Literary Remains [jhc]
In "Loup-garou," one of 10 unsettling tales comprising Russell's second short fiction collection (after Putting the Pieces in Place), a man notices eerie parallels between events in his life and in a werewolf film he is watching. Years later, when he screens the movie again, he discovers that he was either completely mistaken about the similarities he thought he saw-or that parts of his life have themselves shifted shape. This indirect approach to the uncanny characterizes most of the book's stories, a number of which feature weird, possibly supernaturally engineered role reversals and identity shifts. In "Blue Glow," a man finds that his new apartment is remodeling his life to match that of the previous tenant. In "Where They Cannot Be Seen," a pair of lovers discovers that nighttime trysts away from their spouses magically transport them to a room that appears to exist in another dimension. Though some of the tales climax too ambiguously to achieve a genuine frisson, most are competent examples of how effective a subtle approach to the macabre can be.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.