Fur-Lined Ghettos # 4 (e-mag review).

Geoff’s monthly offering. This is what Sophie Essex, The Editor, gives us for an editorial:

‘And you.

  You glowing, glowing with psychoanalytical embers;

  burning with Dalinian giraffes,

  Organs clogged with sunburnt grass.’

Stand aside, Uncle Geoff, you have been superseded. You can’t beat that for an editorial!

I’m not completely sure about Dalinian? I’m more familiar with Darwinian giraffes, some with long necks and others with short. Anyway, this is a rather bizarre magazine which I haven’t read before. In this fourth issue, we have a collection of poetry, admittedly not with a direct connection to Science Fiction but interesting nonetheless.

The poetry is intriguing and oddly rewarding. I had strange imaginings of the Weimar Republic in Germany while reading it and then considered that this is the sort of stuff that would have been condemned by the Nazi Party with the contents burnt and the editors chucked in a concentration camp. Fortunately, we don’t live in such times!

There were collections of poems by nine authors. To give a couple of examples, Ig Zjoot has a poem which begins ‘a man made of telescopes and indie rap is lifting his arms towards the sky to shoot down airplanes.’ I particularly liked the work of Joseph Reich who had several works in the magazine. ‘The motel on the side of the road’ I thought, was very good. However, there are lots of good works on offer, some enabling the reader to reflect and some to shock the reader. It’s all subjective as they say!

This isn’t a comprehensive review of the magazine, rather it’s just a little piece to let you know that it is there on the market so if you’re interested, why not give it a look?

Rod MacDonald

March 2014

(pub: Fur Lined Ghettos. 60 page poetry e-mag. Price: £ 4.00 (UK))

check out website: http://fur-linedghettos.weebly.com/