Shindig! January-February 2010

Although he’s produced some 23 novels, sixteen non-fiction books, sundry poems, and numerous essays in a journalistic career spanning over forty years, Mick Farren is probably still better known as being front man for anarchic, 1960s psychedelic proto punks, The Deviants. But, any number of his novels could easily make the transition to the big screen quite successfully, so why his name doesn’t cut a more prominent swathe through the genres of sci-fi, horror and fantasy literature is anybody’s guess!

The majority of this collection of poetry, prose, essays, lyrics, commentary and short fiction spans the nineties and noughties, but there are a few examples from the two previous decades, and even a couple of previously unpublished pieces thrown in for measure too. It’s divided into sections with titles like ‘Rampage and Drunkenness’, ‘Pitstops to Perdition’, ‘Visions of a Short Apocalypse’ and so on - you get the picture. Farren’s evocative writing style brings all of his subjects vividly to life, whether he’s describing a night he spent in a Los Angeles police cell that coincided with an earthquake (‘Jailhouse Rock’); a mother of all hangovers (‘Diabolo’s Cadillac’); Doc Holliday and the Old Wild West (‘Is There a Chinaman in Town?’), or sci-fi. In ‘Head 58 and the Mantis Syndrome’ Lord Byron is transposed into a parallel universe of white trash drug addicts, biker gangs and Knights Templars.

>Zones of Chaos serves as a fine testimony to the diversity of Farren’s literary oeuvre, so if you’re a big fan of gonzo style journalism, post-apocalyptic poetry and lyrics, out-there science fiction and crazy, off-the-wall alternate histories, do yourself a favour and buy a copy of this book now - you won’t be disappointed.