A Little Something for Everyone

01/17/2005

Fowler, Christopher. Demonized. London: Serpent's Tale, 2004. 241 p.

In his introduction to Demonized, Christopher Fowler describes the contents of this collection as darker fiction, which is an heir to earlier English writing that included tales of mystery and imagination. Darker fiction is perhaps the most useful term I can find to summarize this eclectic collection of stories, which has something for nearly all fans of horror, dark fantasy, and even mainstream writing, whatever that is.

Many of Fowler's stories are tales of the grotesque and are reminiscent of the short fiction of Joyce Carol Oates in that the unsuspecting reader can never really be sure when the protagonist will lead the reader from the a safe and familiar narrative space into a sinister doppelganger of reality. That's certainly the case with "In Safe Hands" and "American Waitress." In the former, Simon Woolf inherits a crumbling Victorian home from a man he never really knew, only to discover that the man's mentally disturbed adult son Marcus has been living secretly in the property since his father's death. Marcus's father, a Jew, lived through the Holocaust, and has convinced his son that the world is still a dangerous place for Jews and anti-Semites still hide within plain sight, waiting to round up people like him in order to implement the final solution. But when Simon and his fiancée take it upon themselves to convince Marcus that the whole wide world is a wonderful place to be enjoyed freely, it is their own ideas about reality are radically altered, as perhaps are our own as we are invited, in this post 9/11 universe, to reassess our beliefs about the world as benign.

In "American Waitress," Molly has a calling to serve others in the ever diminishing mom and pop restaurants across the country. But waitressing itself is a precarious profession, and the server can be fired for a good many things that are beyond her control, as Molly well knows before the story begins. So one day, when one of the typical mean spirited customers comes into her place of business and manipulates a situation where it appears as if Molly has deliberately scalded him with coffee, she hangs up her apron and leaves before the owner even has a chance to fire her, as she knows the game well by now. It's a lot easier for the restaurant to fire her to placate the angry customer than fend off a personal injury lawsuit. But this particular disgruntled customer follows Molly to each successive place where she manages to secure employment, devising ever more ingenious ways of injuring himself in order to implicate Molly and get her fired. Ultimately, Molly will discover that this customer wants something far more disturbing than the dubious pleasure of knowing he has the puny power to ruin someone's life.

Others are more gothic in that the reader knows the protagonist has, of his or her own free will, chosen a path that will ensure an unhappy ending. An example of this sort of story is "Hitler's Houseguest," where Anthony Pettifer, a lovelorn reporter, wrangles an invitation to the Fuehrer's schloss for the weekend, wishing to see his old flame Greta, who has since become part of Hitler's staff and a True Believer in the Third Reich, and convince her to come away with him. A sense of foreboding is established immediately when Anthony is handed a list of strict house rules upon his arrival. Things verboten include more obvious enjoinders such as freely exploring the house, and ones that reinforce Hitler's sense of his own importance such as speaking of Hitler in a way other than the Fuehrer, or discussing one's visit or Hitler's private life with strangers. It also doesn't help that Anthony suffers from Tourette's Syndrome, and is likely to blurt out obscenities while under stress. Without giving away too much, it is a foregone conclusion that Anthony won't meet with a good end.

Fowler demonstrates his virtuosity with tales such as "The Scorpion Jacket," where his writing mimics the style of old Middle Eastern fables. An unnamed medieval eastern kingdom is ruled by a cruel sultan and his mother, the dowager sultana, whose wasteful wars on infidels combined with their own love of luxury have left their subjects so hungry and destitute that they're driven to eating tree bark and smothering their newborn children rather than bring them into such a world. When a tailor displeases the dowager sultana mother, his head is placed atop the palace walls, until there are skeins of blood running down their sides. Understandably, this method of registering displeasure with one's couturier depletes the kingdom's supply of skilled garment makers, and ultimately, the dowager sultana is compelled to broaden the scope of her personnel search if she wishes to remain fashionable. At the ends of the kingdom in a mud hut, she finds Abdul, who is brought to the palace to make her mother-of-the-bride dress for her son's wedding to a ten year old princess. Naturally, something happens to greatly displease the demanding dowager sultana, and it is of such great magnitude that merely beheading her hapless dressmaker isn't sufficient to placate her. Instead, her son devises a far more diabolical torture for Abdul. He is to be kept on as the royal tailor and paid handsomely, while kept forever from seeing his beloved daughter, who is forced to marry the ugliest man in the kingdom. Of course, Abdul has his revenge on the sultan and his mother, in the most ingenious and appropriate way.

This collection is representative of Fowler's inventiveness and skillful story telling. It will be enjoyed by his current fans, and serves as an excellent introduction to those not yet familiar with his writing.