Angry Candy

I am awed, inspired and a little disappointed. Whoever reads this will be most attracted by the last description–but wait, there's more.

Harlan Ellison is one of the finest story tellers that has ever lived. No arguments. I'll not entertain them. His metaphors and colorations are so unique and strange that his ability to transport a reader into a scene is nothing less than immersive. The stories I read here were tight, at times intellectual, at times challenging, at times humorous with a pinch of gross. Stories like 'The Paladin of the Lost Hour' were so believable one might go a looking for the current holder of that arcane pocket watch. The story 'Broken Glass' was a master class in the art of story, character, and setting. Readers show more who found no pleasure in this collection of important works are either put off by Ellison's reputation as an asshole, or lack the intelligence to read with a "critical eye". It's not often I'll knock someone's opinion as founded on idiocy, but if you like fiction and didn't like this collection, there's something wrong and it's not the book.

Having gushed a bit, there are problems. Ellison's characters are always intelligent and have a rather authorial way of noticing things. Now, this is just his style, which is fine, but far too many narratives give way to authorial intrusion and Ellison at times wishes us to note how great a writer he is. Which we all understand, but perhaps his characters should remain in the dark on the matter. This complaint is petty, but I must counter a gush with a slam lest I be accused of the old "sack-riding" epithet. I don't ride scrotums, certainly not to gain favor with any group of people who think they're literary critics, but I do like Ellison's work. I'm not a critic. I'm a dude.

Now that that is settled, I have one more minor complaint. Actually it's a big one and it is closely related to the previous complaint: Far too often Ellison likes to tell us what his politics are. This to me is not OK. It robs the story and ALWAYS stops it cold. We all get it, Ellison's a big liberal and he hates republicans. This is fine, but when it crops up it feels so forced and blatant that it turns me off to the story. Not because the hero is always a liberal (which is always the case) but because I feel like Ellison is creeping in on the story I'm trying to enjoy. Granted, he is subtle and quick about it, but I HATE it when religious authors do it and I would like to think Harlan is above that preacher-as-author nonsense.

It's a five. Don't argue, just read it. You'll be entertained and a better thinker for it.

That was a good review...nailed it. show less

As Harlan Ellison described it during his interview with Jim Bohannon on the Larry King show, Angry Candy is a compilation of stories that deal with “the sense of loss and grief that attends the death of loved ones.” However, he didn’t realize this theme until after the stories were collected.

My favorites among them include:

“Paladin of the Lost Hour” - After being mugged in a cemetery, an elderly gentleman named Gaspar is rescued and taken in by Billy, a Vietnam vet. Billy soon discovers Gaspar’s gold pocket watch, but when he tries to pick it up, it levitates away and into Gaspar’s hand. The old man reveals that the watch is stuck at 11PM because it contains the lost hour that resulted from a miscalculation when the show more world adopted the Gregorian calendar. Gaspar is the latest in a line of guardians of that lost hour, charged with preventing the end of time. This story was translated into an episode of the 1980s Twilight Zone series.

“When Auld’s Acquaintance is Forgot” - Jerry Auld will pay anything to have one last horrible memory erased, even if he has to resort to illegal means.

“Broken Glass” - During a bus ride, a young woman daydreams about a sexual fantasy with two other women, only to have her thoughts invaded by a peeping tom. Elsewhere on the bus, a male passenger with telepathic abilities forces himself into her mind, causing her to panic until she turns the psychic tables.

“The Region Between” - After his death, William Bailey’s soul is reincarnated into different lives throughout the galaxy under the direction of an entity known as Succubus who assigns souls to living bodies for specific tasks. Bailey, however, will have none of it!

“Quicktime” - During an uprising in Galiopolis, a mob of peasants storms the towers and slaughters the royalty. Lord Garth manages to escape to the kingdom’s science building where a professor is developing a time machine. The machine has so far only been programmed to send an occupant back to the Upper Jurassic Period in the Mesozoic era. Garth arranges to travel there for a short time then be brought forward again once the revolution has ended. Best of luck with that plan, Garth.

“The Avenger of Death” - After finding a cryptic note and an uncashed check inside an old book, Pen Robinson learns that he was to be struck down by an agent of death, until said agent spared him. When Pen catches up to the agent, he finds the man dying on the street—the penalty for his failures. Pen learns that these agents are called “Takers” and is given the task of killing as many of them as possible before they claim more victims.

“Chained to the Fast Lane in the Red Queen’s Race” - A traveler in space and time pushes through the membranes between multiple realities, forcing his duplicate in the next reality to do the same until finally, one of the travelers finds the perfect life and refuses to move on.

“The Function of Dream Sleep” - While mourning the loss of several friends, a man wakes up in the morning to witness a fanged mouth appear in his left side, exhale a cold breeze, then vanish. In his quest to find an answer to this vision, he learns that he is not alone. According to Ellison, this story was inspired by an actual dream that occurred when during a brief nap before a meeting. show less

This collection of 18 short stories is centered on the theme of death. Ellison writes a great introduction and I really enjoyed a lot of these stories. My favorites were Paladin of the Last Hour, The Region Between, Chained to the Fast Lane in the Red Queen's Race and The Function of Dream Sleep.

I quite enjoyed this death-themed collection, in particular the opening story, "Paladin of the Lost Hour", "Laugh Track" (which I found quite funny) and "Eidolons".

This isn't Ellison's best, in my opinion, but it's still good reading.

One of Ellison's best collections - Paladin of the Lost Hour is deeply moving, Prince Myshkin and Hold the Mustard is hilarious, and The Function of Dream Sleep extremely disturbing. Typical Harlan.

I wept when I first read the introduction, since many of the deaths he referred to were still fresh. Even now, it makes me sad. I'd like to read this again, some day, but for now, it still hurts.

(Jack Gaughan is credited for the design and graphics for The Region Between on that story's title page.)