Christopher Conlon’s Reviews > Horrible Imaginings > Status Update

I've read a bunch of the stories in this one but never quite finished the book. I really enjoy Leiber. Even his minor stories I usually find entertaining.

Leiber doesn’t always click with me, but when he does he’s great. In the past year I really enjoyed “The Pale Brown Thing” (later expanded to “Our Lady of Darkness,” but less effective—for me—at the greater length), and “The Big Time.”

Have a friend who I loaned Conjure Wife and Our Lady of Darkness. He liked Conjure Wife much more. When I reread OLoD, I could see why, even though I still liked it. One thing I found dissonant, the narrator is said to be in his 40s, but I kept thinking of him as older. I'm still not sure if that's just me, or if there's something in Leiber's writing that pushed me in that direction. Maybe it was just awareness of Leiber's age at the time.

Not just you—I had the exact same issue (with both versions). It doesn’t help that Leiber seems to have shaved the years off in order to make the character’s casual affair with his neighbor, who I believe is in her 30s, more believable. Unfortunately it’s still not believable. The novella “Horrible Imaginings,” which I read yesterday, is set in very much the same kind of world, with the same kind of character, but I found it excellent—strange but excellent.

Interesting. Seems like that generation of writers -- thinking chiefly of Heinlein -- once they realized they could address sex more directly in their work, didn't do so gracefully.