Fat Face


Michael Shea, Fat Face (Axolotl Press: 1987).

The story is a fun one to unpack, and this murmur points to a thematic layer that is particularly striking.   

Like Dyer's discovery at the Mountains of Madness, this too is a story of times changing—a story of the degeneration of a culture that has come to merely mimic the accomplishments of the past in a cheap and unskillful way. Look at what the Parnassus has become! As the Hollywood office buildings flaunt gaudy pseudo-Mesopotamian architectural excrescences that are even now past their so-called swanky age, another power shift looms. The streets are being abandoned, and Patti clings to a community that no longer exists. The time of Shoggoths, who can't even be bothered to form their bodies into passable human form, is upon us.    

Does Arnold, the newspaper vendor, offer hope?



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