A review by masonanddixon
Machines in the Head: The Selected Short Writing of Anna Kavan by Anna Kavan

4.25

Early stories are skeletal tales of class struggle or repetitive city sketches that remind me of Poe and Kafka , but the later ones, written well into Kavan's long relationship with heroin, are slippery, surreal nightmares of alienation, and absurdity. The titular story of 'A Bright Green Field' is the real shit. That story, and its follower 'The Ice-Storm' seem to contain the germs of many a latter-day British experimental writers— from Ballard, to McCarthy, to filmmaker John Smith. One of the best pieces of short fiction I've read in years.