Unforgivable Stories

by Kim Newman

A collection of stories which re-open some of the great closed cases of fantasy and horror fiction. Newman explores familiar universes in a new, unusual light, from Dr Jekyll to Dracula, and from a Victorian ghost story to the Paris of Bogart and Bergman.

Genres: Horror, Fantasy, Fiction, Collections

340 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Note: This author also writes under the pseudonym of Jack Yeovil.
An expert on horror and sci-fi cinema (his books of film criticism include Nightmare Movies and Millennium Movies), Kim Newman's novels draw promiscuously on the tropes of horror, sci-fi and fantasy. He is complexly and irreverently referential; the Dracula sequence--Anno Dracula, The Bloody Red Baron and Dracula,Cha Cha Cha--not only portrays an alternate world in which the Count conquers Victorian Britain for a while, is the mastermind behind Germany's air aces in World War One and survives into a jetset 1950s of paparazzi and La Dolce Vita, but does so with endless throwaway references that range from Kipling to James Bond, from Edgar Allen Poe to Patricia Highsmith.
In horror novels such as Bad Dreams and Jago, reality turns out to be endlessly subverted by the powerfully malign. His pseudonymous novels, as Jack Yeovil, play elegant games with genre cliche--perhaps the best of these is the sword-and-sorcery novel Drachenfels which takes the prescribed formulae of the games company to whose bible it was written and make them over entirely into a Kim Newman novel.
Life's Lottery, his most mainstream novel, consists of multiple choice fragments which enable readers to choose the hero's fate and take him into horror, crime and sf storylines or into mundane reality.

Reviews

[Joshua · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kim Newman is simply a master at this kind of thing...mixing fantasy and reality in stunning alternate history stories that give you a nice chill and even make you think a-bit.
Plus, two stories about John Major. That's two more stories than the average history book has...

[Robert Day · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got to give him this: the guy writes good. Technically, the author can string his words together in the right order and with a style that I would imagine he's happy with. Thing is, though, that doesn't make up for the feeling I have that I'm not 100% sure I like the things he writes about. Or the way he constructs his worlds. Or his stories.

What I mean is that he's kind of tied himself to some kind of post-modernist thing where (generally) he writes stuff that examines a scene or scenario or a situation in detail, but without any discernible plot.

The one exception is a story (Great Western) that's based on a cowboy movie (or two) and consequently has a defined beginning, middle and end. I found this tale to be satisfying in a way that the others were not. I guess I just like my stories that way on.

The rest of the items in this collection (and this one too, to some extent) have this annoying (to me) habit of weaving in real people in ways that, although they are clever, are not in line with what happened in the 'real world'. I guess the author is aiming for some sort of 'alternate history' thing, but, as I said, I just found it annoying. Let's just let Fiction be Fiction, right, dude?

I kind of feel obscurely sorry for this author. His head seems to be twisted in all kinds of ways. But then again, mine is too. I guess we just don't like the same kinds of twists. I'm totally okay to agree to disagree, though.

Read this book if you're not happy with the way things are and you want examples of how to re-write the world to suit yourself. Forget about it though if you what a straightforwardly plotted story that grips you and leaves you feeling satisfied. The end.

[Andrew Gibbs · Rating 4 out of 5]

What is both good and bad about Newman's writing generally, and this book in particular, is most of his work can only be appreciated in context of other culture- both fictional and non-fictional. This means that it is possible to skip by fun references to, for example, the avengers popping up as bodyguards in one of these stories. How much you appreciate or recognize these references will change your enjoyment in the fiction. Because Newman's knowledge and interest in culture is so disparate there are references most people will probably enjoy but others that they will miss. Newman's pop references also mean that some works don't age as well as others.

All the works here, even more than most of Newman's fiction, are heavily dependent on this vicarious enjoyment.

There are certainly some enjoyable stories here. I thought the last (and longest story) written in collaboration with Eugene Byrne about a communist Britain's involvement in the Vietnam war raised some interesting questions. There are also quite a few stories that weren't as memorable. Overall a reasonably strong collection but not the best of Newman I would say.

[Bill Wallace · Rating 2 out of 5]

Newman's writing is solid but the stories bored me -- one note takes on the works of better writers. I made it about halfway through before pulling the plug, something I almost never do. My main reaction was to remember why I pretty much stopped reading a certain kind of genre fiction in the 90s -- derivative fiction dependent on the audience's recognition of Lovecraft, Poe, etc. told in a workmanlike but mostly uninspired style. I'm not the audience.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Newman is a writer who commonly receives the dubious criticism of being too clever. Unlike moments in the work of the similar Waldrop I think the criticism usually rings false, because Newman always tells a hell of a story keeping you entertained while indulging his encyclopedic grasp of pop culture, history, and literature. “Amerikanski Dead”, “Teddy Bear’s Picnic” (w/Eugene Byrne), “Residuals” (w/Paul J Mcauley), and “Victorian Ghost Story” do this the best, combining history, pop culture, horror, and satire in bursts of surreal invention.

[Lewis · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book that's saddled with one of the worst covers I've ever seen. Don't let that put you off though, the short stories are great, particularly The Teddy Bear's Picnic.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just could not get into it so gave up half way through. Life is too short to be wasted on drivel.