African-Australian writer Eugen Bacon is one of those authors whose singular style creates works that defy classification and celebrate contradiction. It’s speculative fiction, sometimes fantasy, with technological flourishes of science fiction. Yet throughout it is filled with the unease of horror. She writes poetry that can propel with prose-like narrative, while she constructs prose with a playful, poetic touch: fluid lines that invite readers to dance among possible meanings and interpretations, evocative words that sing out to strike emotional chords.
In his insightful introduction to Bacon’s short story collection Chasing Whispers, D. Harlan Wilson includes her writing within the irrealist fold that categorizes his own works and critical/academic interests. He correctly notes that sometimes the best way to portray the real is to explore the irreal, with all of the unconscious details that our human minds tend to ignore, erase, or lie to us about. Raw Dog Screaming Press likewise uses the term “Afro-Irrealism” in the official blurb for the collection, and Afro-Futurist could likewise be used to describe some of the stories here.
Bacon herself uses the term “irreal” at least once in Chasing Whispers, but she has also identified with the category of “slipstream” (“The Radical Nature of Slipstream Fiction”, Apex Magazine). And reading the thirteen stories in Chasing Whispers (eleven new to the collection), I realize that all of these labels are accurate, but none are precisely complete.
Aside from being linked with black female protagonists, all of the stories in Chasing Whispers repeat back to one simple phrase that thematically ties them all together: “A deep and terrible sadness”. Those words appear in each story, and one of the stories even bears it as a title, which you can hear the author reading on YouTube.
Search the Web for that phrase and you’re sure to get a lot of hits about depression, and advertisements for help lines. But those words never evoked the emotion or theme of depression as I read the stories in Chasing Whispers. Instead, they continually gave me a distinctly Gothic vibe. And I gradually realized that “Gothic” is another term that could equally apply to Bacon’s style and her embracement of contradiction: Death and decay versus life and love, madness against self-realization and discovery, the curses of family balanced with their support, the ghosts of history that haunt in the face of a future pursued.
Whatever terms apply, Eugen Bacon is an author to be read. Her writing is art, and though entertaining, it needs to be savored and carefully considered like the lines of a poem. And it tends to be work that I can only appreciate by reading more than once.
I usually like to quote from the book I’m reviewing to give a sense of the writing, but I unfortunately don’t have my copy of the collection on hand to reference. I can grab a quote from another story by her that is not included in the collection, but is available in Apex Magazine: “Simbiyu and the Nameless”. I admit, though, that I have not read this entire story, as it is written in the second person, and I abhor stories in the second person. Bacon uses that same voice some in Chasing Whispers, for instance the above linked “A Deep and Terrible Sadness”. Thankfully, it’s not often and there was plenty remaining in Chasing Whispers for me to fully enjoy. Yet, even in those cases of second person that bother me, Bacon’s writing style still vividly shines with its poetic influences:
Your world is small yet familiar, framed in textures and shapes. Sometimes you see darkness and lizards, cats nudging and gliding between grown-up legs. You touch what you know. Listen to what you don’t, but still touch it. Trust or instinct is not your diplomacy. It’s all about repetition, endurance. Curiosity and hunger etched in your living…
…The rogue sisal belongs near the candelabra tree but today it is here. Chorused trilling, squeaking birds. You adore nature in its glory. Look, a shrub, weather-trimmed to resemble the bum of a gorilla facing away. The chwee chweee of a cousin bird hushes with the cough of a giant bird flapping its wings above the broad star-face of wild cassava leaves. The sound of water running. You can smell it: wet soil and reed.
Chasing Whispers leads off with the titular story, a well-placed entry that establishes the key elements of Bacon’s style while not being too abstract or difficult to penetrate in a leisurely read. The plot involves a woman trying to find her place in the world, particularly in keeping relationships while haunted by her memories of an absent father and trying to parse enigmatic advice from her mother. She literally and figuratively chases whispers that echo in her mind from voices within and without. Here Bacon forms a beautiful story rich in symbolic imagery and poetic language.
Gothic-like themes of family and secrets continue in “Where the Wind Blows”, “Memories of the Old Sun”, and “Nyamizi, the Skinless One”. But, with other stories Bacon demonstrates how equally deftly she writes lightness and humor, even if struck with “a deep and terrible sadness”. “A Visit to Lamont”, “Sita and the Fledgling”, and “Fire Fall on Them” are highlights with undertones of humor that call back to the classic fantasy of fairy tales, but with modern outlooks and serious import.
“Black Witch, Snow Leopard” may be the most conventional and straight-forward of the stories in Chasing Whispers, featuring a woman and leopard cub in the historical Cape Colony, with the institution of slavery and oppression of black women its society upheld. On the other end of the spectrum, “Neuter” and “The Shimmer” represent stories much harder to penetrate, where even their plots are not simple to glean, particularly when reader expectations at the start of a story become subverted to go in directions very unexpected. Bacon does this with many of her tales, including the novelette (and longest story in the collection) “Namulongo and the Edge of Darkness”, a piece that defies simple explanation and characterization, like that Baconian style itself.
Eugen Bacon’s strong work in fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and artwork has not gone unnoticed, as a list of her awards on Wikipedia will attest, and aside from Apex Magazine, you may have come across her stories in various collections and anthologies. But if you haven’t, Chasing Whispers is a good, and varied, place to start. Also, there’s more to look forward to. In 2024 Raw Dog Screaming Press – who continues to put out amazing and likewise varied works – will be releasing a new collection by Bacon: A Place Between Waking and Forgetting.
