Dreamsongs by GRRM

[Xray the Enforcer]

Rimmer -- sounds very cool.

[john]

My copy of GRRM: A RRetrospective isn't signed... yet. I'll have it signed after March.

I've got a copy that's signed twice. Does that make it more valuable?

[Rimmer]

Rimmer

Sounds like a good idea to me. I would suggest we take on a bit more than one short story a week though. Maybe we could do a " section " per week or a section bi-weekly?

Personally I think a whole section is too much for people that have already read it and are reading other things, and with up to six stories in a section we would probably just be glossing through mini-reviews again rather than properly disecting them. I just think it'd be neat to have maybe a thread on each story eventually, all linked from the sticky thread.

Just throwing out my idea anyway; my future net access is a bit uncertain so I can't organise it or anything - any way you people want to do it is fine.

[williamjm]

Personally I think a whole section is too much for people that have already read it and are reading other things, and with up to six stories in a section we would probably just be glossing through mini-reviews again rather than properly disecting them. I just think it'd be neat to have maybe a thread on each story eventually, all linked from the sticky thread.

It does sound like quite a good idea, and I agree that doing each story separately would probably be best - although we could do it by section, there's no reason to go through it fast and I think in some sections some stories would end up getting a bit ignored.

[Werthead]

And that makes two.

Following on from my earlier review of Dreamsongs, Volume I, this entry covers the second volume of Geore R.R. Martin's collection of short fiction. Whilst Volume I covered GRRM's work from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, Volume II focuses more closely on his work as a scriptwriter and editor (on the popular Wild Cards series of superhero anthologies) and includes what for many people will be the primary draw of the collection, a novella set in the world of GRRM's Song of Ice and Fire novels.

As with Volume I (as this is one huge book broken in two for US publication), Volume II is divided into sections, namely four sections containing stories and a bibliography of GRRM's published work.

The first section focuses on one of GRRM's several signature characters, namely Haviland Tuf, the vegetarian, bald and somewhat eccentric master of the ancient seedship The Ark, who proclaims himself the last of the long-extinct Ecological Engineers. Tuf was designed to be the hero (if that's the right word) of a series of stories set in GRRM's Thousand Worlds mileu, and these stories were collected into the popular 'fix-up' novel Tuf Voyaging. Two stories are presented here. A Beast for Norn (1975, published 1976) is the earliest Tuf story and was revised for its appearance in Tuf Voyaging, so it's the original version that appears here. It's not a particularly original tale and the well-worn SF reader will see the 'moral' coming from halfway through the story, but it's still exceptionally amusing to watch unfold. Guardians (1981) is much stronger, with Tuf a more sophisticated, well-developed character by this time and the story more intriguing, as the colonists on a remote ocean world are being attacked by increasingly savage creatures and Tuf has to find out where they are coming from and how to defeat them.

Around the time that Tuf Voyaging appeared, GRRM was invited to submit scripts for The New Twilight Zone, the resurrected mid-80s version of the classic Rod Serling anthology series. After some rather hectic re-jigging of the credits (including Harlan Ellison storming off the show after one of his scripts was messed around with by the studio) GRRM landed the job of script editor and worked on several episodes of the short-lived show. The Road Less Travelled (1986) was GRRM's only original contribution (the rest being adaptions or developments of other people's ideas), a somwhat curious tale which combines GRRM's trademark melancholy and musings on missed opportunities with a more optimistic ending. This script was filmed by Wes Craven and is reputedly a superb episode, but when it aired it had been butchered with nearly a third of its original material edited out, and due to legal reasons it cannot apparently be released or seen even today. A shame as the script is very interesting indeed. Also included is GRRM's pilot script for Doorways (1991), an alternate-reality show about a girl who passes from world to world and inadvertantly drags a native of our world along for the ride. This was also filmed, but again the filmed version is difficult to find and reportedly not as strong as the original script as several elements had been radically changed. The script included is very atmospheric and disturbing, and the reader may or may note the similarities to another series which aired a few years later called Sliders (purely coincidental, no doubt).

The next section takes us to the world that made George R.R. Martin an SF&F household name long before A Song of Ice and Fire took off. In 1987 GRRM and several close friends and collaborators began work on the Wild Cards universe, which postulates the existence of superheroes following the release over New York City in 1946 of an alien virus. 90% of those affected by the virus die; 9% become 'Jokers', horribly disfigured by the illness; and 1% become 'Aces', superheroes wielding incredible abilities. The Wild Cards series of anthologies became one of the biggest 'shared world' phenomenons of the 1980s, rivalled only by the Thieves' World series, eventually reaching fifteen volumes before petering out. However, the series was resurrected seven years later and several new volumes appeared, with the eighteenth and latest, Inside Straight, due out in the next couple of months in the USA. GRRM presents two of his Wild Cards stories here: Shell Games (1987) introduces another GRRM signature character, the Great and Powerful Turtle, and the role he plays in restoring the self-respect of Dr. Tachyon, the alien genius who created the Wild Card virus in the first place. From the Journal of Xavier Desmond (1988) is the framing story from the fourth volume in the series, Aces Abroad, and is a more familiar story of melancholy and musings, but is nevertheless exceptionally well-written as a dying Joker gets to see some of the world before he passes, and finds much that is worthwhile and beautiful in the world, but also sees some of its darkness as well.

The final section is called 'The Heart in Conflict', based on Nobel Prize-winner William Faulkner's statement that, "the human heart in conflict with itself alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about." This appears to be GRRM's philosophy and lends itself to his 'furniture rule', that a story is just a story and is an SF tale or a Fantasy or a Western purely due to the 'furniture': a guy riding into a frontier town to settle a score or anothe man riding into a castle to challenge the wizard who wronged him or another person flying his spaceship in pursuit of an alien who has a grudge against him. The stories that follow seem to particularly respond to this, defying easy genre categorization or limitations: Under Siege (1984) is a 'remix' of GRRM's much earlier historical story, The Fortress (printed in Dreamsongs, Volume I), this time with added time travel and the suggestion that pinning the hopes of the world on one small group of people might not actually be a good or healthy thing to do. The Skin Trade (1988) is somewhere between a horror story and a thriller, featuring werewolves and private detectives and rich old men harbouring secrets. It won GRRM a World Fantasy Award and deservedly so. Unsound Variations (1982) focuses on GRRM's history as a chess tournament organiser and those not particularly interested in the game may find this tale of obsession a bit odd, but GRRM captures the game as a fictional device quite well and the melding of chess with quantum theory is well done. The Glass Flower (1986) marks GRRM's last visit (for now) to his Thousand Worlds and brings in Kleronomas, one of the signature legendary characters of that setting. The story is rather downbeat and to be honest I found it even depressing. There is a tremendous depth of character in the story, however.

The Hedge Knight (1998) is a prequel to A Song of Ice and Fire, taking place eighty-nine years prior to the events of A Game of Thrones. At this time the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros are still unified under the rule of the Targaryen kings and seeing the realm at peace and shorn of the political machinations of court is interesting and somewhat refreshing. The protagonist is Dunk, a hedge knight who risks everything he has to ride in the great tourney at Ashford Meadow, but instead finds himself caught in the grip of history with a squire named Egg joining him for the ride. The first of a planned series of 'Dunk & Egg' stories is nothing short of a masterpiece in itself, expertly timed with terrific character-building and a depth of detail to the setting that is remarkable. If it wasn't for the A Knight's Tale movie a few years later, I imagine that Hollywood would have snapped this up by now. A sequel followed in 2003, The Sworn Sword, although it appeared too late to make it into this collection (the original version of which was published in 2003). A third Dunk & Egg tale will appear late next year (or early the next), in the Warriors anthology edited by GRRM and Gardner Dozois.

The final story is the Nebula Award-winning Portraits of His Children (1986), which is an obvious story to end on but still a fine piece of work. The story comes across as a modern take on Dickens, with an author visited by his creations and haunted by the decisions he made about their fictional lives. It doesn't take too huge an imagination to cast George in this light, enjoying a beer and a lively discussion with Tyrion or comparing notes on living in Brooklyn with the Turtle.

Dreamsongs, Volume II (*****) lives up to the promise of the first volume and is an essential read for any GRRM fan.

[Caligula_K]

We got Dreamsongs Volume II at the bookstore today. It is happily now in my possession, and I can finally read some Tuf Voyaging!

[Freshwater Spartan]

Just got the first volume. So far so good.

The best so far "The second kind of lonlieness" and "Remembering Melody" Great charactors and atmosphere

The fortress was a little rough for me. You can tell he was still developing as a writer. It was neat to read about a fort surrounded by ice and snow (future seeds for the wall?") Loved the atmosphere, everything else needed some work.

Looking forward to the Ice Dragon and Sandkings.

This volume is a great substitute for ADWD.

[Werthead]

Er, you did realise that The Fortress was actually a true story? Well, the setting was. The reasons for the surrender are still a bit up in the air today.

[Jussi]

As a Finn I'm looking forward to read The Fortress. The surrender of Viapori in 1808 is a well-known historical event in my country. It's interesting that Martin has written a fiction schoolwork about it.

[Sandor the Irrelevant]

I'm in the midst of reading this and quite enjoying it. I have to say that my favorite parts are the Bio sections about George's life and watching the evolution of his writing - very interesting stuff.

Anyway... I specifically have a question about "And Seven Times Never Kill Man". I'm to dumb to think it all through. What's going on with the native specises Gods? Is it the Pale Child they worship? Is there god actually some sort of mind controlling thing - i.e. an actual god?

Any thoughts?

[999th]

I've read Volume 1 up to "The Way of Cross and Dragon", so far it sucks. Man he's come along way. His early shorts are shit.

[Maltaran]

Anyway... I specifically have a question about "And Seven Times Never Kill Man". I'm to dumb to think it all through. What's going on with the native specises Gods? Is it the Pale Child they worship? Is there god actually some sort of mind controlling thing - i.e. an actual god?

My guess was some sort of telepathy - they could see what the humans' gods looked like, and thus made statues of those.

[Sandor the Irrelevant]

My guess was some sort of telepathy - they could see what the humans' gods looked like, and thus made statues of those.

Then why were the Commander's eyes turning the same color as the native species? And they seemed to be controlled by the temples? When the temple was destroyed the kids (Bitterspeaker et. al.) all went bonkers and then when they saw that statue at the end her eye color changed again and she went docile.

[Sandor the Irrelevant]

Just giving this a little bumpity bump bump

[Rob B]

I've read Volume 1 up to "The Way of Cross and Dragon", so far it sucks. Man he's come along way. His early shorts are shit.

Yeah, a really shitty story. It only won the Hugo Award for best short story in 1980. I read it as part of the Dozios edited Galileo's Children and I have it in The Locus Awards : Thirty Years of the Best in Science Fiction and Fantasy edited by Charles N. Brown and Jonathan Strahan, so clearly some people thought it was good.

I thought it was a very strong tale that offered an interesting question of faith and the power of truth in the face of an uncompromising belief.

[The Pita]

The only story that I didn't like in the whole thing was "only children are afraid of the dark". It was some of the shoddiest writing I've seen other than TG and CP. And even then it's pretty borderline.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Pita,

The only story that I didn't like in the whole thing was "only children are afraid of the dark". It was some of the shoddiest writing I've seen other than TG and CP. And even then it's pretty borderline.

You know he wrote that when he was something like 15 years old, right?

[The Pita]

"That's no excuse" nyah nyah nyah.

Still, I can nitpick at my favorite author, can't I?

[Sandor the Irrelevant]

Man... you should have seen the crap he was turning out when he was 6. It was like a first grader had written it!

"The Way of the Cross and Dragon" is one of the stories that has stuck with me the most - I think it made a very interesting point about faith and it's benefits.

Anyway... I think people reading this thread should focus more on my question about "Seven Times Never Kill Man" and what the heck is actually going on there.

[The Pita]

I absolutely agree with you, Sandor. A great author should be great from the moment he wets his diaper.