Book Description & Information
What happens when you’re face-to-face with a truth that shakes you?
Do you accept it, or pretend it was never there?
Award-winning author Mark A. Rayner smudges the lines between realist and fabulist, literary and speculative in this collection of stories that examines this question—what Homer called passing through The Gates of Polished Horn.
We discover the cruelty of creating synthetic consciousness. A woman is worried that her husband is having an affair but discovers it’s much, much worse. A time traveler uncovers a reality-bending fact while observing the death of Socrates. Waldo, of Where’s Waldo fame, has an existential crisis. A traveling salesperson is killed on the highway, and this is just the start of his journey through the gates.
Infused with comic insight and tragic vision, this collection invites readers into new realities that touch on our shared humanity.
“Mark A. Rayner’s formidable storytelling is on full display in this thoughtful and diverse collection. He’s a fine and creative writer whose characters and storylines are quirky, inventive, and often very funny. Bravo!”
~Terry Fallis, author of The Best Laid Plans &
two-time winner of the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour
Details:
- Full title: The Gates of Polished Horn
- Author name: Mark A. Rayner
- Publisher/Imprint: Donovan Street Press Inc.
- Pub date: March 1, 2025
- Page count: 203
- Amazon link
- Categories: Short Story | Science Fiction | Speculative Fiction
- Not illustrated
- Softcover Price: 14.99 USD
- ebook price: 3.99 USD
- ISBN 9781999431174 (softcover) | ISBN 9781999431181 (EPUB)
Key Ideas from The Gates of Polished Horn
1) Facing the Truth in an Age of Misinformation
All the characters in this collection of stories have truths to face. Many characters must deal with their own inner lives, while some are confronted by the world around them. Most of the stories center on this challenge: can you accept the facts in front of you, even when they contradict your beliefs about yourself or other human beings? What happens when you do? And what happens when you don’t?
2) The Datasphere Is Coming
The collection has many science fiction stories that are preoccupied with the notion of what Mark calls The Datasphere. This is more than the internet, more than virtual reality, augmented reality and artificial intelligence. It imagines a world where all these things have come together and control not only our culture and economy, but our essence as human beings.
3) Compassion and Empathy Make Us Humane
Being human is a tough business. We are—as far as we know—the only species fully aware of our own mortality. So why is it so hard for us to treat one another kindly? We’re all in the same metaphorical boat. Many of the tales in this collection are meditations on this key idea. Not an original notion, but one that we need to remember in a crass age when hypocrisy and cruelty is routinely ignored by our leaders.
4) We’re a Species of Imagination and Dreams
Many of the characters in this collection are also dreamers. Or they realize they are living in a dream. Some are good dreams, and some are not, but in all of them there are new truths to be confronted, absorbed, and integrated. What kind of world do we want to create? Because all worlds originate in our dreams and imagination.
5) It’s So Much Easier If You Can Laugh!
Being human is tough, sure, but it’s also funny. Many of the stories in this collection bring a sense of humor and, sometimes, outright comedy to all these serious and important themes.
“Two gates there are for our evanescent dreams, one is made of ivory, the other made of horn. Those that pass through the ivory cleanly carved are will-o’-the-wisps, their message bears no fruit. The dreams that pass through the gates of polished horn are fraught with truth, for the dreamer who can see them.”
–Homer, Book XIX, The Odysseey
Author Bio, Contact & Socials
Human-shaped, monkey-loving, robot-fighting, pirate-hearted, storytelling junkie, Mark A. Rayner is an award-winning author of satire and speculative fiction. He writes in the genres of science fiction, humorous SF and dark comedy. He dips his toe in the occasional bit of
dramatic prose and experimental/literary fiction, too. When not working on the next novel, he pens short stories, squibs and other drivel. (Some pure, and some quite tainted with meaning.)
Mark is the co-host of Re-Creative, a podcast that talks to creative people about the artwork that inspired them. He’s also teaches in the Faculty of Media and Information Studies at Western University, in his hometown of London, Ontario.
He does all these things while being Canadian and owning cats.
Contact and Socials
Email: markarayner@gmail.com
Website: https://markarayner.com
Tel. 519.871.6936
Also available via Skype and Zoom
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/markarayner
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RaynerWriting
Mastodon: https://mas.to/@markarayner
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/markarayner.bsky.social
Twitter: https://twitter.com/markarayner
Donovan Street Press
Publisher: Joe Mahoney
Email: joemahoney@donovanstreetpress.com
“An all-Canadian synthesis of Douglas Adams and Ben Elton.”
~Corey Redekop, author of Husk and Shelf Monkey
Gallery – click to link to image files
Author photos by David Redding Photography
“An author with a fantastical sense of humor and a dangerous imagination.”
~The Next Best Book Club
Sample Stories from The Gates of Polished Horn [pdf files]
Awards & Critical Praise for Mark A. Rayner & His Work
Alpha Max – 2022 IndieReader Discovery Award for Best Cover (Fiction)
Snarky as Pratchett, insightful as Stephenson, as full of scathing social commentary as Swift or Voltaire, and weirdly reminiscent of LeGuin, Alpha Max is the only multiverse novel you need this month, or maybe ever.
~Ernest Lilley, Amazing Stories
The Fatness – 2018 Independent Book Publishing Association Award for Best Humor (silver)
The Fatness – 2018 IndieReader Discovery Award for Best Humor
“The Fatness is notable for its spot-on appraisal of a bureaucracy that manipulates its citizens by means of silent consent, maintaining the illusion of a moral high ground whilst benefiting economically. With such a heavy backdrop, though, Rayner’s sense of humour keeps the reading light.”
~Broken Pencil
“A terrific storyteller and one of the most imaginative and original writers you will ever have the pleasure of reading.”
~Ian Ferguson, author of Village of the Small Houses
The Fridgularity – 2013 IndieReader Discovery Award for Best Humor
“With plenty of humor and much more, The Fridgularity is an exciting, sci-fi view askew, highly recommended.”
~Midwest Book Review
Note: This media kit is also available in PDF files on Google Drive.
Archives – The Fatness Media Kit (2017)
The Fatness Media Kit [pdf]
Included in the kit:
- Book Description
- Critical Praise
- Author Biography
- Short Synopsis
- Author Interview
- Excerpt: Chapter 1 – Eat Your Cake and Have It, Too
- Excerpt: Fact – The Fat Cell
- Excerpt: Chapter 8 – You Deserve a Break Today
Note: high-resolution files of the book cover and of Mark are available on request.