Darkness Divided

Darkness can be divided. —It can be split like an atom, and in it can be found a destructive fire—or light. Light, too, can be folded into darkness.The stories brought to light in John Shirley's stunning DARKNESS DIVIDED -- most of them never before collected, some written especially for this book--are presented in two sections: one featuring stories set in the present, or the past, the other set in myriad futures. These dark tales of new noir, science fiction, fantasy, and crime, demonstrate humankind's evolution from where we were and where we are, to where we have yet to be. Shadows are a current—a continuity—streaming from "Til Now" into "And Soon."John Shirley incisively explores human nature and the pitch-black streak within the soul that each of us fears. The twenty-two excursions collected here divide the darkness with scalpel-like precision, daring you to peek inside. In these divided shadows, in the shift of diffuse light and occlusion, things move--things that aren't there. There you will find your own id, the dark side of your own imagination.Read these words, and be forever changed by what you find.

From Publishers Weekly

Spiritually undernourished souls adrift in denatured worlds of anomie and isolation are the focus of these tales of contemporary horror and near-future speculation. Though uneven in execution, the 17 reprints and four originals in Shirley's third collection in as many years (after Stoker-winning Black Butterflies and Really, Really, Really, Really Weird Stories) alternate caustic critiques of the morally bankrupt with sympathetic explorations of personal salvation. "My Victim" is a creepy first-person account of an assassin-in-training whose mastery of dispassionate murder qualifies him to assume an ironically appropriate role in corporate life. In "Occurrence at Owl Creek Ridge," a frustrated housewife who sacrificed artistic ambitions for her family is magically allowed to sample the life of celebrity she might have enjoyed. Shirley's ire with irresponsible parents, greedy businessmen and socially detached leaders can be indelicately polemical at times, or, as in "The Prince" about a heartless real estate developer who learns compassion after a nightmarish experience in the squalor he has created emerge as unbelievably wistful idealism. His characters, however, are genuine specimens, developed with sincerity and sympathy whether embarked on killing sprees, discussing the nature of evil in the midst of a satanic rite, or, in the poignant "Nineteen Seconds," enduring the humiliation of an adolescent rite of passage. A conscientious and committed side of Shirley is on display in these tales, and it tempers the punky cynicism by which most readers know him. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

In 22 stories, Shirley proves that he is a noir master, regardless of whether a particular piece is set in the present or the future. "My Victim" deals with a young hitman; "Occurrence at Owl Creek Ridge" gives a woman a choice of two dire fates; "Learn at Home" allows a character to take a correspondence course in Nazism; "A Walk through Beirut" has terrorism as a theme; and "Where It's Safe" cannibalizes (literally) one of the polluters who brought on the Great Famine. This is variety. A substantial readership is devoted to Shirley and will rejoice at having his scattered stories assembled. Newcomers to his work who can cope with its high levels of sex, mayhem, and dirty words may come to rejoice, too, in a real master of a style of fiction that probably works better in short stories than novels. Roland GreenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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