Back in 1997 Mark Zeising published one of the most underrated story collections / story cycles I know of: Kim Newman and Eugene Byrne’s Back in the USSA. The book, now sadly long out of print and pretty much only available to collectors, is clever, moving, and a lot of fun. It deserved to be a lot more widely read than it was, and hopefully time will correct that.
Today’s mail, happily, brought a new short story collection from the indefatigable Mr Newman, The Man from the Diogenes Club. The book, which features an absolutely note-perfect cover from John Picacio is a thing of beauty, and I can’t wait to sit down and read it over the coming days. You’ll hear more about the adventures of Richard Jeperson and the Diogenes Club here soon enough, in the meantime go buy one. What’s it like? Hmmm. Imagine if Austin Powers was as cool as he thinks he is, and actually investigated something, then you might be in the area. The stories are, generally, smart, creepy and very well done. I can’t wait.
Actually there’s a lot more to it than that. I’ll be interested to see how much of the sutble British political comment is visible to people outside of the UK.
Jonathan,
Twice now I have clicked on the link above to the MonkeyBrain Books site for the Kim Newman book and received an immediate Virus detection and deletion notice from my Norton Anti-Virus software. Just wanted you to know.
- marty
Cheryl: I don’t know either, but I love the book a lot. I hope some people will consider checking it out. I see you can still buy it, and it’s no more expensive than it was in 1997.
Marty: I’ve redone the link to Monkeybrain. Don’t know why you’d have that problem though. It seems to work fine from here.
J, Just tried the link again, and it worked fine. Something in that original html page my virus protection didn’t like. – marty
The MonkeyBrain site is long overdue for a serious overhaul, but it shouldn’t have any viruses (at least none that I know of!). Not unless you consider frames a virus, and you might be well justified.
But I agree whole-heartedly. Back in the USSA is a personal favorite of mine, and a considerable influence on my Celestial Empire stories. I’ve always thought it too bad that so many of the hard-line allohistorical fans couldn’t get past the inclusion of other author’s fictional characters in the stories, which I’ve seen many cite when objecting to the “implausibility” of the alternate history itself.
I don’t know of anything that should have triggered an antivirus program. And I’ve had no problems with the site.
Want to thank you for sending the book. It’s lovely. Wonderful cover, well designed and just a peachy object. I also agree about the Back in the USSA stories. They were never real alternate histories. They were fabulations that allowed Newman & Byrne to tell the kind of stories they wanted to. Very clever, well done stuff.
Another vote for Back in the USSA. Great book.