The collection kicks off with a nicely voiced story which ends on a note that reminds the reader this is old school sci-fi (or enhances the story, depending on expectations). “You Triflin' Skunk!” is an excellent mood piece built on bayou heebie jeebies of the uncanny variety. It tells of a scrappy loner and her son living in a swamp as a storm sweeps over their rickety home. Prior life choices (corn squeezin's!) come back—not to haunt the woman, but to challenge her. “The Will” is a heart-touching tale about a boy named Kenny with an illness doctors cannot cure. In love with a tv super hero named Captain Chronos, Kenny slowly becomes more obsessed with a cure existing in the future, and despite his parents protestations, is determined to get there. The ending rips your heart out with the claws of hope.
“Anybody Else Like Me?” (aka “Command Performance”) is a darkly poetic look at a successful woman falling into the dark side of existentialism. The plot is simple, but Miller Jr. shows a prosaic range not seen in other stories in the collection, and delivers a human story in the process. “Crucifixus Etiam” is a painful, downhill ride that describes, in psychological terms, the human effort needed for any of our greatest achievements—the pyramids, the great wall, panama canal, etc. In this case, it's the terraforming of Mars. A man named Manue signs on as a Mars contract laborer, dreaming of a rich retirement on earth to see the sights. He instead gets a strong dose of reality.
Perhaps the most ambitious story in the collection, “I, Dreamer” tells of a non-human, robot(ish) sentience trained to be a war machine. Love and hate burned out of it, the sentience is a cold killer repaired and maintained daily by a woman. When it attempts to contact her one day, matters escalate quickly—too quickly for the scope of story. A piece needing longer treatment in order to reveal the implication's real impact, it's a spot of space opera with potential as it stands. The setting of “Dumb Waiter” is a city inhabited by mindless robots after humans have left. Things still running like clockwork, the robots go about their tasks, including policing the city and running bombing missions on nearby regions, sans bombs, which ran out long ago. One man has a plan to stop the clockwork city. The premise is not laughable by 21st century standards, but does streeeeeetch credibility given the simplistic manner in which is is presented.
A classic space opera mystery that plays out in classic style, in “Blood Bank” a disgraced officer fights to regain his honor. A fight that takes him from planet to planet in Jack Vance style, he uncovers the pieces and connects them. The twist at the climax is nice even if a touch convoluted. An Indiana Jones adventure on Edgar Rice Burroughs' Mars, “Big Joe and the Nth Generation” tells of a tribesman due for execution who has his sentence staid. Running away with a village woman, he soon finds his quest for revenge on those who chained him upended by a metal monster for which he might know the secret code (conveniently). It is the pulpiest, most dated story in the collection... A poetic human diaspora among the stars, “The Big Hunger” is an effortless switching of gears. From the palubum of “Big Joe” it is a properly prosaic representation of humanity dispersing itself throughout the universe. A supple, smooth meditation on the human condition, desires, religion, existence, and beyond, it aims at: why the stars call, chasing utopia.
The collection closes on a series of novellas, the first of which is perhaps Miller Jr.'s most famous piece of short fiction, “Darfsteller”. Set in an urban world in which primitive AI and robots have replaced stage actors, one man who works in such a theater as a janitor still dreams of hitting the elite stage as an actor. When his boss treats him badly one day, he decides to go all in. Little does he know it also means his mortality. It's a decent story with a relevant setting and a nice denouement that shows the value in human expression through art.
An odd post-apocalyptic story with strong hints of A Canticle for Leibowitz, “Dark Benediction” tells of a young man wandering an America after an alien epidemic. Strange pods landed, and from them came a disease that caused the skin to turn gray and senses to become hyper acute. Such infected people called dermies, they are avoided by the young man lest he become infected too. Things take a turn when the man finds himself on an island of only dermies. The setting is well developed, but the characters needed more depth for the story and theme to have teeth.
A story that wears the 1950s on its sleeve but in short, brief moments transcends itself, “The Lineman” is about a worker who spends his days installing towers and cables across the stark, white landscape of the moon. His rough, dangerous work has left him a gruff, distant man. The local political underground pressures him into their ranks, even as the arrival of a group of female entertainers can't seem to shake his apathy. But something ultimately does, giving him a shift in perspective. And closing the collection is “Vengeance for Nikolai”. A good closing note, one with sound authorial voice, it is set in a Soviet vs US war in which a Russian mother, whose infant son was killed by American bombs, crosses enemy lines to get revenge. Symbolism nicely intertwined with story, indeed there are no victors in war, except legends.
Reading this collection in 2023, the biggest question is: does it transcend the 50s? Is it worth reading beyond nostalgia? Has Miller Jr. created something for the ages or the age? The answer is sometimes yes, sometimes no. A mix of pulp and more more human-oriented pieces, the reader will hit and miss depending on their expectations.
In the end, Dark Benediction is a mixed collection from several angles. Miller Jr.'s authorial voice shows range, from plain Jane to poetic, colloquial to prosaic. The collection is also mixed in terms of intentions. There are a couple literary-minded stories, a few low-brow stories, and the rest floating between. And the collection is likewise mixed in terms of consistency and quality. Regardless pulp or high brow, Miller Jr. shows varying levels of focus and execution, good to mediocre. In other words, the collection offers something for almost everybody, which is a blessing and a curse. Those who want variety will get it. Those who are looking for a product, will not.
The following are the fourteen stories collected in Dark Benediction (aka The Best of Walter M. Miller Jr.):
You Triflin' Skunk!
The Will
Anybody Else Like Me? (aka Command Performance)
Crucifixus Etiam
I, Dreamer
Dumb Waiter
Blood Bank
Big Joe and the Nth Generation
The Big Hunger
Conditionally Human
The Darfsteller
Dark Benediction
The Lineman
Vengeance for Nikolai
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