Book Review: ‘The Fantasies of Harlan Ellison’ | The Mindful Writer

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Today, I’m reviewing The Fantasies of Harlan Ellison by Harlan Ellison.

And here you see the spine, because really the cover doesn’t have much on it. I got this out of the library. I would buy a copy if I could find one cheap. Not that it isn’t worth a lot of money. It’s a wonderful collection of short stories by Harlan Ellison. And if you like science fiction and you like stuff that’s kind of out there and sort of free associated, stream-of-consciousness type stuff, this is definitely for you. I enjoyed it very much.

I got this book because I wanted to read one of the short stories in it called “‘Repent Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman”, not only because the title was so interesting, but because I’ve heard that it kind of plays around with narrative structure in terms of time. It does do that, and he does it in such an interesting way. And in a short story that I just thought it was incredibly clever.

And on the whole, the thing about his stories are that they are informed by his love of humanity and his distrust of too much technology. And I read this and I wonder what Harlan Ellison would think of what’s going on today with social media and other things that are happening with technology. I can only imagine what he would say.

The guy writes, honestly, like he’s high on acid, but he’s not. He’s the kind of person who is just like that. So, you may have whatever opinion you can hold about Harlan Ellison, the person, his writing is unbelievably creative, unique and totally him. And he even has these little prologues that he writes for each of the short stories, which is itself like a mini-story.

So it’s intriguing reading and I highly recommend it. Harlan Ellison’s The Fantasies of Harlan Ellison. Just get the book and give it a try.

That’s it for now. Thanks.

Originally published at https://debbimackblogs.com on October 24, 2019.