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The Ladykiller, As Observed From a Safe Distance [7]

Review by Ian Braidwood

This story is close kin to Sexual Chemistry, in that it features the sort of sexual augmentation developed by the hero of that story.

Stephanie Greaves is a newly promoted detective inspector working the graveyard shift, when Randolph Markham - James comes into the police station and demands to see a senior officer. Once seated in an interview room, Randolph tells Stephanie that there's been a murder and he is not so much the murderer as the weapon.

This is an early Emortality story, set in roughly the same era as The Cassandra Complex.

The Lamia's Soliloquy [1]

Review by Trent Walters

The Lamia's Soliloquy rewrites her life from her point of view.

The Last Man [v]

The Last Supper [6]

Review by Ian Braidwood

Young Ben wants to impress a woman and decides to take her to a restaurant, Trimalchio's, which is not only exclusive, but utterly unique. All the meals are based upon recipes featuring genetically modified foods. Its chef and proprietor is Jerome, a character with all the artistic flair and temperament we've come to associate with that profession.

At Trimalchio's, Ben and his potential fiancé are can chose from pork (pig), beef (cow), veal (calf), calimari (octopus) and venison (Bambi); all tastefully and specially modified to provide the most sumptuous delicacies.

Things of course, do not go to plan.

A light tale, which is worth having if you don't have to chase it.

The Last Worshipper of Proteus [5]

Review by Ian Braidwood

A fantasy set toward the end of the seventeenth century in the Dutch university town of Leiden, which Rembrandt called home.

The story follows another painter, boarded next to our narrator, who is also a hard-up student. Despite living so close and painting such enigmatic pictures, the art student maintains his distance until poverty forces him into company to share food, warmth and secrets revealed by a mysterious stone.

When he disappears, our narrator enters the artist's room for the first time...

Layers of Meaning [2]

You'll be ova - come with admiration,
as Brian plays with hen gestation;
starting with a curate's egg,
then stretching your imagination.

Beginning with a familiar smell,
he pins your ear, a tale to tell;
a gift for you of every nation,
stand up and give a loud ova - tion!

The Legacy [1]

The Legacy of Erich Zann [35]

Review by Sally Startup

The Legacy of Erich Zann takes place some years after the events described in Lovecraft's, The Music of Erich Zann. However, the setting is now identified as nineteenth century Paris, and the narrator is an American correspondent of Edgar Allan Poe. Furthermore, he has written to Poe about some of the exploits of his friend, Auguste Dupin, who has therefore featured in some of Poe's published tales. Brian Stableford has interwoven the work of Poe and Lovecraft, and a lot more besides, to create a new and intriguing work of his own.

The ideas woven into the story are expressed from the point of view of characters living in nineteenth century France, but the author has the benefit of wider, and more recent, knowledge. Contemporary readers may still be troubled by the threat of The Crawling Chaos, that so terrified Erich Zann at the moment of his death. But Dupin, the rationalist, is well-suited to the task of moving the story onward and considering such terrors from a different perspective.

Dupin may be a nineteenth century character dealing with the implications of a horror conceived by a twentieth century author, but in this story, his character is further developed by a twenty-first century author.

When we discover that our ways of thought are not fit for purpose, we need to let them go, and consider new possibilities, as Poe and Lovecraft have demonstrated. This story brings us up to date on the Legacy of Erich Zann.

The Light of Achernar [17]

Review by Ian Braidwood

For me, the main reason for interest in this story is that it forms the germ around which, not only Curse of the Coral Bride, but an entire six novel sequence will grow. Whether or not these novels of the far future will ever get written and published is of course, another question. So perhaps this story will be the subject of daydreams about what might have been. If so, then there's not a great deal from which we can speculate.

For all intents and purposes, this is a fantasy with a faint medieval and mediterranian feel. There is nothing to suggest that in fact, the action is taking place on the inside of a Dyson sphere and perhaps when it was written, it wasn't, because Zothique is the creation of Clark Ashton Smith; set on a dying Earth, far in the future. My knowledge of Zothique goes no further, so neither will I.

This story turns around Giraiazal, astrologer to the court of the island of Cyntrom, whose 'gift' seems to have more veracity than that of modern astrologers, without losing the dubiousness quality of that 'discipline'. Forecasts in Cyntrom have an ambiguous quality which can trip up even the wariest believer and leave them dealing with the most unexpected consequences.

Nevertheless, Giraiazal seems able to maintain his position serving the royal family and mediating between its competing factions. He guides the kingdom through several episodes unitl fate comes knocking on his door.

Actually, the signs for Coral Bride seem quite good on the strength of this, because it is a good story. I have of course, no knowledge of Zothique, so I can't tell whether any Clark Ashton Smith fan should follow this up, but I do know Brian's ability to undermine expectations while delivering the goods.

The Light of Transfiguration [7]

Review by Ian Braidwood

When the holy Sisters of Shallya are invited to build a temple on the site of a destroyed citadel, they are not too pleased.

However, given certain assurances and some help with the donkey work, they set about clearing the site. This is when Sister Adalia discovers the remnants of a stained glass window and since her father made such windows for a living, she sets about collecting all the remains, so she can reconstruct the glass.

After some weeks she is discovered by the other nuns and has to continue her work surreptitiously...

I liked this one, it has a strong Poe feel to it.

Limelight [prose poem]

Loki [poem]

The Lost Romance [5]

Review by Ian Braidwood

Brother Simon is a scribe who discovers an old Welsh scroll among the records of the abbey at Valle Crucis, which purports to give the location of the Holy Grail.

Despite being sceptical about the document, the abbot has to send Brother Simon and the scroll to the abbey of Rievaulx, so the abbot there can make further investigations. On the way to Rievaulx, Brother Simon is captured by bandits and is forced to sing for his supper...

Here Brian fuses two English legends in a very ingenious way; though really this is a meditation on the nature of history.

Lucifer's Comet [3]

Review by Ian Braidwood

Another playful story with Brian using a character who inherits a famous name and has to live down the consequences.

This time young Edmond is inspired to go comet hunting and won't accept anything less than a showstopper...