TIME MACHINE: Prose Poems & Vignettes

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The world, and its whole concept of time, science and philosophy, must wait for him to speak. Watson is also one of the most inventive and creative writers around and a more diverse collection of ideas and subject matter from one author will be a tough order.

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He is also particularly prolific, and has several collections of short stories available. They are all highly recommended. Ian Watson exhibits a prolificacy and breadth and depth in theme, subject and setting in his short stories, something unusual in SF writers since their short forms on the whole tend to fall within certain parameters.

Furthermore, each story is exquisitely constructed, its brevity belying the wealth of concepts employed. The stories here are a selection from the Nineteen Seventies, covering a period of about five years.

A capsule appears from nowhere in containing a mad and incoherent old man whose life appears to be running backwards. The capsule appears to have been sent back in time from the near future and is impregnable, but the highly efficient recycling system inside the allows its occupant to sustain himself. As he grows younger and saner he begins to deliver a message.

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Over the years the time-traveller begins to assume a Messianic status with the general public. Ironically it would appear that the media storm around the capsule and its passenger has ensured that we build such a ship and send it back in time and has also ensured that that the occupant — who has grown up somewhere outside the capsule knowing of his destiny — will be compelled to come to the launch site, believing that he is destined to be God.

Thy Blood Like Milk An ecological tale in which gangs roam the highways searching for sunspots; moments when the sun breaks through a permanent cloud layer caused by pollution and global warming.

One of the leaders of the gang, who has revived the Aztec cult of the sun god, is being punished for a death he caused on the road. Having his blood milked for hospital use is paying his penance. The story however focuses on his relationship with his nurse who happens to be the girlfriend of the man he killed.

The Time Machine

Sitting on a Starwood Stool Watson is adept in packing several extraordinary concepts into a deceptively short story. Starwood is the product of trees grown on an asteroid with an eccentric orbit about its sun, and absorbs the energies of trees. When turned into something such as a stool, it will leak its stored star energy into whomever it comes into contact with, rejuvenating or curing the subject. A cancer victim hatches a plot to steal the stool form a Yakuza boss, but things do not go according to plan. Agoraphobia AD Watson again demonstrates his fascination with Japanese culture in this surreal tale in which an astronaut is required to enter a virtual environment in order to commit hari kiri.

Programmed Love Story A highly stylised Japanese tale of a businessman who is requested to abandon his bride as she is rather too complaint to be a corporate wife.

When she becomes a hostess at the Queen Bee they meet again, but in her work she has been endowed with the persona of an aggressive and ruthless Imperial Consort, and it is this with which he falls in love, Beautifully written and beautifully structured. The Girl Who Was Art A story which examines Art and Japanese culture in which a young girl undergoes muscle training in order to reproduce three-dimensionally the work of a twentieth century photographer in tableaux forms.

But Art, it appears, is fickle and transient. Our Loves So Truly Meridional The world becomes divided into segments along the meridians by immense glass-like forcefield walls. Two people in separate segments attempt to reach the poles to find out what happens at the nexus of the barriers. A Time Span to Conjure With A scheduled inspection of a young colony world finds the colonists childless and oddly philosophical. We see them briefly on the page, but realise through the narrative that they are always around.

On Cooking The First Hero in Spring Three human anthropologists examine an alien tribe who show little signs of intelligence and seemingly have only one word in their vocabulary, although a Buddhist member of the team looks at them from a different perspective. Event Horizon Maybe the least accessible of the stories, this features a black hole which may or may not have a mind trapped with it, and some investigators, who achieve telepathic union by the use of drugs and tantric sex. Jan 08, Scott Golden rated it really liked it. Above-average collection by an above-average writer.

The title story is a brilliantly simple creation: What If a time machine traveled to the past in real time? Cashback will be credited as Amazon Pay balance within 10 days. Valid only on your first 2 online payments. Cashback will be credited as Amazon Pay balance within 10 days from purchase. Here's how terms and conditions apply.

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