Mini-Reviews 14: It Starts With "The"

Title because the last four macro-reviews I've done have been of books whose titles start with the word "the", and the first two in this collection also do that.

"The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" by Edgar Allan Poe

This is a short story about hypnotism (the Victorians had a thing about it). Basically, it's a (fictional) recounting of what happens if you hypnotize someone right before they die. It's also, as befits Edgar Allan Poe, pretty creepy.

Also, apparently this was first published without explicitly claiming to be fiction? That would have been really creepy to read in the newspaper.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: T for body horror. I don't think it would make a very good game.

4 stars.

Tags for this one: 4-star, fiction but historical, horror, rated T

The Scarlet Plague by Jack London

If this book hadn't been written in 1912, it would be rather suspect. For one, it uses the term "Aryan," which the Nazis ruined ("Aryan" has nothing intrinsically wrong with it, but the Nazi connotations make it practically unusable), and it's about a catastrophic plague that depopulated the world (thanks, Covid scaremongering).

Oh, and this actually superlethal plague? Happened, in-universe, in 2013. One year off from the whole "the world is ending in 2012" thing, and seven years off from the actual mass-panic-causing not-all-that-lethal still-kinda-around-but-no-one-cares plague we had.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for discussion of abuse.

3 stars.

Tags for this one: 3-star, post-apocalyptic, rated E10+

Hideout by Watt Key

You've had a bunch of classic SF, now get ready for true crime! But not actually true crime, because this is fiction. False crime.

Basically, a twelve-year-old boy discovers the secret swamp hideout of another twelve-year-old boy. The second one is waiting for his dad and his older brother to come find him once his dad gets out of prison. Unfortunately, |the dad is dead and the brother does criiiiiiiiiiime (i.e. grows marijuana) for a living (and is also not a nice person)|. It's a good thing that the first twelve-year-old boy has a police officer for a dad.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: A soft T for drug reference (|that guy and his marijuana farm|), though nobody actually uses any.

4 stars.

Tags for this one: 4-star, modern setting, rated T

(Endnote: All the 19th- and 20th-century SF I've been doing lately is thanks to an anthology I got. It has all that in it, plus a couple I didn't bother reading because they sounded boring.)