SEVERAL REVIEWS BY DON WEBB (6/16/94) Name: Don Webb Address: 6304 Laird Drive Austin, TX 78757 Author of book reviewed: Gary Eller Editor of book reviewed: Translator of book reviewed: Title: Thin Ice and Other Risks Name of press: New Rivers Press Address of small press: 420 North 5th St. #910./ Minneapolis, MN 55401 Year of publication: 1994 Cloth and/or paper: Paper Number of pages: 144 Price: Paper: $9.95 Cloth: Biography: Don Webb recently completed a new book of short fiction Ecaflow Revisted , as well as selling short stories to Rodger Zelazny's Wheel of Fortune and Nancy Collins-Linahrt's Forbidden Acts. Author of book reviewed: Rick Christman Title: Falling in Love at the end of the World Name of press: New Rivers Press Address of small press: 420 North 5th St. #910./ Minneapolis, MN 55401 Year of publication: 1994 Cloth and/or paper: Paper Number of pages: 114 Price: Paper: $9.95 Cloth: Author of book reviewed: Carol Masters Title: The Peace Terrorist Name of press: New Rivers Press Address of small press: 420 North 5th St. #910./ Minneapolis, MN 55401 Year of publication: 1994 Cloth and/or paper: Paper Number of pages: 144 Price: Paper: $9.95 Cloth: ABR sent me three volumes of the Minnesota Voices Project (62- Falling , 63 - Thin , and 64 - Peace ) and asked me to review them as a group. A process, I suppose not unlike a compare and contrast exercise in High School. All three are winners of an annual competition "for the Upper Midwest's new and emerging writers." All three are collections of short prose. All thee are basically forms of Puritan autobiography -- as Tom La Farge described once as, "Meaning meaning me." Each has it own problems and promise. All are nicely produced, and feature good covers by Upper Midwest artists. Both Falling in Love at the End of the World and The Peace Terrorist are clearly based on their author's experiences, and Thin Ice and Other Risks' voice is suggestive of autobiography. All contain both previously published and new material. Falling in Love at the End of the World is a collection of Vietnam and post-Vietnam vignettes by Rick Christman. The twenty one pieces center on one or two tableaus minimally but skillfully described of a highly emotional nature. Some are extraordinarily poignant such as the soldier's huge hand on the eleven year old prostitute's head at the end of "Lan's World." As individual pieces these vignettes would stand out for the emotional appeal, as a collection they loose effectiveness, much as hearing the same chord struck loudly on an organ over and over will do. The vignettes all have the same pacing and style -- third person paragraphs without dialogue from the point of view of essentially the same character -- a young soldier in the early war, who had enlisted in the hopes that his smarts would send him to language school rather than waiting around to be drafted for Vietnam. Unfortunately it sent him to Vietnamese language school. The character is variously named Klein, Lang, John, Don, Haberman, etc. The ability to speak the language is often times as alienating as opening -- and the scenes of the vets afterward watching As the World Turns show that same movement between alienation and insight continue. I think this book is working notes for a novel that could be very good, if Christman goes beyond the effective emotional tableau into a continous emotional space. Thin Ice and Other Risks by Gary Eller is the best of three. It contains nine stories written (all but one) in first person, character sketches characterized by the skillful handling of absences. The title story concerns an almost adultery that never occurs between an unemployed man and an ice skater. But even in his own thoughts, he never allows the words adultery or cheat or even sex to surface -- the thin ice remains intact. In "Independence Day" a story about a middle aged man's almost coming to terms with death of a boyhood friend's recent death from AIDS, the narrator never can quite say that his friend was gay. In "A Hundred Reasons" the one of the best stories in the collection, even the symbol for the narrator change into the world of freedom and possibilities isn't actually there: "He wished he'd mounted a weather vane on that sturdy roof. he could see it now, glinting in the light as it turned in the wind, pointing to all the different directions in the world." The sparkling ice of the Upper Midwest winter is here in these stories. Eller is in the process of finishing a long novel set in Alaska. The Peace Terrorist is the type of book I hate to be confronted with as a reviewer. It becomes difficult to separate my views on the political content of the stories and the writerly craft in them -- particularly when they are clearly drawn from life. Blurbs and biographical notes stressing Masters involvement in beaucoup social change organizations, her imprisonment for nonviolent protests, even the books dedication to family and change groups make it very, very clear that the women protagonists in this book of social change heroism are Masters herself (or at least her best friends). The causes her characters fight for in these ten stories -- ranging from world peace to Amerindian rights -- are all virtuous in my book. Those women who have lead the charge against military contractors are heroic. So I would like to see writing that really gets me inside the head of these people. Instead I found Masters' characters cold and remote -- even in the two first person vignettes that frame the collection. All of the hard driven women in this book are very very alone. If they have or had husbands, the husbands are dealt with in one sentence either with the word divorce or supportive. If they have children the kids are described as "babies' regardless of their age and seen as reasons to stop whatever madness. The frame pieces enforce this isolation. In the first our narrator -- on a work program from jail -- identifies with a street women in the library, but discovers that the street women is murmuring racial hatred and flees back to her station. In the last story the narrator is lamenting that when a lesbian comrade at arms died she wasn't called into the circle of friends to give comfort. Each of these tales does an OK job of describing the individual who loves mankind and mother earth but can not love and be loved by the specific manifestations of either -- a portrayal of sainthood as a dysfunctional relationship -- but Masters' work as a writer lies before her -- to portray service to the cause of Love not just as the endless hard work it is -- but as a gateway to self transformation as well. I always keep the books I'm sent to review until the review appears, then I decide their fate. Falling in Love at the End of the World and The Peace Terrorist will become gifts to friends, who resemble the main character in each. My greatest joy in such books is that they provide mirror for persons I know, who like of all of us are trying to figure out that ultimate mystery of the person in the mirror. Thin Ice and Other Risks will go into my over packed bookshelves, because I will get a lot of joy rereading it as I try to figure out the mystery of writing about what isn't said at all. REVIEWS OF _THE NAUGHTY YARD_, _PUCK#10_ and _The Gets of Boombox Heaven_ Name: Don Webb Author of book reviewed: Michael Hemmingson Title: The Naughty Yard Name of press: Permeable Press Address of small press: 47 Noe St. #4./ SF, CA 94114-1017 Year of publication: 1994 Cloth and/or paper: Paper Number of pages: 103 Price: Paper: $5.95 Cloth: Biography: Don Webb recently completed a new book of short fiction Ecaflow Revisited , as well as selling short stories to Rodger Zelazny's Wheel of Fortune and Nancy Collins-Linhart's Forbidden Acts. The Naughty Yard is one of the first works from a writer of my generation to show genius. I's also a damn good stroke book. It tells the story of Mike, who had found an erotic paradise -- a naughty yard where one has to work very hard at maintaining one's ecstasy as contrasted with the Garden of Eden where one received happiness for free -- with anal sex goddess Beth, and then lost it with her suicide, and after the long hurting of emptiness decides to enter the yard again with a night of tender and hot sex with Kathy and Cynthia. Each tells their erotic past, and all are informed by the longing and beauty of dreams, desire, sleep, and sadness. As is the case in the best eroticons all topics are covered from the deflowering of virgins (male and female) to the most advanced perversions. The narratives are (for the most part)presented as spoken stories, and the language and rhythm of the speech reminds us of Hemmingson's growing reputation as a poet (check him out in the Winter 1994 edition of Ghost Dance ). The subjective and the antinomian are valorized here, and this will be increasingly the voice of fiction of the turn of the century. My wife, I and a close friend made the book into readers theater acting out (in the interests of literary criticism you understand) some of the more challenging parts. I would recomend that approach to any lucky enough to buy this short novel, but in all cases I recomend this book which blazes in brilliance and darkness to the glory of desire. Name: Don Webb Author of Magazine reviewed: Various Editor of Magazine reviewed: Brian Clark Translator of Magazine: Title: Puck : the Unofficial Journal of the Irrepressible Name of press: Permeable Press Address of small press: 47 Noe St., Studio 4/ SF,CA 94114-1017 Year of publication: 1994 Cloth and/or paper: Paper Number of pages: 84 Price: Paper: $17.00/3 Cloth: I got this for free as a reviewer, which is good because I would have to buy it for three reasons: Hugh Fox, Michael Hemmingson, and Freddie Baer. This issue {The pisberPuck issue}. is decanted to the memories of Frank Zappa, Robert Anton Wilson, and Papa John Creech. But wait you say -- Robert Anton Wilson isn't really dead that was just an Internet hoax. Don't these people have any respect for the Truth? They are interested in something much more important -- ideas which once formed can't go away. They're not just interested in their own; although the 26+ contributors are some of the great idea crafters in the small (or any) press, but are also interested in throwing the spotlight around on other goodies -- as they put it "16 tons of reviews." In addition to the above named talent my favorite entries were an article on Generation X in Australia by McKenzie Wark (with some interesting cross commentary on Japanese Gen X), and Brian's review of the latest Mystic Fire videos. I can get my local store to order a couple of "other" videos a year, but it's hard to find out what's worthwhile -- good stuff here! Permeable press also has a service, mail them $5.00 and they'll send you a pound of small press goodies. A nice node on the eternal network here . . . Name: Don Webb Author of book reviewed: Bob Zark Editor of book reviewed: Translator of book reviewed: Title: The Gates of Boombox Heaven Name of press: Panic Button Press Address of small press: POB 1905 * Stuyvesant Station/ NY, NY 10009 Year of publication: 1994 Cloth and/or paper: Paper Number of pages: 1 Price: Paper: $7.95 Cloth: This is a book of 54 poems dedicated to 43 people, containing 25 images by 8 artists. It has one flaw, which is that the interior art, which ranges from good to poor, is not matched with the names of the artists so you don't know who drew what. It has one great strength, it has Bob Zark's zany anger. From totally honest sincere, "Put Idealism Back in Classrooms Please" to the wonderfully goofy "Millions of Possums.' I've been trying to get people to read Bob Zark since my days as reviewer for the much lamented New Pathways . And I don't intend to stop. Here's a 9 line cento created by randomly pulling 9 9th lines from 9 different poems in the collection: Welcome to the company, Pesticides gasoline fast food stop n shop over the bashed up dashboards of time, do you find it brought houses down? As a hundred madmen clamored golden flecks of mundalingo ate through my clothes uggah buggah damage .