Tuesday, August 18, 2020

Everything's Fine, by Matthew Pridham

[Single]
★★★☆☆

(Slipstream Horror) Today’s a big day at work, but just walking there looks to be a death-defying challenge, what with people randomly turning into monsters and such. (4,732 words; Time: 15m)


"," by (edited by Ann VanderMeer), published on by .

Mini-Review (click to view--possible spoilers)

Review: 2020.396 (A Word for Authors)

Pro: As Eric and his two coworkers navigate the transformations on their way to work, the situation gets worse, and worse the further they go. We quickly pick up on the fact that people who show fear are the first to get transformed. Eric’s good at hiding it, or he never would have got this far.

In keeping with the slipstream aspect, things like meetings and promotions and TV shows just keep right on happening through this apocalypse. In fact, up until Jenkins’s accident, I was entertaining the idea that Eric was suffering from schizophrenia and seeing hallucinations, since no one else seemed to see anything was wrong.

To a degree, it reminded me of “It’s a Goood Life,” by Jerome Bixby.

Con: It doesn’t really go anywhere. Things look hopeless at every step of the story, and even though Eric gets his promotion, that seems almost entirely pointless. We have no idea why this is happening or what it means.

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