Deathbird Stories is back! In Part 3, the short stories in this include:
The Face of Helene Bournouw
Bleeding Stones
At the Mouse Circus
The Place with No Name
Paingod
I go over some background on The Face of Helene Bournouw (that it was made into a TV episode of Showcases’s The Hunger, and how Harlan Ellison used his famous pseudoname.)
In this book, I’d say the most controversial story is Bleeding Stones. I don’t know exactly what Harlan is trying to say. But if you look at it from a persepctive of an environmentalist, the idea of a bunch of gargoyles coming down and killing all humans in a city might seem pretty normal. Hard to say.
At the Mouse Circus…what to say. Everytime you read it, you get something strange and weird out of it. It’s such a mix of crazy ideas, breaks so many rules. It’s truly a James Joyceian-Finnegan’s Wake sort of experience. Only much more consumable, since it’s only a short story.
A Place with No Name is one of those weird as hell, and definitely, something only Harlan could come up with. Definitely the better of the weirder ones.
Paingod continues to be one of my favorite from the anthology. It’s just good science fiction, with excellent clarity.
Or right below:
See the previous entry in the series.
Check out Deathbird Stories on Amazon.
