Slippage: Previously Uncollected, Precariously Poised Stories [Paperback]

Harlan Ellison (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 17, 1998

With this, his best-selling and most critically acclaimed collection ever, Ellison celebrates four decades of brilliant, outrageous writing. The award-winning novella "Mefisto in Onyx" is the centerpiece of an irreverent and wildly imaginative book that the San Diego Union-Tribune called "electrifying...Ellison is back, as unsettling as ever."

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Harlan Ellison is undoubtedly one of the most audacious, infuriating, brazen characters on the planet. Which may help explain why he is also one of the most brilliant, innovative, and eloquent writers on earth. Slippage simply presents recent, typical Ellison. In a word, masterful. The 21 stories in this 1997 collection, which is encased in black boxes, show Ellison at the height of his powers, with several of the stories (no surprise here) major award-winners. Highlights include a black mind reader who pays a visit to a white serial killer, a husband who falls prey to a vampiric personal computer, and a love affair between a young man and a woman who may be more undead than alive. Perhaps even more fascinating are the painfully candid snapshots of autobiography running throughout the volume. Even if Ellison's unsettling fictions are not enough to dazzle you, his often bizarre life experiences as an author will still keep you compulsively turning the page like a polite voyeur. --Stanley Wiater --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Ellison writes contemporary, absorbing, literate sf and fantasy that often go beyond the genres' boundaries. The Nebula and Hugo award-winning author of I Have No Mouth & I Must Scream (1967) and Deathbird Stories (1975) has compiled here 18 short stories, two essays, and one teleplay previously published in genre periodicals and anthologies but never before collected in one volume. Included is his award-winning novella, "Mephisto in Onyx," a powerful story of a black psychic whose friend convinces him to look into the mind of a white Alabama serial killer. Essential for both general short story and sf collections.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; . edition (September 17, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0395924820
• ISBN-13: 978-0395924822
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,047,734 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Harlan's scalpel is as sharp as ever, September 10, 1999

By 

R. Isaacson (Boston, Massachusetts) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Slippage: Previously Uncollected, Precariously Poised Stories (Paperback)

After his heart attack a few years ago, many were worried that Ellison might stop devoting himself so robustly to the short story. We need not have feared. Harlan had dished his lucky readers up another tray of poisoned chocolates, stories which will go down sweet and sear to the bone. While this collection is a little more uneven than the classic "Angry Candy" (which is the only reason I give it four stars rather than five), each tale is worth the reading, and some are bona-fide gems. My favorites: "The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore" (on the job, with a gestalt of Coyote, Loki, Feste, and Ellison himself. This one is worth the price of admission all by itself, and may well become an acknowledged masterwork on par with "The Deathbird"), "Crazy As A Soup Sandwich" (a very funny, wonderfully visual teleplay), the classic "Mefisto In Onyx" (never mind psychodrama, this is a PSYCHIC-drama! They're allegedly making a film of this one, so read the original before Hollywood starts messing), "Go Towards The Light" (the only sci-fi Channukah story I know of), and "Midnight In The Sunken Cathedral" (which should wring a tear or two from the most cynical reader). If you've never read Ellison before, this book is a fine example of the author's range, humor, anger, and real depth. If you're already a fan, rejoice! "Slippage" has the goods; just try to read it slowly, 'cause books like this should be made to last...

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nearly the Best of Ellison, September 19, 2001

By 

doomsdayer520 (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Slippage: Previously Uncollected, Precariously Poised Stories (Paperback)

This great collection gives you a representative sampling of Ellison's best short stories, and prove that he is far from a science fiction writer, which is what most people think. Sure, some of his stories definitely are sci-fi, like "Chatting with Anubis" and "Midnight in the Sunken Cathedral". However, most of Ellison's tales are better described as speculative fiction, and mostly consist of biting social observation. The best example is the classic "Mefisto in Onyx" which adds the supernatural to a treatise on racial tension, and the "Nackles" stories which deal with the uncomfortable realities of child abuse in the guise of a Christmas fairy tale. Ellison even veers into fantasy ("The Dragon on the Bookshelf") and bizarre character sketches ("The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore") while keeping his offbeat but perceptive worldview intact.

Here you can see that Ellison as a writer is impossible to categorize, and also impossible to ignore. (Note: For an even better collection, see the similarly-packaged volume "Angry Candy".)

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ellison: The Loud, Cranky Windmill Tilter, May 26, 2001

By 

Jay Smith (Harrisburg, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Slippage: Previously Uncollected, Precariously Poised Stories (Paperback)

I keep a copy of Slippage in my house and I take another copy on the road. "The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore" is, perhaps, one of the most brilliant bits of disjointed fiction since Joyce tilted several pints and scribbled his "Wake" It reflects the complex personality Ellison portrays in the media and suggests that there are new gods, but they aren't on high...they are among us. But they are flawed, emotional and sometimes indescriminate in their actions with mere mortals.

The whole of "Slippage" It is cranky and angry - angrier and more cynical even than Angry Candy - but it is also passionate and pleading. In this collection of stories, Ellison just doesn't grab your left bit and squeeze til it hurts, he tears a hole into your chest and massages your heart until it works in the shape it had when you were a little kid seeing the world fresh. He knows how the world works and hates much of it, expounding on the dark beast of man in the same breath he expounds on its glory. The result of personal near-death exercises, his introduction is as Jacob Marley warning of the spirits within that will try to change our narrow-minded, shiny-object trained mentality before its too late. Read it. You need to.