When I review this work, my thoughts will appear in the comment stream below….
DES LEWIS GESTALT REAL-TIME REVIEWS – established 2008
A Constructive Congeries of the Conceits, Coincidences and Cross-References of Fiction — Please use the Search Box and ‘Navigation & Backstory’ link in the top pinned post.
FRAGILE DREAMS
“The receptionist had sucked-in bronze cheeks bookending glossy lips that made Matthew think of two fat babies lying back to back, red as blood.”
Don’t expect me to say anything about this novella. Other than what it says on the blurb, that is. Even though I know that gives you no clue as to what it is about. And if I tell you what it is about, and the characters in Matthew the protagonist’s backstory, past dreams, present dreams, his current parlous state, you will realise how fragile such a re-telling can be and how my words will root right back to to the beginning and cause what happened in the first place. As if like Robbie, who was to be a writer, was writing it from scratch? And others (Matthew’s grandfather, parents, wife, the other Robbie, even Dee) will start fiddling at the edges to adjust the story. Fiddling first at Matthew’s toes then working towards the head, as I did as a child when trying to go to sleep. To put some colour back into sky, or squeeze my eyes to see floaters as pinprick stars or other shapes moving into focus…?
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“Many of the words were hard to make out, but once he got a feel for the author’s form, the words cleared, came into focus:”
“You are just that to me. A wonderful idea I had upon waking. An idea I will realize fully once aware, best left to a dream.”
“He touched his eyes with his fingers and felt their I’mreal solidity.”
“the world slipping into a cone of muffled quiet.”
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That Cone Zero.
DEATH, MY OLD FRIEND
It’s a spoiler in itself to reveal with this review that there is a bonus track at the end in the shape of this story. Because otherwise, before you reached it, you might have thought the preceding novella was longer than you hoped, expected or dreaded it to be. A bit like Death?
A moving story, with Death’s own bonus track, as it happens.
“who I used to play lawn darts with, and who’d once put one right through my foot”