Black Static Issue 4 by TTA Press
The April-May 2008 issue of the UK's Dark Fantasy & Horror Magazine
May 1, 2008
In the latest issue of Black Static magazine, columnist Stephen Volk considers horror (especially Richard Matheson’s work, including I Am Legend) as a means to examine religious belief; Mike O’Driscoll criticizes the BBC for Anglo-centrism in its Worlds of Fantasy history , and pigeonholing it as descended from children’s literature; John Paul Catton highlights Japan’s political apathy as a warning to the West, while Tony Lee examines the DVD releases. Peter Tennant interviews Conrad Williams, and reviews a revision of his International Horror Guild Award-winning The Unblemished.
Fiction
Tyler Keevil opens the fiction with “Cleaning the Western Kittiwake.” The narrator works at a dock cleaning boats such as the eponymous vessel, the scene of a recent tragedy. Keevil scores highly with his characterization; the narrator is at first almost proud of how unaffected he is by the scene, but by the end comes to understand both the Kittiwake's captain and himself a little better.
After a comparatively traditional opening, Cody Goodfellow takes the reader to the strange “Atwater,” which at times is reminiscent of Hieronymous Bosch, but as the story judders toward its denouement, the grotesques begin to make a nightmarish sense in highlighting the emptiness of the protagonist’s life, and the story’s resolution, while unexpected, is both satisfying and moving.
Nicholas Royle
By contrast, with “Salt,” Nicholas Royle seems to be following a path worn to nothing by earlier authors, yet just when the story seems to be in danger of disappearing into cliché, Royle abruptly ends it with a marvelous last line that guillotines the plot, and suddenly transforms everything that’s gone before. Highly recommended.
Black Static 4 seems much less exotic than the first three issues, which took the reader to Brazil, Central European theatres, carnivals, France and a Lovecraft-ian quasi-Germany. By contrast, this issue is much more contemporary urban and Anglophone, and -doubtless to the delight of the hardcore horror fans- has a more traditional feel. Some will miss the breadth provided by those visits to Elsewhere. It seems churlish to grumble at innovation but this is the weakest issue so far, simply because too much of it hits the reviewer’s blind spots.
Conrad Williams
Conrad William’s “Zombie” tells of the last few hours of a dysfunctional narrator unable to relate to people. On one level it’s a beautifully crafted tale, yet the fine writing simply highlights the story’s emptiness. That may be its point, but in addition there’s the continuity error of a supposed numero-manic who counts thirty-two years from 1977 as 2007 --rather than 2009. Perhaps it’s intended to highlight the breakdown of the narrator’s functioning, but if so it’s so subtly done that it failed as a signal.
Steve Nagy’s sort-of-sequel to Dracula “Ye Shall Eat in Haste,” also fails to impress. The reader needs a detailed knowledge of Dracula’s protagonists, and in the absence of that detailed knowledge there’s nothing in the story to generate any empathy. At the end the reader is left mentally shrugging shoulders, and asking, “So what?”
Barry Fishler’s “This Much I Remember” ends the issue, telling -to begin with- the story of a retired engineer remembering the apparently motiveless murder-suicide of his wife and son. However, while it's ostensibly about the power of memory it’s more about different versions of ‘reality,’ and like “Atwater,” abruptly tilts the reader’s world-view. It bears careful re-reading.
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