Borderlanz: Tales From the Edges by Douglas Smith (book review).
Borderlanz is the third collection of short stories from author Douglas Smith. I have had the pleasure of reading, and reviewing, the previous two, so I looked forward to cracking the spine on this volume. Borderlanz is a strong collection that displays the diversity of Smith’s talent.
Before I get into the stories I loved the most, a note on the introduction by Charles de Lint: de Lint talks about the musicality of Smith’s writing, from the songs that inspired the stories to the narrative style. This is a wonderful way of describing what I’ve always felt about Smith’s work. Like songs, his stories have structure. Beyond the words, there are themes that repeat, and each story has an emotional centre. Many of the stories deal with grief and lost relationships, but also evident is the joy of connection between friends, lovers and family.
In his own introduction, Smith talks about the title, Borderlanz, and how his stories explore the edges and the spaces in between. He also touches on the thing I love most about his writing: “the challenge of creating an entire world and fully formed characters within the tight confines of a handful of words.” I agree that a short story is much harder to write than a novel, because creating a complete experience in fewer words is so difficult. But that’s why I love short stories. They’re a great way to get a good feel for an author and also visit their worlds, which is how this collection works. Borderlanz serves as a great introduction to Douglas Smith and will entice readers to try his novels.
The first story I’d like to talk about is ‘Gypsy Biker’s Coming Home.’ This is one of the longer stories in the collection, and it does a lot with the extra few pages. Set in Smith’s Merged Corporate Entity universe, this is the story of a love that doesn’t die. After the Gypsy Boys come home in body bags, the women they left behind plan a special surprise for the Boys’ ‘second funeral’, a celebration of their unit that focuses not on the dead, but on the technology responsible for their deaths. The revenge here is not exactly cold. It’s pretty creepy, but very well deserved. In his afterword, Smith promises an upcoming novel in this universe. I can’t wait to read it.
One of my favourite stories is ‘Oregon Shooters,’ which has one of the best opening lines: “For the second time that week, Nick Cabot stood in his favourite restaurant, staring down at a corpse.” ‘Oregon Shooters’ is a detective/science fiction mix, which I always enjoy. Nick has the job of figuring out how patrons of the restaurant end up dead when there isn’t a clear shot to either victim. It’s the tone and the tongue-in-cheek humour that make this story stand out, and I wouldn’t mind a series featuring Nick Cabot and more weird cases.
The shortest story in the collection is another favourite. Called ‘The Stopover,’ this was Smith’s entry for a contest to win a trip to a writing retreat in Iceland. While he felt his message, “Iceland – Hide Here from the Apocalypse,” might not have resonated with the judges, it certainly did with me. I would love to see this expanded.
The absolute standout in the collection, however, is ‘Murphy’s Law.’ I loved this one. It’s presented like a tall tale shared at a bar for the price of keeping the beer flowing, but it has all the elements of a larger story. It’s about a guy nicknamed Murphy who, as you’d guess from the title, wrecks nearly everything he touches. He hires on with a ship bound for a distant colony, hoping that putting himself far, far away will save the universe from his bad luck. The crew of the ship find another way for him to save the universe, and it’s pretty cool.
I also enjoyed ‘What’s in a Name,’ which had me laughing out loud and, yes, I want more of Hari and Louie. ‘Doorways’ is wonderfully inventive, but also creepy. What I liked best about ‘Doorways,’ aside from the maths lesson, yes, really, was Jack’s character arc. The choice he makes at the end, and its reward, are well earned. ‘Fiddleheads’ is again in the creepy group, but ‘The Balance’ shows us where Smith gets his compassion from and why so many of his stories are love stories.
Finally, ‘The Last of a Thing’ is one of those perfect stories that delivers it all. I’m not going to summarise it because that would ruin the beauty of what it is: a story that does double duty as high fantasy and a call to action for today’s environmental crises. Well done.
There are many more stories in the collection that I haven’t mentioned, but I have to limit my review to a handful so that I don’t spoil the entire book. In summary, this is a great collection. Outside of the many nods to the music of Bruce Springsteen, the themes of love and loss, and the diversity of subjects, these stories illustrate Smith’s boundless imagination and his willingness to explore not just the edges, but the spaces in between. Or, as he has decided to call it, the Borderlanz.
Kelly Jensen
June 2026
(Pub: Spiral Path Books, March 2026. 273 pages. Hardback, paperback and e-book. Hardback price: $24.99 (US), £19.99 (UK). ISBN: 978-1928048473. Paperback price: $19.99 (US), £14.99 (UK). ISBN: 978-1928048466. E-book price: $6.99 (US), £5.99 (UK). ASIN: B0G3NFN4PB.)
Check out Douglas Smith’s website: https://smithwriter.com/
