Lynda E. Rucker

This is a pretty good anthology of strange tales about obsession. There are two brilliant stories, a few good ones, and one absolute piece of bullshit.

The two best stories are Calligraphy by James Everington and This Many by S.P. Miskowski, the latter being one of the most chilling ghost stories I've read in awhile.

Unfortunately I feel compelled to deal with the piece of crap. Each author writes a little piece about their obsession after each story. One of these, longer than the story itself, is a self serving piece of rubbish. If you want to include a suicide note with your story, fine, but the editors should have rejected it. The author proceeds to name check about a dozen famous literary suicides while lampshading his own paltry contribution to the literary canon and recounting his own experiences with stepping off the pier. The piece is complete with footnotes (!) going so far as to quote famous Roman suicide (he was probably compelled to do it, not by choice) Petronius Arbiter. At least the story that accompanied this diatribe was good.

Suicide is mental illness not heroism. Unfortunately and tragically it seems that some of those who plumb the depths are also our greatest artists, however the vast majority are just like the rest of us. Mental illness does not a genius make. The fact that it is a great career move for some artists is a reflection on those of us that are left, not the artists themselves.… (meer)

Having had no familiarity nor prior experience with Lynda E Rucker, I purchased this book on the strength of its publisher. I put a lot of stock in the work that Brian J Showers chooses to publish on his Swan River Press imprint so 'blind purchases' like this are not uncommon for me where he is concerned. I've always been pleased with the results.

But never, so far as I recall, quite so pleased as I was with this collection. I'm a fan of ghost stories as a general rule. It doesn't take much to get me to enjoy them. But the tales assembled here are a cut above much of what I read and I find myself yearning to have discovered Ms. Rucker's work years ago just so that I could have enjoyed it for even longer.

Rucker's voice in these stories is a mournful one. Despite a sort of ethereal beauty that resonates from the jacket art to the text in these yarns, the tales are fraught with bitterness, resentment, confusion, alienation, isolation, and a terrible sense of loneliness. Not inappropriate, given the context, of course. Restless spirits and malevolent hauntings rarely find much truck with happy, stable, self-confidant folk of stalwart heart. No, each and every POV in these chilling little vignettes is there for a reason. And, often as not, that reason is a deep-seeded sense of brokenness or, in the least, a close attachment to a broken loved one.

But this sort of melancholy and sense of displacement fit the theme of the work perfectly. The characters are earnest and well-constructed and easy to get attached to, almost surprisingly so, given the brevity of some if the stories. But the sorrow and hopefulness (all too often abandoned for its antithesis) in each of their breaths is palpable and you inevitably find yourself sharing their various dooms.

Despite the strength of Rucker's individual voice, the profound influence of several past masters is clearly evident all across the work. Some of these were elucidated upon in her closing remarks at the end of the book, so it is possible that I am seeing influences that weren't actually there. But I felt them nonetheless, both ones she mentioned and others besides.

The opening tale was only one bucket of grue short of being spiritually at home in Barker's early Books of Blood. Other stories were obvious homage, including a delightful tip of the hat to M.R. James, a very worthy entry into 125 years of collected fiction within the Robert Chambers 'Yellow Sign' mythos, and an eerie, subtly erotic tale of longing and missed opportunities that is so environmentally reminiscent of Karl Edward Wagner (like Rucker, a native of the American South) that it gave me chills.

Overall, there is really a lot to love here for fans of compelling, broken characters, haunted landscapes, and hungry spirits lurking just below the surface of the psyche...or the water. I couldn't be happier with this book and will be seeking out pretty much everything else Ms. Rucker has written in hopes of more weird tales presented in her unique voice. In closing, I want to strongly recommend pairing this book with a Marissa Nadler record. They synergize gorgeously and elegantly.… (meer)