Part of Series
From Publishers Weekly Readers may have believed that all that could be said about a band of loyal appliances was stated with electrifying eloquence in The Brave Little Toaster. But there is new territory to cover with old friends like the AM radio and new: a ceiling fan, an electric blanket and a microwave among them, as well as a hearing aid handmade by Albert Einstein. They all head to Mars after learning that there resides a force of warring appliances with plans to invade Earth. The toaster simply and persuasively speaks of peace to the planet's inhabitants and is elected president (a reign which lasts only until he returns to Earth). What is Disch talking about? Perhaps it doesn't matter, for while he seems to be amusing himself, much of what he writes will entertain readers, too. The epic elements will more than appease those awaiting this sequel, but the most exuberantly funny scenes are those in which the appliances while away the time with their distinctive brand of gossip. Ages 10-up. Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. From School Library Journal Grade 5 Up Like The Brave Little Toaster (Doubleday, 1986), this satiric sequel in which the toaster and his appliance friends journey to Mars to save the world will have more adult than child appeal. Rogue appliances on Mars are planning to invade the earth, destroy mankind, and end the horrors of planned obsolescence. Through heroic efforts and the electoral process, the rogue appliances are convinced to explore space instead. While children could easily read the brief adventure story, few will understand or appreciate Disch's parody of science fiction formulae and his manipulation of Einstein's theories. Anne Connor, Los Angeles Public Library Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Author
Poet and cynic, Thomas M. Disch brought to the sf of the New Wave a camp sensibility and a sardonicism that too much sf had lacked. His sf novels include Camp Concentration, with its colony of prisoners mutated into super-intelligence by the bacteria that will in due course kill them horribly, and On Wings of Song, in which many of the brightest and best have left their bodies for what may be genuine, or entirely illusory, astral flight and his hero has to survive until his lover comes back to him; both are stunningly original books and both are among sf's more accomplishedly bitter-sweet works. In recent years, Disch had turned to ironically moralized horror novels like The Businessman, The MD, The Priest and The Sub in which the nightmare of American suburbia is satirized through the terrible things that happen when the magical gives people the chance to do what they really really want. Perhaps Thomas M. Disch's best known work, though, is The Brave Little Toaster, a reworking of the Brothers Grimm's "Town Musicians of Bremen" featuring wornout domestic appliances—what was written as a satire on sentimentality became a successful children's animated musical. Thomas M. Disch committed suicide by gunshot on July 4, 2008.
