MALFORM
>> Monday, July 20, 2009
Presenting Malform: brief tales and short stories about the oddity of the human condition.
Malform presents three (3) short stories -- "Still,"
"Bullet," and "Words Carved into Stone; Wood Left Unharmed" --
as well as an introduction to the forthcoming novel
Daredevil Amphibians.
To learn more or read excerpts from the 'zine, please visit the website.
1 comments:
The first thing one sees of Andrew's zine, unless one finds it already open, is the cover. I am grabbed by it, as I've always had a thing for that kind of 'old-timey medical illustration.' These are a little gross, as they show deformed faces, but if one looks closer it is fun to see how perfect the hair is drawn, the curls, etc. I can't assume that these images weren't pulled from another source, but it doesn't matter, it's enough for me to open it up.
The back cover continues the 'old-timey' theme with a sort of advertisement for what's inside. The ad for the 'cover models' and the pictures on his blog of him handling the zine with pincers set the reader up to expect the 'old timey medicinal' quality to permeate throughout the writings inside. I am unsure of what exactly I expected, but calling one's stories 'about the oddity of the human condition' makes me assume that they will be jokes about the human condition, or maybe not having anything to do with the human condition at all.
Regardless of what I thought before, there is no better way to describe the stories and the characters within them than as sufferers of human-condition-oddities. Part of what I mean to say is that the word oddity is not used as a gimmick in these pieces. The stories are well written character pieces that do show human-condition-oddities, but those oddities are what connects us to them, not alienates them from us.
A slight ramble from me, perhaps, but all in all I am quite pleased. I can't say that the 'pin up face' in the middle is really working out for me, though, as it cuts into a story I was engaged in, and if I was to pull it out, two pages of the story would come with it. A slight quibble, though, in the face of an otherwise strong collection.
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