The Ghoul Goes West by Dale Bailey
My rating: 4/5 cats
Movies change lives.
That’s the fundamental axiom of my faith.
Unfortunately, they don’t always change them for the better.
oh, man, i was SO THRILLED to see a new free tor short on the site today, after more than two whole months of zero free tor shorts, that i devoured this one like halloween candy even though i usually stay away from novelettes—i use tor shorties as saturday morning wake-em-ups, and committing to a fancy long novellette is too languid an introduction to the day—i gotta hit the ground running! however, you starve me long enough and i’ll even eat olives (maybe), so 42 pages before my eyes are fully open? consider it gobbled.
this one is lovely, although i know there will be grumblings of “not fantasy enough” from people who grumble about such things (i may have, myself, once along the way). it’s true, the magical element is not taking center stage, but the writing is so good, and it’s a tale full of the gloomy themes i love. and i realized just now that he wrote another free tor short i enjoyed—The End of the End of Everything (although looking at it now, i only gave it three stars cats and a “meh” review, so my memory is a dummy), and one i am definitely going to check out soon, even though it is also a novelette—A Rumor of Angels.
since i have promised myself to review these tor shorts quick n’ shallow from now on, so i don’t get further behind in my reviewing than i already am, i won’t say much, even though as a novelette, there’s more content to discuss than usual, but a promise is a promise, even if it’s only a self-promise. n.b.—i have made no promises about run-on sentences or excessive comma-usage. anyway, ambition, self-delusion, despair, mourning, regret, defeat, bittersweet possibilities, alla my bread and butter. plus, hollywood and the dazzling allure of fame and glory, to add a little glitter to the grit-themes. longer than usual, but definitely worth it. plus, “dale bailey” is a fun name to say.
perhaps i should go back to writing proper reviews for these tor shorts instead of just typing whatever pops into my head as quickly as i can type it. maybe in 2019.
WELCOME BACK, FREE TOR SHORTS!
read it for yourself here:
https://www.tor.com/2018/01/17/the-gh…
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