Necromantra by Philip Emery

[Roy1]

Arnold Bennett's five towns expand to the nightmare 'Hundred-Towns' in Emery's Smog Punk novel 'Necromantra' from Immanion.

Stoke born and raised writer, dramatist and Keele University tutor Phil Emery's novel more than redresses Arnold Bennett's reduction of Stoke-on-Trent's six towns to five. Phil's novel 'Necromantra' takes place in his alternate and fantasy potteries; 'The Hundred-Towns'. Phil describes his novel as Arnold Bennett meets Edgar Allen Poe in Burslem. 'Necromantra' is a gothic adventure where the dead are returned to life, ghosts haunt gravediggers and nameless forces lie in wait deep beneath the cobbled streets in a murky nineteenth century world of pot-banks, pits, and canals.

Stoke on Trent, The Potteries, famed for their tableware, yes, but porcelain also receives your used food. Emery's novel is set in a nasty, squalid, exaggeration of its model, and quoting Storm Constantine, "heaving with smog and phantoms and arcane terms for machinery and mining - and a host of debilitating conditions and diseases!"

Emery's 'Hundred-Towns' are also a bureaucracy where records can't be wrong so when someone dies they are gone and there are rectifiers to ensure no documents need be disturbed if they return to life. Obviously rectification would not be necessary in normal times but times are not so normal and Jem is a frighteningly effective rectifier despite a mining accident leaving him minus an arm.

"Jem looked out over the Hundred-Towns - over the smoggy terraces, pitheads, manufactories, slaughterhouses, workhouses, shardrucks, the black swellings of other slag heaps. Over the furry points of streetlamp light. Over the ruddy patchwork of furnaces toiling to power countless engines, all night, all day, every night, every day. Over the thousands upon thousands of chimneys. Town after town, all grouted into one with grime."

Jem is an efficient rectifier but falling for a girl who raises the dead is not a good career move. His mission to save her takes them through the canals, hospitals, streets and mines of his fantasy potteries; polluted cities, set under murky skies in dank northern climes, (so no change there then) and enveloped in fog and the stench of spoil tips. The hacking coughs of its disease ridden citizens echo across kiln shadowed cobblestones, its beggars are crippled by terrible industrial accidents, its animals are cruelly used, its hospitals are horrifyingly unclean and its mines are abandoned to ghosts. As its author admitted "So not too many laughs," but an exciting story that kept me up far too late just to finish reading.

http://www.immanion-press.com/ip0064.htm

[Roy1]

Phil's short story 'ID' will be broadcast on DAB radio, BBC 7, on Wednesday 28th Feb at 6:30 pm. This is in BBC's Dimension 7 SF series.

[Roy1]

BBC say

28/2/07: 'ID' by Phil Emery
Terror grips a man as he regains consciousness and discovers he’s lost his identity card. He's lying in a deserted alleyway in the middle of a city with no memory of who he is. His only clue is a name and address on a scrap of paper in his pocket. He sets out to find this person, all the time, consumed by a fear that unless he tracks down his card, his very life is in danger.
Reader: Sam Dale

Phil says "You might expect 'ID' to mean identity concerns but its better to stick to the Freudian."

[Roy1]

ID Phil Emery's short story.
Don't forget DAB radio, BBC 7, on Wednesday 28th Feb at 6:30 pm.
If you have Digital TV you can record it on your video
Sky EPG no. 0131
Freeview: EPG No. 708
Virgin TV EPG No. 910 (NTL as was)

Internet
Select the "Listen Live" button at the top right corner of BBC 7 pages.
BBC - BBC 7 - Homepage
You need "real player" installed.

[Roy1]

Phil will make a rare appearance at BFS Fantasycon in Nottingham on Saturday 22 Sept.
He shoud be on the Immanion stand in the dealer's room but if you can't find him look for me on the Interzone TTA stand and I'll phone him.

Fantasycon - Presented by The British Fantasy Society

[Roy1]

Phil has a story, "The Last Scream of Carnage", in The Return of the Sword an anthology

of blood-pounding, spine-tingling stories by some of fantasy's most critically acclaimed Sword and Sorcery authors.

Available March 15, 2008 from Amazon.com and fine bookstores everywhere.

[Roy1]

Return of the Sword is out now and the press release states it's

a brand new anthology of blood-pounding, spine-tingling stories by some of fantasy's most critically acclaimed Sword and Sorcery authors.

Stacey Berg, Bill Ward, Phil Emery, Jeff Draper, Nicholas Ian Hawkins, David Pitchford, Ty Johnston, Jeff Stewart, Angeline Hawkes, Robert Rhodes, E.E. Knight, James Enge, Michael Ehart, Thomas M. MacKay, Christopher Heath, Nathan Meyer, S.C. Bryce, Allen B. Lloyd, William Clunie, Steve Goble, Bruce Durham, and Harold Lamb present you with enough fast paced adventure to keep you reading for hours.

A hand painted, wrap around cover by fantasy artist Johnney Perkins ensures that Return of the Sword will not only be enjoyable to read, but also look good on your coffee table or bookshelf.

[Roy1]

Here is the wrap around cover.

[Roy1]

Return of the Sword reviewed.