I’ve heard John Kessel’s name a few times, and read a few of his stories that have appeared in anthologies, but I’ve never made an effort to read his work before. Small Beer Press released this collection of some of his short stories last month, and licensed them under a Creative Commons license. Smart move, methinks. It got me to download the PDF of the book and read it. Color me impressed with the work.
The theme of the stories in the book is that most of them are responses or homage to other works of fiction, most of which I am not familiar with. The opening story takes on Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz, while some in the middle are responses to science fiction works, to the last story which combines Pride and Prejudice with Frankenstein. I liked almost everything in the collection, with the exceptions being several of the more experimental stories toward the end.
Worth purchasing I think, and definitely worth downloading.
- The Baum Plan for Financial Independence
- Well, this collection is off to a great start! Dot (a.k.a. Dorothy) worked for a rich family which owns a summer cottage in the woods. She and Sid plan to break into this summer cottage where Dot believes the family has left $10,000. They get to the house all right, but can’t find the safe. What they do find is a secret door and stairwell down to a subway station. I’m probably missing a lot of the layers of this story. But I just love the suspicious bewilderment Sid adopts, as well as the nonchalant attitude from the people they meet.
- Every Angel Is Terrifying
- That’s one helluva cat! This one follows an escaped criminal and his cat. I can’t write how good this story without giving any of it away. Read this!
- The Red Phone
- Not deep, but pretty cute. A quick riff on the idea of executives who have their help make their phone calls for them. In this case, they are doing this with phone sex. And the best part is the help embellishes the calls and makes them so much better.
I double your investment, going short on Euros in the international currency markets while shaving your balls with a priceless ancient bronze Phonecian razor of cunning design.
- The Invisible Empire
- A story of a night of one of the female vigilance societies in the 1800s. Alternative history. Also a very inventive story like the previous three. Four for four so far!
- The Juniper Tree
- Here’s the setup: Jack, estranged from his ex-wife Helen, steals his daughter Roz away (she wants to go) to a new colony on the moon. The colony of
Cousins
is matriarchal, as well as sexually open. The idea of the social experiment is similar to that of female-only education; without men in charge, the dependency girls feel will be broken and can achieve their full destiny. However, the story isn’t really about the social experiment so much as the personal relationship between Jack and the two women in his life, Roz and Eva. Jack has a really hard time adjusting to the different mores of the colony. I’m having a hard time putting into words just how messed up he is. Suffice to say I think he would need medication even if he in a place he found normal. Actually, his history indicates he did have problems there too. He can’t let go of Roz as she grows up, and he can’t even have a conversation about her without losing his cool. Good story. - Stories for Men
- There’s a lot going on in this story set in the same Cousins lunar colony as the previous story. It’s mostly the story of Erno and a provocateur who goes by Tyler Durden. Obviously there is a connection between Fight Club and this story. Erno is a young male who has a lot of anger and grievances against the colony which oppresses his sex. Tyler impresses on young Erno the male ethos as coming from the 20th century. Tyler Durden without the anti-corporate message, but continuing the non-conformity. Tyler would bring down the Cousins. Several views of sex roles came to my mind when I read the story. One is that there is little difference between men and women; our roles are primarily cultural. Put women in charge and you could easily just have a reversal of roles. The women in this story certainly do not behave ideally when in charge. This could also be viewed as a story turning the tables on men from the current situation in the U.S., and how would we feel. Show men being objectified in a non-positive way and see if male readers might have an emotional reaction. I certainly did. And a third look is that men are denying their basic nature when they subsume the macho. If we don’t indulge ourselves, we lose something essential (but also destructive too). If nothing else, the story will make you think.
- Under the Lunchbox Tree
- The two previous stories looked at the Cousins society from the perspective of men. This one looks at it from the perspective of a girl, Mira. She’s sent off to a summer camp, becomes homesick and doesn’t like the other girls (boys don’t get to go to camp). She escapes by social engineering one of the older male servants at the camp. In other words, she gives him a sob story that’s a complete lie and he agrees to take her home. Of course, it doesn’t take long for Mira to be missed and her escape is thwarted, putting her pawn in jeopardy. There’s a little but of exposure of female to female relationships. Mira also has a small epiphany about how her brother is treated differently.
- Sunlight or Rock
- Now Kessel returns to the story of Erno in exile (his punishment for his transgressions in
Stories for Men
) in a non-Cousins lunar colony. Surprisingly, it doesn’t deal too much with Erno’s adjustment to a non-female run culture. A little bit, but not much. Destitute, Erno attempts a big gambling score by hawking everything of value at a pawnshop. - The Snake Girl
- This is a non-genre story. Ben is an awkward lad in college, starting his experimentation with drugs and other forms of slackery. Linda takes a liking to Ben, and initiates a relationship. But to her, it’s just a college fling. Ben makes a fairly common mistake though and thinks his first love is forever, but is devastated when it isn’t. Also, Linda owns a snake. The story didn’t seem particularly original, but I still really liked it. Sometimes it’s just nice to put yourself in someone else’s shoes for a bit, and it’s easy to do that with Ben.
- It’s All True
- I’ve read other stories where people from the future travel to their past (i.e., around now) and snatch people to use their genius in the future. I’m pretty sure I’ve even read one about abducting Hollywood people to make movies. But I can’t recall any of them that make the characters as interesting as Kessel does. I’m in the home stretch of this collection, and I’ve liked every single story (though some more than others). This one is about a blackballed talent scout who gets another chance to land Orson Welles for the future, something that no one else has been able to do.
- The Last American
- This story is a
review
of a biography of the future last president of the United States, Andrew Steele. I guess I shouldn’t have written so soon, as I thought this story was pretty blah. Though Kessel probably meant it to be more than speculation on how the United States and it’s culture would end, that’s all that came across to me. And that’s not a topic I usually find all that interesting. - Downtown
- I didn’t get this one at all. I have no clue what to write about it. It’s short. Definitely short.
- Powerless
- I didn’t completely dislike this story. Parts I liked. Parts I didn’t. Part a story of a guy trying to invent a Foucault engine, powered by the rotation of he earth. Part ruminations on the Foucault’s (the other Foucault) philosophy of power. A couple other parts thrown in. Some essay style. Some third person. Some second person. Just wasn’t my style.
- Pride and Prometheus
- I’ve always assumed I wouldn’t really like Pride and Prejudice and so I’ve never read it. Although it is good social commentary from what I’ve read, I’ve thought it would be too subtle for me to appreciate and I would get bored with the language and lack of action. I could be completely misinformed on the contents of the book though. Here, Kessel combines Jane Austen’s work with Frankenstein, with Dr. Frankenstein traveling the English countryside. It’s kind of slow at the beginning, and I had a hard time keeping my interest up. But toward the end when the action picks up and the two novels are pushed together to expose a common theme, then things got interesting. I liked it.
Title: The Baum plan for financial independence and other stories
Author: John Kessel
Cover creator: Nathan Huang (artist)
Imprint / publisher: Small Beer Press
Format: E-book
Length: 316 p.
Publication date: April 2008
ISBN-13: 978-1-931520-50-8
LC classification: PS3561.E6675B38 2008
