Raymond's Reviews #171

%T The Jekyll Legacy
%A Robert Bloch and Andre Norton
%I Tor
%D December 1991
%O paperback, 248 pp, US$4.99
%G 0-812-51583-8

Bloch and Norton have done an audacious thing -- they have written a full-length sequel to R.L. Stevenson's classic tale of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Surprisingly, it works rather well. They have succeeded not only in evoking the atmosphere of Victorian London, but in imitating the moral tone of Stevenson's story, reminding the reader how closely all of us coexist with evil. If the fruit of their efforts seems a bit tame and bloodless, that's not necessarily a fault. We have all become accustomed to reading graphic stories of crimes even more horrible than Hyde's since Stevenson first put pen to paper. [CCO]

%T Cloven Hooves
%A Megan Lindholm
%I Bantam
%D December 1991
%O paperback, 360 pp, US$4.99
%G 0-553-29327-3

"Cloven Hooves" is a fantasy (sf?) tale with the feel of a serious mainstream novel. The protagonist is an independent-minded, tomboyish woman with a young son and an ailing marriage. After a long period of fruitlessly striving to make her life work, she walks away from civilization to mate with, and bear a child to, a satyr; a half-goat, half-man creature. Despite its wildly implausible biological assumptions (e.g., that satyrs can only reproduce by mating with human women), Lindholm's tale is oddly convincing and genuinely moving. Unfortunately, it's probably too weird for most buyers of mainstream fiction, and much too tame and predictable for sf or fantasy fans. [CCO]

%T Bicycling Through Space and Time
%A Mike Sirotta
%I Ace
%D December 1991
%O paperback, US$$3.99
%P 202
%G ISBN 0-441-05735-7

The author of this book is obviously a bicycling enthusiast. Also, rather obviously, he wants to be Douglas Adams when he grows up. Unfortunately, this tale of a hack fantasy writer who acquires a souped-up alien bicycle and the keys to the Bike Path Between The Universes is basically a one-joke affair, and palls quite a bit before it ends. Slight, trite, and not very bright; give it a miss.

RECEIVED BUT NOT REVIEWED:

I, Robot, The Caves Of Steel and The Naked Sun, by Isaac Asimov (Bantam). Handsome reprints of three classics.

Songkiller Saga II: Picking The Ballad's Bones by Elizabeth Sscarborough (Bantam).

Demon Pig, by Karen A. Brush (Avon). Gag me with a cute-animal fantasy.

Horse Fantastic, Martin & Rosalind Greenberg (eds) (DAW). Gag me with a cute-animal-fantasy anthology.

Mattimeo, by Brian Jacques (Avon). Gag me with a cute-animal-fantasy sequel...

Into The Dark Lands, by Michelle Sagara (Del Rey). "First Book of The Sundered", and you know what that means...