Gary Carden
For the past few years, internet literary critics of fantasy/supernatural novels have been raving about about a writer of “punk rock prose” named Caitlin Kiernan. The praise has been excessive, comparing her to H. P. Lovecraft, Poe and Clive Barker. However, if the endorsements of Peter Straub, Neil Gaiman and Garrison Keillor (no kidding!) should move you to find one of her seven novels — and if you live in a small town in Western North Carolina — you may have a problem. Neither the libraries nor the bookstores stock “the poet and bard of the wasted lost.” There is a reason for that.
Kiernan’s work certainly falls within the boundaries of what is called horror, fantasy and the supernatural — but these are classifications that the author steadfastly rejects. She has a point. Although the novel Silk is packed with otherworldly creatures that live by night, imbibe a mix of pot, mushrooms, Ramen noodles and bourbon while exhibiting sexual behavior that is, by mainstream standards, “aberrant,” the cast of characters are quite definitely ... human. They are young, homeless and frequently mentally unstable. Although some are gifted, they are invariably impaired in some fatal or tragic manner. All of them are painfully alienated and lonely creatures, who, in order to survive, huddle together, attempting to create “families.” Often living in unheated tenement slums, they emerge at night, to congregate in back-alley nightspots with names like Dr. Jekyll, the Cave or Dante’s where drug addicts and acid-head musicians and prostitutes dance and drink and make out until daylight.
Mainstream America is horrified by Kiernan’s world (Silk is set in drab and bleak slums of Birmingham, Ala.), and if morbid curiosity tempts the average reader to sample a few pages in something like Daughter of Hounds, they will probably close the book as though they feared contamination or infection and quickly return it to the shelf.
Such reactions delight Kiernan, who notes that she does not write for “the office monkeys” — her contemptuous label for people who live a 9 to 5 existence in a “politically correct” world. Kiernan’s protagonists flip burgers, wash dishes in coffeehouses, work in garages, peddle drugs or eke out a minimal existence in the uncertain world of music (punk rock, goth, grrrl, etc.) and outsider art. Kiernan captures their world with a grim and gritty prose that frequently has a dark and lyric beauty — especially the dialogue which has been called “poetically nasty.”
The characters are unforgettable: Daria Parker is an intense, chain-smoking young woman who dyes her hair with cherry Koolaid and works in the Fidgety Bean, a local coffeehouse, using her wages to keep her band, Stiff Kitten, up and running. Her lover, Keith Barry is a talented musician with a hopeless drug addiction. Spyder Baxter functions as a kind of den mother for a dozen wrecked and lost outcasts (lesbians, transsexuals and drug addicts) who gather each night in her ramshackle house to listen as Spyder weave dark stories about fallen angels and ... spiders (a topic that she knows a great deal about). Niki Ky, a haunted young Vietnamese fleeing from the memory of a suicidal lover, finds herself in Birmingham where she first befriends Daria, but finds herself drawn to white-haired Spyder and her court of “shrikes.”
Although there are terrifying scenes in Silk, scenes in which Kiernan’s characters find themselves at the mercy of a nameless evil that skitters through the dark alleys of Birmingham, thumps on the walls (and whispers in Spyder’s basement), it is finally an evil that originates in the tormented minds of Spyder and her followers. A foolish, drug-induced ritual in Spyder’s basement (lots of mushrooms and an occult mantra) leaves the participants haunted by the belief that they had summonsed “something” and now it follows them relentlessly.
Despite all of its bleakness and obscenity, Silk contains descriptive passages that glow and pulse with sensory details: a thunderous and nightmarish band festival in Atlanta in which the Stiff Kitten performs (and fails) is especially notable. Then, the massive snowfall that buries Birmingham during the novel’s conclusion reads like a frozen tableau in Hell. She may be “nasty,” but this weird woman can write!
•••
Kiernan’s latest novel, The Red Tree, chronicles the psychological disintegration of a single character named Sarah Crowe, an author, who flees a wrecked life in Atlanta and rents the Wight Farm in rural Rhode Island in order to complete her latest novel. The farm turns out to be the infamous site of supernatural events dating back 300 years, including demonic possessions, suicides and human sacrifice. When Sarah discovers a battered manuscript in the basement — a kind of journal composed by the last occupant of the house, Dr. Charles Harvey — a renter who committed suicide, she becomes obsessed with the manuscript, especially after reading about “the red tree” which is located a short distance from the house. Eventually, she gives up all pretense of completing her novel and devotes all of her time researching the history of the great oak, which has played a prominent role in the region’s occult history.
When an artist named Constance Hopkins rents the attic of the house, Sarah gains both a roommate and a lover. However, in time, the two women begin to bicker. Both develop a dread of the “red tree,” and begin to suspect that they are helpless pawns of the tree. Attempts to visit the tree turn into nightmarish treks (It takes you hours to walk a few hundred feet, and even a longer time to return to the house). As Sarah continues to read the manuscript, (which she shares with Constance), this novel gradually turns into a terrifying story of compulsive possession. Eventually, Sarah comes to doubt the world around her, a doubt that is substantiated when she visits Constance in the attic and discovers that no one lives there.
The Red Tree takes the form of a journal in which Sarah Crowe provides a daily record of events. After Sarah discovers the manuscript in the basement, she begins to record passages from it. As a consequence, Sarah’s journal is interspersed with passages that were typed on a manual Royal typewriter with a worn ribbon. Like the faulty typewriter in Stephen King’s Misery, these typed passages (just as they appear in the original manuscript) give the narrative a disturbing quality.
Caitlin Kiernan’s novels give abundant evidence of the author’s impressive research and learning. Within a single chapter, the reader may find references to sources as varied as Seneca, Nina Simone, Thoreau, Tom Waits, Joseph Campbell and H. P. Lovecraft. Kiernan often wields her impressive learning like a bludgeon and seems to take considerable satisfaction in doing so. The reader may feel both taunted and intimidated by this amazing author. However, discerning readers will probably forgive this author for her occasional outbursts of unabashed arrogance and vulgarity. Caitlin Kiernan has a rare talent.
Silk by Caitlin R. Kiernan. RoC Books, 2002. 353 pages.
The Red Tree by Caitlin R. Kiernan. New American Library, 2009. 385 pages
Muse of Fire by Dan Simmons. Subterranean Press, 2008. 105 page
In recent years, it has become fashionable for writers who have “cult followings” to issue limited editions of handsomely packaged and extravagantly priced short works. Somebody like Stephen King, William Gay and Caitlin Kiernan can get away with this. In addition, these “collector’s editions” frequently end up on eBay where they are sold for astonishing sums. (At the present, limited “rare” editions of Kiernan’s Tales of Pain and Wonder are being sold for $900 to $l,000 each!)
Dan Simmons is no stranger to the glitzy field of special editions. Most of his epic novels (which usually run over 600 pages) are customarily issued in both a standard format and a collector’s edition which invariably sells out. However, last year, Subterranean Press issued the slender Muse of Fire (actually a novella) with much fanfare and a price tag of $35. A half-dozen critics began their reviews, “Worth every penny!” The first edition sold out, and the second edition is still doing well. Is it worth it?
Yes, it is, simply because the author remains one of the most gifted writers of “speculative fiction” around. Epic works such as The Terror, Drood and Hyperion demonstrate Simmons’ skill in blending exhaustive research with stunning imaginative narrative. Muse of Fire has the same characteristics, plus this brilliant gem is actually a homage to William Shakespeare.
The narrator of Muse of Fire, a young actor named Wilbr, belongs to a Shakespearean troupe called the Earth Men. (One of the names for Shakespeare’s original troupe was “The Lord Chamberlain’s Men.”) The 30-some members of the troupe travel on a great spaceship, the Muse, performing the complete works of the bard for the inhabitants of 10,000 inhabited planets; in fact, the number of worlds is so vast, explorers have stopped giving them names. Numbers will suffice, says Wilbr who notes that the Earth Men have just completed a production of “Much Ado About Nothing,” for planet 25-25-261B where the seas are composed of sulphuric acid and the days are 18 hours long.
According to Wilbr, the Earth is but a faint memory — a dead planet with its natural resources depleted and its oceans drained. All humankind has been enslaved and is scattered through other galaxies where they work in mining camps. Their conquerors, the Archons are a highly advanced (and totally non-human) race devoid of sensory perception. Consequently, they only experience and understand “human” feeling by attaching themselves to another species, the dragomen. Each dragoman possesses hundreds of filaments and tentacles which can convey sensations (emotion, music and human speech) to the Archons. The dragomen hang over their hosts like great squid, their dangling tentacles attached to Archon brains — a decidedly creepy image.
When Muse of Fire opens, Wilbr’s troupe of actors find themselves performing in a mind-boggling setting. The silent Archons — the usually invisible members of the ruling caste — sit in a massive theater encircling the Earth Men and their makeshift acting area. Their only response to the conclusion of the play is a whirring of their great insect-like wings. Eventually, the troupe learns that their last performance was a test to determine if the Muse and the Earth Men should be exterminated or allowed to travel to other worlds and perform for other species that are even more advanced than the Archons — the Poimen, the Demiurgos (the original creators of the “failed” earth) and perhaps even a semblance of a supreme being called Arbaxas.
At this point, when the troupe learns that they will not be destroyed, they are given a new name: the Heresiarch’s Men. They also discover that they are no longer capable of determining the destination of the Muse (which had previously been controlled by a mummified woman, floating in a cylinder of water — a kind of guiding spirit). When control passes to an unseen power, the mummified body of the Muse is rejuvenated and acquires the features of a beautiful woman.
The troupe begins a series of performances — each more demanding than the last — which includes “Macbeth” (a play traditionally associated with bad luck), “Hamlet” and “King Lear.” Key passages from all of these plays are interspersed with Wilbr’s account of the troupe’s exhaustion as they move from one full production to another with only an hour and 10 minutes to rest between performances. The actors become increasingly frustrated since they are dependent on a badly impaired dragoman to interpret and explain their dilemma.
What gradually emerges in this extravagant “space drama” concerns the significance of Shakespeare’s plays — not merely as literature, but as some ultimate moral and spiritual guide. When the Earth was subdued, highly advanced species such as the Archons, Poimen and the Demiurgos became the caretakers of Earth’s art, culture and religion. The discovery of Shakespeare’s plays and their possible significance led to the creation of a kind of cosmic philosophy. Although thousands of years have lapsed, Wilbr and his fellow actors still meditate on the sacred teachings of Jesus, Saint Jung and Shakespearean drama. All of the actors know all the speeches in all the plays. However, for all of their advancement, the meaning of “Hamlet,” “King Lear,” and “Macbeth” cannot be fully comprehended by the conquerers. As the dragman finally tells the troupe of actors, “You have been allowed to live only because of Shakespeare.” Slowly, painfully, the “great powers” of the universe are receiving spiritual and moral guidance from the Earth’s Men’s performances.
There is much more here, of course. Muse of Fire contains beautifully contrived scenes of advanced cities on planets with numerous moons — all wrapped in impossible scenes of stellar beauty. There is even a sensual enactment of “Romeo and Juliet,” for the Demiurgos in which simulated sex becomes real. One member of the troupe turns out to be a kind of galactic terrorist, intent on bringing it all down, and he nearly succeeds. However, beneath it all is Simmons’ lavish narrative that glitters with mythical, Gnostic and poetic images that are reminiscent of the best of Ray Bradbury’s science fiction. Muse of Fire is definitely a “collector’s item.”
