From: Richard Horton <rhorton@mdc.com>
Subject: (urth) Early Urth & Other Writers -Reply
Date: Fri, 16 May 1997 08:32:30 


[Posted from URTH, a mailing list about Gene Wolfe's New Sun and other works]



>>> Joel Priddy <jpriddy@saturn.vcu.edu> 05/15/97 09:20am >>> writes
to recommend:

>_The_Luck_In_The_Head_ by M. John Harrison
>All I know of Harrison is this one story, printed as a comic book by Dark
>Horse and Visual Graphics with uneven art by Ian Miller.
>It's apparently from a collection of short stories,
>_In_Viriconium_, but I've had no luck in finding it. It's so
>Wolfe-like that I suspect Harrison had just set down his copy of
>_Shadow_ and said, "Now THAT's what I'm gonna write like!"

M. John Harrison is a very fine British writer of SF and mainstream fiction. 
He's probably best known in the States for his Viriconium books: _The
Pastel City_, _A Storm of Wings_, and _The Floating Gods_.  There was a
story collection, as well, though I think the US title was different than the
UK title: moreover, one or more of the novels is an expansion of some of
the short stories, and his whole publication history is a bit chaotic.  I
understand that several of his novels have been published in the UK but
not yet in the US.  However, the Viriconium books all had paperback
editions in the States, the later ones were published by Timescape, IIRC.

He's very good, very evocative, and, I'd say, very British.  _The Pastel
City_ was published in about 1973, so it, at least, was not influenced by
TBotNS.  Definitely recommended, though, and certainly of the same
general orbit as Wolfe.

-- Tusk