of Miller's Traveller universe. Suffice it to say, it's complex, but does not bury itself under details. There are nuances in the book that I had not expected from the source materials of the original game. For instance, there is the "problem" of the Zhodani, a human race that has embraced the use of psionics to the point where honesty is the only policy that makes sense in their culture. It is often compared to a pure communist system (Marc confirmed this to me directly in a conversation we had once). But here, there is a textured cultural take on a small sliver of Zhodani society showing both the diversity that is possible in a society where there are no lies and all thoughts are transparent, while simultaneously showing the impossibility of such a society understanding a culture that dissembles, deceives, and lies (i.e., the rest of Humaniti).

I'm glad I'm familiar with the Traveller universe. Yes, I could read this without it and still understand what's happening, but having been steeped in the lore for over 40 years now, I have a much clearer understanding of the impact of the events being portrayed here. But this should not stop the reader who has never played the game. The novel stands on its own feet. But if you'd like to know more, to engage in the actual ongoing creation of the setting, there's always the roleplaying game. Such is the creative magic of RPGs!

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Rogue's Gallery: Gameholecon 2024

 

9 years now, I've attended Gameholecon in Madison, WI. It helps that I used to live in Madison and am about 40 minutes away now. Also helps that my son lets me crash on his apartment floor. Not the most comfortable arrangement, but hey, it's free, and best of all I get to see my son every day, if even for a short time before I crash out. Love that guy.

This year Gameholecon was a little earlier than in past years. If I remember correctly, last year it was on Halloween weekend (or maybe that was the year previous - I forget). So it was just a touch warmer, which suits me fine. I have memories of earlier Gameholecons, when I lived in Madison, walking home in the bitter cold at stupid o'clock (yes, I was within walking distance). So, yay for global warming, I guess . . . 

Below is my "Rogues Gallery" AKA, the masks I wore for the various games. My schedule was like this:

Started off playing Dark Ages Cthulhu, which was just like modern Call of Cthulhu, but with different skills. The rules were essentially the same. It was a good scenario in which my character ended up becoming one with Shub Niggurath, which is de rigeur for such scenarios, no? There was supposed to be a chase scene, but the Keeper generously skipped that or we would have been there all day. 

Next up was an Empire of the Petal Throne game run by my friend Victor Raymond. I always want to squeeze in an EPT game if I can get in. This one played out as a very pulpy adventure, like something from a 1930s radio drama. It was kitsch, but in all the good ways. And, of course, I'm always happy to immerse myself in Tekumel - it's such a great setting. If you haven't played and get the chance to, jump in, but don't be overwhelmed, as Tekumel is thoroughly-recognized. I can guarantee, though, that if you're playing at Victor's table, you will get everything you need. He is very keen on, and very good at, introducing new players to the world.

Last game Thursday was "Catastrophe Island" for Dungeon Crawl Classics, run by another friend of mine, Doug Kovacs. I've been playing with Doug for a long time now, so I knew what to expect: utter insanity. And so it was. I played a punk kid who ended up as a unicorn-riding skeleton. That's . . . never happened to me before . . . that I want to talk about . . . ever.

Friday started with Achtung! Cthulhu! in which I played a special forces type infiltrating behind enemy lines to discover what some Nazis were doing and what they were digging up (whether intentionally or ignorantly). Yes, there was Nazi-punching. Lots of Nazi-punching. It felt cathartic. 

Next was a Classic Traveller adventure: "Death Station". It's a classic adventure, but I'll be honest, I've never played in it or read it before. Reminded me mostly of Pandorum, for those who know that movie. The best parts came at the end, actually, when we were able to carefully manipulate a no-win situation into something we could not only live with , but which was a satisfying resolution. Things looked very grim, but in-character roleplaying, which involved not a little threat of blackmail, won the day. 

And from there, I played a Boy Scout. Yes, a Boy Scout in a Call of Cthulhu adventure. This was a "black letter" adventure put on by the crew at You Too Can Cthulhu (bless their souls). I learned that a lot of ttrpg nerds were also Boy Scouts in their youth, including yours truly. I have fond memories of playing D&D by flashlight in a tent on a few campouts. This Boy Scout service activity, however, only created horrific memories for all involved. Given the timeline of the adventure, though all the Boy Scouts survived, it's likely they all got killed later storming Japanese-held islands in the Pacific. That's what we thought, anyway. I guess it's good when you speculate together on what happened to the characters later on in life. Wait, did I say "good"? I think I meant "horrible".

At every con, I try to play at least one game I've never played before. This time, it was Warhammer 40K RPG, which I was excited about. I've got to say, though, that it just fell flat for me. The system did not live up to the hype, as far as I am concerned. It was a fine adventure, but the emphasis on tactics just felt a little too video-gamey to me. I suppose the character sheet was cool. Your mileage may vary.

Saturday morning I was up early for a game of Troika!, which is, let's face it, very Saturday-morning-cartoonish. In other words, it was the perfect way to start the day! The scenario was rather simple, but because the Troika! system is also fairly simple, things flowed quickly and we had a good, goofy time. I'm a big fan of the system. It's stripped down the essentials, and the initiative system adds an element of chaos to everything that is a welcome change from going down the numbers list to see who goes next. 

That afternoon, I played Battletech. Now, I was a fairly early adapter to that game, first playing back in 1986. I played a lot (along with the Mechwarrior RPG) for a couple of years, then moved back to the States from England, and just kind of fell off the bandwagon. The last few years, I've enjoyed a renaissance of sorts. No, I'm not crazy about the game, but since I always try to get into at least one miniatures game per con, I saw the slot and took it. This one was a tournament-style wherein once you lose, you are then brought back on to the board in a bigger mech. Then, if that one gets toasted, you move on to a yet larger mech. It was a lot of fun. I put a photo below of my mech about to be absolutely destroyed by the opposing (and much larger) mech's axe. That was the last thing that happened in my participation in the free-for-all. Good fun, getting your head split open (and your pilot crushed to pulp) by another mech. It was pretty epic. 

In between sessions, I went to the dealer room. I was on a mission: I had played Never Going Home at a previous con and absolutely fell in love with it. So, I headed more or less straight to the Wet Ink Games table and barfed up a wad of money for these beauties:

Can't wait to dig in more on those! Given the way I'm trying to structure my time next year (more on that in a later post), I should be able to cook up some craziness and maybe even run a game at a con?

I also stopped in to see Marc Miller, the creator of Traveller. As always, I had a very pleasant conversation with him about games and life in general. I've stated before that it was a childhood dream come true to play at his table a couple of times and other conventions, and now he recognizes my face and knows my name. That might not seem like much to you, but to the 10-year-old that lives deep within my heart, that creates a great deal of excitement and gratitude within. I'm not afraid to say that he's a hero of mine (though he would likely try to brush that off as too-kind).

In any case, I stopped and bought some Traveller dice, something I've needed since childhood, but didn't know I needed. He also proffered a great deal of schwag, for which I'm grateful, including a comic about the Beowulf class of starships and a Beowulf all-access badge. Then, a week or so after the con, I received an envelope from Marc with a(nother) nobility card, among other goodies. To say that Marc's generosity is off the charts is an understatement.

The phrase "saving the best for last" has been so over-used as to become trite. But in the case of Gameholecon 2024, it really was saving up the best for last!

I was lucky enough this year to get into two games run by the You Too Can Cthulhu crew. The last game of the con for me was "Black Sun Rising". If this is ever published, I will destroy anything in my path preventing me from being first in line for this one. Our party was composed of Interpol agents. I played Vitali Kovalev, a Russian ex-pat whose specialty was busting organ trafficking rings. This proved critical in getting clues (i.e., calling in favors) to figure out how the illegal sale of Nazi artifacts co-terminated with a criminal organ harvesting operation. This was a complex, twisting trail of clues that culminated at a pagan folk music festival. You can guess what baddy was involved (hint, I've mentioned her already in this post). I don't want to give anything away, since you might very well play in this scenario at a later date, but this was absolutely THE BEST rpg experience I've had (as a player) at a con so far. I don't have enough superlatives. The scenario was a real test of the player's intelligence and problem-solving skills. The group of players (several of whom I've gamed with before) was just an amazing group of gamers, the kind of table one would die for to be able to play with on a more regular basis. The keeper was (as is always the case) on the top of his game and slipped into character easily. There was more dialogue and ROLEplaying than I've ever participated in for one game. It was absolutely PERFECT! Special thanks to the YTCC crew, who always do a great job, but absolutely knocked this one out of the park. And, yes, many Nazis were punched and shot and killed in the production of this gaming session. And it makes me smile, unlike my character, who, as you can see here is all business.

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Into the Cosmos

 

I've been a fan of Decadence Comics for years now. I think I first encountered there work in 2017 or thereabouts. My first purchase of their products was Geopolitical Manipulation Through the use of Fungi Based Parasites on 186F, which I strongly recommend. Since then, I've picked up a variety of their works and never been disappointed. Most of their books feature art by Stathis Tsemberlidis or Lando, a pair of brilliant artists who, when one looks at their work combined, is loosely reminiscent of the work of Moebius combined with that of Pepe Moreno and Arnaud Dombre (better known as Arno, from his collaborations with Jodorowsky in what appears to be the now-defunct Heavy Metal Magazine), but in a more organic register. 

Now, one of my favorite movies of all time is 2001: A Space Odyssey. So, when I saw that 50 Watts Books was publishing a collection of illustrations from Tsemberlidis featuring work from his graphic novelization of 2001, Solaris, and Rendezvous with Rama, along with the comic "Protoconscious", I hit the buy button before I even knew what I was doing. Thankfully, sometimes my instincts are right. 

While the entirety of these stories are not contained herein (except for "Protoconscious"), those familiar with either the written or filmed versions of these science fiction staples will recognize the touchpoints. But Tsemberlidis, while providing gracious nods to the originals, makes the works his own with his distinctive (if not evocative of the aforementioned artists) style and impressionistic structuring of panels. 

I am particularly fond of the illustration of the black monolith of 2001:

Now, I might be playing a little favoritism here, as another black monolith of much larger dimensions, which I dubbed The Black Cliff, features in my newest published Mutant Crawl Classics adventure, At the Mutants of Madness. 

TTRPG nepotism aside, Tsemberlidis has provided here a panoply of compelling imagery and storytelling via illustration. If you're looking for surrealistic science fiction art that uses abstraction to trigger the imagination, you've found yourself a treasure. 

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A Perfect Vacuum

 

A Perfect Vacuum by Stanisław Lem
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is, admittedly, the first time I have read a work by Stanislaw Lem. I'll be reading more, after this. Much more, in all likelihood. Of course, Lem has been lauded for decades by critics and colleagues alike, so he was always on my list of authors I ought to read. But, stubbornness being what it is, it wasn't until I listened to an episode featuring Lem's work on Weird Studies a couple years ago that I felt I needed to read his work. As usual, Weird Studies pushed me again into uncharted territories. More on that later.

I've been a fan of Science Fiction for many decades now, a habit I picked up from my father, who also read a lot of Science Fiction (I have to note that one of my proudest moments as a son was when I was able to call Dad up and let him know I had been published in Asimov's Science Fiction magazine). I don't recall seeing a Lem book on his shelf or his bedside stand, but then again he worked for the US military, so I'm not sure how it would look for him to read Lem's work, given the Cold War and all that rot. All that aside, I have to credit Lem with causing me to question, yet again, the definition of Science Fiction. These are not works of spaceships and laser-blasters. It's not even about aliens, per se, though there are times where the humans in these pages act or at least think in truly alien ways. These stories are, first off, not stories: They are imaginary reviews of imaginary pieces of literature. Fictional reviews of fictional books. The "science" comes in through the imaginary books themselves, in large part, and one might even say that the science involved is actually the philosophy of science and the philosophical implications of science itself.

We start, though, with a purely literary focus. Well, not purely literary, I suppose, if you view comedy as "unliterary". If you're seeking a laugh-out-loud (at times) story rife with self-deprecation and a surprising depth of philosophical thinking, you want to read "Les Robinsonades". It is absolutely brilliant. Right from the get-go of this collection, I could why so many people love (and hate) Lem. He has a cutting wit, which he combines with a sometimes laser-focused logic to create a sardonic, but philosophically-sound critique of a variety of "sciences" that may or may not live up to their "scientific" claims.

One of the funnier notions of "Les Robinsonades" (or the critique thereof) is that the titular Robinson has dismissed his servant Snibbins, a corollary to "Friday" of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, only to find his thoughts haunted by the servant and completely unable to escape the need to avoid Snibbins at all costs.

Poor Robinson, who wanted so to avoid shoddiness, who intended to surround himself with chosen ones, has befouled his nest, for he has ensnibbined the entire island.

Later, upon encountering Snibbins again (unavoidable on the island, one supposes):

Why does Snibbins, who previously only spat at the whales, turn out to be their ardent admirer, even to the point of requesting metamorphosis (Robinson says of him, to Wendy May, "He wants whaling")?

"Gigamesh," which Lem opines in the first introductory essay of this book "was to the least of my taste," is a labyrinthine chain of literary analytic drivel so abstruse as to drive even the most seasoned of academics mad. Reading it drove me through a safari of emotion, from respect to fascination to skepticism to anger to fury to hilarity. It felt a lot like being in graduate school again. In the end, it's so intentionally bad as to be comical. "So bad it's good"!

"Sexplosion" is, as the title implies, a view of what society might become if all the stops were pulled on the intersection of capitalism and sex. Want all the sex you can have? Be careful what you wish for. And what happens if a catastrophic event suddenly makes sex not only undesirable, but downright anathema to happy living? Well, let me tell you about the intersection of rampant capital and the vice of food . . .

"Gruppenführer Louis XVI" is every bit as crazy as it sounds: a cadre of SS officers flee to South America after WW II and create a kingdom based on bad third-hand history. Yes, the whole story is a fake review of a book never written, but I would read it, for sure. The premise is a fascinating social train-wreck and I can't peel my eyes away. Calvino and Sarban smashing into each other, face-to-face at 100 MPH!

Lem tries to out-beckett Beckett by taking the central conceit of the Irishman's imploding narrative in his famous trilogy and pushing it (or pulling it like a black hole) even further. "Rein du tout, ou la Conséquence" is a review of a book that not only was not written, but indeed cannot be written: a literary perpetual negation machine in which language itself utterly collapses.

"Pericalypsis" is science-fictional prophecy at its worst. Lem essentially foresees the proliferation of bad information that buries all good, meaningful information by its sheer mass (internet and A.I., I'm looking at you) along with the mountains of trash choking the landscape and seas. The solution presented by the fictional narrator is the worst possible solution. I'd leave it to your imagination. But you can't imagine just how bad it is.

"Idiota" is a side-wise examination of Dostoevsky's similarly-titled work. It is at times a condemnation of the Russian's work, and at times laudatory; Lem, tell me you're trying to critique The Idiot without critiquing The Idiot.

What happens when the "sanctity" of classics is besmirched by a tool that allows the easy disassembly and reassembly of great pieces of literature into penny-dreadful, even pornographic content? Ladies and gentlemen, I present "U-Write-It". Lem lambasts the uneducated and the academic elite all in one fell swoop! My, oh my, would he have hated US politics in the 21st-century.

"Odysseus of Ithaca" follows dungeoneers of the trash stratum (note another Weird Studies reference) in a quest for hidden genius, the type of intellect so profound that it is completely unrecognized by geniuses of the second order. You can probably see where this is going . . . or isn't going. Come read a tale of genius eternally undiscovered.

"Toi" outlines the logical impossibility of writing a book about the reader and an author's (failed) attempt to write the impossible. It is the weakest piece in this collection and yet, compelling.

"Being, Inc." presents the impossibility of each person on Earth selecting their fate, down to the fine details, from a catalog administered by corporations that arrange events such that everyone, eventually, has their desires arranged for and met. Of course, things get complicated when one considers capitalist competition in such an economy. One wonders where Lem, who lived through communism and the Solidarity movement in Poland, might fall in his preferences of economic systems. I suspect it was a bit of a sliding scale for him.

I think, in "Die Kultur als Fehler," the critic convinces himself, over the course of the review, that the author of the book is completely correct, which is the exact opposite of what the reviewer implies at the beginning. We see what seems to start as the opening of a Hegelian dialectic, but straightaway jumps to the opposite conclusion, leaving Hegel (and all supporters of "Civilization") behind. I'm reminded of a skeptic on youtube recently flipping his opinion about whether or not the moon was . . . brace for it . . . an artificially-constructed celestial object.

Right at the crossroads of philosophy and physics, "De Impossibilitate Vitae and De Impossibilitate Prognoscendi" examines the intersection and collision of probability theory and existentialism. What is the likelihood that you, as an individual different from all other individuals, exist at all? It's a rich question and Lem tackles it with a great deal of understated humor. You really are amazing!

. . . and so, but for the diarrhea of the mammoths, Professor Benedykt Kouska also would have not come into the world.

I can't understand why people were giving me weird looks for laughing out loud while I was reading this.

In "Non Serviam" Lem asks "the big questions" about life, morality, faith, existence, and God. He does this by positing what would happen, in terms of philosophical discourse, among virtual beings created by humans wielding computers with sufficient programming ability that the programmers become, effectively, gods. It's a compelling read, to say the least. I strongly suspect that the Brothers Quay were influenced by this story (they began their careers in Lem's native Poland, after all), and one cannot avoid comparing this work with the works of Philip K. Dick.

As for the concluding review/story, "The New Cosmogeny," I'll leave you to the Weird Studies examination of the same story. They explore it in much more depth and with more erudite insights than I can provide. Hopefully their analysis will also drive you to read A Perfect Vacuum.

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Vouchsafe Incarnadine

 Subtitles in a book are often, at best, unhelpful, and at worst, misleading. But the subtitle of Douglas Thompson's Vouchsafe Carnadine, "A Metaphysical Thriller" hits the nail on the head. Leaving the genre identity aside, I will vouch for Thompson's ability to craft believable dialogue that leads the reader to understand the depths of his well-defined characters. The three-headed protagonist of the story, Raymond Tierny, a brilliant scientist recently deceased, Maria, his lover who receives his letters in spite of his death, as if beyond the grave, and Helen Tierny, Raymond's jilted, but beautiful and brilliant wife, is . . . are . . . a sort of organism of complex connections, as one can imagine from a bizarre love triangle. 

Thompson's writing is "clean". There's no purple prose, no alliteration, no fanciness. And, though I do normally prefer some poeticism in my prose, this works out just fine. The story itself is strange enough that the clarity of writing here helps things along, allowing the reader to focus on the action and, more importantly, the philosophical implications of of the ongoing epistolary exchanges between Maria and the dead Raymond. 

At it's heart, Vouchsafe Carnadine is a love story, but an incredibly strange love story wrapped on the bones of a thriller. The heard of the story, however, has to do with the metaphysical propositions of what is possible with quantum physics. So, as I hinted at earlier, this story is anything but straightforward. But it is, after all of its emotional and investigative twists and turns, rewarding. 

Of course, the artwork is gorgeous. This is, after all, a Mount Abraxas book! Spendy? Yes. Worth it? Also yes.

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Dhalgren

 

Dhalgren by Samuel R. Delany
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The older I grow, the more I realize that my childhood might have been exceptional. Not exceptionally good, mind you, just an exception to what the "normal" American child experiences. I was raised as an Air Force brat. Born in Germany, lived in The Philippines, Italy, England, and all over the US (Texas, Minnesota, Nebraska, Wyoming). Since the commencement of "adulting," I've lived in Pennsylvania, California, Utah, and Wisconsin. This shiftiness, especially in the first eighteen years of life, led to forming and cutting friendships and love in rapid order. I have no idea what it's like to have a "hometown". That just doesn't exist for me. I keep contact with a select few people I knew as a child. And even though I've lived in Wisconsin for nearly thirty years now, I still feel like a wanderer on this planet.

In all these journeyings, I've come to appreciate places for their unique mood, style, atmosphere, amusements, and shortcomings. When I visit a new place, I like to soak up the ambience and get to know the place. Cities, in particular, have personalities, I've found. My favorites are Oxford (UK), Vienna (Austria), and Madison, Wisconsin (US).

I've also met some strange characters in my life's wanderings. When I was young, I had more time and freedom to get to know individuals who lived out of the mainstream of society. Freaks, geeks, punks, goths, metalheads, gangsters, ex-soldiers, mystics, chronic alcoholics and drug abusers, the chronically mentaly ill, the homeless, other wanderers. The list can go on and on. I find humans endlessly fascinating and endlessly frustrating. I have a love/hate relationship with the human race. For the record: mostly, I love 'em!

I find that my experiences have everything to do with Dhalgren. Everything.

I'll be honest, I was shocked at how much I related to many of the characters in this book. Because I knew them. Some I still know. I won't name names, but the carnival of personalities in this work are almost all people I've met. It's an ugly bunch, with a lot of deviance from social norms. These are "my people".

But the real main character in this story is not the protagonist, who has forgotten his name and is simply called Kid throughout. The main charachter in this story is the city, Bellona.

Like any city, this work of psychogeographical semi-apocalyptic fiction is not particularly "linear". In fact, the last section's typeset is intentionally non-linear, with "asides" that contrast sharply with the other text in its immediate vicinity, a choppy fluidity between space and time-lines, and an aggressively experimental layout. Much like a city. In fact, I'd say this is one of the greatest works of psychogeography I've read to date.

And why "semi-apocalyptic"? Before I answer, let me point out that my Dad, an avid and voracious reader of science fiction (I owe that addiction to him), had this book on his bedside shelf for many months. I don't know if he ever finished it, but it eventually disappeared some time in the early '80s. So when I began the book, I was expecting all the regular tropes of science fiction, but something of a higher intellectual train than the pulps. Well, I was altogether wrong. Dhalgren is a semi-apocalyptic work, a story set in a city that has become a sort of pocket dimension, it's own entity, while still existing in a decidedly non-apocalyptic America. It's a place that time and space didn't forget, really, but a place that time and space set aside for its own little apocalypse. Something like "The Zone" in Roadside Picnic, or like what happened to the planet of Tekumel in the Empire of the Petal Throne universe.

In Bellona, things have become . . . disordered. Imagine that the late '60s and early '70s never ended, but that law and order were simply absent. It's not utter chaos - people still gather in groups, some in communes, some in gangs, some in ultra-luxurious compounds, some in . . . utter denial of the situation they are in (they try to maintain a "normal" lifestyle, despite the crumbling city and social order). Yes, there is violence, but there is also love and loyalty. As Depeche Mode used to say "People are People". And so it is in Bellona.

But Bellona is a jealous city. It doesn't let go so easily that one just walks away. Something undefined and strange compels many people to stay, though some do "escape" . . . if they avoid the forces that have been put in place to contain the decay of the city from escaping into the rest of the world. Well, it's not so mystical as it sounds, but as in many cities, people find it difficult, sometimes impossible (because of ideology, economics, or relationships) to leave.

Is the city alive? Maybe, maybe not.

Are the people who enter it under some kind of geas that doesn't allow them to leave? Possibly.

Will everyon who reads this work enjoy it? I doubt it.

Is Dhalgren a great work of experimental science fiction? Absolutely.

I'm glad I journeyed there. Though it was rough going, at times. Very rough going. I myself was, for a time, trapped against my will. But, as with many of the places I've seen in my life, I would return, if only for a visit.

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