Name: Christmas Forever
Rating: 3.76 (3 reviews)
ISBN: 9780312855765

260 reviews31 followers

December 28, 2011

I picked up this book used for something like 28 cents on the Amazon marketplace, thinking that SF + Xmas was a pretty sweet combination. And, hey, maybe it is—but I wouldn’t know that from reading Christmas Forever.

The problem is that it seems like a lot of authors missed the point. More often than not, the story either A) didn’t have a SF/Fantasy element to it, or B) didn’t have a Christmas element to it. Sure, most of the stories at least took place during Christmas, but the majority of the time that was largely irrelevant to the plot; the stories could just as easily have happened during Easter.

Now, I’m not saying that Christmas needs to be a pivotal part of the plot here—however, I should at least get a Christmas feel from the setting. Make me see the lights, hear the carols, etc. Just writing a story and saying, “Oh, by the way, this takes place in December, in case you were wondering” doesn’t cut it.

With that in mind, I found this book to be a very slow read simply because it wasn’t living up to the expectations I’d had for it. I ended up quitting at page 251, and will possibly resume next Christmas.

Until then, here’s a quick run-down of the stories I did manage to read, with asterisks by the ones I thought were best:

*Midnight Clear, Jack McDevitt: A tale of a girl trying to send some holiday magic back to the past (figuratively speaking) by erecting a Christmas tree in the ruins of a dead civilization on an alien world. I felt this story was a little weak for the opening act of the book (mostly because the protagonist’s journey dragged on a little too long), but once I read some of the other entries, I realized “Midnight Clear” was actually one of the better options because it stuck to the two major themes (Xmas/SF) well. I also liked that what was implied throughout the story was never explicitly stated at the end. This is definitely one of those tales that seems better in hindsight than it did while I was reading it; I wouldn’t have given it the coveted asterisk right away, but after thinking on it for a while, I’ve decided that this is where my shift+8 belongs.

Not a Creature, Damon Knight: A four-page story that gives a new twist on the Scrooge archetype. This tale, like “Midnight Clear,” managed to stick to the two main themes, so it gets props for that.

*My Favorite Christmas, Dave Wolverton: Being one of the longest stories in the book (if not the very longest), “My Favorite Christmas” manages to get more detail into the characters and setting than most of its neighbors. Although there was no sense of SF or fantasy for much of the story, I was able to overlook that as I spent the Christmas season with a high school boy and his strange uncle who randomly showed up on the family’s doorstep one day. A cool ending for a cool story.

*Prince of the Powers of this World, Roger Zelazny: Zelazny is the only reason I even knew this book existed, ‘cause I read “Prince” in Manna from Heaven. Being the obsessive Zelazny fan that I am, of course this retelling of a classic Christmas story was my favorite entry in the book. It also had the heaviest fantasy themes of anything in this anthology (keeping in mind I only read to page 251), which was a big plus, because I like my writing to have some fantasy/SF elements that aren’t completely muted in the background.

The Cockatrice Boys, Joan Aiken: The premise started out great, then the story dragged for a bit, then I found myself wondering what the hell had just happened by the time I hit the end. After doing some research, I found that this is actually the beginning of a novel of the same name (I don’t know if this is the first chapter, or the first few chapters, or what). No wonder it felt so incomplete and the ending was such a let-down. This excerpt actually served as a negative marketing tool in my case, because I was so irritated by the abrupt ending that I don’t care to ever read the novel in its entirety.

And When They Appear, Gene Wolf: What. The. Fuck. This story started out fine (it stuck to the two themes of the anthology), but the ending was more than a little disturbing. Don’t get me wrong—I like disturbing. I enjoy horror. Had this been a Christmas Horror book, “And When They Appear” would be fine. But as it is, the fucked-up ending to this story of a boy living alone in an automated house full of holograms seemed wildly out of place.

We Traverse Afar, James P. Blaylock and Tim Powers: Didn’t much care for this story about a man trying to get through the holidays in the absence of his wife. The SF/Fantasy element was weak, the plot was uninteresting, and the character’s “change” at the end seemed too abrupt and without reason.

*Joyful All Ye Nations Rise, Margaret Ball: Now this is the type of thing this anthology was lookin’ for. The SF and Xmas elements are both very prevalent, and there’s a good amount of humor that keeps things light and enjoyable. It’s a story about various nations on an alien planet that’s always on the verge of war (if not actively fighting), and they look to the forgotten Earth traditions of Christmas to try and actually agree on something for once. Unfortunately, they have a few problems translating their historical texts and don’t exactly get everything right. My only complaint about this story was that there were a bunch of obscure names for alien races and whatnot, which I felt somewhat muddled an already-heavy plot about political differences.

Pal o’ Mine, Charles de Lint: This story is 99.99% SF/Fantasy-free, and the fact that it takes place during Christmas has no impact on the plot. Once again, that’d be fine if I at least got some Xmas feeling out of it all, but there are no lights, no trees, no nothin’. I’m really not sure how this story ended up in this book.

*How the Cohml Leeched Out Christmas, Alexis A. Gilliland: This is exactly the type of story the authors in this anthology should have been writing: a fantasy/SF explanation for how Christmas came to be on Earth. Bravo, Alexis.

Dance in Blue, Catherine Asaro: Another decent story that missed the Christmas mark. Yes, it happens to take place during Xmas, but that’s where the holiday similarities end.

*Christmas Games, David Langford: This is the opposite of the previous entry. Although it didn’t need to take place during Christmas, it did, and I really got the feeling that I was in the setting of Dickens’s “Christmas Carol.” This murder-mystery was one of my favorites of the book, and it had a great ending that put a smile on my face.

Toy Chest River, Paul C. Tumey: Where do lost toys go when they die? A boy finds out with the help of his uncle, and the answer ends up leading to a quest to preserve childhood magic for generations to come. Not the best story I’ve ever read, but not bad.

A Present for Santa, Hilbert Schenck: If I ever read another Hilbert Schenck story, it will either be an accident or the result of having a gun held to my head. This story had, hands-down, the worst writing of the book. I found myself groaning at the poorly handled exposition (you don’t have to tell us every little detail, we can figure out your brain-buster of a plot just fine), and the atrocious dialogue made soap opera conversations sound goddamn brilliant. I actually wish I’d written this review shortly after reading the story, so I could recall and review some of the particularly excruciating parts. Then again, maybe it’s best that the memory is already fading—I think it’s a part of my brain’s self-defense mechanism that wards off bursts of concentrated stupidity.

Easy as Pie, Rudy Rucker: I was totally groovin’ on this story that retells a classic fairy tale (even if the Xmas element seemed a little lacking), then I was blasted in the face with an ending that was apparently teaching some moral that went over my head. Or something. I’m really not sure what was going on there.

And that’s where I left off for 2010. Hopefully I’ll read the rest of the book in December of 2011, and hopefully it will be better than the first half.

[Resumed December 2, 2011-December 23, 2011]

The Tamerlane Crutch, James Powell: Bonus points for definitely having a strong Christmas element (the story’s about none other than Scrooge himself), but minus points for leaving out commas that resulted in sentence confusion (I’m thinking, in particular, of the 5th paragraph on page 254). This story has a sort of “jewel heist” feel to it, which is sort of okay, but I was given no reason to care about the characters because all I knew about them was that they wanted the Tamerlane Crutch (and they only wanted it because it was valuable). Not a bad read, but nothing exciting. (Also, where was the Fantasy/SF element?)

*Chronos’s Christmas, Rhea Rose: Another great example of an author actually hitting the goal of the book: a story that is decidedly SF/fantasy, and also DECIDEDLY based on Christmas. Rhea Rose’s contribution gives us a look into the future where orphans fight for the right to celebrate Christmas—literally.

*We Three Kings, Alan Dean Foster: I’m recording my thoughts on these stories as I read them (rather than doing them all in one fell swoop, when I’m done with the book), and as of now, I have to say that this may be my favorite of the book. Well, okay—maybe not my favorite. It’s hard to deny the Zelazny. But at the very least, we’ll say that this is my favorite that I’ve read in the 2011 half of my review. Alan Dean Foster takes us through a fun story with a mix of mythological creatures and science-fiction creations, all while teaching us a valuable lesson about the season. Bonus points: this is the only story I’ve come across so far that addresses the winter holidays of other religions than just Christianity. Love it!

Xmas Cruise, Patricia A. McKillip: This story sucked, for a number of reasons: 1) It started out talking about an older couple being all in love with one another (this is a subject that is NOT RELEVANT TO MY INTERESTS). 2) This was by no means a Christmas story—it was just a regular ol’ SF story, with a random Xmas tree placed into the background every fourth page or so. 3) I was so bored by the premise in the initial pages that I stopped paying attention halfway through the story and came out with no idea what had happened in the end. It almost made me want to go back and re-read, just so I’d have a better understanding of things, but then I remembered how much I disliked the story and decided it was better to just move along. TLDR: Crappy subject matter, not a Christmas story. Boo.

A New Christmas Carol, Robert Sheckley: I have a bit of a bias against Robert Sheckley, because I’ve read that he was kind of an asshole during his 3-book collaboration with Roger Zelazny. Although it’s a little humorous at times, this story’s message about material gifts being bad is a little harsh—it goes so far as to equate those who give physical presents with “sinners.” I do have to say, though, that I liked the idea of robots getting very excited about telling a Christmas story in the form of a play. It reminded me of Zelazny’s “Passion Play,” except that “Passion Play” is about 100x better.

Christmas at the Edge, Sarah Smith: I’m a little torn on this one. The writing was good and I felt myself inexplicably drawn into the plot; but I say “inexplicably” because the plot involved shit I do not care about in the least. It’s about a guy who gets stuck watching his landlady’s 4-year-old son, and basically ends up inheriting the kid over the week preceding Christmas. The story has some weird father-son moments that made me cringe. I do not want to read about a guy developing any sort of bond with a child, whether the child is his or anyone else’s. But I guess that just comes from my complete and total lack of paternal instincts. So, the writing here was good, but the subject matter was so barf-worthy that I’ll never read this story again, and I’ll be happy with that decision.

*Sandy Claws, Edward Wellen: I’m not entirely confident in my decision to award this story with the coveted asterisk. And I think that’s because I’m not really sure what to make of the story. It’s about a cat that stumbles into a virtual reality Christmas scene and . . . well, it’s just odd. But I think I liked it. And I’m pretty sure the reason this story gets the asterisk is so that I’ll remember to re-read it in the future—this story deserves a re-read, if not just so I can better decide what I think of it.

Another Bad Day in Bedlam, Brian Stableford: This isn’t a story. It’s a writer trying to get some message across through big blocks of crappy dialogue and minimal action. And the entire thing is wrapped up in an “I don’t give a shit” plot about the second coming of Christ. Oh, and in addition to using italics so that you know how characters are speaking, the author also adds an adverb to every dialogue tag, just in case the slanted text didn’t make things clear (which it did, every single time). “Ugh,” I said, disgustedly and with lots of disgust, “Next story, please.”

Not Even a Chimney, Stanley Schmidt: Okay, so I waited way too long after reading this story to write something about it. And now the book is no longer in my possession (loaned it to a friend), so I can’t remember much about this story. What I do recall is that it’s a story about a scrooge-ish old man receiving an odd gift for Christmas, and having his chief of security check it out to make sure it’s safe. Then, there’s some plotline about some lady that Scrooge had fired from his company many years before, despite her brilliant ideas. On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d give the story a “meh.” (I figure that if I can’t remember much about it, I must not have particularly liked it.)

Christmas Wingding, Janet Kagan: This was the story that killed the book for me. It seems like anytime I’m reading anthologies (unless they’re exclusively filled with Roger Zelazny’s work, OF COURSE), I always hit a point at which I’m done and don’t want to continue on. “Christmas Wingding” was that point. It’s a story about some diplomat visiting some random planet and hearing the story of how that planet’s local smuggler “smuggled Christmas” one year. The story is like 20 pages long and filled with boring characters I didn’t give half a shit about. It seriously took me something like 7-10 days to get through this story, and I didn’t even end up finishing it—I skimmed the last 5 pages or so and don’t even know how it ends.

From that point on, the rest of the book seemed like a chore . . .

A Present for Hanna, Maggie Flinn: I’d seen this story mentioned a few times when reading about Christmas Forever, so I was semi-excited to finally get to it. (I say “semi-” because the previous story drained most of the excitement from my body.) “A Present for Hanna” is probably a pretty good story, potentially worthy of the Asterisk o’ Quality, but at this point I was just so done with the book that it was hard for me to think of it as anything but work. I’d like to read the story again some day when I’m in a better frame of mind, even though this was one of those entries where the Christmas factor was tacked onto the end and had no real effect on the plot.

Cottage, Bruce McAllister: Santa and Mrs. Claus are whining about how they should have had a kid when they were younger. Not only is this COMPLETELY against my interests (being that I’m not a fan of children or human reproduction in general), but it was written in a way where the plot was sort of vague. Normally, I’m okay with vague (if it makes you think, that’s a good thing!), but I was so disinterested in both this particular story and the entire freakin’ book that I just wasn’t in the mood to do any unnecessary thinking.

Beginnings, Michael Bishop: With only one story left in the book, you’d think I’d power through it just so I could say I’d read every entry.

But you’d be wrong.

Maybe I’ll pick up Christmas Forever again in 2012 and read those last few pages.

But maybe not.

Christmas Forever

David G. Hartwell (Editor), Catherine Asaro (Collaborator), Alan Dean Foster (Collaborator)

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David G. Hartwell

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