The Review
A Romance of the Equator: The Best Fantasy Stories of Brian W. Aldiss
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A Romance of the Equator: The Best Fantasy Stories of Brian W. Aldiss is the 1989 Gollancz best-of collection of Aldiss's fantasy-mode short fiction, gathering nineteen stories across thirty years. Aldiss's fantasy work tends to be overshadowed by Helliconia and by Super-Toys Last All Summer Long, but the fantasy short fiction is some of the strangest, most morally complicated short work the British New Wave produced.
The stories range from baroque fairy-tale retellings to dreamlike historical fantasies (The Great Fire of Mexico, A Romance of the Equator) to outright surrealism. Aldiss is in his exuberant prose mode throughout; readers who came to him through the more austere Helliconia trilogy will find the fantasy work substantially more playful. The title story is the high point of the collection and one of the best things Aldiss ever wrote.
Recommended for fans of British New Wave fantasy, for readers looking for books like A Romance of the Equator in the late-career best-of tradition (Michael Moorcock's Stormbringer, John Brunner's The Best of), and for completists. Four stars, and one of the more rewarding career-overview collections of its decade.
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