ChiZine #35, January-March

After reviewing issue #34 of ChiZine, I didn’t find issue #35 nearly as impressive. Still, ChiZine certainly seems aimed in a direction I’m very fond of: intelligent, interesting substance delivered with down-to-earth storytelling and more than a hint of darkness. Whether or not each individual story lives up to that is a different matter, but the mere existence of this goal helps this reviewer delve into each new story with a real sense of anticipation.

In this issue, A. C. Wise offers us “Matthew,” where Rana finds her friend’s dead husband at her doorstep, whispering her name.

“She hadn’t thought of him until he died. She hadn’t loved him until he had returned.”

That line just about sums up the story. Not that nothing else happens; there are plenty of events, but they are mere detail, going nowhere and adding nothing. The main thrust seems to be the sequence of Rana’s emotions towards Matthew, as arbitrarily decreed by the author—as there is little substance to back them up, giving no opportunity for the reader to identify with the protagonist and making no attempt to portray the romance as plausible, natural, or likely. Nor is this a character-driven story: neither Rana nor Matthew have any personality beyond their attraction to each other. They’ve got no past, no memories, no life. The lack of any unique characterization makes the romance all the more difficult to swallow.

This reviewer was also vexed by the constant repetition of questions the story makes no attempt at answering—most notably, why the dead are returning and why Matthew returns specifically to Rana—and by the peculiar decision to make Matthew only one instance of a widespread phenomenon of living dead, a development which makes no positive contribution to the whole but does serve to distract from the main narrative and to let another couple of loose threads out to dangle pointlessly. All in all, I’m afraid “Matthew” expects a lot from the reader and gives very little in return.

“The Mystery of the Missing Puskat” by Lavie Tidhar is somewhat confusing and not entirely focused. Densley, a child in Vanuatu besotted with American detective stories, “takes on a case” when he finds his cousin crying, her cat missing. We follow Densley in his investigations through the village, during which he touches upon complexities of harsh reality that his detective games aren’t really much help in solving. (In many ways, this reviewer found “The Missing Puskat” reminiscent of Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time; though, thankfully, Tidhar didn’t feel it necessary, as Haddon did, to belabor the theme over an entire novel.)

The difficulty I had with this story is that it did very little to draw me in, and only towards the end did I begin to get a glimmer of why it was being told. Upon reaching the end, I could reread and freshly appreciate the earlier scenes. But to get there to begin with (if you’ll pardon the turn of phrase), I had to wade through a childish case with few clues and little direction undertaken by an annoying protagonist in a setting described only enough to feel confusingly unfamiliar. If you’re inclined to forgive all that long enough to read the story, and then are willing to plunge in again, then the second time around, the plot’s significance is clearer. Densley’s character is only at the beginning of its path, and you’ll be comfortable enough with the setting for it not to distract you. Alack, your reward for the first wade and the reread is a short, solid, yet hardly outstanding coming-of-age story, which is not necessarily worth the effort.

“Dust and Bibles” by Michael Colangelo is a much more accessible story. Post-U.S.A. Nevada desert is a violent, lawless land, where a man survives and profits by having the biggest truck on the road. The story describes a single clash between a few of the dangerous characters in this dangerous landscape. Most of its substance is interesting, colorful dialogue and rapid action. But what really gives “Dust and Bibles” its backbone, in this reviewer’s opinion, are a few lines about the setting’s past and future. The immediate plot is not exceptional (nor is it meant to be), and the background of the milieu is mostly hinted at, but those few lines, in a sudden flash, show us that these characters are very much created by the milieu they are living in. We gain a new understanding of the violence and the harshness that the story spends so much of its time portraying, and the entire story takes on a fresh significance.

“Dust and Bibles” isn’t flawless. The setting is left mostly in the dark (allowing the story to achieve that effect I liked so much, but it’s still annoying), the plot is (knowingly) a mere MacGuffin, and there’s a groaner twist midway. Still, the whole is very enjoyable, and if Mr. Colangelo happens to write further stories in this setting, or has written such already, one assumes they would much alleviate these issues, and this reviewer would be gratified to read them.

Ziv’s Final Tally:
Stories: 3
Figures From The Past making a Surprising Return: 3
Guns: .357, .38, burau wood
Stories Whose Mysteries Are Solved: 1
Stories Whose Mysteries Are Left Unsolved: 1
Stories Whose Mysteries Are Not Given A Damn About: 1