★★★★☆ Fascinating, Memorable, Inexorable
(Multiverse; Harry's All-Night Hamburgers) A private detective tries to find a source for a device that makes you feel really good when you hold it. So good he can’t think of anything else. A device that’s out of this world. (8,888 words; Time: 29m)
Recommended By: 👍RSR+1 👍STomaino+2 (Q&A)
This is a sequel to “Why I Left Harry’s All-Night Hamburgers,” which won the Best Short-Story Hugo Award in 1988. That’s a great little story, and worth the 99¢ Amazon charges for it, but there’s no need to read it to enjoy this one.
"How I Found Harry's All-Night Hamburgers," by Lawrence Watt-Evans [bio] (edited by Sheila Williams), appeared in Asimov's Science Fiction issue 03-04|19, published on February 15, 2019 by Penny Publications.
Mini-Review (click to view--possible spoilers)
Review: 2019.126 (A Word for Authors)
Pro: Even though it’s obvious fairly early on that there’s some sort of inter-dimensional travel going on, it’s still lots of fun learning how it works.
More surprising, this is really a horror story, not a detective story, describing how the detective’s addiction took over his life. There’s something scary about an addiction that locks on merely because you touched something, and which, as a result of that one touch, can ruin your life completely.
I liked this well enough that I read the other stories in the series.
Con: The narrator is hard to identify with, since he’s a totally obsessed addict (even if it’s not his fault). Once we know he’s probably beyond hope of recovery, the story is pretty depressing.
Other Reviews: Search Web
Lawrence Watt-Evans Info: Interviews, Websites, ISFDB, FreeSFOnline
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Pro: Even though it’s obvious fairly early on that there’s some sort of inter-dimensional travel going on, it’s still lots of fun learning how it works.
More surprising, this is really a horror story, not a detective story, describing how the detective’s addiction took over his life. There’s something scary about an addiction that locks on merely because you touched something, and which, as a result of that one touch, can ruin your life completely.
I liked this well enough that I read the other stories in the series.
Con: The narrator is hard to identify with, since he’s a totally obsessed addict (even if it’s not his fault). Once we know he’s probably beyond hope of recovery, the story is pretty depressing.
Other Reviews: Search Web
Lawrence Watt-Evans Info: Interviews, Websites, ISFDB, FreeSFOnline
Follow RSR on Twitter, Facebook, RSS, or E-mail.
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