Review (#14): The Year's Hungarian SF and Fantasy Short Stories

By Péter MARTON

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A collection of stories by established writers as well as other authors (the latter were selected on a competitive basis), this book is an exciting new development on the Hungarian SF scene. It comes edited by Csilla Kleinheincz and Gábor Roboz, published by GABO (Budapest, 2018).

A strong anthology, albeit with mostly not "pure SF" for contents. One may thus complain about the cover, given that astronauts do not exactly play a central role, or any role for that matter, in about 95% of the stories featured here. That slight astro-naughtiness aside, however, it's quality stuff that you find here, most of the way. Moreover, with my broad understanding of the "science" in science fiction, the dominance of fantasy and slipstream across the volume should not be such a big issue after all.

The book's overall design could be, seemingly, more of a problem, but ultimately that's not an issue, either. What I am hinting at is the similarity with the design of Jonathan Strahan's popular "year's best" anthologies. Some may argue that the similarity ends right there, with the design, given how the selection process for Strahan's anthologies is much more competitive, and that you can't really say that the book reviewed here is a best-of as such. As far as I'm concerned, I would point out two things in response to this: 1) I'm not so sure about the competitiveness of some of the selection taking place for Strahan's anthologies (one always finds some really crappy stories in them); 2) I would prefer to re-read the weaker pieces from the Kleinheincz-Roboz anthology to re-reading the weaker ones from Strahan's compilations ON ANY F**KEN DAY, as the legendary Ozzy Man would say.

With that, I will add here some spoiler-free commentary on some of the best stories in the volume, my arbitrary selection -- with a view to my mission of highlighting European stories for the big wide world out there.

To spice it up, I'll try to pull this off in the sarcastically bombastic vein of Ozzy Man, now that I have come to mention him -- after I've been watching videos of his for the last couple of hours. This is to convey my appreciation for the work of the authors all the more effectively, I hope.

Let the funfest begin!

***

Anita Moskát: The Master-Lie (A mesterhazugság). You already had your chances to read about Anita Moskát's work from us here, and also here. So now she is giving you a reassuring life signal that under all the heavy praise we heaped on her, she is still alive and writing. The raw material for the story is fair dinkum brilliant as! A city literally built of back-stabbing bleeding lies that can quickly make life a generally bitter experience for the hapless recipients. It reminds me of at least some of the city that I live in, and that happens to be the city Anita Moskát also lives in. As usual from her, the craziness in her idea frames some actually solid drama that follows from it. Less usually from her, the ending is not so satisfying perhaps, a little convoluted I would say, with all those lies that are not lies and are thus lies. But given the original concept, by the time that the ending comes, you may be satisfied with the story anyway.

Gergely Buglyó: Seven Minutes and a Single Moment (Hét perc és egyetlen pillanat). Your master narrator (I mean my humble self here) comes from the righteous realm called the social sciences where an encounter with "subaltern voices" and "subaltern narratives" is as deeply appreciated and welcome as a warm handshake and a hot cuppa on a cold morning. Moreover, back in the day when I still had time to skip nights of sleep and chase random thoughts, I played my share of Dungeons & Dragons and I was always a little sorry for the skeletons, those poor undead creatures, who are as cursed by the recurring visitations of treasure-hunting adventurers as they are by being undead creatures in the first place -- so I am doubly appreciative of this fun little story with skeletons for heros. 

Katalin Baráth: Fish-Greasy Legend (Halzsíros legenda). One of the best pieces in the volume has its strength coming from a source where you will not be able to follow, unless you're Hungarian, and, sadly, mate, your chances in this respect are practically zero -- statistically speaking. But before you head to the bottle-o nearby, be warned that this is a downright excellent piece of alternative history (or just hidden history!?) nonetheless, featuring the Hungarian contingent of quasi-volunteers stationed in Finland during the war of our Finno-Ugric so-called brothers against the Soviet Union. Rich in sophisticated references, it puts you in the shoes of these blokes, which is of course a tad more enjoyable if said shoes fit your feet. What you need to know at a minimum is that Hungarians and fish food do not mix too often, that is, with the exception of Chrissie Day, when custom dictates it to them.

Gabriella Kiss: Guests (Vendégség). This time, you may get away with not being a Hungarian, but it still sure helps you if you are -- to have a sense of what visiting grandparents in a small village in the Hungarian countryside may be like, these days. Fantastic hospitality that mostly no one appreciates enough. As the lifelessness of the humble and largely immobile life of the grandparents and the similarly wretched online/gaming existence of their grandson begin to stand out as the real deal here, the tale is ready to take a U-ey in a weird sort of way. The writing is brilliant, the author really nails it!

László Sepsi: Bruce (Brúsz). My favourite, a bloody ripper! And real SF, for that matter -- for that of course matters. The concept behind the story builds on the Bruce effect. I won't tell you what that is, because knowing what it is about could kill the beating heart of this story, and that is to be avoided! So feel free to be a bludger and just give it a go when you get your chance. The style is amazing, it gets you in the head of the character in a really discomforting sort of way. And by discomforting I mean a POV akin to an "I am a spider about to bite your f**ken testacles in the portable toilet you're unfortunate enough to have ventured into" kind of perspective, so be responsibly prepared for whatever may be the equivalent of a spider in your own context. In the meantime, the narrative of what happens is cleverly built up, detail by f**ken daring detail, all the way to the story's climax. The setting could be a Latin-American barrio, but, if you're not from the Western Hemisphere's Down Under, you may be forgiven for thinking of Eastern Europe first, where some of the countries of the region have a history of selectively anti-natalist practices.

Zoltán László: Endings of the World (Világvégék). I'm not sure about the 2nd person narrative used here, but then I'm not sure about many other things in life, either, so I'll give it a pass -- I've had so much consumer satisfaction already I may be gifting points away at mates' rates, but I still think it is worth it. This one is a very Hungarian take on the theme of 15 minutes of fame, with a decently drawn character at the centre of the events depicted and some sarcastic references to mud-slinging domestic politics.

Balázs Farkas: The Taste of Laughter (A nevetés íze). Pundits who dig boxing stuff into genre categories more than your cat loves Boxing Day on any day will say things like "weird" and "slipstream" seeing this one. If you ask me they should be chased away like mozzies! This is simply a good story, with some seriously surreal shit and the depth of a bottomless pint of beer, accurately reflecting the nature of the worst of stand-up comedy where they go for the jugular to capture the attention of the audience and to keep them laughing... with all the lowliest of jokes they've got, like there is no civilised tomorrow or at least they are not personally interested in seeing it come.

Gábor B. Molnár: Don't Feed the Troll! (Ne etesd a trollt!) After the first read you might be scratching your head seeing this dog's breakfast only to then realise that the point is exactly this being a dog's breakfast! That's what it has to be to give an accurate portrayal of the nihilistic quasi-coexistence of people in an ordinary Hungarian apartment block where the more you try to reason with thy neighbours the more shit you are ultimately about to eat. A glorious vision of a future where people are just as petty and full of shit (that you might end up having to eat) as they ever were. Funny as hell. And still SF. (To the author: Bonus Points for the Raskolnikov reference, you rascal!)

Brandon Hackett: Artificial Gods (Mesterséges istenek). Brandon Hackett is a Hungarian author who otherwise goes by the name of Botond Markovics. This is the last piece in the anthology and it is worthy of its position given that it is really enjoyable far future SF. It could go straight to the pool room if it weren't for two regrettably obvious weaknesses. One is the title which kinda gives away the point of the story and that tends to be a wee bit self-defeating. The second is the ending where (spoilers, Peter, remember, we don't want any spoilers here!) let me just say that the POV change is a basic technical error that should be avoided like the plague. The story could be safely led through to the back end of the Outback and the originally intended destination, safe and sound, without the POV change. Otherwise, I can easily see this one score in that unlucky non-Hungarian-speaking part of the universe that currently cannot read it.

***

Now, I would just like to add a closing statement that I really think there are no particularly weak pieces in this anthology. Some comparatively big names are included in the line-up whose stories I haven't discussed here, such as Bogi Takács (see er work reviewed by us here), György Dragomán or Attila Veres, whose absence above may be worth an explanation. But this is already a long post, so I will just stop here and leave it to you to figure out how you might want to read these stories, in Hungarian or perhaps another language, in the future. Not the far future, hopefully! Cheers!

Previously reviewed in EUtopias and Other Futures: "Guardians of Twilight" (Alkonyőrzők), a novel by Zsuzsa Bartos