FILARIA
By Brent Hayward
Filaria is a double debut: the first book to be
published by the new macabre fiction imprint ChiZine Publications (an offshoot
of the Chiaroscuro website run by Toronto author Brett Savory), as well as the
first novel by Toronto writer Brent Hayward.
The story’s framework borrows from a pair of science-fiction
conventions - a future society with a rigid system of social stratification, run
entirely by machines. Beneath a dead planet a sort of human ant colony has been
set up by a legendary engineer. The colony consists of 32 levels - each a city
in itself - connected by an advanced elevator/transit system. At the top, Level
One, the beautiful people live on plantations. At the bottom, sickly ghouls
labour as garbage collectors and sewer workers. At the beginning of the novel,
the network that runs this claustrophobic system has broken down. Chaos ensues.
What’s more, an alien force seems to have invaded the subterranean biosphere,
motives unknown.
The narrative has four parallel threads that never actually meet
but are each indirectly related. A young Morlock from the 32nd floor is chased
upward, pursuing an unlikely destiny. A privileged plantation princess climbs to
the edge of the known world and beyond. A centenarian lift attendant begins his
last ascent. And a troubled family man finds himself drifting to the lower
depths, seeking some kind of primary energy source.
Much of the story remains a little vague, and is made more so by
Hayward’s technique of eliding crucial plot points, but this also leads us to
sympathize with the characters’ confusion in their newly out-of-joint and
de-compartmentalized world, and emphasizes the story’s prominent (but not
restrictive) allegorical qualities.
First and foremost, however, Filaria is a great read,
crackling with invention, energy, and suspense. For both ChiZine and Hayward,
it’s an auspicious start.
Notes:
Review first published in Quill & Quire, September 2008. ChiZine's
next offering, Robert Boyczuk's Horror
Story and Other Horror Stories, was just as impressive. Brent Hayward's
next book was The
Fecund's Melancholy Daughter.
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