Aberrant Dreams, April 2008

Four new stories and four new poems are offered in the current online issue of Aberrant Dreams, updated mid-April. Additional new material includes a review by Ernest G. Saylor of The Prefect, a novel by Alastair Reynolds, and a “Myles Cabot Presents” interview with Michael Swanwick, author of the Nebula award-winning novel, Stations of the Tide.

“Mr. Templar” by Jason Sizemore tops the table of contents and is a good, old-fashioned robot tale, with an alien twist. Humanity has fled, all biological life has since died out, and in this endless post-holocaust nuclear winter, androids roam the planet in search of energy to maintain their existence. When they chance upon each other in the desert wasteland, it’s usually a fight to the finish, with the loser’s power source as the reward. So it’s with skepticism and grave reservation that Mr. Templar, one of the last remaining androids on Earth, agrees to assist a dying robot who claims that humans—with fuel—have returned from space to save them and are orbiting the planet even now. Are Mr. Templar’s misgivings with or without merit? The author does a fairly good job introducing characters, planting clues, and creating a little suspense in this sci-fi mystery, but the resolution lacked the punch I was looking for. The conclusion was probably a bigger letdown for Mr. Templar, however, who had his hopes pinned to that promise of reuniting with his human masters.

An oddball zombie tale, “Things That Go…” by C. Vincent Pritt starts off with some creepy happenings, then gets a little silly, and ends up in a confusing turn of events that made me wonder who the real monster was. While the concept is a good one (a mysterious gardener shows up late at night every Saturday to mow the lawn and trim the hedges), the weekly ritual goes on for too long without any resolution. Finally, our protagonist goes crazy and decides to confront the zombie. But even then, the reader is left wondering what’s going on, with no context or motivation for the surprise appearances. The mystery remains unsolved, and so the story simply limps along until it ends.

Bruce Golden’s “I Found Love on Channel Three” is another story that doesn’t go anywhere. It’s actually more of an exercise in anime erotica and probably should have found a home in a venue that caters to that genre. The first person narrative is reminiscent of a high school boy’s diary entry, which was probably intentional, but didn’t make for very compelling reading—unless you’re into that type of, er, fantasy. The writing felt sophomoric, and, although the idea of having a TV character step into the real world had potential, the how and why of it are never fully explored. The lack of a compelling crisis and resolution left me wondering at the end if indeed, in the words of the storyteller, it wasn’t all just “one man’s perverted fantasy.”

“The Toy Car” by Luisa María García Velasco (translated from Spanish by Ian Watson) is a quaint, modern day “sequel” to the Pinocchio tale and captures the whimsical yearnings for childhood lost. It’s a sad yet hopeful story that treats the reader to some familiar characters without going overboard or becoming too self-conscious. A couple of writing flubs, but I wasn’t sure if that was due to the translation or whether the original word choice wouldn’t have worked in either language. Overall, a light, sentimental piece that serves as a nice addition to this issue’s eclectic selection.

Of the four poems in this issue—“My Kids Went to Barbados (and All I Got Was this Lousy Bottle of Rum)” by F. J. Bergmann, “Briar Witches” by Amal El-Mohtar and Jessica P. Wick, “a 24th century reflection on emptiness” by Kit O’Connell, and “Table Manners” by Mary Cook—I enjoyed “Table Manners” the best as it seemed to do better than the others at holding the whimsical and the creepy together in a nice balance. Of all the new material posted in April at Aberrant Dreams, only the first story really stood out, and I think the issue as a whole suffered from a lack of cohesion. Still, some fairly entertaining material if you have a lunch break or two available.