It's hard to avoid getting repeated recommendations to read Gene Wolfe if you hang out with the more old-fashioned fans of science fiction. One year I read both

It's hard to avoid getting repeated recommendations to read Gene Wolfe if you hang out with the more old-fashioned fans of science fiction. One year I read both the New Sun novels and a "best of" collection of several dozen of Wolfe's short stories. Wolfe had a long career and a big reputation, and he certainly was distinctive among his peers. But I found that many of his stories lean heavily into two tricks. They are occasionally effective, but encountering them in story after story in rapid succession wore me out. The first is opening a scene with a "hook" sentence. "I was standing in line to buy a newspaper -- of course, this was before I divorced my own mother." If you've read the well-known "The Fifth Head of Cerberus," you know exactly what I mean. It can be an effective trick, but Wolfe's career is basically an exploration of how far it can take you by itself. The second is nenuphars. It's a technique for alienation that Wolfe uses with gusto. I happened to know the trivial fact that a nenuphar is a kind of water lily, but Wolfe relies on the reader not knowing what the word means to produce the effect of alienation. So sometimes a word like "nenuphar" will be a term for a unique concept within the world of the story, and other times it will just mean "water lily, but, like alien water lily, you know?" Do not call a rabbit a smeerp.[1] Wolfe was, of course, a Catholic and admired the writing of religious moralists like Chesterton. One short story that, to me, illustrates a lot of what Wolfe as a writer is all about is titled "The Detective of Dreams." Allow me to summarize it for you. A wealthy client begs an old detective to stop a man from ruining his dreams. The client dreams of arriving at a vast, illustrious palace, but soon upon entering, he meets the thief, who puts an abrupt end to the pleasant vision. One by one, several more wealthy clients approach the detective, asking him to apprehend the thief. The detective goes about town in a vain attempt to find out the thief's identity. Tired, he takes a seat on a bench near a church. His weary gaze rests on a robed figure in the beautiful stained glass window. He has found the man who troubles the sleep of the wicked. [1] https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CallARabbitASmeerp https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CallARabbitASmee...