The Blast

by David Ohle

Building the pedway so that everyone had access was a marvel of engineering. Yet no one knew who the engineers or builders were. They were lost to history. Though it was assumed that somewhere there must have been a central power source, perhaps in an underground facility with dynamos and belts and enormous gears, it had never been located.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction

98 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 2014

About the author

David Ohle is an American writer, novelist, and a lecturer at the University of Kansas, Lawrence. After receiving his M.A. from KU, he taught at the University of Texas at Austin from 1975 to 1984. In 2002 he began teaching fiction writing and screenwriting as a part-time lecturer at the University of Kansas. His short fiction has appeared in Esquire, the Transatlantic Review, Paris Review, and Harper's, among other magazines.
While it remained out of print for over thirty years, his first novel Motorman (initially published in 1972) gathered a quiet cult following, was circulated through photocopies, and went on to become an influence to a generation of American writers such as Shelley Jackson and Ben Marcus.
His subsequent novels The Age of Sinatra (2004), The Pisstown Chaos (2008) and The Old Reactor (2013) take place in the same dystopian setting as Motorman. Ohle's fiction is often described as weird, surreal and experimental. His own influences include Leonora Carrington, Philip K. Dick, Flann O'Brien, and Raymond Roussel.

Reviews

[Charles Dee Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

David Ohle has seen the future, and it will be degrading. But people will get by.

[Chip Howell · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good, short novel. Actually, I'd classify it as a novella as it didn't even crack 100 pages. It's an enjoyable romp: a bit slight on things like character development and the development of anything as complicated as mood. In some books, that's a problem, in this book, it seems to have worked, if only because the world in which the story takes place is such a wacky place. I can't say if this would be everyone's cup of tea, but I enjoyed it and I'm quite interested in reading some of the author's other works. It's easy to read this book in a day, in a single sitting, even: it's that short and that brisk...it took me substantially longer than a single sitting, simply because that "real life" stuff kept getting in the way.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

As always a surreal trip into a post apocalypse world of surprising normalcy and nonchalance despite the forgettings and the dire state of life. Enjoyed it and can't wait for his next one this fall.

[fire_on_the_mountain · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad, but I can't help but compare it to 'Motorman' and 'The Old Reactor' and they shined a little brighter than this one. Maybe I just miss my man Moldenke.