Otherways- Fiction Fanatics

  There are several reasons to review an author's work, not the least of which is that many new authors just need a push of sorts to become household names. Sometimes the reviewer wants to ride the popularity of a book or author, driving up their own content  by talking about something that everyone either likes or hates. Sometimes, and this is my favorite reason, the person writing the review simply can't get a book out of their heads, and wants to  share that experience with the rest of the world.

This is one of 'those' books, although I'd be willing to bet that most of the internet community won't be familiar with it, even though the author has been justifiably popular for a long time. The Flesh in The Furnace, by Dean Koontz, isn't exactly a new book,as it was published in 1972. It isn't Koontz' best novel, and one might say that the story line is too compressed. At only 132 pages, it took me barely an afternoon to read it,even when I was eleven, but more than three decades later, the ideas still strike a chord.

Central to the story is a machine, the Furnace, with which Petros can create living dolls for his performances. The catch is that the dolls must be returned to the furnace, and destroyed, when their task is complete. Though their flesh is synthetic, their lives, as they experience them, are real enough, and they have no desire to lose them. What follows involves their desperate search for freedom and survival, an alien race of puppeteers, and several weeks worth of nightmares for the eleven year old girl that I was when I first read this.

And yet, it stuck with me. Why? I still have my battered paperback copy, despite two children and multiple moves. It may not look like it, but it is a treasure.

Though it took me years to understand, in retrospect, it is painfully simple. This book was the first time that I had entertained the notion that life belonged to the person living it, no matter how they came by it.  It was the dolls, not the creator, that were responsible for the direction of their own lives, both the good and the bad. Yes, there were disparities of power, and yes, not all outcomes would be good, but the choices were still theirs to make.

The Petros character is both god and parent to his puppets, yet to him they are merely fuel for the fire once he is done with them.  Discovering, through the medium of a story,  that they had the right, and even obligation, to rebel, was a new and powerful concept to me at that time, and one that I desperately needed to hear. 

So why talk about a little-known book that is so long out of print, by an author that everyone already knows?

Because this is the heart of why writing is magic. An author's words, no matter how distant in time and space, have the power to alter the perception of another living soul. Ideas, written months or even centuries ago, remain as fresh and potent as the day they formed. Even if they are not your best words, they may still touch someone, somewhere. So I write this to encourage all those that have a story to tell to put it to paper, because someone is waiting to hear it.

 Plus, I never did thank Mr, Koontz for the gift, and it is long overdue.

Cheers,

Michelle