gotta laugh

Regan Sues HarperCollins For $100M

 

reads the AP headline (http://www.wtov9.com/news/14590852/detail.html). Judith Regan, sacked ostensibly over the tasteless OJ Simpson book she'd commissioned, is suing her former employees, NewsCorp, claiming unfair dismissal: it seems her ousting had nothing to do with the OJ book, nor with the antisemitic remarks she's said to have made, but everything to do with the affair she'd had with Bernie Kerik. Apparently the bigwigs of NewsCorp are keen for Rudy "9/11" Giuliani to become US President, and recognize that the biggest fly in his ointment is the close relationship he's enjoyed over the years with Kerik. (Hang on. Yes, it's Giuliani I'm talking about here, not Regan. I got confused for a moment.) When the pouting ingenue (yep, Regan again) refused to lie to federal investigators about Kerik, her days at NewsCorp were numbered. After her canning, she was the victim of a NewsCorp smear campaign.

Enough innocent folks have been the victims of NewsCorp smear campaigns without the tiniest flutter of protest from NewsCorp employees like La Regan, happy enough to take the Murdoch shilling so long as she could, that I find it hard to feel sympathy for her on this latter count: hoisting, petards, that sort of thing. Otherwise, though, the lawsuit strikes me as infinitely cheering news: true, there'll be a bit of sadness whoever wins, but at the same time there'll be a cause for rejoicing whoever loses.

And, who knows, perhaps there really has been some pro-Kerik, pro-Giuliani skullduggery at NewsCorp? I'm rubbing my hands with anticipation on this one ...

The complete complaint she's filed is available as a PDF at http://www.portfolio.com/images/site/editorial/pdf/regancomplaint.pdf. It makes quite surprisingly funny browsing.

Datlow's Inferno - an opening salvo

The imminently forthcoming Ellen Datlow anthology Inferno: Twenty Original Tales of Terror (Tor, December), in which there's a story by moi, is garnering some great advance reviews. In Fantasy Magazine Paula Guran, no less, starts off thus (http://www.darkfantasy.org/fantasy/?p=44):

Seeking a definition of “modern horror” or “literary horror”? Look no further. Inferno, edited by Ellen Datlow, defines short dark fiction circa 2008 as surely as Kirby McCauley’s Dark Forces did in 1980.

adding, in the course of a long review, that "there’s not a bad story in the bunch". Eventually my own humble offering appears:

John Grant’s “Lives” is memorable for its twisted answer to one of those questions you may not want to ask again after you read his story: If there are those who have incredible luck, what might that mean for those around them without it?

Library Journal likes the book too ("All of the stories are wisely chosen and deserve attention and comment"), while PW (http://www.publishersweekly.com:80/article/CA6496987.html) has made it one of its picks in a Best of the Year roundup ("Datlow offers a state-of-the-art anthology of 20 new stories by some of horror fiction's best and brightest"). And Nick Gevers gives it the thumbs-up in the current issue of Locus:

. . . the quality of the prose is high, and many of the contributions are triumphs of construction, bringing plot and metaphor together in resounding harmony. The impression, to a critic who doesn’t read overmuch horror, is of a genre recovering from its big commercial setbacks and yearning to assume a major market position once more. . . . The list of strong stories continues . . . “Lives” by John Grant turns to suspenseful humor in its portrait of a boy with many lives to call upon but one short of the necessary . . . Inferno delivers in full on its awful premise, and Ellen Datlow stands on the same plinth as Dante, if only in fright-coordinating echo. More anthologies like Inferno . . . should be urgent priorities. It’s very clear that horror at short length is poised for a major revival, and the commercial stimulus must, as here, be applied, and on a large scale . . .

All very cheering, eh?