Post by AloeVega on Aug 16, 2022 5:35:40 GMT
Recently, Obverse Books has released the excellent short story collection The Boulevard: Part One, and I'd love to hear people's thoughts about it here!
My thoughts on the individual stories, containing spoilers (copied from a post I made on Gallifrey Base):
A Reasonable Man - this seemed like a great pick to start out the book. I wouldn't consider it one of the best stories in the book, but it was very good, and a very promising debut for Gareth Madgwick (and I'm not just saying that because he's active on this forum!) I liked the way the story cut between different scenes, making the story come together over time as you're able to put the pieces together in your mind. I also thought this one was one of the best stories to really let the reader sympathize with the prisoner and feel the pain of being trapped in the Boulevard. Things like the Man checking his beef to ensure it was cooked all the way and the way he longed for the blue sky of London did a nice job humanizing him. On a final note, the concept of a conceptual entity being turned into an actual person with a physical form was nice, and maybe it's something other Faction Paradox writers can use later on.
Body and Soul - as a jazz musician and a fan of jazz music the title of this story was very enticing. Unfortunately, the actual story disappointed me a little bit. As a whole, the story didn't have the sort of wild imagination I associate with Faction Paradox. I generally anticipate that an FP story will be unique, thought provoking, and just plain weird. This story, by contrast, felt like a fairly generic "deal with the devil" type of story, just with a member of the Faction taking on the role of the Faustian enticer. This is also more of a nitpick, but something about the way jazz culture was portrayed felt a bit off to me. It seemed like notable musicians were namedropped in an attempt to make it feel authentic, but it just didn't quite feel right.
The Boy Who Couldn't Stop Aging - I enjoyed this story a good bit. I think it excelled at using descriptive language that really got into what it feels like to be trapped in the Boulevard, which was great. I also liked Sophia's revulsion to the boy's mockery of the rituals, it's nice to have a reminder every once in a while that the Faction really is a cult. The actual conceptual meat of the story was pretty cool, a person whose age constantly fluctuates. The twist ending where Sophia became the guard was pretty cool, although it felt a little out-of-nowhere. Maybe I'll notice more of the setup when I reread the story later.
Marticide - this story stood out to me as the first one in the collection that really hooked me right away. It's written with a captivating and distinctive voice, with the bits in the Boulevard feeling perfectly oppressive and hopeless and the bits on Mars being more straightforward, but still well-written especially with the emotional descriptiveness. I love Faction Paradox stories that play on the concept of the observer effect, and the idea that a well-intentioned, rational mind can cause such destruction is cool (some common ground with A Reasonable Man here, but it's probably just a coincidence.) Looking at TARDIS Data Core after reading the story I see that Godfather Cocoyte was meant to be the character of Doctor Omega. I'm very glad that, as someone only vaguely familiar with Doctor Omega, it didn't hinder my enjoyment of the story at all.
The Sisters of the Little Moments - when I saw that this story was written by Kelly Hale, I was already very interested. The "old guard" of Faction Paradox, the ones who worked on the original Mad Norwegian Press books, always stand out to me as having the greatest connection to Faction Paradox's unique identity as a series - they don't just write Doctor Who with the serial numbers filed off like some FP writers do, you get an impression of the grand and imaginative universe that Lawrence Miles always intended for FP to be. This story, of course, was amazing. It was beautifully written, and the way The Mundane Order of Sisters of the Little Moments is talked about gives the feeling that there's an entire history behind this organization and its ties to the broader universe, but this history is only hinted at and not shown. The sections with Dyzeps do a great job showing us an alien perspective - not just alien in the sense of little grey men, but a character with a truly alien outlook, with an understanding of love based entirely on a relationship that we would see as horrible and parasitic. It was a little confusing how exactly all the different pieces of this story fit together, but not in a bad way. This story is probably the first one I'm going to reread, as I get the sense I'll get more of out of it after reading it twice.
You are the Absurd Hero - this is the story I've seen the most discussion about, and it's honestly for good reason. The idea of a surreal choose-your-own-adventure story that plays on the myth of Sisyphus is something that could only be done in Faction Paradox, and I mean that in the best way possible. The medium was used very well, too. When I went through the story several times, never reaching a conclusion that didn't put me right back where I started, I really felt the desperation of a prisoner in the Boulevard. And when the only way to get a proper ending is by breaking the rules of a choose-your-own-adventure story, that's a perfectly Faction-y twist. This might not have been quite the best story in the anthology, but I would say it was definitely the most fun.
The Oracle - this story was fairly straightforward, but I enjoyed it. The aesthetic of a frontier planet with the appearance of the old American west was very nice. I also liked that the Oracle had powers that came from an unexplained source that the Faction wasn't familiar with, it makes the universe feel bigger. The thing that stood out to me from this story was that the Faction felt pretty much straight-up despicable, trying to taking advantage of a woman with a power she doesn't understand, and imprisoning her eternally when they can't.
The Fixer - I'm a sucker for stories that show the lives of "normal" people in fantastical universes, so I'm a little biased towards this one. With that being said, I thought this was one of the best stories in the anthology. The way the Faction was portrayed in this story - a shadowy, background organization that the main character has heard of, but whose workings are a mystery - and the main character's ultimate fate - sentenced to eternal imprisonment for an accidental crime committed while trying to appeal to those who punished him - gave this story a very mythical feeling. The scene that shows Dodie's ultimate fate has the same effect, with the results of her deal being described in a way that feels haunting. Stories which focus on the internal workings of War parties like the Faction can make them appear very human to the audience, which is a good thing, but this story shows us how participants in the War appear to normal people: horrifying and incomprehensible, but with a strange allure that can draw you in and lead to your self-destruction.
This Is What They Took From You - the big standout in this story was the shifting perspectives. It showed the Faction's intervention in a culture through the perspective of someone from that culture, the Faction Paradox cultists responsible for intervening, and a member of the Faction divorced from the situation. This story also gets points, like Sisters does, for showing us an alien perspective, a person who sees their conscious and unconscious sides as distinct entities. This is another one that felt like it had a lot going on, and I've mentally marked it as one that needs a reread soon.
The Crikeytown Cancellations - this one is...weird. It's written in the form of the script to a comic, and as a fan of comics myself I can tell the author has a wide repository of knowledge on the situation to draw from. Especially early on, it does capture the feel of this sort of comic perfectly. The idea that real-world reboots and changes in storytelling conventions affect the characters in-universe, sometimes resulting in them being erased entirely, brings to mind Alan Moore's run on the comic Supreme, though I'm not sure if this was a case of deliberate inspiration or just conceptual common ground. In any case, I liked it when it was done in Supreme, and I liked it here. I would say Faction Paradox felt a bit shoehorned into this story, but that was clearly deliberate, so I can't fault it for that. This probably wasn't one of my favorite stories, but I really enjoyed it and thought it was a great way to end the collection.
My thoughts on the individual stories, containing spoilers (copied from a post I made on Gallifrey Base):
A Reasonable Man - this seemed like a great pick to start out the book. I wouldn't consider it one of the best stories in the book, but it was very good, and a very promising debut for Gareth Madgwick (and I'm not just saying that because he's active on this forum!) I liked the way the story cut between different scenes, making the story come together over time as you're able to put the pieces together in your mind. I also thought this one was one of the best stories to really let the reader sympathize with the prisoner and feel the pain of being trapped in the Boulevard. Things like the Man checking his beef to ensure it was cooked all the way and the way he longed for the blue sky of London did a nice job humanizing him. On a final note, the concept of a conceptual entity being turned into an actual person with a physical form was nice, and maybe it's something other Faction Paradox writers can use later on.
Body and Soul - as a jazz musician and a fan of jazz music the title of this story was very enticing. Unfortunately, the actual story disappointed me a little bit. As a whole, the story didn't have the sort of wild imagination I associate with Faction Paradox. I generally anticipate that an FP story will be unique, thought provoking, and just plain weird. This story, by contrast, felt like a fairly generic "deal with the devil" type of story, just with a member of the Faction taking on the role of the Faustian enticer. This is also more of a nitpick, but something about the way jazz culture was portrayed felt a bit off to me. It seemed like notable musicians were namedropped in an attempt to make it feel authentic, but it just didn't quite feel right.
The Boy Who Couldn't Stop Aging - I enjoyed this story a good bit. I think it excelled at using descriptive language that really got into what it feels like to be trapped in the Boulevard, which was great. I also liked Sophia's revulsion to the boy's mockery of the rituals, it's nice to have a reminder every once in a while that the Faction really is a cult. The actual conceptual meat of the story was pretty cool, a person whose age constantly fluctuates. The twist ending where Sophia became the guard was pretty cool, although it felt a little out-of-nowhere. Maybe I'll notice more of the setup when I reread the story later.
Marticide - this story stood out to me as the first one in the collection that really hooked me right away. It's written with a captivating and distinctive voice, with the bits in the Boulevard feeling perfectly oppressive and hopeless and the bits on Mars being more straightforward, but still well-written especially with the emotional descriptiveness. I love Faction Paradox stories that play on the concept of the observer effect, and the idea that a well-intentioned, rational mind can cause such destruction is cool (some common ground with A Reasonable Man here, but it's probably just a coincidence.) Looking at TARDIS Data Core after reading the story I see that Godfather Cocoyte was meant to be the character of Doctor Omega. I'm very glad that, as someone only vaguely familiar with Doctor Omega, it didn't hinder my enjoyment of the story at all.
The Sisters of the Little Moments - when I saw that this story was written by Kelly Hale, I was already very interested. The "old guard" of Faction Paradox, the ones who worked on the original Mad Norwegian Press books, always stand out to me as having the greatest connection to Faction Paradox's unique identity as a series - they don't just write Doctor Who with the serial numbers filed off like some FP writers do, you get an impression of the grand and imaginative universe that Lawrence Miles always intended for FP to be. This story, of course, was amazing. It was beautifully written, and the way The Mundane Order of Sisters of the Little Moments is talked about gives the feeling that there's an entire history behind this organization and its ties to the broader universe, but this history is only hinted at and not shown. The sections with Dyzeps do a great job showing us an alien perspective - not just alien in the sense of little grey men, but a character with a truly alien outlook, with an understanding of love based entirely on a relationship that we would see as horrible and parasitic. It was a little confusing how exactly all the different pieces of this story fit together, but not in a bad way. This story is probably the first one I'm going to reread, as I get the sense I'll get more of out of it after reading it twice.
You are the Absurd Hero - this is the story I've seen the most discussion about, and it's honestly for good reason. The idea of a surreal choose-your-own-adventure story that plays on the myth of Sisyphus is something that could only be done in Faction Paradox, and I mean that in the best way possible. The medium was used very well, too. When I went through the story several times, never reaching a conclusion that didn't put me right back where I started, I really felt the desperation of a prisoner in the Boulevard. And when the only way to get a proper ending is by breaking the rules of a choose-your-own-adventure story, that's a perfectly Faction-y twist. This might not have been quite the best story in the anthology, but I would say it was definitely the most fun.
The Oracle - this story was fairly straightforward, but I enjoyed it. The aesthetic of a frontier planet with the appearance of the old American west was very nice. I also liked that the Oracle had powers that came from an unexplained source that the Faction wasn't familiar with, it makes the universe feel bigger. The thing that stood out to me from this story was that the Faction felt pretty much straight-up despicable, trying to taking advantage of a woman with a power she doesn't understand, and imprisoning her eternally when they can't.
The Fixer - I'm a sucker for stories that show the lives of "normal" people in fantastical universes, so I'm a little biased towards this one. With that being said, I thought this was one of the best stories in the anthology. The way the Faction was portrayed in this story - a shadowy, background organization that the main character has heard of, but whose workings are a mystery - and the main character's ultimate fate - sentenced to eternal imprisonment for an accidental crime committed while trying to appeal to those who punished him - gave this story a very mythical feeling. The scene that shows Dodie's ultimate fate has the same effect, with the results of her deal being described in a way that feels haunting. Stories which focus on the internal workings of War parties like the Faction can make them appear very human to the audience, which is a good thing, but this story shows us how participants in the War appear to normal people: horrifying and incomprehensible, but with a strange allure that can draw you in and lead to your self-destruction.
This Is What They Took From You - the big standout in this story was the shifting perspectives. It showed the Faction's intervention in a culture through the perspective of someone from that culture, the Faction Paradox cultists responsible for intervening, and a member of the Faction divorced from the situation. This story also gets points, like Sisters does, for showing us an alien perspective, a person who sees their conscious and unconscious sides as distinct entities. This is another one that felt like it had a lot going on, and I've mentally marked it as one that needs a reread soon.
The Crikeytown Cancellations - this one is...weird. It's written in the form of the script to a comic, and as a fan of comics myself I can tell the author has a wide repository of knowledge on the situation to draw from. Especially early on, it does capture the feel of this sort of comic perfectly. The idea that real-world reboots and changes in storytelling conventions affect the characters in-universe, sometimes resulting in them being erased entirely, brings to mind Alan Moore's run on the comic Supreme, though I'm not sure if this was a case of deliberate inspiration or just conceptual common ground. In any case, I liked it when it was done in Supreme, and I liked it here. I would say Faction Paradox felt a bit shoehorned into this story, but that was clearly deliberate, so I can't fault it for that. This probably wasn't one of my favorite stories, but I really enjoyed it and thought it was a great way to end the collection.
