Review: "I don't want to be the green monkey."
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 05 24, 2013
The short story format is not usually my favorite reading material. But I have enjoyed Gannon's books so much -A Song for the Asking;Kane; andAllison- that I wanted to see what he had to offer in short stories.First of all, I was surprised that many of the stories are science fiction since none of his books are. But I enjoy sci fi and liked these stories. I am going to give just a brief description of each story and how I liked it.1. JESSIE - Jessie has been in a vegetative coma for 3 months after a car accident and hard decisions have to be made.This was one of stories that reminded me of Gannon's books (in fact I think a portion of it was used in one of them). Strong.2.  THE GREEN MONKEY - Post apocalyptic tale with paranormal leanings. Seth is a  healer with a dark past and he's not the only one with a special talent.I love post-apocalyptic fiction and this is a good example. I'd like to see this one lengthened into a book.3.  I CAN'T SLEEP - What happens when you stop sleeping - at all. In John Starling's case, you start taking bunches of meds and start having visions that come true. Or do they?This story is well written but is not one of my favorites.4.  FINAL EXAM - In this sci fi shorty, a human is tested by aliens to see "whether the species is fit to join the brotherhood of servant races."Okay but not one of my favorites.5.  WHAT GOES UP... George Simpson is an inventor who doesn't take into account what consequences there might be to his experiments.Very short and just okay.6.  THE SACRIFICE - This is a poignant sci fi story that talks about what sacrifices you might make for your child, even if you are an alien being and never considered that this might be a problem.I liked this story a lot. It starts on a vastly crowded Earth and ends up on a planet being populated by indentured settlers.7.  THERE'S ALWAYS A CATCH - This is a clever little tale about immortality.8.  THE CRUX - Excellent climbing story with some cruelty and vengeance thrown in. This is one of my favorites.9.  DANIEL'S SONG - Sci fi with paranormal characters, this is a touching story about what makes up a deformity. This is also the story that Allison supposedly wrote in Gannon's book "Allison." This is another favorite of mine.10. VIRUS - An excellent sci fi story with a Federation Starship, 2 alien ships and an intelligent computer named Carla.This is one of the longer stories and I liked every bit of it.11. BLUE SKIES - Matt and Rob take their dogs out pheasant hunting.This is my favorite story out of the whole book and I can see pieces of it in his other books.