1985 science fiction novella by Roger Zelazny. Second appearance in the 1989 short story compilation Frost & Fire, also featured in Cthulhu 2000. The title is drawn from an actual book of woodcut reproductions. The Cthulhu mythos link is weak - the narrator makes passing mention of the sunken city of R'lyeh. No mind-blasting encounters with tentacled alien gods here. Rather, the narrator makes a pilgrimage to Mt. Fuji to confront a former lover turned cybernetic megalomaniac ala Lawnmower Man. Each View is a station in her pilgrimage. En route she practices a bit of non-lethal tantric vampirism, a dry and mechanical wink to the adult audience. Zelaznophiles will note cyberpunk resonances between 24 Views, Mask of Loki, and Donnerjack.
Author
Roger Zelazny made his name with a group of novellas which demonstrated just how intense an emotional charge could be generated by the stock imagery of sf; the most famous of these is A Rose for Ecclesiastes in which a poet struggles to convince dying and sterile Martians that life is worth continuing. Zelazny continued to write excellent short stories throughout his career. Most of his novels deal, one way or another, with tricksters and mythology, often with rogues who become gods, like Sam in Lord of Light, who reinvents Buddhism as a vehicle for political subversion on a colony planet. The fantasy sequence The Amber Chronicles, which started with Nine Princes in Amber, deals with the ruling family of a Platonic realm at the metaphysical heart of things, who can slide, trickster-like through realities, and their wars with each other and the related ruling house of Chaos. Zelazny never entirely fulfilled his early promise—who could?—but he and his work were much loved, and a potent influence on such younger writers as George R. R. Martin and Neil Gaiman. He won the Nebula award three times (out of 14 nominations) and the Hugo award six times (out of 14 nominations). His papers are housed at the Albin O. Khun Library of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger\_Ze...
