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Interzone # 204 - June 2006
01/07/2006 . Source: Rod MacDonald 
bi-monthly magazine: UK publisher/editor address: Andy Cox, TTA Press, 5 Martins Lane, Witcham, Ely, Cambridgeshire CB6 2LB. Price: £ 3.50 (UK) $ 6.00(US). ISSN: 0264-3596. Buy Interzone in the USA - or Buy Interzone in the UK  check out website: www.ttapress.com
What do you get for £3.50 today in terms of entertainment? It doesn't go very far in the betting shop, especially if backing one of my horses. It wouldn't get you into a cinema, theatre or a fringe show at the Edinburgh Festival. In terms of literature, you'd be hard pushed to find a paperback of any quality for this price. Compared to other magazines, this one is packed full of fiction and it will last up to five times longer. In other words, you can do a lot worse than spend your money on a copy of this long-running Science Fiction magazine.
Of particular interest in this issue is the fantasy short story 'A Short History Of The Dream Library' by Elizabeth Hopkinson. This won the 2005 James White Short Story Award (in memory of the Irish Science Fiction author). This is Yorkshire humour, not quite as we know it, but at its best. It is about, as you would imagine, a library which lends out dreams. The author must have been daydreaming while visiting her local library and came up with the idea for the story. It's worth taking the time to check out the Elizabeth Hopkinson website http://www.hiddengrove.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/hiddengrove_001.htm#home which will give you a lot more information about this new and upcoming author. An interesting website which was slightly spoilt, in my opinion, by the musical notes activated by the movement of the mouse.
The longest story in this issue by far is 'Longing For Langalana' written by Mercurio D. Rivera. In many ways it was rather sad and even deeply emotional in places, reminiscent of something from ancient Greece by Sophocles or Euripides. Mind you, there are those who would say that all plots were invented by the Greeks several hundred years BC and that anything written since is only a derivation of one of these plots.
Anyway, the story involves a woman of alien nature from a race called the Wergen. Sounds a bit twee and even more so when you learn that her name is Shimera but twee it is not. On the planet Langalana, many years before she fell in love with an Earth boy called Phineas, the women from Wergen think Earth boys are the bees knees and are irresistibly attracted to them. (Where exactly is their planet?) Unfortunately, the love cannot be and the poor woman descends into a sort of melancholy. It must be Phineas' aftershave.
I'm now going to look through the Greek tragedies to see where I've seen this before. This doesn't detract from the story. In fact, it puts it on an elevated level which is where it should be. An excellent read!
Of the other stories in this issue, I would like to mention 'The Song' by Tim Akers. Some time or other, we all have tunes in our head which won't go away. This can be maddening especially if it's the 'Birdie Song' or 'Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep'. This idea has been taken one step further by Tim Akers in that the guy in the story, Jackson, has had a tune in his head all his life. Now an accomplished musician, he is determined to reproduce it but seems unable to do so. Does the tune drive him mad? Now there is the dilemma!
There was also an alternative history story about Palestine by Martin J. Gidron. While this was interesting enough and well-written, I'm not sure if what it was trying to say was relevant. 'The moving finger writes and having writ moves on' old Omar once said and perhaps it should be left at that.
I liked this issue of 'Interzone'. There was nothing I could really complain about, which was a bit of a nuisance and it only remains to be said that I can thoroughly recommend it.
Rod MacDonald
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