A shared interest in the building of a wind-farm leads Patty to begin conversing with the enigmatic Mr Tullis, who has much to say about the symbolic significance of the wheel shape described by the turbines’ blades, and is – of course – more than he seems. This is a short (four-page) tale that doesn’t quite pack all the emotional intensity for which I think it aims. Mr Tullis’s talk of ‘wheels within wheels’ successfully creates a frisson of wonder that there’s more to Meikle’s fictional reality than the world we know. But I feel that the emotional heart of the story takes off a little too late in proceedings for it to have quite as strong a pay-off as I’d have liked.
Rating: ***
Elsewhere
William Meikle’s website
17th August 2010 at 11:01 pm
Hi David,
I think one of the unique strengths of this anthology is not necessarily in the merits of the individual stories per se, but rather in the ‘gestalt’ or web of unintended consequences and synchronicities that develops as the reader works their way through the book. This is the result of DFL’s consistent antagonism to the ‘intentional fallacy’, the assumption that any story can be considered as a ‘complete’ intended work in isolation from any other.
Meikle’s story grows in significance as you read through the rest of ‘Null Immortallis’, functioning almost like a passport to gain entrance into the labyinth – perhaps once the book is complete it will take on a different resonace.
Degsy
20th August 2010 at 9:36 am
Thanks for your comment, Degsy.
Ah, so ‘Turn Again’ could be seen as a kind of prologue or foreword to the anthology — that’s interesting. But I do think there’s value in responding to the stories as I encounter them, one at a time.