Reviews: Man Struggling With Umbrella (2)

“Somebody put a blindfold on me and gave me acid” by Bethany Myers

That's what this book is like. Half the time something's happening to somebody but you don't know what it is or why it's happening, and the rest of the time nothing seems to be happening at all. At least not in the real world. A lot of "the action" takes place in dreams, or in fiction within fiction. When reality of a sort does bite it bites hard. The author appears to have done his fair share of suffering and living in general and his work is very difficult to pin down to any kind of movement or genre. There's a lot to be said for that in these times of micro-pigeonholing.

This really is very internal. It's about alienation. It's Kafkaesque. It's like the surviving pieces of some amazing, mysterious artefact that got broken. Sounds weird, and it is weird, but don't knock it till you've tried it. Plenty more of this in the pipeline apparently and I for one am intrigued to see where it goes next. I have a need to make what I've experienced here make more sense.

What's it about? Well, reincarnation, I suppose.

And fate.

And love.



*************



“Not "easy" but well worth the effort" by Ben Jameson

This is a real mixed bag containing some absolute gems. Not everybody is going to be 100% happy with all of them, but as Forrest Gump once said...."Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get". That was never more true than here.

You need to think of this like a meal on a plate. If you like your ingredients all kept separate with shiny white plate showing between them you might find this a little difficult to deal with. This is more like a hash or a stir fry. Or is it? Actually I'm not sure. Maybe I meant that to be the other way round? This is an anthology. But it also isn't. It's elusive, evasive, deceptive, ambiguous, allegorical, enigmatic, almost dreamlike in nature. Put together with great care and attention to detail. Occasionally awe-inspiring, and I don't say that lightly. I loved it.

I suppose everyone will have their favourite piece. I think mine is "Sirens".

The last two are companion pieces. "The Protected Area" and "Seen But Not Seen" could and should be made into a TV series. "Game Of Thrones" eat your heart out. Another TV series could probably be made out of "Killing Time On The Other Side" - it's very VERY different.