A review by jake_
Antisocieties by Michael Cisco
adventurous
dark
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
3.75
My feelings about this collection are mixed. At times I felt the stories were too forced, too deliberate, too focused and formulaic: the stories are written purely like weird short stories, and there are no extraneous details which hint, for example, at character backgrounds or histories; there is never a question of what sort of material you have in front of you. At other times, I was impressed by a well-told weird story, whether invoking Kafka, Aickman, or Ligotti. And there are moments in this collection which place Michael Cisco at the forefront of contemporary weird fiction, as he finds new subjects (though through traditional methods) to extract the weirdness from: the weirdness of maths, or of reading. I'm not selling it well - but he really has a gift for finding an unsettling, madness-inducing weirdness in things, a void or lacuna which everyone neglects in everyday life.
I came away with mixed feelings, not because the stories varied much in quality, but because every story had similar, and noticeable, flaws and strengths. Nevertheless, many other readers like me, people who look for weird fiction of the kafkaesque/strange story/uncanny kind, think a lot of this collection, so I would encourage you to judge it for yourself.
I came away with mixed feelings, not because the stories varied much in quality, but because every story had similar, and noticeable, flaws and strengths. Nevertheless, many other readers like me, people who look for weird fiction of the kafkaesque/strange story/uncanny kind, think a lot of this collection, so I would encourage you to judge it for yourself.