Canavan’s Comments (group member since May 15, 2018)

Canavan’s comments from the Spells, Space & Screams: Collections & Anthologies in Fantasy, Science Fiction, & Horror group.

“Second Chances”

Hmm. I didn’t care for this one. The science element of the story seemed pretty wonky and I found myself rather flummoxed by the rather bleak ending — no idea where that came from.

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“The Dead Are Not”

(view spoiler)[This is another Jones story where the central element involves the very real horror of losing someone close to us. Relying on a rather unique plot, Jones asks here, what if we really don’t understand the nature death? This is also another tale with a last line that I liked. (hide spoiler)]

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“Doc’s Story”

(view spoiler)[In essence, the story of a dysfunctional family with some werewolf stuff grafted onto it. Joe R. Lansdale wrote the intro to this collection; this story feels to me very much like something Lansdale could have written. (hide spoiler)]


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Nyssa said: I'm not sure why it's not linked to the edition in this thread.

A quirk of the way Amazon sometimes works. I assume it’s because the print and digital editions were released at widely different times, the print edition back in 2002 and the Kindle edition (by a different publisher) in 2020.

Lena said: Martin Lawrence is revamping Silence of the Lambs -
Mindcage

The lack of originality here is rather breathtaking. I kinda want to avoid this movie just on principle.

“Snow Monsters”

(view spoiler)[This is another Jones story where the horror springs from a fear of losing a loved one. Well written, I thought.

At one point the narrator reminisces about a short story dealing with self-sacrifice read during his school days. I feel certain he is describing an actual story. Did anyone recognize it? (hide spoiler)]

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“The Spider Box”

(view spoiler)[This was an okay variation on ideas found in Stephen King’s Pet Sematary. (hide spoiler)]

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Some stuff I’ve watched in the past week. Mostly Halloween fare.

Dracula, Tod Browning (1931) ✭✭✭
Drácula, George Melford (1931) ✭✭✭
The Mummy, Karl Freund (1932) ✭✭½
The Black Cat, Edgar G. Ulmer (1934) ✭✭✭½
The Raven, Lew Landers (1935) ✭✭½
The Alphabet, David Lynch (1969) ✭✭
Geometria, Guillermo del Toro (1987) ✭✭✭
The Devil’s Harmony, Dylan Holmes Williams (2019) ✭✭✭½
Big Shot, Season 2 (2022) ✭✭✭
House of the Dragon, Season 1 (2022) ✭✭✭½

“The Black Sleeve of Destiny”

(view spoiler)[A tale of teenage angst that morphs into something more sinister. I think “Sleeve” would have worked better as a mainstream story. I don’t think Jones makes a particularly compelling case for the rather slight supernatural impact of the hoodie on Dick. Dick, for example, seemed like a pretty angry kid before his mom bought it. (hide spoiler)]

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Lena said: Some consider Hell a Loop.

I think it’s a relatively common horror trope. Perhaps it’s true that there are no original ideas.

“Xebico”

This one, like “The Spindly Man”, builds on the fiction of another author, in this case the 1926 pulp classic by the mysterious H. F. Arnold, “The Night Wire”. “The Night Wire” has already popped up twice before in group discussions — it appeared in the anthologies Lost Signals and The Weird . I liked Jones’ story, but I wonder if my appreciation is artificially enhanced because of my admiration for the earlier Arnold tale. (view spoiler)[Jones steers things in a rather disquieting and (for me at least) unexpected direction. The narrator makes a final and rather startling decision, presumably dictated by his sense of connection with Arnold/Winters. Great last line, I thought. (hide spoiler)]

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“The Spindly Man”

I first read this one quite a few years ago in Ellen Datlow’s Fearful Symmetries . (view spoiler)[Jones re-examines one of Stephen King’s most celebrated short stories, “The Man in the Black Suit”, itself an homage to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown”. I found Jones’ effort worthwhile, but “Spindly” perhaps works better as a think piece than as an effective tale of horror. It more or less starts with the proposition that the appearance of the Dark Man (and by extension the Spindly Man), while terrifying, confers a sort of spiritual benefit on the victim, since it confirms the religious worldview of the witness — as one of the characters notes, if there is a devil, there must be angels. But this perhaps surprisingly turns out not to be true, both in the King story and in this extension. Jones seems to argue that people are prone to use to religion as a crutch — more specifically, as a way to deflect personal guilt, as evidenced by the narrator’s belief that the truck driver involved in his accident was an incarnation of the Spindly Man. But in the finale when the narrator witnesses his own reflection we are in essence shown that this is a lie. (hide spoiler)]

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“This Is Love”

(view spoiler)[This is essentially what I refer to as a “loop” story, a rather tragic one in which the protagonist, Jonathan, is provided insight into the nature of the loop, which, one presumes, makes the experience all the more hellish. (hide spoiler)]

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Along with a few other items, I’ve mostly been watching (or re-watching) 80s horror.

Docteur Jekyll et les femmes (The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Miss Osbourne), Walerian Borowczyk (1981) ✭
Wolfen, Michael Wadleigh (1981) ✭✭
Cat People, Paul Schrader (1982) ✭✭✭
Q, Larry Cohen (1982) ✭✭✭
Once Bitten, Howard Storm (1985) ✭½
The Hidden, Jack Sholder (1987) ✭✭✭✭
Near Dark, Kathryn Bigelow (1987) ✭✭✭✭
The Lair of the White Worm, Ken Russell (1988) ✭✭
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, Season 1 (2022) ✭✭✭
Werewolf by Night, Michael Giacchino (2022) ✭✭✭✭

Just some things I’ve been listening to:

Gaucho, Steely Dan (1980) ✭✭✭✭
Ten of 10, 10cc (1980) ✭✭
Wanderlust, Mike Mainieri (1981) ✭✭✭✭
Coming Around Again, Carly Simon (1987) ✭✭✭✭½
The Sea Hawk: The Classic Film Scores of Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Charles Gerhardt & National Philharmonic Orchestra (1991) ✭✭✭✭
Debussy: Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune • La boîte à joujoux • Jeux, Michael Tilson Thomas & London Symphony Orchestra (1992) ✭✭✭½
So What, Ron Carter Trio (1998) ✭✭✭½
Word of Mouth Revisited, Jaco Pastorius Big Band (2003) ✭✭✭½
The Word Is Out!, Jaco Pastorius Big Band (2006) ✭✭✭✭
Into White, Carly Simon (2007) ✭✭✭
Harris: Symphony No. 6: “Gettysburg” • Symphony No. 5, Marin Alsop & Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (2010) ✭✭✭
Saving Mr. Banks [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack], Thomas Newman (2013) ✭✭✭✭½

“Welcome to the Reptile House”

(view spoiler)[This turns out to be a fairly standard yarn about a punk vampire. It takes a while to get going, but is pretty solid. (hide spoiler)]

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“Brushdogs”

(view spoiler)[In his introduction to this collection, Joe R. Lansdale compares this story to David Drake’s 1979 tale, “The Red Leer”. I agree that both are accounts of some sort of transformative experience, one that the victim is either partly or wholly unaware of. Jones’ version is more ambiguous and possesses more emotional heft. (hide spoiler)]

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“Thirteen”

This story was a re-read for me. I must have read it in the Paula Guran 2013 anthology, Halloween: Magic, Mystery, and the Macabre . (view spoiler)[It’s a tale about the power of urban legends or maybe about the power of film or, heck, maybe both. In any case it’s a good opener that pushes a lot of my emotional buttons, no doubt because elements resonante with some of my personal childhood memories. Jones isn’t really breaking new ground here; a lot of writers have played with this particular trope. The story reminded me a bit of some of Robert Bloch’s stuff, e.g., “The Movie People”. (hide spoiler)]

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Graeme said: Despite the rat hole plot, I'm still giving the series 3 stars ... I just think it could've been a lot better. That said, Obi Wan's arc from defeated, out of hope and unable to use the force, back to his old competent self was the best part of the story.

I gave the series an additional half star. I agree that Obi’s redemptive arc, the core of the plot, was the best part.

Some stuff I’ve listened to over the last few days:

Come Dance with Me!, Frank Sinatra with Billy May & His Orchestra (1957) ✭✭✭½
Cloud Nine, The Temptations (1969) ✭✭✭
Wish It Would Rain, The Temptations (1969) ✭✭✭
Pink Moon, Nick Drake (1972) ✭✭✭✭✭
Stardust, Stéphane Grappelli (1973) ✭✭✭½
Rickie Lee Jones, Rickie Lee Jones (1979) ✭✭✭✭
Piston: Symphony No. 6 • The Incredible Flutist • Three New England Sketches, Leonard Slatkin & St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (1991) ✭✭✭✭½
Prokofiev: Five Melodies, Op. 35 • Sonata in D major for flute and piano, Op. 94 • Visions Fugitives, Op. 22, Laura Gilbert (flute) & Emma Tahmizian (piano) (1993) ✭✭✭
Debussy: La Mer • Nocturnes • Jeux • Rhapsodie pour clarinette et orchestre, Pierre Boulez & the Cleveland Orchestra and Chorus (1995) ✭✭✭✭
Man Behind Bars, Mike Mainieri (1995) ✭✭✭✭
Oscar and Lucinda [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack], Thomas Newman (1997) ✭✭✭✭
Chinese Butterfly, The Chick Corea + Steve Gadd Band (2017) ✭✭✭✭
This Dream of You, Diana Krall (2020) ✭✭✭