Recently Read: The American Zig-Zag, Volume Two

 

The second (and I'm hoping not the last) of author Van Reid's short story collections again features whimsical and entertaining tales taking place in various American locales during the 19th century. "The Windmill" features a cantankerous but well-meaning Geology Professor and a trio of unusual women he meets in a countryside. "Mr. Seabury's Grove" is a lovely tale of a young lady and a "hobo" she encounters camping on her family's prodigious grounds. Amidst poems, epigrams and letters, you'll meet characters reprising their roles from the previous volume, including Chicago cop on the beat Thomas Borum O'Toole and Fustianne Mae and her fascinating family in chapters of "The Ongoing Tale" (and I trust it will someday go on). Reid's prose is delightful, wry, observant and revealing, reminiscent of the ways Charles Dickens brought his characters and environments to life. (Some of "The Ongoing Tale" may bring to mind the work of P.G. Wodehouse.) Illustrating the book is the work of nearly a dozen artists (disclaimer: I'm among them), topped off by Jeff Suntala's stunning wraparound cover design. I highly recommend this volume.

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Recently Read: Detective Dandy: Bump in the Night, by Jordan Kirian

If you enjoy Agatha Christie's Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, Jeff Rice's Kolchak: The Night Stalker or Chris Carter's The X-Files, you'll love Jordan Kirian's Detective Dandy series. A collection of short stories, Bump in the Night features the aging Dandy going up against vampires, swamp creatures, mummies and, in one of the best stories of the bunch, a drawing room mystery: a werewolf. The stories are fun, concise and suspenseful. I now want to read an entire Detective Dandy novel - and see the movie.

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Recently Read: All the Sad Young Men, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Cambridge Edition of F. Scott Fitzgerald's third collection of short stories (originally published in 1926) contains eleven additional short stories, all written within the same time period as the original collection. The editor, James L.W. West III, moreover, presents the original, uncensored versions of stories toned down by magazines like The Saturday Evening Post for their mainstream readers.

Though written at a time of emotional, marital and financial troubles, this is by far the most accomplished and adult short story collection Fitzgerald had yet written. There's a broad range of subject matter and scenarios in the book, but a connective, thematic throughline of middle-aged, married, adult concerns, with a clarity of objectivity that comes from lived experience impossible in his earliest works - making the collection a joy to read from beginning to end.

If you should decide to read All the Sad Young Men, I suggest this edition. It includes historical, explanatory notes, illustrations of historical events stories allude to, and detailed listings of changes made for magazine publication.

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Recently Read: Dancing with the Squirrels: Tales from Comics Fandom and Beyond, by Dwight Decker

 

Dancing is a unique short story collection: fan fiction written about comics fans and fandom. If this sounds too insular and circular, fear not. Dwight Decker's stories (in some cases, I suspect, loosely based or inspired by events and observations in his own life) are a joy to read. Created over many decades, but with a cohesive tone (and sometimes with connective chronologies), the stories range from fantastical and whimsical to poignant.

Especially entertaining is the roundabout story of a comic book collection built during WWII and the winding ways this collection, its owner, and its would-be destroyer, end up affecting and influencing comic book collectors and friends decades later. These good-natured tales will especially ring true to anyone who collected comics and was a part of fandom in the '60s and '70s, but all can enjoy.

The collection also features a chapter on the king of fan stories about fandom, author John Stockman (whose work Decker partially collected in the excellent and highly recommended book The Crackpot, in 2015) and a short history of comics fandom.

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Recently Read: The American Zig-Zag Volume One

 

This short story collection, lovingly created in the tradition of early 20th century magazines like Argosy and The Blue Book, showcases author Van Reid's skills at bringing to life far flung places (the "zig-zag" of the title), people and events. The tone of the stories - a seaman's tall tale, a serious and suspenseful western, a policeman's unexpected adventure, to name but a few - vary widely, but have in common a profound love of humanity in all its forms and a subtle, wry wit. With a beautifully descriptive writing style and memorably sharp observations on human nature, this volume makes a fine addition to the library of those readers already a fan of Reid's Moosepath League novels.

Published in 2010, The American Zig-Zag was followed by one more volume (due to be reviewed here). The book is liberally illustrated (and I should mention in all fairness that I illustrated the western tale, "Mrs. Pynchon's Prerogatives"), and includes many amusing asides, diversions and off-trail observations. The volume concludes with a gorgeously written beginning of a serialized story, stirring the appetite of those readers who will want to pursue more Zig-Zag and the writings of Van Reid. 

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Recently Read: Argosy Magazine, March 2nd, 1918

This issue is the fourth 1918 Argosy I've read consecutively (starting with Feb. 9th), and it's an all-around entertaining issue. The serialized novel begun in the issue is "To Make or Break", a sea-faring tale by Captain Aylward Edward "A.E." Dingle. A life- long adventurer and pulp writer, Dingle knew the sea well. His tale involves a crusty old ex-con assigned to test the bravery of the son of his previous love. Will the lad turn out good, like his mum, or evil like his dad? Guess.

Published as a whole is Frank A. Russell's "Game and Rubber", a match of wits between
a Mexican guerilla and celebrity/occassional detective Ronnie Campbell. "Game and Rubber" refers to an earlier Campbell story. I don't know where that one was published, but a future Campbell story appears in the June 22nd, 1918 Argosy.

Actor, performer, conservationist and all-around teacher and entertainer Chief Henry Red Eagle contributes a revenge story set on a Missiquoi reservation. A good tale, but could have been fleshed out more (it "tells" when it needed to "show"). It's the second story in the issue in which a doctor is accused of deliberately botching an operation.

George M. A. Cain's "His Maid of the Northland" continues, a story of love and murder in 
an Alaskan mining town. It's suspenseful - I want to know what happens next - and is 
noteworthy in that it expresses and shares the viewpoints of all three main characters 
in its love triangle. 

Part III of Lenivers Carew's "A Kashmir Abduction" is equal parts comedy and suspense.
Rex Parson's rugged terrain love story "All Man" ends in this issue.

The rest of the short stories are fairly predictable crowd pleasers. I'd like to learn more about Madeleine Sharps Buchanan, who apparently wrote a series of '20s detective novels. Her "As the Snow Fell" is funny and droll, ruined by the last two unbelievable paragraphs. The story was geared up for a twist ending which should have happened, but didn't.

Also noteworthy: an editorial request from Franklin Roosevelt, then Assistant Secretary 
of the Navy, for binoculars, spy-glasses and telescopes from citizens, to be sent to the 
Navy for the rental cost of one dollar (or, purchase cost if the items could't be returned 
after the end of WWI).

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Recently Read: Flappers and Philosophers, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Like most any short story collection, the quality of Flappers and Philosophers is hit and miss. It must be taken into account that most of these stories, published in book form in 1920, were written for and/or published in The Saturday Evening Post, and so were tailored and fashioned to appeal to that market and meet one strict goal: to sell and generate income. Within those boundaries, though, this collection contains some fine and experimental writing, creating works more coherent and consistent than most of Fitzgerald's novels.

Not having read Fitzgerald short stories before, I was surprised by the variety of subject matter and tone in the book. Two stories, Benediction and The Cut-Glass Bowl, reveal that Fitzgerald could have made a career writing the sort of supernatural-tinged psychological dramas published in Weird Tales magazine (which began being published in 1923). The Cut-Glass Bowl, in particular, is like Douglas Sirk meets H.P. Lovecraft.

The Ice Palace and Bernice Bobs Her Hair are two of the strongest stories; both have been filmed and hold up strongly after ninety years. The Ice Palace has a very strong sense of place and atmosphere.

Other stories are of lesser quality. The Offshore Pirate (also filmed) seemed too manipulative and also suffered from casual racism. Head and Shoulders is a whimsical one-note twister which failed to win me.

Knowing a bit of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald's lives, I found much of the material autobiographical in a real raw, exposed way: the visit to the Confederate graveyard, the fiancee's visit up North, the reversal of roles in Head and Shoulders...these events and many more nearly took me "out of the story" as they so clearly mirror the Fitzgeralds' actions and feelings (to be fair, the novels function the same way). What my reaction to the fiction would be if I wasn't aware of those correlations, I can't say.

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