Nick DiChario
Author of Death Dines at 8:30
About the Author
Works by Nick DiChario
Dragonhead 3 copies
Blind Spot 2 copies
Barbie Marries the Jolly Fat Baker and More Twisted Notions: Collected Stories 1996 - 2011 (2012) 1 copy
Pleasantly Pink 1 copy
Drainage 1 copy
Carp Man 1 copy
Presentes 1 copy
Birdie 1 copy
Associated Works
The Best Alternate History Stories of the 20th Century (2001) — Contributor — 617 copies, 10 reviews
The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-First Annual Collection (2004) — Contributor — 573 copies, 6 reviews
The Way It Wasn't : Great Science Fiction Stories of Alternate History (1996) — Contributor — 164 copies, 4 reviews
Crime Through Time: Original Tales of Historical Mystery (1997) — Contributor — 137 copies, 2 reviews
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction May 1994, Vol. 86, No. 5 (1994) — Author — 17 copies, 1 review
In the Shadow of the Wall: An Anthology of Vietnam Stories That Might Have Been (2002) — Contributor — 6 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Other names
- DiChario, Nicholas A.
- Birthdate
- 1960
- Gender
- male
- Occupations
- playwright
- Places of residence
- Honeoye Falls, New York, USA
- Map Location
- USA
Members
Reviews
Valley of Day-Glo by Nick DiChario is a post-apocalyptic novel where tribes of natives are all that's left in a dry, desolate wasteland where the white men, or Honio’o, all perished (along with the yellow and dark skinned people)in the Great Reddening. Broadway Danny Rose is a member of what is left of the Gushedon’dada tribe. He and his mother, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe, are taking his dead father, The Outlaw Josey Wales, to the mythical Valley of Day-Glo. His father told stories show more about the existence of the Eden-like valley where death becomes life. The dangerous journey to the valley takes them through the lands of other hostile tribes.
Now, if that description makes you think this is a sad, serious tale of struggle and woe, then you need to know that Valley of Day-Glo is at times entertaining, philosophical, humorous, original, and warped. DiChario himself calls Valley of Day-Glo absurdist fiction, and while it is absurd it is also much more. In the introduction, Nancy Kress says to DiChario, "You have a very warped mind."(pg 9) but she goes on to say: "His warp may be fanciful and wildly inventive, but his cross-threads are deadly serious. They are love and the price that love exacts, violence and the grief it causes, striving and the ways that striving can be twisted by the larger world. Nick's tapestry is a life-like design of brilliant, heart-breaking colors, including that imaginative warp." (pg. 10)
Nick DiChario is a very talented writer, and Broadway Danny Rose is an unforgettable (and rumored impotent) hero who seemingly stumbles through life constantly being confronted with human stupidity along the way. This is a highly original novel in many ways but also archetypal in others. Oh, and definitely read the "Book Club Guide" at the end of the novel. It will be well worth your time... maybe.
highly recommended; http://shetreadssoftly.blogspot.com/ show less
Now, if that description makes you think this is a sad, serious tale of struggle and woe, then you need to know that Valley of Day-Glo is at times entertaining, philosophical, humorous, original, and warped. DiChario himself calls Valley of Day-Glo absurdist fiction, and while it is absurd it is also much more. In the introduction, Nancy Kress says to DiChario, "You have a very warped mind."(pg 9) but she goes on to say: "His warp may be fanciful and wildly inventive, but his cross-threads are deadly serious. They are love and the price that love exacts, violence and the grief it causes, striving and the ways that striving can be twisted by the larger world. Nick's tapestry is a life-like design of brilliant, heart-breaking colors, including that imaginative warp." (pg. 10)
Nick DiChario is a very talented writer, and Broadway Danny Rose is an unforgettable (and rumored impotent) hero who seemingly stumbles through life constantly being confronted with human stupidity along the way. This is a highly original novel in many ways but also archetypal in others. Oh, and definitely read the "Book Club Guide" at the end of the novel. It will be well worth your time... maybe.
highly recommended; http://shetreadssoftly.blogspot.com/ show less
I am a big fan of Nick DiChario’s first novel A Small and Remarkable Life. It remains one of the only modern novels I’ve come across to effortlessly evoke the works of sci-fi legend Theodore Sturgeon, which in itself is a rare and wonderful thing. Yes, comparisons to Frank Herbert, Orson Scott Card, or Arthur C. Clarke are all well and good, but who gets compared to Sturgeon? Very few, and with very good reason. Sturgeon was an innovator, fusing a depth of humanity with bizarre, show more outworldly concepts that resulted in works of astonishing complexity and clarity. A Small and Remarkable Life was Sturgeon reborn, and if you haven’t read it, or Sturgeon for that matter, then shame on you. Needless to point out, I awaited DiChario’s second novel, Valley of Day-Glo, with an eagerness that bordered on the pathological.
So, here it is, and what’s the consensus? DiChario is no Theodore Sturgeon, not anymore. And that’s a compliment. Valley of Day-Glo is as far away conceptually from A Small and Remarkable Life as Sturgeon’s To Marry Medusa is from, say, Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan. That is to say, pretty damn different. But it is equally compelling, equally weird, and equally accomplished. DiChario cannot be accused of repeating himself in anything but quality.
Valley of Day-Glo is ostensibly a post-apocalyptic epic, but by way of the absurdist fictions of Kurt Vonnegut and Will Self (whose novel The Book of Dave has slight echoes in DiChario’s narrative). Its protagonist is one of the last of the Iroquois, in a future where tribes of Natives are slowly reclaiming the earth, the white men (or Honio’o) having perished in the Great Reddening which decimated the planet. It all sounds deadly serious, and DiChario approaches the subject with utmost respect, but when you realize that the main character’s name is Broadway Danny Rose - the eunuch son of Father The Outlaw Josey Wales and Mother Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe? - you get an inkling of DiChario’s warped and refreshing take on the apocalypse genre.
It is the intent of the tribe of Broadway Danny Rose to “actively integrate the words of wisdom, the objects and rituals that remain from the Pre-Reddening Honio’o into the cultural habits of the Indian tribes, so that the horrible deeds that provoked the great Indian spirits to destroy the yellow- and dark- and white-skinned people will never be duplicated in ignorance.” Unfortunately, there are only three members left, and when Father The Outlaw Josey Wales is strangled to death by Mother Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? after an argument concerning Major League Baseball, there aren’t many options left for keeping the tribe alive. Mother and son decide to take Father’s body to the Valley of Day-Glo, a fabled land “where all the colours of the pre-Reddening Earth can be found. Flowers are in constant bloom there. Trees reach up so far into the sky that it is impossible to know where the branches end and the flowers begin.” It is, in other words, Eden, where death becomes life. And although Broadway Danny Rose does not believe it exists, Father The Outlaw Josey Wales did, and burying him there seems the right thing to do.
In a recent interview, DiChario classifies Valley of Day-Glo as absurdist fiction, although he admits even he does not necessarily know how to define the term (He also states his love for Steven Sherrill’s The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break, which makes me like him even more). Much of what occurs in Valley is indeed absurd, as when the tribes each take a book as their personal bible; the tribe of Broadway Danny Rose, the Gushedon’dada tribe, worships The Microwave Cookbook. After a harrowing journey through the blasted landscape, Broadway Danny Rose meets up with an established township of tribes, and discovers that “[the] chiefs of the Independent Iroquois nations planned for the future by organizing the tribes into a coalition of argumentative nincompoops.” The ultimate answer to the existence of the Valley of Day-Glo is as strange and inspired a piece of weirdness as ever graced the pages of sci-fi. But DiChario never flinches, never winks, never suggests that he’s just goofing, which contributes to Valley’s lasting effect on the reader.
There is much of Vonnegut in DiChario’s narrative; the beset-upon and often impotent hero, the strange underhanded humour, the overarching anger at unending human stupidity. The book jacket makes a slightly misleading comparison between Valley and the works of Douglas Adams; both are science-fiction with a humourous bent, but Adams, God love him, was far more concerned with making people laugh than exploring the literary boundaries of his chosen genre. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but Adams was Monty Python and The Goon Show, whereas DiChario is Samuel Beckett and Joseph Heller. Both options are funny, but if you go in expecting similar levels of hilarity, you’re bound to be disappointed at best, and outright perplexed, befuddled, and flummoxed at worst.
What is clear is that DiChario is a unique talent, a writer of depth and originality (a mix far more rare than it should be). He’s not afraid to take risks. He’s warped. I await his third novel with all the breathless anticipation of a child newly introduced to chocolate, with the promise of more in the indeterminate future.
And as an aside, if for no other reason, I would love Valley of Day-Glo for its book club discussion guide alone, rife with such questions as:
2. Do you think humankind can survive a nuclear world war? If so, are you serious?
5. How important is it for you to be accepted by other people?
9. Why are you reading this guide when you could be out in the world discovering great books?
Now that’s ballsy, suggesting that people read something else. show less
So, here it is, and what’s the consensus? DiChario is no Theodore Sturgeon, not anymore. And that’s a compliment. Valley of Day-Glo is as far away conceptually from A Small and Remarkable Life as Sturgeon’s To Marry Medusa is from, say, Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan. That is to say, pretty damn different. But it is equally compelling, equally weird, and equally accomplished. DiChario cannot be accused of repeating himself in anything but quality.
Valley of Day-Glo is ostensibly a post-apocalyptic epic, but by way of the absurdist fictions of Kurt Vonnegut and Will Self (whose novel The Book of Dave has slight echoes in DiChario’s narrative). Its protagonist is one of the last of the Iroquois, in a future where tribes of Natives are slowly reclaiming the earth, the white men (or Honio’o) having perished in the Great Reddening which decimated the planet. It all sounds deadly serious, and DiChario approaches the subject with utmost respect, but when you realize that the main character’s name is Broadway Danny Rose - the eunuch son of Father The Outlaw Josey Wales and Mother Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe? - you get an inkling of DiChario’s warped and refreshing take on the apocalypse genre.
It is the intent of the tribe of Broadway Danny Rose to “actively integrate the words of wisdom, the objects and rituals that remain from the Pre-Reddening Honio’o into the cultural habits of the Indian tribes, so that the horrible deeds that provoked the great Indian spirits to destroy the yellow- and dark- and white-skinned people will never be duplicated in ignorance.” Unfortunately, there are only three members left, and when Father The Outlaw Josey Wales is strangled to death by Mother Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? after an argument concerning Major League Baseball, there aren’t many options left for keeping the tribe alive. Mother and son decide to take Father’s body to the Valley of Day-Glo, a fabled land “where all the colours of the pre-Reddening Earth can be found. Flowers are in constant bloom there. Trees reach up so far into the sky that it is impossible to know where the branches end and the flowers begin.” It is, in other words, Eden, where death becomes life. And although Broadway Danny Rose does not believe it exists, Father The Outlaw Josey Wales did, and burying him there seems the right thing to do.
In a recent interview, DiChario classifies Valley of Day-Glo as absurdist fiction, although he admits even he does not necessarily know how to define the term (He also states his love for Steven Sherrill’s The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break, which makes me like him even more). Much of what occurs in Valley is indeed absurd, as when the tribes each take a book as their personal bible; the tribe of Broadway Danny Rose, the Gushedon’dada tribe, worships The Microwave Cookbook. After a harrowing journey through the blasted landscape, Broadway Danny Rose meets up with an established township of tribes, and discovers that “[the] chiefs of the Independent Iroquois nations planned for the future by organizing the tribes into a coalition of argumentative nincompoops.” The ultimate answer to the existence of the Valley of Day-Glo is as strange and inspired a piece of weirdness as ever graced the pages of sci-fi. But DiChario never flinches, never winks, never suggests that he’s just goofing, which contributes to Valley’s lasting effect on the reader.
There is much of Vonnegut in DiChario’s narrative; the beset-upon and often impotent hero, the strange underhanded humour, the overarching anger at unending human stupidity. The book jacket makes a slightly misleading comparison between Valley and the works of Douglas Adams; both are science-fiction with a humourous bent, but Adams, God love him, was far more concerned with making people laugh than exploring the literary boundaries of his chosen genre. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but Adams was Monty Python and The Goon Show, whereas DiChario is Samuel Beckett and Joseph Heller. Both options are funny, but if you go in expecting similar levels of hilarity, you’re bound to be disappointed at best, and outright perplexed, befuddled, and flummoxed at worst.
What is clear is that DiChario is a unique talent, a writer of depth and originality (a mix far more rare than it should be). He’s not afraid to take risks. He’s warped. I await his third novel with all the breathless anticipation of a child newly introduced to chocolate, with the promise of more in the indeterminate future.
And as an aside, if for no other reason, I would love Valley of Day-Glo for its book club discussion guide alone, rife with such questions as:
2. Do you think humankind can survive a nuclear world war? If so, are you serious?
5. How important is it for you to be accepted by other people?
9. Why are you reading this guide when you could be out in the world discovering great books?
Now that’s ballsy, suggesting that people read something else. show less
Rating: 3.6* of five
The Publisher Says: "Broadway Danny Rose is on the move!"
In this brightly satiric, postapocalyptic novel of the far future, a young Indian brave named Broadway Danny Rose embarks upon a quest across the desolate planet Earth to find the mysterious Valley of Day-Glo, where plants and animals and large bodies of water are rumoured to still exist, and where, according to legend, "death becomes life."
Valley of Day-Glo is a brilliant blend of Douglas Adams' farcical humour and show more Kurt Vonnegut's droll absurdity. Hugo Award-nominee Nick DiChario delivers a witty and poignant story that deals with the power of myth, the search for truth, and the meaning of life and death.
My Review: The UK Book-A-Day meme, a book a day for August 2014, is the goad I'm using to get through my snit-based unwritten SF-book reviews. Today's prompt, the first one of August, recalls to mind a book with a memorable first line.
Baseball, post-apocalyptic future, and the kind of names I associate with A Canticle for Leibowitz...okay, I'm in.
And that was the last thing I really grokked for the next 210pp. The Bibles of the various Indian (the word used in the book, leave me alone about it) tribes are all random survivors of the pre-Apocalyptic Honio'o (white) culture. They are some dillies, including a network marketing self-help text and a book of baseball statistics and records.
Broadway Danny Rose, our narrator and the son of Mother Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Father The Outlaw Josey Wales, appears to be an intersex person. This is a problem for a tribe reduced to three people. In due course, the tribe is reduced to Broadway Danny Rose, and that's the end of that:
And that, laddies and gentlewomen, is the end of this particular road.
As Broadway Danny Rose journeys Candide-like through the landscape of a world brutally and completely destroyed by the Honio'o, he meets several different tribes and nearly succumbs to several different fates, but in the end he fetches up in the Valley of Day-Glo, where death becomes life, and where Mother Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? intended to take the murdered carcass of Father The Outlaw Josey Wales so that the tribe might continue to eke an existence out of the way of the great and powerful Seneca people.
Once in the place where death becomes life, Broadway Danny Rose is met by the Cuisinart Coffeepot that rules the Valley of Day-Glo. (Believe me when I tell you that by the time this eventuates, you won't care that it makes little to no sense.) After a discussion with Father The Outlaw Josey Wales in which the naked intersex Broadway Danny Rose learns nothing new, the book ends.
I'm not actually being over-generous with my stars here. There are moments of weirdness that make one impatient, and then there are phrases like this:
I liked the verve and the manic energy of the book. I appreciated that the author and publisher kept it short. I enjoyed the sharpness of the satire, and the mischievous survival of so much bad-book publishing.
But I am not going to warble a paean of praise for it, exhorting all who come into range to buy and consume the story. Most non-SF readers would simply not enjoy the read at all. Bizarro readers will feel it's tame. The Longface Puritans' League will whinny about how pointless and amusing the book is, these being their cardinal sins for writing. (WHAT?! Someone might ENJOY it?! BURN IT NOW!!)
So why should you read it? Cat fur to make kitten britches, as Mama used to say. Read it because it's there, or don't read it at all, or pick it up at a garage sale with a vague memory of an old review...you never know.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. show less
The Publisher Says: "Broadway Danny Rose is on the move!"
In this brightly satiric, postapocalyptic novel of the far future, a young Indian brave named Broadway Danny Rose embarks upon a quest across the desolate planet Earth to find the mysterious Valley of Day-Glo, where plants and animals and large bodies of water are rumoured to still exist, and where, according to legend, "death becomes life."
Valley of Day-Glo is a brilliant blend of Douglas Adams' farcical humour and show more Kurt Vonnegut's droll absurdity. Hugo Award-nominee Nick DiChario delivers a witty and poignant story that deals with the power of myth, the search for truth, and the meaning of life and death.
My Review: The UK Book-A-Day meme, a book a day for August 2014, is the goad I'm using to get through my snit-based unwritten SF-book reviews. Today's prompt, the first one of August, recalls to mind a book with a memorable first line.
The day Mother Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? killed Father The Outlaw Josey Wales, they were arguing again about the Pre-Reddening game of Major League Baseball.
Baseball, post-apocalyptic future, and the kind of names I associate with A Canticle for Leibowitz...okay, I'm in.
And that was the last thing I really grokked for the next 210pp. The Bibles of the various Indian (the word used in the book, leave me alone about it) tribes are all random survivors of the pre-Apocalyptic Honio'o (white) culture. They are some dillies, including a network marketing self-help text and a book of baseball statistics and records.
Broadway Danny Rose, our narrator and the son of Mother Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Father The Outlaw Josey Wales, appears to be an intersex person. This is a problem for a tribe reduced to three people. In due course, the tribe is reduced to Broadway Danny Rose, and that's the end of that:
The woman tried her best to entice me, calling me 'dear, sweet boy,' stroking and pumping me as if I were a bleating animal from which she hoped to produce milk. Father turned into a cheerleader when he saw things weren't going well, clapping his hands, patting my back, pushing me on top of the old harlot again and again, as if I might discover some buried treasure deep within the gaping, malodorous hollow between her legs.
And that, laddies and gentlewomen, is the end of this particular road.
As Broadway Danny Rose journeys Candide-like through the landscape of a world brutally and completely destroyed by the Honio'o, he meets several different tribes and nearly succumbs to several different fates, but in the end he fetches up in the Valley of Day-Glo, where death becomes life, and where Mother Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? intended to take the murdered carcass of Father The Outlaw Josey Wales so that the tribe might continue to eke an existence out of the way of the great and powerful Seneca people.
Once in the place where death becomes life, Broadway Danny Rose is met by the Cuisinart Coffeepot that rules the Valley of Day-Glo. (Believe me when I tell you that by the time this eventuates, you won't care that it makes little to no sense.) After a discussion with Father The Outlaw Josey Wales in which the naked intersex Broadway Danny Rose learns nothing new, the book ends.
I'm not actually being over-generous with my stars here. There are moments of weirdness that make one impatient, and then there are phrases like this:
I could feel a headache circling in on me with the long, careful, merciless descent of a carrion bird.
I liked the verve and the manic energy of the book. I appreciated that the author and publisher kept it short. I enjoyed the sharpness of the satire, and the mischievous survival of so much bad-book publishing.
But I am not going to warble a paean of praise for it, exhorting all who come into range to buy and consume the story. Most non-SF readers would simply not enjoy the read at all. Bizarro readers will feel it's tame. The Longface Puritans' League will whinny about how pointless and amusing the book is, these being their cardinal sins for writing. (WHAT?! Someone might ENJOY it?! BURN IT NOW!!)
So why should you read it? Cat fur to make kitten britches, as Mama used to say. Read it because it's there, or don't read it at all, or pick it up at a garage sale with a vague memory of an old review...you never know.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. show less
Theodore Sturgeon is one of the great unsung heroes of science-fiction, a genius of style and character, and a true visionary when it came to intricate plotlines that were completely unpredictable yet completely, devastatingly logical. Sadly, while his name is still held in high esteem by the literati of the sci-fi genre, he has never truly risen above the level of cult author, largely ignored while his contemporaries and imitators attain a level of popularity denied to him. We hear of show more target="_top">Philip K. Dick, of Frank Herbert, of Clarke, Asimov, Bradbury, Zelazny, and Delany, yet Sturgeon is relegated to the sidelines, more often known as the inspiration for Vonnegut’s famed character Kilgore Trout (himself a failed science-fiction author), or as the original writer for the famed Star Trek episode, “Amok Time.”
Sturgeon’s true flair was in plotting, excelling in narrative’s which always keep the reader in a state of heightened suspense. Take his novel More than Human (his acknowledged masterpiece), wherein six strange and damaged individuals discover that they each form a part of a whole, a “blesh” organism which takes on the next step of human evolution, the “homo gestalt.” To Marry Medusa is a brilliant exploration into another evolutionary concept, as humanity becomes infected by a hive mind, and learns to function and defeat the alien host through its collective strength. Sturgeon had a definite knack for revealing the many facets of humanity through stories of alien contact that spurned the popularity of their shoot-‘em-up alien invasion space opera cousins (a la Independence Day), and rose to the level of art. But the genre he wrote in denied his fame, as for the most part people still reject science-fiction as being ‘popular,’ and therefore not literature.
There, of course, have been many, many examples since Sturgeon passed away of excellent writers consigned to relative obscurity because of their chosen literary field. Nick DiChario may suffer the same problem; it’s far too early in his career to tell. But let us hope he achieves more: based on his deeply surprising first novel A Small and Remarkable Life, we may have discovered the 21st century Sturgeon.
Taking the form of a ‘first-contact’ novel (i.e. a story based on the presumption of Earth’s first contact with an alien life form), DiChario’s tale bears all the hallmarks of the classic ‘fish out of water’ scenario so beloved in science-fiction: an alien, trapped on Earth, must learn to adapt and survive. Yet as in Sturgeon’s best, DiChario subtly subverts the concept, taking the reader down unexpected paths.
Setting his narrative in the mid-19th century, DiChario intriguingly lays out the story of Tink Puddah, an unusual bluish-hued individual that most people refer to as “the foreigner.” Tink is the mysterious progeny of Nif and Ru, two aliens from “Wetspace” who have decided to adapt themselves to life on earth: “Their metamorphosis had begun—they had each developed two miniature spherical structures of jelly-like eyes with which to see the new world. Bodies shrinking, rounding, bending. Bones to support the eco-matter. Small, bipedal, humanoid creatures they would become. Atoms, molecules, joints, nails, skin, glands, hormones, blood.” Right from the start, DiChario propels the story through startling imagery that pays homage to the tenets of the genre while at the same time raising the bar.
Unfortunately, Nif and Ru fall to misfortune as Tink’s body is adjusting itself to a human shape. Their motives for coming to Earth are never explained, nor should they be, as Tink’s tale would be forever spoiled from too much back-story. DiChario presents Tink’s life in two ways, weaving a standard chronological narrative of his life with the tale of Jacob Peirsol, a preacher who presides over Tink’s funeral (it gives nothing away to say that Tink dies, as the story begins with his memorial service). Jacob, like Tink, has been searching for meaning in his life, and his collision with Tink alters his lifepath irrevocably.
By keeping Tink confused as to his past, thereby becoming a blank slate on which an existence on Earth can imprint its various glories and cruelties, DiChario manages the not-inconsiderable feat of having Tink function as both character and parable. He truly becomes the ‘good Samaritan,’ traveling the land, dispensing kind acts for no compensation, yet persecuted for both his outward appearance and a case of mistaken identity. There are strong parallels to the messiah myth, but also present is a strong homage to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (Tink’s odyssey as an incompletely-formed human is directly analogous to Shelley’s Monster wandering alone and unloved through the world), as well as Robert Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land – although how any modern Christ analogy in science-fiction could not but harken to Heinlein’s revolutionary sci-fi parable is hard to fathom.
Interestingly, despite the abundance of evil in Tink’s world, the true ‘villain’ of the piece, Jacob, is hardly a villain at all, in the traditional sense. His only crime is one of pride, as he cannot comprehend Tink’s unwillingness to consider the possibility of God; “Jacob had always believed Tink Puddah nothing more than a heathenish savage and feared for his misguided soul. And, as any preacher would have done, he harbored a secret resentment for someone who could turn so easily from the Word of the Savior, Lord Jesus Christ, to a belief in…well…nothing.” Jacob's eventual outcome, like Tink’s, is blazingly unexpected, completely logical, weirdly touching, and bewilderingly original.
It does a disservice to DiChario’s accomplishment to lump it in with the usual assortment of ‘aliens lost on Earth’ stories such as the cinematic adventures of E.T. and Starman. A Small and Remarkable Life does perform the archetypal function of holding up a mirror to the acts of mankind, reflecting all their flaws and triumphs, but DiChario’s talent for pathos (and his skill at creating a colonial world that doesn’t feel stale or trite) ensures that A Small and Remarkable Life holds itself tall over its competitors, a small and remarkable novel. show less
Sturgeon’s true flair was in plotting, excelling in narrative’s which always keep the reader in a state of heightened suspense. Take his novel More than Human (his acknowledged masterpiece), wherein six strange and damaged individuals discover that they each form a part of a whole, a “blesh” organism which takes on the next step of human evolution, the “homo gestalt.” To Marry Medusa is a brilliant exploration into another evolutionary concept, as humanity becomes infected by a hive mind, and learns to function and defeat the alien host through its collective strength. Sturgeon had a definite knack for revealing the many facets of humanity through stories of alien contact that spurned the popularity of their shoot-‘em-up alien invasion space opera cousins (a la Independence Day), and rose to the level of art. But the genre he wrote in denied his fame, as for the most part people still reject science-fiction as being ‘popular,’ and therefore not literature.
There, of course, have been many, many examples since Sturgeon passed away of excellent writers consigned to relative obscurity because of their chosen literary field. Nick DiChario may suffer the same problem; it’s far too early in his career to tell. But let us hope he achieves more: based on his deeply surprising first novel A Small and Remarkable Life, we may have discovered the 21st century Sturgeon.
Taking the form of a ‘first-contact’ novel (i.e. a story based on the presumption of Earth’s first contact with an alien life form), DiChario’s tale bears all the hallmarks of the classic ‘fish out of water’ scenario so beloved in science-fiction: an alien, trapped on Earth, must learn to adapt and survive. Yet as in Sturgeon’s best, DiChario subtly subverts the concept, taking the reader down unexpected paths.
Setting his narrative in the mid-19th century, DiChario intriguingly lays out the story of Tink Puddah, an unusual bluish-hued individual that most people refer to as “the foreigner.” Tink is the mysterious progeny of Nif and Ru, two aliens from “Wetspace” who have decided to adapt themselves to life on earth: “Their metamorphosis had begun—they had each developed two miniature spherical structures of jelly-like eyes with which to see the new world. Bodies shrinking, rounding, bending. Bones to support the eco-matter. Small, bipedal, humanoid creatures they would become. Atoms, molecules, joints, nails, skin, glands, hormones, blood.” Right from the start, DiChario propels the story through startling imagery that pays homage to the tenets of the genre while at the same time raising the bar.
Unfortunately, Nif and Ru fall to misfortune as Tink’s body is adjusting itself to a human shape. Their motives for coming to Earth are never explained, nor should they be, as Tink’s tale would be forever spoiled from too much back-story. DiChario presents Tink’s life in two ways, weaving a standard chronological narrative of his life with the tale of Jacob Peirsol, a preacher who presides over Tink’s funeral (it gives nothing away to say that Tink dies, as the story begins with his memorial service). Jacob, like Tink, has been searching for meaning in his life, and his collision with Tink alters his lifepath irrevocably.
By keeping Tink confused as to his past, thereby becoming a blank slate on which an existence on Earth can imprint its various glories and cruelties, DiChario manages the not-inconsiderable feat of having Tink function as both character and parable. He truly becomes the ‘good Samaritan,’ traveling the land, dispensing kind acts for no compensation, yet persecuted for both his outward appearance and a case of mistaken identity. There are strong parallels to the messiah myth, but also present is a strong homage to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (Tink’s odyssey as an incompletely-formed human is directly analogous to Shelley’s Monster wandering alone and unloved through the world), as well as Robert Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land – although how any modern Christ analogy in science-fiction could not but harken to Heinlein’s revolutionary sci-fi parable is hard to fathom.
Interestingly, despite the abundance of evil in Tink’s world, the true ‘villain’ of the piece, Jacob, is hardly a villain at all, in the traditional sense. His only crime is one of pride, as he cannot comprehend Tink’s unwillingness to consider the possibility of God; “Jacob had always believed Tink Puddah nothing more than a heathenish savage and feared for his misguided soul. And, as any preacher would have done, he harbored a secret resentment for someone who could turn so easily from the Word of the Savior, Lord Jesus Christ, to a belief in…well…nothing.” Jacob's eventual outcome, like Tink’s, is blazingly unexpected, completely logical, weirdly touching, and bewilderingly original.
It does a disservice to DiChario’s accomplishment to lump it in with the usual assortment of ‘aliens lost on Earth’ stories such as the cinematic adventures of E.T. and Starman. A Small and Remarkable Life does perform the archetypal function of holding up a mirror to the acts of mankind, reflecting all their flaws and triumphs, but DiChario’s talent for pathos (and his skill at creating a colonial world that doesn’t feel stale or trite) ensures that A Small and Remarkable Life holds itself tall over its competitors, a small and remarkable novel. show less
Lists
Awards
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 19
- Also by
- 35
- Members
- 191
- Popularity
- #114,254
- Rating
- 3.6
- Reviews
- 11
- ISBNs
- 11
- Languages
- 1