You Thought You Knew Everything About Global Warming, But This Story Will Blow Your Mind!

I couldn't think of a stupid pun, even though it shouldn't be that hard, so I just went with a clickbait title.

This week I read The Cold Pools by Chris Ward.

(Link)

Description:

"Meet me at the end of the world ...
As civilization comes to an end, Lewis and Karen take their last vacation to the only cold place left on Earth, the remote resort town of Cold Pools. There, they will say goodbye ...

The Cold Pools - a short story of 3,000 words, is taken from the author's collection Ms Ito's Bird & Other Stories.

Chris Ward is the author of more than 80 short stories (33 of them published) and the novel The Tube Riders, available now on Amazon."

The Tube Riders, eh? Amazon really has way too much erotica these days. Well, anyway, this one isn't an erotica (unless you're into really weird stuff I guess). It's about global warming and the consequences of it, including, of course, skin cancer and the only inhabitable continent being Antarctica.

I'm actually NOT going to spoil this one, because it's decent for once. What I will say is this guy and his wife go to the last glacier on Earth which is also the only place where the temperature is below 80 degrees fahrenheit. It is, sadly, their last big, expensive trip because his wife is dying of a rare form of skin cancer that leaves her body covered in pussy sores. That's kind of scary... maybe I  have cancer because- no, wait, WebMD says it's just herpes. Thank god.

So I was like, "where is this going?" thinking the author had just thought of a unique scenario for a story and was screwed for an ending. I was pleasantly surprised, though, that it turned out to be a little poignant commentary on our human need for the artificial, lies, and self-deception. Even though we know the truth, sometimes it is better for us not to say so out loud and use the therapy of illusion as best we can.


Ratings:

A Little Too Far: 3 out of 5. Of course, this story is about global warming and is a speculation on how terrible it is all going to turn out. That's fine, but there were some parts where I was like, "OKAY, I get it!" There's not really a need to explain stuff like the couple doesn't have kids because they would have a terrible life and humanity will probably find a way to survive for a couple hundred more years but they will eventually all die. That could all be worked in, but it's shit we kind of already know without going into so much detail. These things should be used as flavor instead of preaching. And that is a fine line, because some of the stuff just adds more to the reader's imagination of this planet, but other stuff is kind of like, "And this is all because the people in the PAST drove their CARS too much! Maybe if they had read more cautionary tales about the future!"

Research: Shaky out of 5. I'm not a scientist or a doctor, but there are a few things about this story that I kind of doubt were researched. The world seems to be one constant temperature except Antarctica and the Himalayan Steppe. It seems logical that those two places would be more habitable, but the details are a little cloudy. It would have added to the story if the author had researched predictions of what it will actually be like a little more and included them, because I didn't get a really great image of this planet. That's all fine, but another thing that got me was his wife's cancer. I think he described it as "a rare form of skin cancer" or something, which is sort of a red flag in itself. Again, I could be wrong, but I have never heard of any skin cancer that gives you puss-filled sores all over your body. I sort of doubt that this isn't just made up. That's fine though, because it becomes a metaphor for things which were once beautiful and still are under all the scars but which you cannot touch without causing more harm. There is therefore a painful distance and desire between the narrator and his wife that does add to the story. It's also a work of fiction, so I'll leave it at that.

The Ending: 3 out of 5. This also goes into the same category as the "a little too far" one above, but in a different way. The ending isn't preachy, it's just a little too caught up in trying to convince the reader. There is a lot of explanation which I don't really think is necessary. Some of it adds to the overall message of the benefit of self-deception, but at the same time some of it is caught up in explaining logistics and that very explanation ruins a bit of the self-deception message. If the narrator is explaining all this shit to us, he is obviously thinking about it and explaining it to himself, which means he's not doing a very good job of accepting the illusion. This is all really hard to do without spoiling the fucking story for you, so just bear with me. It's like if you said to a girl, "You want to come up and see my collection of vegetables shaped like things?" and if she actually accepted, you wouldn't then be like, "Awesome, because we both know you aren't actually interested in that and I don't actually have such a collection and we're just going to have sex."

By the way, works every time.

Overall: 3.5 out of 5. This was by no means a kick-you-in-the-balls type of great story, but it was decently written. It had plenty of flaws, which I told you all about, but aside from those it was well written, and most importantly, fucking well-edited. Amazon needs more stuff like this, so please don't rely solely on your sales of "The Tube Riders," Mr. Ward.



If, however, after reading this, you are still interested in stories about tubes, go to amazon.com/author/a.c.blackhall.