Out Here on the Perimeter
The ostentatious murders are the most obvious manifestation of cartel power over Mexican society. The Zeta cartel has the power to seal off entire districts, close highway bridges, and participate in four-hour armed standoffs with the military. The cartels have police officers and soldiers on the payroll, even drug czars. Dr Muñoz, Vulliamy’s pathologist, guessed the conviction rate for murder as around one per cent. An idealistic Nuevo Laredo police chief was assassinated within seven hours of taking office. The necessity of money laundering means that drug money saturates every aspect of borderland cities. In Cuidad Juarez – run more or less by the Juarez cartel – people refer to public and private architecture as ‘early narco’ or ‘mid narco’.
Max Dunbar reviews Ed Vulliamy‘s Amexica.
Boppers, Moldies and Meatbops
I think it’s boring if futurist SF focuses on weaponry and politics which are, after all, perhaps the least interesting aspects of life. I disliked history courses in school because they were about ruling elites, with nothing much about art, science and culture. I try and put those things into my SF. The things that matter. It’s quite a task to dream up interesting forms of art for your future societies. One trick is to pay very close attention to the latest current trends, and to imagine dialling them up to eleven—or to eleven hundred. An awareness of art history helps as well. Today’s taste isn’t going to be tomorrow’s—all sorts of things cycle in and out of fashion.
Maxi Kim interviews Rudy Rucker.
Three Poems
Rooks blacked the gable end of her house
Folded in on themselves against the heft of the wind
The wind-break trees shaking
Winnie Battle’s dog barked as she fell back
Onto the wet loamy soil
My mother said poor Winnie Battle – she had no life
She had shiny black rooks guarding her house
She had high swaying elms trees lining her drive
She had wet rushes that brushed against her legs
When she walked the river field…
By Seamus Scanlon.