The Empire of Ice Cream

By Jeffrey Ford
Golden Gryphon Press, $14.95, 319 pages

In this collection of fourteen stories, Nebula and World Fantasy Award winner Jeffrey Ford uses his personal experiences to create tales of myth and wonder. From the World Fantasy Award winner “Botch Town,” in which a model city becomes a metaphor for glimpses into a changing world; to Nebula winner “The Empire of Ice Cream (from which the book gets its title), where a person suffering from synesthesia does not know whether what he sees is real or a figment of his imagination; to “The Weight of Words,” in which math is applied to the understanding of words with unfortunate consequences; Ford’s fiction is always very real and very personal. Much of it is born from the his own life experiences-a fact he makes clear in the story notes at the end of each tale. Though there is some repetition of specifics due to this birthing from personal history, each story has a separate theme and a distinct flavor that keeps them all engaging. Ford is not afraid to represent the world as he sees it, so there is drug use and profanity, but these are integral to the story, a means for using concrete, noticeable facts to anchor the more ethereal elements of the story. The only element that seems an additive to some of these stories is Ford’s disdain for Christian belief and tradition. In “The Green Word,” this is especially evident, as Ford could just have easily used a made-up religion in place of the Christian one or could have chosen another belief system entirely. As the story was written for children, it seems this element is more a piece of propaganda for malleable minds than a truly required part of the narrative. The majority of the stories could be labeled urban fantasy, though a couple are set in different times and places entirely. All in all, the stories within The Empire of Ice Cream are well-written, entertaining (albeit it sometimes quite sad), and are worthy of the awards and acclaim they have received.

Reviewed by John Ottinger III