DNF @ 30%

CW: Obnoxious white dude writing offensive Black man and white woman, including a number of occasions wifh him writing the Black protagonist as dropping hard Rs.

I'm in a really annoying, impossible to please phase at the moment with my mental health and general existential crises, which made actually made me pick this up, as I had such a profoundly positive and strangely reassuring experience with I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. So much so I listened.lnronfihe different readings, including the BBC radio over the course of one evening. At first, that classic Ellis absolute lack of charm and nihilistic self-importance was a tone that was working for my own neurotic heads pace, and I was genuinely intrigued by the descriptions of the mind reading and their mental roll.

However, this didn't last because this is some Ellis at his most self-indulgent fart huffing, which is one thing, but while juggling a protagonist who is a Black man and his foil who is a white woman, is something else slenfifeor/entirely. Frankly, I for a feeling relatively early on that it was going to be a race between the story actually getting to the central conflict, before my discomfort levels with the desoltry characterisation becoming increasingly racist and misogynistic in their portrayal and language. Sadly, the action lost.

To be clear, I don't think Ellis is necessarily going out of this way to be gross. It just comes naturally. I think he genuinely believes he is really doing something with his awkward phonetics that edge towards AAVE and multiple hard Rs.
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On the whole it was just to full of itself and utterly insufferable Ellis that made me realise that there was no exploration of the oremins or pay off that was every going to be worth putting up with nasty white cis man writing a painful and offensive Black man and white woman.

Maybe I was just in the right place at the right time for No Mouth to really speak to me and my feelings of helplessness in this hell world. Not ready to abandon trying any more Ellis, but my opinion of him continues to plummet. ( )

Mefisto in Onyx is the story of a black man who can read minds. When asked by a friend to determine whether or not a serial killer is innocent, he finds out far more than he had ever bargained for. Quite the weighty premise.

This is the first I've read of Harlan Ellison, and I can say that I enjoyed it. The premise, to me, was quite fresh and the twists all interesting although some of them I figured out on my own. There were several problems that I had with this novella.

Firstly, I believe he spent a bit too much time on the beginning, and a bit too little on the end. The pace of the story felt too constrained, and it could have benefited from either being stripped down further, or expanded to a slightly longer form. The characterization, likewise, I had a bit of trouble with - Henry, in particular, could have used a slightly stronger voice.

None of my complaints are large enough that I regret reading the novella. I just believe that it could have been significantly improved upon, as currently the main strength it has lies primarily in its premise. ( )

This story is as punchy and disturbing as Harlan Ellison gets without becoming (as he sometimes is) completely incoherent. (Would anyone care to explain to me "The Beast That Shouted Love at the Heart of the World"?)

For those of you not familiar with Ellison's writing, think Chuck Pahluniak, with slightly better manners.

Ellison creates a compelling voice with Rudy Pairis, a black man blessed with the ability to read minds. Well, in a slightly saner world he would be blessed. As it is, he has yet to find one person whose mindscape doesn't make him want to vomit.

When Rudy's truest friend asks him to take a look inside the mind of a convicted mass murderer, the worst he fears is not half as bad as what he actually gets.

It kept me up till two AM the second time I read it. Most definitely worth your time.

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