Ballard Blog Page 1 Entry HERE
Ballard Page 2:
I seem to be unable to edit my Ballard Page 1 blog to add new novels, since Blogger updated to a new format. So I am starting a 2nd Ballard page here, which will consist of his later books, and all the short stories. This has happened since the July, 2020 Google Blogger update. Sorry for the confusion and inconvenience.
Scroll down for a recent review of several of "The Complete Short Stories, Volume 2," below, reviewed August 23rd/21. This project is now complete. 9 books reviewed by Ballard on this page.
COCAINE NIGHTS
From 1996 comes this highly readable 352 page epic novel from one of the greats. It is not SF, but rather a murder mystery novel. It is highly unlikely you've read one remotely like it, though. There is a helpful introduction by James Lever in the 2014 edition, and a short interview with Ballard that has appeared in other volumes and does not discuss the present book.
Ballard was notorious among SF fans and writers when he entered the scene in the 1960s with some highly unusual novels, all of them brilliant. He is doing a similar thing here with the mystery novel. Who burned down a house killing five people? Was it Frank Prentice? He has plead guilty to the crime. His brother Charles leaves England to go to Spain and find out what is going on. Arriving in Gibraltar, it is a very unsettling opening to a novel, yet one that draws us in right away. We are soon in Spain, at an exclusive and very lively resort community on the Costa del Sol. Frank was the manager of a night club and sports club there. He was very well liked. No one really believes he set the fire, not even the police detective.
Frank is soon learning more than he really wants to know about the community, made up mostly of retired British citizens. The book is actually fun to read. I enjoy murder mystery and crime novels if they are well written, and especially if they are well off the usual whodunit track. This one is so far off the track that true mystery fans would probably laugh out loud in certain places, as I did. Charles, the brother, soon comes under the spell of a female doctor, Paula Hamilton, and even more strongly, under the spell of Bobby Crawford, the tennis instructor at the sports club.
These two characters are at the heart of the story, though the ostracized psychiatrist Dr. Sanger is also an important character. As Charles slowly learns what has been going on within the community he is at first shocked and morally outraged. His views slowly change as time goes on, and he learns the reasons behind some of the incredible events occurring. Bobby Crawford has been the catalyst for a great change in the community, which once was filled with retired TV watchers, locked in their homes all day, taking drugs to relax them them even further. But Bobby has found a new way to stimulate the local population, and Charles is soon sucked into a strange and mostly fantastic world of parties, hard drugs, crime, and other fun things.
Unlike most mysteries, this one is not that hard to guess how it will end. I will leave one clue; it ends in extreme irony. This is a really fun book to read. Don't expect anything like any other murder mystery book you may have read before. This one really gets inside the genre and has a lot of fun with it. Highly recommended.
**** stars. Reviewed August 15th/20
A USER'S GUIDE TO THE MILLENNIUM
From 1996 (published 1997) comes this time capsule of essays lasting 294 pages, some of them now more than 50 years beyond their best before date. Ballard wrote short essays and reviews for the Guardian, Daily Telegraph, and many other top flight newspapers and magazines, including Vogue, and about a hundred of them are collected here. Thus there is a lot of reading to do here, and I took my time. Topics range from film (the best review of Star Wars I have ever read) to famous people, and literature, including lots about SF. In fact, there are so many different topics, and the reviews are so well thought out, that Ballard obviously devoted a lot of time to writing them.
Specific topics include essays of Einstein, Coca Cola, Mein Kampf, American astronauts, and the Surrealists. Having read all of Ballard's novels is not a prerequisite to enjoying this book, but a well rounded education and lots of general knowledge of the sixties and seventies will help. Enclosed within most essays are single line jokes that often had me laughing out loud, including Ralph Nader's attack on breakfast cereals.
Also included are a few autobiographical chapters. This book was published ten years before Ballard's autobiography. Eventually a portrait of the writer emerges, one that I very much like. It would have been such a treat to meet this man at a London pub and spend an afternoon discussing various topics with him, especially SF writing. Though I don't agree with everything the man has to say, I was surprised by how often our views did coincide. And while many of his predictions from the 70s did not come true, several have, and then some. He predicted England would be covered in motorways, and that access to London by car would be subject to tolls. In fact, he chooses the automobile as the single most significant icon of the 20th century. It's hard to disagree.
He is not impressed by human space exploration, and firmly believes that any exploration should be done within the human mind, and not in outer space. This is a rich and varied collection, and one to which I will often return.
****+ stars. Reviewed January 18th/21
SUPER-CANNES: A NOVEL
From the year 2000 comes this 435 page novel that had be in its grip from page one until the very last page. On one hand it is a rewrite of Cocaine Nights, but Ballard has given this volume even more teeth Middle-aged Paul, an aviation magazine and book publisher, has recently wed Jane, a young doctor from London. She accepts a six month position at a business park above Cannes, called Eden, as a pediatrician. They leave together, driving there in Paul's vintage Jaguar. Jane is replacing Dr. David Greenwood, who went on a killing rampage at the exclusive residential/business park, no stopping until 11 people were dead, including himself.
Jane knew Greenwood from earlier days in London, and likely had an affair with him. Paul had met him socially, but did not know him. Everyone seems mystified how a caring children's doctor like Greenwood could do such a thing. The newly wed couple are soon set up in a luxurious villa, with a swimming pool and very discrete neighbours. But it was Paul Greenwood's villa, and Paul is deeply troubled by the mysterious mass murder spree. He begins to investigate on his own, and the novel really begins to develop from this point on.
At least a hundred times I wished I had stopped to record some of the imagery and thoughts that came out of this book, and I could have filled pages with amazing quote after amazing quote. Ballard is at the height of his powers here, and his words, sentences, and paragraphs seem magical in their intensity and importance. Every character, especially that of Dr. Wilder Penrose, the staff psychiatrist, is carefully drawn and penned, and given enough character for the reader to imagine them in full colour 3D.
This is probably as close to science fiction as regular fiction can be, and its predictions of what these gated communities could be like has obsessed Ballard for many years. This novel isn't as stifling as it could be, as the reader is taken to many nearby places, including Cannes during the yearly film festival. In fact, we are away from Eden as much as we are in it, and this helps create a much more vivid picture of the evils that are going on. Taking a cue from Joseph Conrad, we venture into the deepest, darkest part of the hearts of men. Like its African counterpart, this novel is not a pretty journey. But it is a revealing one.
There is also a vital tie-in with Lewis Carroll's Alice books. It begins unknowingly with Paul's infatuation with Jane, who he calls his teenage doctor because of her young looks and small body size. There are also many other book references, but I have named the two most important ones (not counting the author's own unforgettable Cocaine Nights). While Cocaine Nights had an unhappy though inevitable ending, this one allows a bit more light to creep in at the very end. We know that the downfall of the Eden park is at hand, though we aren't allowed to see the great downfall.
This is one of the best books I have ever read. Very highly recommended.
****+ stars. Reviewed September 17th/20
THE MILLENIUM PEOPLE
No art credit is given with the Kindle edition. The interview promised on the front cover of the Kindle edition is not included.
From 2003 comes this 288 page novel set within London, following the exploits of a small group of middle class people rebelling against the establishment. Their acts are at first mere pranks, but under the supervision of young doctor Robert Gould major violence is soon part of the fight against the constraints of being middle class in Britain. They are fed up and aren't going to take it any more. The novel opens with a devastating bomb blast at Heathrow Airport baggage claim. David Markham watches the news bulletins on TV, and is certain that he sees his ex-wife, just returned from Switzerland, as one of the walking wounded. By the time he and Sally, his second wife, reach the hospital, she has died.
The rest of the book takes this death as the catalyst that slowly begins to awaken David's mind, an unsatisfied mind unhappy with his psychologist's job at a large institute. In his search for the killers of his wife, he joins a strange group of demonstrators. His first arrest and injuries come as he joins a protest at a cat fanciers show, the group he is with protesting that the animals are in cages and must be set free. This is one of the very few times that humour is part of the story, but with lessons learned (and a criminal record added to his good name), next comes the arson attack on a video cassette store. Then the National Film School and Library are set ablaze. Tate Modern is bombed, again with tragic consequences.
It's difficult to sit back and read about these things happening, as Ballard will undoubtedly instill such ideas into impressionable heads. Usually David Markham is almost ready to phone the police and stop the event, but he doesn't. He comes under the influence of Richard Gould, and trusts him and believes him when he is told that violence is not the real intention. In Chapter 4 he lets some of his dark beliefs into the light: "A vicious boredom ruled the world, for the first time in human history, interrupted by meaningless acts of violence." This becomes Ballard's mantra throughout the book, that only meaningless violence can have any true meaning. It is the thing that makes the world stop and take notice for a time, and hangs in their conscience far longer than a political killing, or a bomb that has a specific target for a specific reason.
Vera Blackburn, who assembles the flash bombs and real bombs, comments at one point that "...an arts degree is like a diploma in origami." Meaning that university degrees are now so prevalent and in such variety that they have lost their worth. What was once a ticket to a better life and world now barely gets you accepted into the lower rung of the middle class, and usually turns out to be a trap which you can never escape (mortgage, beach holiday, daily grind of the job). But the book really gets into an interesting field when the subject returns (often) to the motiveless crime. No one knows how to deal with such a thing--there is usually only silence and hand-wringing afterwards. Try rationally explaining the Sandy Hook children massacre to a sane person. It can't be done. This is a very frightening side of terrorism. As Gould says towards the end of the book, "The absence of rational motive carries a significance of its own."
When you really stop to think about it, yes it does. Since the book was published these type of random acts of violence against innocent people have increased many times over, and show no sign of stopping. Are we ready for a nuclear war, set off by someone who really had no reason to do so? If we aren't ready for that ultimate random act, then we should at least expect many more of a higher and higher body count before it does happen.
This is a very frightening book to read, but it is also a brilliant one, and I think, a necessary one, to read. It goes a long way to explaining where we are now, how we got this way, and where we are headed. Highly recommended.
**** stars. Reviewed October 20th/20
KINGDOM COME
From 2006 comes Ballard's final novel, at 313 pages. This version includes a decent introduction by Deborah Levy, and following the novel there is a brief but fun interview with Ballard, and a short essay by him.
I was wondering if Ballard would ever get around to the shopping mall. He certainly did. There isn't much in the world that I dislike as much as shopping malls, except perhaps Disneyworld, which shopping malls model themselves after. Richard Pearson is a recently fired advertising man who comes to Brookland, a suburban London city, to investigate his father's shooting death. He was shot in the vast mall, and much of what Richard is told does not add up. Like his previous three novels, this one is very much in the noir tradition, though a very bright and glittery one. There are just enough main characters to easily keep track of them, including Dr. Julia Goodwin, the doctor who tried to save his father's life, and Duncan Christie, the accused gunman.
There are so many quotable sections in this novel that I finally had to stop writing them all down. Here is one early on by William Sangster, a headmaster of a local school: "These days even reality has to look artificial." Disneyworld anyone?
Here's one by Dr. Julia: "...parking was well on the way to becoming the British population's greatest spiritual need." Ballard points out in the novel that far more people attend shopping malls and sporting events than church. Indeed, Brooklands has no churches.
And here's one by Dr. Sangster, psychiatrist: "Like it or not, only consumerism can hold a modern society together. It presses all the right emotional buttons." And a bit later, the same character says "Liberalism and humanism are a huge brake on society; they trade in guilt and fear." Exactly! And this is why we are doomed as a race. When people are made to feel guilty about their part in climate change, they will instantly rebel and deny it even exists, to protect themselves. This is why there is virtually no racism noticed by many white folks, too; they want no part of guilt, or fear of what they might be contributing to the problem. Much easier to just deny it exists.
Ballard bases the violence in this story on the fact that people are bored, and love to let off steam after football matches. As a race, we are fully attuned to violence, having survived ages of brutal wars and ethnic cleansings, even before recorded history. We are savage primates at heart, and not just when we are cornered.
Things slow down a lot once the siege of the mall begins. The story is told in three parts, and most of part 3 takes place inside the mall. I found this part a bit long, but them again, Ballard is trying to give the idea of time passing the way it might in such a situation. It is still fascinating reading, though less so than the other parts.
As disturbing as Ballard's fiction can be, and as much as we want to take hold of some of his characters and give them a good shaking (there's that primitive instinct again), he usually allows them all the rope required to hang themselves, and brings us along to watch the result. Like anything by Ballard, this is essential reading.
**** stars. Reviewed November 22nd/20
MIRACLES OF LIFE
I read the Kindle edition.
From 2008 comes Ballard's 279 page autobiography, published one year before his death. My Kindle edition features an introduction by China Mieville. I continue to thank my lucky stars for getting interested in the authors from the Avon/Equinox SF Rediscovery series, where more than half of the authors I was able to "rediscover" have warped my mind into a completely new dimension of happiness. J. G. Ballard is right at the very top of the list of those author's that have most affected me, as I continue to read everything he wrote.
His biggest success was undoubtedly Empire of the Sun, which was made into a movie by Steven Spielberg, no less. But most of his other works remain outside the mainstream, some of them really far out there, like Crash, and The Atrocity Exhibition. After reading all of his longer fiction (with all his short stories awaiting my eager eyes and mind), and seeing the filmed version of Crash by David Cronenberg, it was good to get right inside Mr. Ballard's head to see what made it tick. Aside from the obvious influences of Shanghai, we learn about his love of film (especially American Noir), his two years at medical school, and the friends he made and cherished. To name one, Michael Moorcock, also happily represented in the Avon series.
The book is dedicated to his three children (the miracles of life), and to his ability to raise them after his wife died when they were very young. There are so many funny, fascinating, and amazing things to discover in this book, but I only recommend it after reading a good portion of his fiction, both early, middle, and late. As a former fan of Hammer movies, it was fun to read about his collaboration on "When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth."
Ballard will hopefully be remembered as one of the greatest writers of the 20th and 21st Centuries, and I would not be surprised to eventually see virtually all of his books turned into films, though perhaps not for a very long time. Highly recommended, as is anything by Ballard.
****+ stars. Reviewed December 18th/20
EXTREME METAPHORS
From 2012 comes this rich tapestry of over 40 interviews Ballard gave over the course of his life. The interviews were selected and commented upon by Simon Sellars and Dan O'Hara, and they have done a superb job. The book is 498 pages long, including a 14 page introduction, and an extensive index. Ballard loves to talk about his work, even though he keeps getting asked similar questions about the same books. Most of the interviews at least touch on The Atrocity Experiment and Crash, his two most controversial novels.
Ballard is at his best talking about his work, and responding to the interviewers' interpretations of his work. He often agrees with what they say, but then goes on to expound and enlarge the vision he was trying to get across during his novels and short stories. Having read all of his novels, the interviews made total sense, except when his short stores were being discussed. My next Ballard project (and the only one remaining for me) is to tackle 1500 pages of short stories and novellas.
Some of Ballard's comments, especially from his early days, are way off the mark and no longer justifiable. However, much of his musing is very profitable for the reader, especially when he talks about how consumerism is all that remains for the Western world. But after buying the object of our desire, and then feeling strangely empty afterwards, Ballard hits a raw nerve, a bullseye one might say. We are a society with nowhere to go, no place to turn, once we reject consumerism. As the world becomes (has become) Americanized, people don't even realize what has happened, and continue to walk blindly into a future that has no future.
There are so many fascinating sentences that come out of Ballard's mouth that this is a book I will likely purchase as a hard copy, rather than the Kindle edition I own and have read. It will receive a 2nd reading, and a highlighter will be liberally used. This is a man who's thoughts should be listened to, and possibly learned from.
****+ stars. Reviewed February 22nd/21
THE COMPLETE SHORT STORIES
VOLUME ONE
Volume 1 contains stories written from 1956 to 1964. It is 288 pages long, including a short intro by the author, a longer intro by Adam Thirwell, and a short interview at the end. There are 39 stories in this volume.
Prima Belladonna is from 1956, and is 15 pages long. A brilliant and entertaining story about singing plants, and a golden skinned singing woman, taking place in Ballard's imaginary Vermilion Sands (standing in for Palm Springs). There are very few short stories about music, and in addition to this we have Ballard's wonderful out-of-time writing. It should be called Duel of the Vocalists,
**** stars. Reviewed March 22nd/21
Escapement is from 1956, and is 14 pages long. Ballard's humourous take on Time playing tricks, thanks to a solar flare. Television programs, marriage, friendship, and Scotch all come into play to make this brilliant little story come to life. Readers will be reminded of The Twilight Zone.
**** stars. Reviewed March 23rd/21
The Concentration City is from 1957, and is 20 pages long. A man attempts to find some open space to try out his radical new idea. The only problem is that there is no open space, only a vast city spread horizontal and vertical without end. The man boards a train to find the end of the city, but is unable to find it. What is his radical idea requiring open space? To fly. A fantastic story, not to be missed.
**** stars. Reviewed March 23rd/21
Venus Smiles is from 1957, and is 15 pages long. Back in Vermilion Sands, the author presents us with a second musical story, this one involving a sonic sculpture that is set to take over the world. Funny yet horrifying, Ballard sets up another wonderful episode of The Twilight Zone, though more unique and terrifying than Rod Serling's.
**** stars. Reviewed March 23rd/21
Manhole 59 is from 1957, and is 24 pages long. When doctors operate on volunteers so that they no longer need a night's sleep, some unknown side effects pop up. Though the men no longer need sleep, they do require companionship. A very original story, and very well handled.
**** stars. Reviewed March 23rd/21
Track 12 is from 1958, and is 6 pages long. An interesting idea about a man who records mundane sounds and increases the frequencies, until they sound like nothing else. Unfortunately, the story is really about a murder, so the wondrous invention is ultimately used in a (for me) mundane manner.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed March 23rd/21
The Waiting Grounds is from 1959, and is 32 pages long. This is the first Ballard story I have come across that takes place on an alien planet, and it's a humdinger of a story. Ballard seems to think that the entire universe is not too big to feature in a short story, and he pulls it off magnificently. One of the best SF stories I have ever read.
**** stars. Reviewed March 24th/21
Now: Zero is from 1959, and is 14 pages long. This is a darkly comic story about a man who is able to get his revenge on others by simply writing about what is going to happen to them, and waiting for it to happen as described. Not a great story, but fun nonetheless. How many of us would love to have a power such as this over the written word.
*** stars. Reviewed March 24th/21
The Sound-Sweep is from 1960, and is 42 pages long. Long enough to be considered a novelette, this is Ballard's 3rd music story, this one focusing on a soprano forced into retirement by major upheavals in the music industry. Everything has now gone supersonic, and music is felt rather than heard. She longs to return to the opera stage, and has a lackey to help her. The most interesting part of the story is not the story, but the concepts surrounding it, such as the evolution of music itself, and the idea that walls and buildings absorb sound throughout a normal day, and it must be removed via sound sweeper regularly before it damages structures. There are many things about this story that will linger in the mind, long after the soprano herself is forgotten.
*** stars. Reviewed March 26th/21
The Zone of Terror is from 1960, and is 18 pages long. Another very fine tale in the Twilight Zone tradition, as an overworked man is sent to an isolated recovery area with his doctor. He begins seeing other people, soon realizing that he is seeing images of himself. This leads to a unique confrontation at the climax. Very well done.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed March 27th/21
Chronopolis is from 1960, and is 26 pages long. Ballard continues on his winning streak with this solid tale about a young boy fascinated with watches and clocks, which are now banned and never used. His teacher takes him to the heart of the matter, and from then on our hero becomes doubly obsessed. Highly original story, very well executed, but with a cruel twist at the end. I can't get enough of these stories!
**** stars. Reviewed March 28th/21
The Voices of Time is from 1960, and is 36 pages long. Loosely related to Manhole 59, above, this novelette seems less complete and understandable than it could be. A scientist is succumbing to the new disease, which sees afflicted people sleep more and more, until they at last go into a deep coma. The scientist is followed until his time to sleep comes, and we see the research he was doing, and meet a man who was the victim of a grand experiment undertaken by the scientist. Ironically the experiment was to keep people awake all of the time, to give them a fuller and richer life. Meanwhile, it now appears that DNA is actually wearing out, and that a reboot of life is coming up soon. This and more, as it appears that the universe is counting down to zero, and the remaining time is known, via communication from a distant galaxy. Add in some cryptic earthworks created by two of the scientists, and what we have is a bit of a mess. Some great ideas should and could have been extended into a novel. A confusing story, mostly, though very well written and fun to read.
*** stars. Reviewed March 29th/21
The Last World of Mr. Goddard is from 1960, and is 17 pages long. Another in a long line of clever tales that remind me of the best of The Twilight Zone, Mr. Goddard loses control of his two parallel worlds in two very different ways. Fun to read, and definitely unsettling at times.
*** stars. Reviewed March 30th/21
Studio 5, The Stars is from 1961, and is 36 pages long. A strange little story about poets, their muse, and also a nod to Fritz Leiber, who invented wordwooze well before Musak was invented. The Silver Eggheads had to have been in Ballard's mind as he wrote this, though he adds in the legend of Corydon and Melander. Some fine writing.
*** stars. Reviewed April 21st/21
Deep End is from 1961, and is 13 pages long. The world's oceans have been mined to extinction. All that is left is tiny Atlantic Lake, with one remaining fish. This bleak view of the future has humans leaving Earth as fast as they can. All but a very few. A very sad story, with more cruelty than I can handle at this point.
*** stars. Reviewed April 21st/21
The Overloaded Man is from 1961, and is 15 pages long. A man learns how to tune out the world around him and escape to a better, less cluttered life. He ends up going a bit too far, however. Reminds me of stories by Barry Malzberg, who often deals incredibly well with mental illness.
*** stars. Reviewed April 21st/21
Mr. F is Mr. F is from 1961, and is 17 pages long. Reminding me of a short story by Fritz Lieber where time runs backwards, and of course the movie The Incredible Shrinking Man, Ballard puts his own spin on the story of a man shrinking backwards in time at a very fast rate.
*** stars. Reviewed April 21st/21
Billenium is from 1961, and is 17 pages long. I can see Harry Harrison being greatly influenced by this story of overpopulation for his famous book Make Room Make Room. Ballard's subtle humour is at its best in this story.
*** stars. Reviewed April 21st/21
The Insane Ones is from 1961, and is 12 pages long. Psychiatry is outlawed, as is giving any aid to a mentally disturbed person, or even trying to stop them from committing suicide. Just released from a three year prison sentence for such a crime, Dr. Gregory takes a road trip, only to become involved yet again.
*** stars. Reviewed April 22nd/21
The Garden of Time is from 1962, and is 9 pages long. This is a very sad story, kind of mirroring the French Revolution in its depiction of two aristocrats trying to hold off the raging masses for as long as they can. Some wonderful imagery at the end.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed April 22nd/21
The Thousand Dreams of Stellavista is from 1962, and is 22 pages long. Houses are sentient, and the aura of previous owners can linger a long time. Also, the mental health of these psychotropic houses depends on what the previous owners were like. The new owners get caught up in the psychic lives of the previous owners, in this very original tale of murder, attempted murder, and mayhem.
*** stars. Reviewed April 22nd/21
Thirteen to Centaurus is from 1962, and is 25 pages long. This is a very different take on Orphans of the Sky, about a generational starship travelling to the Centauri system. Pretty strange concept.
*** stars. Reviewed April 23rd/21
Passport To Eternity is from 1962, and is 21 pages long. This is a very humourous take on travel agencies and package tours.
*** stars. Reviewed April 23rd/21
The Cage of Sand is from 1962, and is 25 pages long. A strange fate has sealed south Florida, and only three people are still living in an otherwise abandoned Coco Beach. Desert sands from Mars were brought back in quantity, and they eventually spawned a virus that destroyed much of the native flora. Odd landscapes and one of the strangest plots I have come across, this is classic Ballard at his best.
**** stars. Reviewed April 23rd/21
The Watch-Towers is from 1962, and is 30 pages long. This is a very creepy Twilight-Zone tale, about mysterious watch towers that hang from the sky, controlling the lives of the people in a small town below. One man figures out the mystery. A great tale.
**** stars. Reviewed April 24th/21
The Singing Statues is from 1962, and is 13 pages long. A rich, eccentric woman falls in love with herself all over again when she discovers the beauty of a particular sonic sculpture. The sculptor at first falls in love with her, then realizes his mistake. Some beautiful imagery in this other musical sculpture tale.
*** stars. Reviewed April 24th/21
The Man on the 99th Floor is from 1962, and is 9 pages long. More mind control (see The Watch Towers), as a man has to discover why he is being compelled to climb to the 100th floor of buildings with exactly that many floors. He finds one of the reasons, but the 2nd reason eludes him until it is too late. A murder story with a difference.
*** stars. Reviewed April 24th/21
The Subliminal Man is from 1963, and is 19 pages long. A disturbed man tries to convince a doctor that the new and enormous highway signs being installed are for subliminal advertising. This harrowing story takes capitalism and continued growth to the extreme limits of perversity.
**** stars. Reviewed May 17th/21
The Reptile Enclosure is from 1963, and is 12 pages long. While the first reptile to make its appearance on land millions of years ago changed evolution forever, who says it can't happen the other way around. Mysterious doings on a crowded human beach, a routine satellite launch, and two physics professors become part of the latest form of regression.
*** stars. Reviewed May 17th/21
A Question For Re-Entry is from 1963, and is 33 pages long. This is one of the better rain forest stories I have ever read, as a white UN worker takes a cruise up the Amazon in search of a fallen lunar space capsule and its astronaut. Channeling Joseph Conrad, and foreseeing films by Werner Herzog, I thoroughly enjoyed this river adventure.
**** stars. Reviewed May 17th/21
The Time-Tombs is from 1963, and is 18 pages long. Modern tomb raiders risk a ten year jail sentence to uncover the secrets of a forgotten civilization on another planet, going back some ten thousand years. One of the raiders becomes enamoured with a beautiful image of a dead woman, leading to his downfall and rather shallow view of beauty.
*** stars. Reviewed May 17th/21
Now Wakes The Sea is from 1963, and is 11 pages long. Another fine Twilight Zone entry, as a man finds himself out at night, called by the rushing of the sea into the neighbourhood, though he lives more than a thousand miles away from it. Like many Ballard stories, a serene melancholy imbues the tale with a unique form of sadness.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
The Venus Hunters is from 1963, and is 33 pages long. An otherwise sane man claims to have seen a space ship from Venus, and talked to the alien, who warned humans not to venture out into space. An astronomer from a nearby observatory slowly becomes interested and intrigued by the man's tale, and his earnestness and investigation leads him to become a believer, too. We know what happens when one person claims to have seen a UFO or n alien. But what if a second encounter is witnessed by a different person? Would it make any difference? Written near the very beginning of the Apollo program.
*** stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
End-Game is from 1963, and is 23 pages long. A political prisoner is held at an isolated manor house until he is to be executed. His only companions are two policemen, one of whom he tries to convince of his innocence. A somber tale in grey and black, its unrelenting taste of communism sticks to the throat.
*** stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
Minus One is from 1963, and is 13 pages long. A patient goes missing from a secure asylum, and the director comes up with a unique way of dealing with it. Reminds me of a certain episode of M*A*S*H, when a soldier invented by Hawkeye to donate to charity is to receive a reward.
*** stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
The Sudden Afternoon is from 1963, and is 15 pages long. The mind of a chemist is suddenly taken over by an Indian doctor who murdered his wife. Another fine Twilight Zone story.
*** stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
The Sudden Game is from 1963, and is 26 pages long. An artist is hired to paint giant screens for the backdrop of a movie about Orpheus and Eurydice. The screens become a side game, a maze, and the players return to it often. Amidst the game comes a pale woman who is to play the part of Eurydice, a shadowy figure with a past that her husband, the producer of the film, tries to hide. Such visual imagery and use of sound as to make one weep. A masterpiece of writing.
**** stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
Time of Passage is from 1964, and is 14 pages long. A variation on a time backwards story by Fritz Leiber, and a pretty good one! This also reminds me of a piece of music that was written by Franz Joseph Haydn. You place the music in front of you and play it. Then you turn it upside down and voila!--there is another playable piece of music. Ballard's hero is followed from his grave site, through his awakening, earlier, and continues on until 9 months before he is born. Fun to read, and extremely well written.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed May 18th/21
THE COMPLETE SHORT STORIES, VOL. 2
Volume 2 contains 775 pages of stories, dating from 1964-1992. The same author's note and introduction by Adam Thirlwell is included at the beginning, adding 16 pages, and a further five pages are added at the end to repeat the interview by Travis Elborough.
Prisoner of the Coral Deep is from 1964, and is 7 pages long. Another Twilight Zone type of story, this one doesn't break any new ground, but is still atmospheric, poetic, and chilling.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 20th/21
The Lost Leonardo is from 1964, and is 21 pages long. This is an engaging art theft whodunnit, with a supernatural twist that reminded me of the movie Tommy Tricker And the Stamp Traveller. A great story
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 20th/21
The Terminal Beach is from 1964, and is 22 pages long. If there is such a thing as a typical Ballard story, then this is probably it. A man maroons himself on a South Sea island, abandoned once nuclear testing had ceased. The imagery is stark, humourless, and inhospitable to a healthy mind. And yet the poetry of existence, of a man searching for release from great emotional and spiritual pain, cannot be denied. Ballard would follow through with this theme in a complete novel, Rushing To Paradise, and also in his Concrete Island. Bleak but essential reading.
**** stars. Reviewed June 21st/21
The Illuminated Man is from 1964, and is 32 pages long. This is the earlier version of the full length novel The Crystal World. The short story follows pretty much the same path as the novel. Ballard's ideas and imagery are at their peak in both, though I recommend the novel for its enhanced look at this new and magnificent world.
**** stars. Reviewed June 21st/21
The Delta At Sunset is from 1964, and is 17 pages long. The stuff of nightmares for people who don't like snakes. A dying man sees thousands of snakes writhing on a river delta every afternoon, and becomes overly fascinated with them. One of the stranger tales amongst a plethora of strange tales.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 21st
The Drowned Giant is from 1964, and is 11 pages long. Speaking of nightmares, this one sounds like one from a first year anatomy medical student. We know Ballard did two years of such work, so it's no wonder this strange event crawled out of his subconscious. Perhaps he had read Johnathon Swift lately, too.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 21st
The Gioconda of the Twilight Noon is from 1964, and is 10 pages long. A man loses his sight for about two weeks, and becomes entranced with his new world of inner vision. Way too entranced. A dark tale of a search for something tangible, all related to Leonardo's Virgin On The Rocks.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 22nd/21
The Volcano Dances is from 1964, and is 7 pages long. A man stays as long as he can in a village abandoned due to an emerging volcanic eruption. Another search for something tangible, something just beyond human capability of grasping. The second recent story taking place in Mexico.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 22nd/21
The Beach Murders is from 1966, and is 8 pages long. An avante-garde mystery story, told in 26 chapters, with alphabetical titles. Reminded me a lot of Moorcock's The Final Program, from a year earlier.
* 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 22nd/22
The Day of Forever is from 1966, and is 19 pages long. A nice theme, but dragged down at the end. The world has almost totally stopped spinning on its axis. The story takes place in North Africa, in an abandoned town, in the twilight zone between day and night, where it is permanently 7 pm. Influenced by the twilight paintings of Paul Delvaux, this comes close to being a brilliant story.
*** stars. Reviewed June 22nd/21
The Impossible Man is from 1966, and is 19 pages long. Another story that reveals the damage to Ballard's mind, caused by what he saw as a boy in Shanghai, followed by his two years of anatomy. In this story he takes on organ and limb replacement surgery, and doesn't do the medical profession any favours.
*1/2 stars. Reviewed June 22nd/21
Storm-Bird, Storm-Dreamer is from 1966, and is 19 pages long. Ballard dreams Hitchcock, in the author's take of The Birds (1963). Birds have grown to enormous size, due to sprays used on crops. They have attacked and decimated civilization. Crispin is armed and on a picket boat when the big attack comes. Later, he tries to be of help to a woman living alone in a damaged house. Her husband was killed by a giant dove, and her baby stolen by another. Crispin doesn't read her thoughts accurately enough, and ends up paying a heavy price.
*** stars. Reviewed June 22nd/21
Tomorrow Is A Million Years is from 1966, and is 13 pages long. A criminal man is hunted to a distant, uninhabited planet by a space police captain. Upon securing his prisoner he is able to mete out a cruel but somewhat just punishment. Reminiscent of a Japanese ghost story, or perhaps something from a Kabuki play.
*** stars. Reviewed June 22nd/21
The Assassination of JFK Considered As A Downhill Motor Race is from 1966, and is 3 pages long. Amusing to the extreme, though many would find it very offensive.
*** stars. Reviewed June 23rd/21
Cry Hope, Cry Fury! is from 1967, and is 18 pages long. Sailing the Vermillion Sands area in a wind schooner, a man's ship is destroyed by a falling extra-large bird that he has just killed. Rescued by a sailing woman out searching for her lost lover, they return to her house on an island. She is a painter who lives with her corrupt half-brother and his girlfriend. Terrific atmosphere, but a very obtuse Hollywood murder/mystery/madness tale is interwoven throughout. Again, surrealist painting seems to have been a great influence here, but Ballard doesn't quite yet know what to do with all that atmosphere.
*** stars. Reviewed June 23rd/21
The Recognition is from 1967, and is 12 pages long. Again, a tale long on atmosphere, as a decrepit small circus arrives at night outside of town. Run by a woman and a dwarf, they have something in caged wagons that a few people come to see. Observed by the person telling the story, he watches until an episode occurs that renders him unconscious for a time. When he awakens, he finally learns what is inside the poorly lit wagons. A good one for the Twilight Zone crowd.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 23rd/21
The Cloud-Sculptors of Coral D is from 1967, and is 18 pages long. One of the best stories one could ever hope to come across. Ballard gets the atmosphere down perfectly, as usual, and puts together a simple tale of three glider pilots and their grounded instructor who sculpt clouds into artistic but brief formations, climaxing in a storm-brewed environment where the project finally falls apart. A must read!
****+ stars. Reviewed June 23rd/21
Why I Want To Fuck Ronald Reagan is from 1968, and is 3 pages long. Written like a clinical sex study, the title is probably the best thing about this weird and mostly lackluster creation.
* 1/2 stars. Reviewed June 23rd/21
To be continued in July....
The Dead Astronaut is from 1968, and is 13 pages long. A moody adventure piece, from a time when the race to space has failed and ended in the deaths of several astronauts, still orbiting. A couple await the imminent crash of one such capsule, with the body of an astronaut inside. Disturbing and edgy.
*** stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
The Comsat Angels is from 1968, and is 16 pages long. A strange worldwide conspiracy is gradually uncovered by a reporter, involving the 2nd coming of you know who. A fun story, with a good mystery element.
*** stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
The Killing Ground is from 1969, and is 9 pages long. Americans are taking over the world, by force. One ragtag band of Brits do their best to fight back. A bit strange and pointless.
** stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
A Place And A Time To Die is from 1969, and is 9 pages long. Another brief tale of the enemy marching over our soil. Though not as pointless as the previous story, it's still pretty much a forgettable one.
** stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
Say Goodbye To The Wind is from 1970, and is 16 pages long. Another fabulous visit to Vermillion Sands, and another messed up woman looking for something that she can't find. These lonely desert tales are among the best fiction ever written. This one also features unique clothing, something Iain Banks might have come up with much later.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
The Greatest Television Show On Earth is from 1972, and is 7 pages long. A silly time travel idea.
** stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
My Dream Of Flying To Wake Island is from 1974, and is 12 pages long. A lovely meditation on downed aircraft, Pacific islands, and an astronaut (a la Malzberg) trying to come to terms with the failures of his past.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 20th/21
The Air Disaster is from 1975, and is 11 pages long. A reporter at a Mexican film festival joins the flock of people heading to an airline disaster. He thinks he has a scoop, so instead of heading to the coast he drives into the mountains. He encounters backward villages and their inhabitants along the way, who have heard of the airline crash. A strange tale.
*** stars. Reviewed July 21st/21
Low-Flying Aircraft is from 1975, and is 18 pages long. A story of the near future. World population has dropped drastically. Only one baby in a thousand is born normal and healthy. While staying with his pregnant wife in an abandoned hotel on the coast in Spain, they encounter a flying doctor and the female who assists him. The reason for his long daily flights is made clear near the end, changing the whole idea of what has been happening to the people of Earth. Edgy and filled with the usual amazing Ballard imagery.
**** stars. Reviewed July 21st/21
The Life And Death Of God is from 1976, and is 10 pages long. It is a cynical tale of what might happen if evidence of an omnipotent god was discovered and verified by science and world religious leaders. Though painted with a broad brush (and though things would likely turn out very different in the age of social media), it's still a remarkable prediction.
*** stars. Reviewed July 21st/21
Notes Towards A Mental Breakdown is from 1976, and is 10 pages long. An interesting and clever writing exercise consisting of 18 words in a sentence, each word having a footnote attached. Thus the ten pages of story, about a woman's murder, is told in the footnotes.
*** stars. Reviewed July 21st
The 60 Minute Zoom is from 1976, and is 10 pages long. A voyeuristic man spies on his unfaithful wife from a distance with a super zoom camera lens.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 21st
The Smile is from 1976, and is 12 pages long. Another fine Twilight Zone-like tale, at which Ballard often excels. This one involves a lifelike female mannikin that he purchases at an antique store and brings home with him. She becomes a part of his life in a very big way. Strange and suitably creepy.
*** stars. Reviewed July 21st/21
The Dead Time is from 1977, and is 21 pages long. One of the more gruesome stories I have every read, this came before Ballard's Empire of The Sun, though parts of this story were used there. The most effective stories about war and its effect on people are often not the battles and the heroism, as this story amply illustrates. Not violent, just unnerving.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 22nd/21
The Index is from 1977, and is 8 pages long. Another creative writing exercise, this one involves a mysterious person whose existence was blotted out by the authorities. Only this biographical index remains to piece together who the person was. Fascinating and very entertaining. Love the Burl Ives entry, among many others.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 22nd/21
The Intensive Care Unit is from 1977, and is 10 pages long. After living through a pandemic for over a year and communicating by Skype and Zoom, I wonder if Ballard ever expected his story to come so close to the truth. In this tale, people simply do not interact or see one another, except through television. This goes for doctors, who must diagnose and treat patients through the small screen, and massage givers, who instruct their clients how to massage themselves. Hilarious and hair raising at the same time. Of course people do not know how to socially interact with one another, so when a family of four finally do meet in person, the result is extreme and violent.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 22nd/21
Theatre of War is from 1977, and is 21 pages long. The Americans are in Britain in force, propping up a puppet right wing government. The fact that the story is told through the medium of a TV documentary doesn't help. Not my kind of thing at all.
* 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 22nd/21
Having A Wonderful Time is from 1978, and is 6 pages long. A vacation that turns into a permanent lifestyle is told through a series of dated postcards. Silly but kind of fun.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 22nd/21
One Afternoon At Utah Beach is from 1978, and is 14 pages long. A man has an unusual (Twilight Zone) experience when visiting a bunker at a famous WW2 historic beach. This story, though a classic Ballard tale in many respects, seem a bit tired and uninspired. Still worth reading, but not breaking any new ground.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 23rd/21
Zodiac 2000 is from 1978, and is 9 pages long. Ballard creates new Zodiac signs for the modern space age. I yawned through a lot of this one.
* 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 23rd/21
Motel Architecture is from 1978, and is 15 pages long. An invalid in a wheelchair, living alone, begins to imagine that someone else is in his apartment with him. He is obsessed with TV, and especially the shower scene from Psycho. Try and guess what happens when a young female cleaner comes to do her job. A good setup, but the writing has no magic.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed July 23rd/21
A Host Of Furious Fancies is from 1980, and is 14 pages long. A retelling of the Cinderella story in Freudian terms, and brilliantly done!
**** stars. Reviewed July 23rd/21
News From The Sun is from 1981, and is 38 pages long. A rewrite and rethinking of The Voices of Time (1960), this novelette eliminates many of the confusing elements of that story. A doctor treats patients who go into a coma suddenly, losing part of their day. This losing of time increases until the victims, of whom the doctor himself is one, are awake only a few minutes each day. The story details what is happening to these people as they drift away from one reality towards a new one. The story also ties in to Ballard's many tales about an abandoned Florida, something caused by going into space. One of his patients is a former astronaut, who may have brought back the affliction with him. A very moody and engrossing story, one of the author's best.
**** stars. Reviewed August 21st/21
Memories Of The Space Age is from 1982, and is 33 pages long. We are back in Florida, again with a terrible disease striking those within the state but not without. Mallory and his wife are here, searching for something intangible,though just on the outer edge of reality. There to thwart his plans is a former astronaut, now a nutcase who flies various classic planes, by the name of Hinton. The more of Ballard I read, the more I realize how damaged his mind was due to his childhood war experiences. That he was able to turn this damage into great art is a testament not only to humankind's ability to redirect previous psychic injuries, but to Ballard's continuing search for something beyond the everyday experience. It is something almost religious in nature, as each main hero has a belief in what he is doing, and a half-knowledge of how to achieve his ultimate goal. Probably best read on its own, rather than surrounded by two similar tales, as seen here in this volume.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed August 21st/21
Myths of The Near Future is from 1982, and is 33 pages long. This is the 3rd story in a row taking place in Florida near the space center. Think of the stories as variations on a theme. While I wouldn't recommend reading all three in a row, as I did, for study and comparison purposes (say a college paper) it would be useful. Again we have something about our reach into space that doesn't agree with many people. In this story, 1 out of every hundred is afflicted with a kind of time disease. People begin thinking that they were once astronauts, before withdrawing into an alternate reality.
"Could it be that travelling into outer space, even thinking about it and watching it on television, was a forced evolutionary step with unforeseen consequences, the eating of a very special kind of forbidden fruit? Perhaps, for the central nervous system, space was not a linear structure at all, but a model for an advanced condition of time, a metaphor for eternity which they were wrong to try to grasp..." (p. 608).
Comparing Ballard's qualms about the space program with those of Barry Malzberg (see his page) also proves interesting. In Malzberg it is only the astronauts themselves that go stark raving mad. In Ballard, it is anyone who has been interested in their doings that goes off the deep end. Though not the strangest of the three tales (or four, if you count the original one, Voices of Time), it is a worthy entry into the series, which also includes The Cage of Sand, from Vol. 1.
*** stars. Reviewed August 22nd/21
Report On An Unidentified Space Station is from 1982, and is 6 pages long. This is a quirky and funny tale about a space ship landing on a small, abandoned space station to make some engine repairs. Told is several very short chapters, the first report makes the station/s size to be about 500 meters. Watch watch happens as the chapters progress. This would make a very good short film!
**** stars. Reviewed August 22nd/22
The Object Of The Attack is from 1984, and is 16 pages long. A psychiatrist becomes involved with a criminal assassin in a London jail, a most interesting case. When he escapes, the doctor keeps his eye on signs of his whereabouts, and soon eventually encounters him. His service to the young man is not what what be expected from the establishment.
*** stars. Reviewed August 22nd/21
Answers To A Questionnaire is from 1985, and is 5 pages long. The story is told through 100 short answers to a questionnaire. Another writer's project experiment, this one is at least entertaining and brief.
*** stars. Reviewed August 22nd/21
The Man Who Walked On The Moon, is from 1985, and is 15 pages long. Down in Rio is man purporting to have once been an astronaut and walked on the moon. Though proven to be a charlatan, he continues to have tourists seek him out for photos. The narrator of the tale becomes interested in this man, and befriends and cares for him as his health seriously declines. The secret to having been an astronaut is in this story, and anyone can find out what to do. Ballard's obsession with Apollo and astronauts continues full steam ahead. Nice change of location this time, though.
*** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
The Secret History Of World War 3 is from 1988, and is 11 pages long. Very few people know about WW3, thanks to concern about president Reagan's health. A very funny story, and not really too far from truth. What is important to people isn't always what is important.
**** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
Love In A Colder Climate is from 1989, and is 9 pages long. Two years in the service is compulsory for men and women, and woe is the person who tries to skip out. More dark humour from Ballard, though with a cruel outcome.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
The Enormous Space is from 1989, and is 13 pages long. A man who is about to be divorced from his wife has a total and very unique mental collapse. He is determined never to set foot outside his front door again. Original and filled with dark humour.
*** 1/2 stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
The Largest Theme Park In The World is from 1989, and is 8 pages long. A very funny and ironic tale about a united Europe, and the consequences to which it leads. This would make such a great film!
**** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
War Fever is from 1989, and is 22 pages long. It is a cynical tale of the planet's last war, being fought by several rival factions on the streets of Beirut. The peacemakers will soon reap what they have sown.
*** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
Dream Cargoes is from 1990, and is 17 pages long. A ship is beached on a tiny atoll off Puerto Rico. Only one deckhand remains with the cargo ship, which is carrying barrels of leaking chemical waste. He makes his home on the island, making friends with a female biologist who is studying the flora and fauna. The chemical waste has an effect on the plant and animal life.
*** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
A Guide To Virtual Death is from 1992, and is 3 pages long. A very funny 24 hour TV Guide from the future.
*** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
The Message From Mars is from 1992, and is 12 pages long. 5 astronauts return from a successful voyage to Mars. They refuse to leave their space capsule on arrival back home, and cannot be coaxed out. Another of Ballard's unrelenting attacks against humans going into space. Quite good, and very amusing.
*** stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
Report From An Obscure Planet is from 1992, and is 4 pages long. Aliens arrive on Earth long after frantic calls for help were sent out. They find no humans, and they are unable to crack the computer codes to gain more information.
** 1/2 stars. Reviewed August 23rd/21
Mapman Mike
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