Book Review:Song for the Unraveling of the World by Brian Evenson

Song for the Unraveling of the World by Brian Evenson

Paperback, 240 pages

Expected publication: June 11th 2019 by Coffee House Press

Maybe this is not the most appropriate time to write an elegy for a writer but hear me out. I know we have lots and lots of years left of Brian Evenson stories but last week we lost Dennis Etchison. If you are not familiar with Dennis he was a writer who despite a few novels, screenplays, and radio dramas was an absolute master of short horror fiction. As a short story writer few reached the level of balancing creepy, delusional and paranoid scares that Dennis Etchison did with 10 or so pages. All with a level of literary prose that is equal to the strength of writers in any genre.

This collection like Evenson’s last "A Collapse of Horses" gives me that same feeling that Dennis did. There is rare company at this level of quality. Song for the Unraveling of the World is a truly and deeply amazing collection of horror that has every right to be shelved in the same section of the bookstore as Clive Barker and David Foster Wallace, Ursula Leguin and Louise Erdrich. He is that freaking good.

This book features just over a dozen short stories, there are certainly a few that stand out as stronger than others but there are no stinkers in the bunch. Not every collection can boast like that. If forced to explain what makes this collection different from his Collapse of Horses (which has my favorite Evenson story "Any Corpse")it is the the surreal nature of the stories. Evenson is always weird but in this collection he is using words to warp reality on almost every page. Sometimes it is subtle, other times it is jaw dropping, but always done with beautiful razor sharp prose.

My favorite stories in this collection play with themes of false skin and go closer to more straight forward sci-fi by going into space. The Story "Smear" is a fantastic sci-fi horror story that has one of the most subtle yet scary monsters I can recall. The monster was just a feeling, fleeting something just beyond sight, but goddamn did it creep me out. "The Lord of Vats" might be my absolute favorite this super PKD style sci-fi story is one of the coolest and creepy takes on hypersleep I have ever read. In the short page count this story explores what is reality?, what is human? All that and it has a great reversal.

On the straight horror side I loved "Sisters", "The Tower", the title story and the entry from the Lost Films Anthology "Lather of Flies." Sisters is a great Halloween story but don't mistake that for a traditional horror story. I struggle with even trying to describe that one. The Tower is a cool post apocalyptic story, and the title story has some of the most unsettling moments of character paranoia and delusion in a book filled with that feeling.

Evenson has quickly become one of my favorite working authors, and his work is a must read, I mean all of it. I read a few of these before they were collected. There is something about reading Evenson stories collected. I hang on every word, each story is strong. If you are not reading Evenson you are missing one of the best weird fiction voices.

Thank you Coffee House Press for giving me an arc, keep your eyes peeled for Brian Returning to the Dickheads Podcast, in the mean time you can look up the interview we did with him about his fantastic novella The Warren.