We Will Speak Again of the Red Tower by Joelle Killian, Carson Winter, Jack Klausner, Joe Koch, Rhiannon Rasmussen, C.J. Subko, TJ Price, and RSL
Publisher: Self-Published
Genre: Sci-Fi/Fantasy, Paranormal, Contemporary
Rating: 3 Stars
Reviewed by Astilbe“The ruined factory stood three stories high in an otherwise featureless landscape…”
With these words, Thomas Ligotti begins one of the most influential short stories in the canon of horror and weird fiction. “The Red Tower” is a singular work, extraordinary even within Ligotti’s exemplary oeuvre, and has long been admired by scholars and enthusiasts alike. It is unlike any other story you’ve ever read.
“We are all talking and thinking about the Red Tower in our own degenerate way…”
The eight artists of these pages have come together, if not as representatives of the Tower itself, as adherents of its twisted, creative force. Each of them have seen the blasted factory, been touched by its encrimsoning, and have produced for your consideration these novelties from its ruddy depths. Perhaps once you have read them, you too
“…will be able to speak again of The Red Tower.”
Few things are scarier than not having any idea what’s happening in a strange situation.
The plot twists in “Jar of Arms” kept me guessing. I never would have thought that glass jars could be so scary or be used in such interesting ways. I also enjoyed the different reactions that children had to what was happening in this tale as compared to the adults around them. Various age groups can experience the same phenomenon in discordant ways in real life, too, so of course the same can be true in fiction.
As much as I appreciated the scary vibes of this universe, there were times when I wished more attention had been paid to plot development and explaining what was going on with the Red Tower. “[_]he [__]a[__]r[_] of th[_] [_]e[_] [___]r [__] [__]o[___] [_____]t[_]”, the second to last instalment, was a good example of this. The main character found an abandoned child and only then realized that he or she had never met a child before and, what’s more, couldn’t even remember that portion of their own life. This was the sort of detail that I would have loved to see expanded upon as it’s not something I’ve seen before in the speculative fiction genre from what I can recall and there were so many possibilities that could have been explored after that revelation.
All of the tales in this collection had dreamlike qualities about them, and this was especially noticeable in “Tolerance” which began with a nightmarish description of how the Red Tower mysteriously changed shape, color, and size so regularly that no map or chart of it could ever be accurate. It reminded me of nightmares I’ve had about trying to escape buildings that never seem to have any way to exit them even if they do appear to have windows or doors at first glance. Focusing on the logistical problems related to not knowing how this tower works was a smart way to not only describe it in more detail but to also help the rest of this book make more sense.
We Will Speak Again of the Red Tower was a wild ride.
