The Third Bear ~Jeff Vandermeer

–published 2010
–Tachyon Publications
–273 pages
–Rating: 9/10

I am about to make an assertion that perhaps only book lovers will forgive me for: a good story can be as heady and electric as a first kiss, as intoxicating as the finest wine (or a really good margarita), as breathtaking as the most beautiful sunset. A good story can induce a state of euphoria that flows through you like an electrical current. A good story can make you want to be something that you are not.

Jeff Vandermeer tells a good story.

Nowhere is that more apparent than in his first collection of short stories, The Third Bear.

The short stories of Jeff Vandermeer defy easy genre classification, though they may find themselves naturally falling under the heading of the New Weird, defined by Jeff and his wife Ann as “a type of urban, secondary-world fiction that subverts the romanticized ideas about place found in traditional fantasy, largely by choosing realistic, complex real-world models as the jumping off point for creation of settings that may combine elements of both science fiction and fantasy.”

For educational purposes (I had to educate myself today, so why not share?), Weird Fiction is defined as “a subgenre of speculative fiction written in the late 19th and early 20th century. Weird fiction is distinguished from horror and fantasy in that it predates the niche marketing of genre fiction. Because genre or stylistic conventions had not been established, weird tales often blend the supernatural, mythical, and even scientific.”

It is important to keep those definitions in mind. Others have described the short fiction of Jeff Vandermeer as “weird”, “absurd”, “bizarre”. I would concur, but in so doing point out that these words have in large part been stripped of their greater meaning by the most narrow of usage until all that is left are negative connotations. Instead I would go deeper into the definitions of those words to say “uncanny”, “illogical”, “unexpected” and would add to that “brilliant”, “inventive”, “profound”. The 15 stories collected in The Third Bear are not easy to describe. What one can say with ease is that they are all worth reading.

The best compliment I can give Jeff Vandermeer is that his stories make me want to write. I don’t often feel that way (though good short stories tend to bring this feeling out more than any other kind of writing), but from page one my head was buzzing with the desire to write. Not because I have those aspirations and certainly not because Vandermeer’s stories made me think, “I can do this”, but because so many of the stories in this collection demand some sort of creative response. They make me want to do something. To use an overused phrase, they inspire me. The inspiration is not the kind you get from, say, an uplifting/optimistic tale, as some of these are quite dark, but in the skill exhibited by the author. Although I enjoy reviewing books, it isn’t often that I cannot wait to finish a book just so that I can write about it. I wanted to start reviewing as soon as I read the opening titular story in this collection!

On the back of The Third Bear Mike Mignola describes Vandermeer’s work as “hypnotic”. Other reviewers point to the fact that Jeff Vandermeer doesn’t always provide explanations for things, they just are. Case in point: in “The Quickening” a rabbit speaks. Vandermeer doesn’t divert from the tale being told to explain why. He doesn’t need to. That isn’t the story being told. Or perhaps it is, but not in the straightforward manner one is accustomed to. The stories offered here are sometimes complex, often surreal, but are never inaccessible. As I sat down to read each story I felt like I was actually being told a story, as opposed to reading about some person or situation. That is another of Jeff Vandermeer’s strengths. And while the stories in The Third Bear are often different than other work that I have read, I never felt like I was being experimented on as a reader. These are not exercises in trying to do something different. Instead they are well told tales from the mind of a man who doesn’t tell conventional stories in a conventional way.

I won’t take the time to dissect each story, but let me tell you about a few that stand out in my mind as I type this.

The collection opens with “The Third Bear”, a dark tale that feels at home here in winter. For some reason I cannot put my finger on this story felt like a Neil Gaiman story (which is a compliment here at Stainless Steel Droppings as I consider him one of the modern masters of the short story format). This story of a bear that menaces a local community is a quietly terrifying tale of vengeance and remorse that feels like a story birthed from folk tales as old as time itself.

“The Quickening” (original to this collection) is a tale that is both fantastical in its execution and beautifully sad in its delivery. A young girl with a talking rabbit learns that Wonderland is fleeting, but greed and madness are eternal.

“The Situation” is easily one of my favorites of this collection, and it is easily the most bizarre. Imagine that Douglas Adams took a few hits of acid and then wrote scripts for Better off Ted and you might have an inkling of the manner in which Vandermeer examines office politics in a company that makes products that defy rational explanation. The protagonist in “The Situation” shares his experience in an increasingly hostile work environment and his story will induce both grins and feelings of deep empathy for anyone who has worked for a corporation. The story ends with a line so droll that it once again brought Gaiman to mind, this time recalling his story “The Day the Saucers Came”.

“Fixing Hanover” tells the story of a man with rare mechanical talent who lives in a small fishing village. When a large piece of salvage washes up, which appears to be the remains of a robot of some kind, he names it ‘Hanover’ and somewhat reluctantly takes on the job of bringing it back to life. “Fixing Hanover” is the kind of story I like to point to when someone says that little can be done with characterization in a short story. Within the economy of the format Jeff Vandermeer introduces a handful of characters that the reader quickly feels drawn to and wants to get to know. When it was all done my first thought was that I hope Vandermeer expands on this story with more short stories, or a novel, sometime in the future.

“Shark God vs. Octopus God” is a clever fable based on a Fijian myth. This is a really fun story in which the reader is introduced to the Shark God, who is understandably cocky and sure of himself. As Shark God begins to answer his yearnings to expand his rule, with his ever-groveling remora advisor Selqu in tow, the reader is able to discover whether or not he has bitten off more than he can chew. I especially enjoyed the remora, Selqu. I couldn’t help but hear him speak with Peter Lorre’s voice.

That is just a third of the stories contained in this volume. Several of these stories can be read free online. Click the title below to follow the link to the story:

“The Third Bear”

“The Situation”

“Predecessor”

“Shark God vs. Octopus God”:

Shark God is actually an audio version from Starship Sofa.

“Errata”:

This is the story about a writer named, oddly enough, Jeff Vandermeer, and about alcohol, a penguin, a water-logged hotel, seals, and a pair of pistols. If you read it, be sure to read the introduction. It is an integral part of the story.

“Three Days in a Border Town”

“The Surgeon’s Tale” (written with Cat Rambo)

The collection closes with “Appoggiatura”, a series of story fragments that often appeared to reference the other stories in The Third Bear. This became more clear in reading the afterword in which Jeff Vandermeer states, “These stories are also meant to reveal more and more of themselves, and the connections between the stories [his emphasis], over the course of multiple readings.” For some authors that might be seen as a desperate attempt to get you to re-read their work. In Jeff Vandermeer’s case I sincerely believe this is true. He knows it, he knows that you suspect there is more than meets the eye in these stories, and he is merely acknowledging the fact. And in regards to the “Afterword”, allow me to opine that Jeff Vandermeer delivers more of interest in three paragraphs than can be found in some lengthy critical essays.

If you choose to pick up a copy of The Third Bear I can promise you an experience like no other. It is unlikely that you will find every story one that you want to rave over, I did not. But what I did find was that I was interested and engaged in each story irregardless of my final analysis of it. In reading several other reviews of The Third Bear it did not surprise me that there was a wide variety of opinion on which were the stand outs. That kind of varied opinion is exactly what I expected out of such an outstanding book. I suspect over time the various stories will jostle for position as my favorite of the collection and without a doubt this book will join a small group of cherished short story volumes that I re-read with regularity.