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No one has ever bothered to attempt to imitate him, because it plainly can't be done. There was only one R. A. Lafferty, and there will never be another. But oh, how he multiplies and throngs when you enter the halls of mirrors where he presides!

Lafferty doesn't knuckle under to the discipline of the narrative arc, preferring to leap from peak to peak. As a result, his novels can be as exhausting as they are exhilarating. So it's best to acclimate to him via his short stories, which tend to be taller than other short stories are. He doesn't bother with character development; his protagonists are either blank canvases written upon by the dire finger of events, or else implausibly talented off-centrics. He only sometimes bothers with plot. The tales are jazz riffs on outlandish notions, extended with always comic, sometimes sinister, and preposterously casual flair, pure joy of invention. Nobody, at least nobody like me, can listen to just one.

Most of his work has been out of print, and praise is due to Wildside Press for bringing so much of it back. The classic short story collection "Nine Hundred Grandmothers" has thankfully stayed available, and is the best place to start. This volume, unlike "Lafferty in Orbit", is all new stories, not overlapping with Grandmothers, and is the best place to continue. Then you're ready to tackle the novels.

My personal favorites are "Boomer Flats", in which three Magi come to a nonexistent river town to be born, to flirt with abominable snow girls, and take field notes on pool playing comets. "The Man Underneath", in which a stage magician, with the aid of his beautiful assistant Veronica, disappears into his disappearing act. "The Groaning Hinges of the World", described in the preceding review. And the one about Adam's three brothers, who didn't fall under the curse, and the one about the mayor looking for an honorable way to sell out his city, and the one about the headhunting asteroid claimjumper...

Okay, so I liked them all. Four and a half stars, but only by comparison with the five star "Grandmothers".

R.A. Lafferty was a master of wonderful and bizarre fiction. The 14 stories collected here are a fine example of Lafferty's style. The stories are divided into two sections; those dealing with 'Secret Places' and those dealing with 'Mean Men'. Every once in a while a story will take place in a strange place AND have angry characters, so the division isn't perfect, but it's only a contrivance. The real joy is in the stories themselves...and they are good ones.

My favorite story in this volume is "Groaning Hinges of the World". What a feast for the imagination. The setting is a South Seas island. A fisherman is at sea when he hears a tremendous grinding noise. He returns and finds that a tribe of islanders that had previously been passive were now vicious warriors. The fisherman recalls an old legend that parts of the Earth would occasionally turn on their hinges, replacing the known land with a land of opposites. The new vicious warriors kidnap, rape, and murder. The other islanders live in fear until they decide to manually flip the Hinges over. This story is indicative of Lafferty's fiction; bizarre and some of the most original work you'll ever read.

"Mad Man" takes place in a future where robots are common. Robots require fluids from an extremely angry human to function. So, scientists run a factory where they employ men with short tempers in mind-numbingly repetitive and frustrating tasks. When the man loses his temper, they take a sample of his blood. Bizarre and original.

Most of the other stories are equally weird. Entertaining too. Lafferty was an unappreciated genius. His works are being reprinted by the wonderful Wildside Press. Fans of discerning fiction should be jumping for joy. Unfortunately, even in death Lafferty is an unknown to most fans of speculative fiction. For those of you who are unfamiliar with him: You have much to look forward to! Lafferty was a prolific writer and there are dozens of his novels and collections on the market. Enjoy people. You will not be sorry. Highly recommended.