How the West Was Weird

[Dan]

After many months in the polls, How the West Was Weird, an anthology edited by Russ Anderson Jr., wins our group read for February 2023. Anderson is the editor whose picture graces our marquis page this month. As you can see, the original anthology was popular enough that Anderson made it into a series. The original, which we will be reading, was published in 2010 and featured nine stories by nine authors I've frankly never heard of, all in just 164 print (not Kindle) pages. I've not previously heard of Russ Anderson, Jr. either. Therefore, this month's read will be an adventure for your moderator as well.

If you're curious about the other books in the series, featured in our marquis, Volume II came out in 2011 and has twenty stories. The Campfire Tales volume also came out in 2011, and Volume III was published in 2014. That as far as I know is the sum total of Russ Anderson, Jr.'s contribution to the subgenre of weird western, unless one of his 99-cent short stories that he himself wrote and can be purchased on Amazon happens to be weird western.

As far as I know, Russ Anderson, Jr., does not write or anthologize for a living. He has a day job around Baltimore, I believe, which limits how prolific he can be, I'm sure. He is not that widely known or widely read yet either. But maybe that's due for a change.

Join us, won't you, in this experiment in weird western fiction. I purchased the Kindle version of this book for $4.99. Brand new paperback print copies, I noticed go for $11.95. People who have purchased a copy are not selling it for less than $11.95 in the used book market once you include their shipping charges, which I see as a good sign. People want to hold on to their copies.

We can start commenting on these nine authors' stories now right here in this topic if you're beginning them. Please be kind and use spoiler tags if you get into any key plot details in your comments. Bon appetit!

[Dan]

I have read the first three stories, meaning I am one third of the way through this nine-story anthology. It's a very mixed experience so far.

1) 3 stars - The first story is "Camazotz" by Joshua Reynolds. It starts out really well. We have three characters: a Mexican, an American, and a dead dude. The interplay in this 1915 Mexico setting is really interesting, and I became intrigued by what would result. Then suddenly nothing results. It's a strangely nothing ending with nothing being resolved. That, or I really don't understand the story. Help!

Interesting thing about this author. We have heard of him before. In fact, he was discussed at some length in this group recently at this topic: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/.... I read and reviewed his novel Dracula Lives! a couple months ago here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show.... Neither of his two early works now garner more than three stars from me, but I bet some of his later ones might, if I get to reading them.

2) 2 Stars - "Wyrm Over Diablo" by Joel Jenkins. The setting, the conflict, and the plot are all fine. The antagonist, Carina Crawley, wants to acquire the Eye of Ulutoth. The protagonist, an Indian named Lone Crow, needs to keep her from getting that kind of power. The struggle ensues. My problem with the story is the storytelling. When writing dialog for characters, the characters must have their own motives for saying what they say. Usually a character speaks in order to get something the character wants, to try to influence something or to get information so that he can then wield influence. Sometimes a character speaks to help another or inform another, but even this has to be motivated. Jenkins' characters lack these motivations for their dialog. They speak, it seems to me, mostly in order to clue the reader in as to what the stakes in the story are and who has what cards to play. Having characters speak in order to loop the reader in is a rookie mistake one learns to avoid after one's first story gets workshopped in a group or class. It's easy to fix in an edit. You just take the dialog out and convert it into narration. I think Jenkins has a few tradecraft techniques to acquire (from 2010 on) before he can truly be considered a writer, but I definitely see potential here.

I just researched further and realize perhaps I am not being entirely fair. This is a very early story in Jenkins ouvre. He probably worked these kinks I mention out within the next year or two. Surprisingly, this is the first story featuring his Indian protagonist, Lone Crow, in a long series of short stories, roughly thirty of them since this 2010 premiere.

Here's the Lone Crow series list, if you're interested:
Wyrm over Diablo (2010) [SF]
Against the Gathering Darkness (2010) [SF]
Long Night in Little China (2010) [SF]
The Lost Vale (2011) [SF]
The Shadow Walkers (2011) [SF]
The Five Disciples (2012) [SF]
The Vanishing City (2012) [SF]
Old Mother Hennessy (2012) [SF]
The Eye of Ulutoth (2013) [SF]
The Steam Devil (2014) [SF]
Blood for the Jaguar (2014) [SF]
The Coming of Crow (2014) [C]
The Homunculi of Azathoth (2014) [SF]
The Pythagorean Hounds (2014) [SF]
The Succubus in Shotgun Ferguson (2014) [SF]
The Trail of the Twisted Tail (2014) [SF]
The Wolves of Five Points (2014) [SF]
Personal Devil (2014) [SF]
The Vorpal Tomahawk (2015) [SF]
Dead Before Sunrise (2015) [SF]
The Burial Mound (2016) [SF]
It Fell from the Nighted Sky (2017) [SF]
Day of the Undead (2017) [SF]
Bitter Days to Come (2019) [SF]
Phantom of the Leaden Skies (2022) [SF]
The Armies Beneath the Salted Sea (2022) [SF]
The Canyon Demon (2022) [SF]
The Vindication of Crow (2022) [C]
The Well of Eternal Sleep (2022) [SF]
Trail of the Brocklin Brothers (2022) [SF]
Two Crows (2022) [SF]

3) 4 Stars - "Space Miners" by Ian Taylor. This is a really good story. It's a western set in space. Instead of riding horses the cowboys are in single flyer spaceships (think Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica), and they're going after rustlers who are taking minerals from asteroids rather than cattle. These rustlers are aliens, sort of like Indians or maybe Mexicans, but they have unanticipated resources that make this a very interesting fight. Loved the storytelling and conflict. The only weird thing about it is there was not one aspect of weird fiction in this story. It is 60% Western and 40% science fiction, no weird, no horror. I don't blame the editor, Mr. Anderson, for including it anyway. It's the strongest, best written story in the anthology so far.

Ian Taylor's work has been really sporadic. His first work was a 2005 novel, Spindle. Then he wrote this gem of a short story in 2010, and followed up with another short story in 2011 titled "They Call Him Pat" which was published in How the West was Weird, Volume II. After that, nothing until Covid year 2020, when he burst back upon the scene with three short stories and his second novel (this time with Rosi Taylor) titled The Gatekeeper. He published no less than nine short stories in 2021, but I can't find anything since. Maybe if he did it's too recent for it to have become known. Obviously I think this guy is worth looking out for. Much of his work does get into the horror and weird genres even if this story didn't.

[Dan]

The next three stories were stronger than the first three.

4) 5 stars. "Don Cuevo's Curative" by Thomas Deja. A child in a small western town becomes possessed by a demon and the town has to call in an exorcist to battle not only the demon, but to an extent the town too and its ability to take their situation seriously. This was a well-told, riveting spectacle. The narrator is a townsperson who knew who to call in to get the job done. The fascinating exorcist is the title's namesake, Don Cuevo, but the character who steals the story is his lovely, enigmatic assistant, Dolores.

This amazing story has but one follow-up featuring Don Cuevo. Naturally, I had to acquire it: PulpWork Halloween Special 2017. The book arrived in my mailbox today, and I must say these five stories it features look absolutely amazing. The second story in the collection is "Don Cuevo's Legion", twenty pages I am very much looking forward to. Curiously, the first story in the book is a Lone Crow story by Joel Jenkins (see my #2 above): "Day of the Undead". I read the first few paragraphs of the story and am happy to report that my prediction was correct; Jenkins developed into a better writer. Those paragraphs read as much stronger material.

Thomas Deja has published twenty or so speculative fiction short stories, no novels yet. The one that looks the most intriguing to me personally is his 2002 X-Men novella, one of the stories that appears in Five Decades of the X-Men.

5) 3 Stars. "The Town with No Name" by Mike McGee. A western town hires a gunslinger to face a menace no one in town is willing to confront. The story turns out to be about the character of the gunslinger in relation to the character of the town. The menace is all but forgotten until the end. This story has a lot of pages and is told so slowly that it's hard to track the plot all the way through, particularly if, like me, you put the story down for a day and pick it up later to finish. On my second read, I read the entire story straight through. It made good sense and has an interesting if not riveting point: be careful who you hire to protect you; you may end up requiring protection from your agent. Speed readers will get the most out of this too-wordy but still good story.

Mike McGee is the smallest name in the book. He only published one other short story so far, "Terror in Toyland" (2011). It appears in the next volume: How the West Was Weird, Vol. 2: Twenty More Tales of the Weird, Wild West.

6) 4 Stars. "Sins of the Past: An Adventure Starring the Rook". This story was a surprise. During my teenage years I read and greatly enjoyed a Warrren Comics series titled The Rook. This can't be an episode in that series. It is written over thirty years later. But it has some amazing similarities in that both protagonists are time-travelling adventurists who call themselves The Rook. This Barry Reese story is one in a series of Rook stories (I'm not sure how many; ISFDB is strangely unhelpful this time) by this author and was a lot of fun to read. The Rook leaves his time (1943) to travel back to a small western town stuck in 1884 that is causing problems for people in 1943. The Rook has a mystery to unravel and a time bubble problem to resolve. I'm would enjoy looking for more Barry Reese to read. Recommended for people who enjoy time travel stories with emphasis on protagonists' characteristics.

So far I am really enjoying this anthology. It has a breadth wider than I expected with different levels of writing talent and widely different ideas of how to tell a weird western story. I'm glad there is such variety. On to the last three!

[Dan]

What is the sound of one hand clapping? If a review gets written of a book no one else reads, is it still a review? This is my take on this month's selection we voted for: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Zina]

I am awfully behind on this one but I will finish it 'ere months' end. I did the first story which I found wonderfully colorful even if a little [haha] weird.
I am in the middle of the second. Also wonderfully colorful if by now seriously cliché as far as characters go. But I am willing to take it as archetypes not as clichés. After all, we are here for the entertainment, not literary innovativeness. It looks quite awesome, in the "Supernatural" sort of way. Obviously, the best one to handle the evil Witchthing and the Hellmenacefromthegorge would at this point be the Doctor. Failing that - it's back to Dean Winchester.... This is lots of fun.

[Dan]

Glad you're giving them a try, Zina. Stories 3, 4, 6, 7, and 8 were truly outstanding in my opinion.

Somewhat against my better judgment I have just ordered The Coming of Crow by Joel Jenkins. See what I wrote for entry #2 above to understand my misgivings. Jenkins calls it an "anthology" (story collection is the correct term). It contains his first eleven Crow stories and a little extra material besides. My curiosity got the better of me. I figure for $4.03 (Kindle) how wrong can I go?

[Zina]

finished the third story about the space miners. Agree, it is fantastic. it is dynamic, fresh, unexpected. It seems to be a straight up sci fi story not a weird story, but not complaining!
That first story (view spoiler)[ I think what happened is the dead guy called his people and then took the guy that was carrying him up North to hell or wherever he was from. (hide spoiler)]

[Dan]

I read another anthology that's related to this month's group read. Three of the five authors in the anthology are featured in How the West Was Weird. It contained the second and so far final of the Don Cuevo series. If you're interested here's my review of that related anthology: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Zina]

Dan wrote: "I read another anthology that's related to this month's group read. Three of the five authors in the anthology are featured in How the West Was Weird. It contained the second and so far final of th..."
Let us know how you liked it! That Don Cuevo story was enthralling, that's for sure. I felt so bad for the poor assistant and the poor kid who fell in love with her, too!

[Dan]

Zina wrote: "Let us know how you liked it!"
I did: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...