The title of Russell Davis’s new collection, The
End of All Seasons is a reference to four of the stories the book
contains. Aside for those
stories’ titles, “The End of Summer,” “The End of Autumn,”
“The End of Winter,” and “The End of Spring,” those stories are
unrelated to each other. The
collection contains fourteen stories and five poems, many of them dealing,
as suggested by book’s title, with endings.
As noted, the four titular stories are quite
different. “The End of
Winter,” Davis’s first professional sale focuses on Danielle Wheatson,
a loner who does not seem to have any need for human company, a theme
which is repeated in several of the stories included in The
End of All Seasons. Wheatson’s
thoughts about other people change, in an uncomfortable manner for her,
when she opens her door to James, whose truck broke down.
In “The End of Spring,” an anonymous man sits in a pickup truck
contemplating suicide. Unlike
Danielle, this man has had a life that incorporated other people, yet his
anonymity and his current situation provide him with as much loneliness as
Danielle had. In her case, she
began to consider embracing others, and the lone man in the pick up truck
potentially turns his back on other people. Loneliness is as much
perception as reality, as indicated by the relationship, or lack thereof,
between father and daughter in "The Last Day of the Rest of Her Life"
which focuses on a girl who is estranged from her father following her
mother's death, but whose perception of the reality of the situation may
not be accurate.
Loneliness is not the only thing Davis writes,
however, and in “The End of Summer,” he describes the fall of Camelot,
in which Merlin confronts Sir Lancelot and Queen Gwynevre in the wake of
King Arthur’s death. Merlin
seems to have little problem with the lovers’ infidelity to Arthur, but
rather wants to make sure that Gwynevre and Lancelot do not hold secrets
from each other. The story is
a wonderful example of a tale which is overshadowed by the backstory, for
if Davis has set it against an incident other than Arthur’s death, it
would have had a very different feel.
Finally “The End of Autumn” brings together a retired Texas
Ranger, Grant O’Keefe, and a brothel owner, Georgia, in order to let
O’Keefe bring to justice Pablo Castillo, a Mexican bandit who O’Keefe
had one imprisoned, but who is now free and causing troubles again. There
is a melancholy feel to the story as O’Keefe knows that whatever the
outcome of his showdown with Castillo, his days as a lawman are
essentially over and he will find himself put out to pasture once he is
done.
O’Keefe’s story isn’t the only western included
in The End of All Seasons.
The final story in the collection, “Letter to Josie” is a look
at the formation of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday’s friendship as
described by Carlotta Thompkins. More
than just a wary first encounter, Davis incorporates a high stakes poker
game between the two men and three strangers, which only poker queen
Thompkins, gifted with second sight, can fully understand.
In addition to loneliness, the other recurring theme
in the stories is death. In
“Midnight at the Half-Life Café,” a one-time musician must come to
terms with his potentially upcoming death after suffering life in a coma.
“The Things She Handed Down” is an author’s attempt to come
to terms with his mother’s imminent death and the knowledge that he will
be called upon to sum up her life in a eulogy. “The Angel Chamber” is
a story of the Holocaust and how it was perceived by a child whose father
was determined to keep her sheltered as much as possible from the horrors
the Nazis were inflicting upon her community. In “Scars Enough,” Davis
depicts an old man waiting for ghosts as his life comes to an end,
mirroring the crimes of two young men in a very different place.
Death and loneliness
are depressing enough, but in most of the cases, Davis does not deal with
a clean death. His characters suffer as much in death as could
possibly be expected. Illness and disease are rife throughout the
pages of The End of All Seasons, whether it is the dying mother of
"The Things She Handed Down," the father suffering
Alzheimer's in "Houdini’s Mirror," or the coma in “Midnight
at the Half-Life Café.”
Read straight through, The End of All Seasons
is a heavy book, although if the stories are carefully sampled over time,
the human condition Davis is exploring becomes more bearable. As may
be indicated by the presence of five poems in the collection, Davis's
prose often rises above the level of prosaic and achieves a rhythm and
meter which sets it apart from most science fiction and provides a majesty
to his stories.
