Review | Illuminations by Alan Moore
Weird fiction fans, check out my review of Illuminations, a short story collection by Alan Moore
For fans of strange fiction, Alan Moore’s latest collection of short stories, Illuminations, is required reading. In eight widely varied tales, Moore dips his ring-studded fingers into every genre of interest for those of us who prefer their stories a little on the freaky side. There’s a mix of fantasy, sci-fi, romance and horror in these hallowed pages — even a long-form poem. But what else is to be expected from the enigmatic Moore? Best known for his work in comic books, Moore singlehandedly redefined the industry with his work on titles like Swamp Thing and Watchmen, introducing a darker, mature element to a field that previously catered almost exclusively to youngsters. Over the years, Moore has only tightened the screws on those abilities. His Lovecraftian homage Providence is a masterwork of storytelling and suspense, proving that Moore has only gotten better with age. Now in Illuminations, Moore casts the visual medium aside with a collection of prose tales that are at turns terrifying, heartbreaking and, believe it or not, side-splittingly funny.
Stories
There’s something here for almost every taste, no matter how odd. In “Cold Reading,” an unscrupulous medium meets his match when he tries to con the wrong ghost. “The Highly Improbable Complex State” showcases a brain-like entity who wills himself into existence and then struggles to adjust to his newfound abilities and surroundings. “Not Even Legend” follows a group of paranormal enthusiasts on the hunt of a supernatural entity that experiences reality by traveling backwards in time. In “Location, Location, Location” a real estate agent becomes romantically entangled with the second coming of Christ against the backdrop of Armageddon.
What We Can Know About Thunderman
For my money, however, none of these is more interesting — or more revealing about Moore himself — than “What We Can Know About Thunderman,” a sprawling novella that makes up the bulk of this collection. This lighthearted satire primarily follows a fictional editor, Worsley Porlock, from the moment he falls in love with comics in his childhood to his eventual rise as an editor in the industry. On the surface level, the story is a joyful enough read unto itself. But on a closer inspection, it seems to be an exorcism of sorts for Moore. In just shy of 250 pages, Moore savagely eviscerates the comic book industry using a cast of ridiculous characters and hilarious situations.
Given Moore’s four decades’ worth of experience in comics and his well-known disenchantment with the field, it’s impossible to miss the connection to real life events in the pages of “What We Can Know About Thunderman”. Moore seems to delight in dishing it out to all the maniacs, perverts, backstabbers and even mobsters that inhabit the industry. Anyone who possesses even a limited awareness of the business can decode the tale’s deeper meanings. Thunderman is obviously a pseudonym for a fictional character who seems to be a mashup of Superman and Shazam. The artist “Jumpin” Joe Gold feels a whole lot like Jack Kirby, in that he’s a talented but naive schlemiel whose work ends up stolen by his bosses. “Satanic” Stan Blatz is a talentless but business-savvy publisher who preys on his artists like a parasite. (Stan Lee, anyone?) Massive Comics is probably Marvel Comics. American Comics recalls DC Comics, and so on. Once the code is cracked, “Thunderman,” becomes a whole lot more engaging.
“There were abysmal troughs and rising slopes that made one doubt the verticals and horizontals of the walls and ceiling, so that Worsley lost his balance for a second, staggering and startled in an endless maelstrom made only of paper, swirling and bone-dry.”
Even in prose, Moore is an accomplished storyteller, and it’s thoroughly entertaining to see him blend satire with surrealism here. Two underlings go to clean up their recently departed editor’s apartment, only to discover his staggering collection of hoarded porn. The image of the duo literally swimming across the apartment on a sea of dirty magazines is absurdly unforgettable. In another scene, an editor out for a stroll in Manhattan encounters a shit-talking, Godzilla-sized dragon named Fin Fang Foom. Oops, did I say Fin Fang Foom? That’s a Marvel comics character. I meant the Spaktoom the Impossible. Muh bad.
Throughout Illuminations, Moore draws from his considerable bag of tricks to keeps the reader thoroughly engaged. In about half the stories from “Hypothetical Lizard” to “Cold Reading” the prose is accessible and mostly user-friendly — well, at least for someone who loves language as much as Moore. But this artist is not afraid to challenge his reader. “The Highly Probable Complex State” is a lush exercise in purple prose that’s sometimes dizzyingly difficult to get through, but nevertheless exhilarating. However, it’s in “Thunderman” the artist seems to have the most fun. Throughout the story, Moore utilizes a variety of storytelling methods to spin this yarn. One chapter is a Reddit-like thread in which a group of comic book nerds ruminate about the sad state of modern superhero films. Yet another is presented as a comic book script in the raw. A third reads like the notes to a congressional hearing. Moore isn’t afraid to take chances, either. In one scene, a cocaine-addled editor attends a comic book convention at a hotel only to plummet to his death from a balcony into the middle of a crowd of horrified cosplayers. Here, Moore manipulates the text on the page visually to evoke the sensation of the falling man. It reminds me of Mark Z. Danielewski’s postmodern exercise into horror, “House of Leaves,” and it’s absolutely lovely.
Conclusion
It's exciting to see Moore craft his prose with the same amount of passion he infuses into his comics. He uses words to woo. To disarm. To slip the knife into your ribs when you’re least suspecting. I’m eternally in awe of his talent, and I can’t recommend this collection highly enough. lluminations sparkles like a gem.
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Fellow writers, read my review of Alan Moore’s storytelling course on BBC Maestro.