"Step into My Garden" - Frank Belknap Long "The Hill and the Hole" - Fritz Leiber, Jr. It's hard to know if Bester was really trying to say something profound with this or not I suspect not, but at the same time reading this will give you that same "the world just turned up-side down, holy shit!" feeling that Philip Dick can sometimes engender. The ending didn't knock me on my arse but on the other hand it was slyly appropriate as well. Quite a trip, to say the least, and any attempt to try to explain what happens takes away from its singular charm. Maybe this is all some twisted game being played on the protagonists themselves by a fairly minor deity. Our hateful point of view characters learn some terrible things about the world, things that make a mockery of existence and reveal it all to be, as so many of us have long suspected, one huge, sick joke. I was reminded of Heinlein's Job just a little bit, but this isn't trying so hard to be funny and when the humour does come it is pretty tragic. From here on we go into bizarre theological territory with a heavy twist of satire. Their hideout is turned to rubble, but something really unexpected happens. We follow a bunch of unlikeable rich characters playing decadent games in a private bomb shelter during the Blitz.
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