Another roundup of some of my recent contributions to
The Horror Fiction Review:
All Souls Day by Martin Berman-Gorvine
Skullcrack City by Jeremy Robert Johnson
The Ghost in the Cogs anthology
Reincarnage by Ryan Harding and Jason Taverner
Danger Slater's I Will Rot Without You
Paper Tigers by Damien Angelica Walters
Dallas Mullican's A Coin for Charon
And BONUS BARBEE ... Thunderpussy!
Title: All Souls Day
Author: Martin Berman-Gorvine
Publisher: Silver Leaf Books
Website:
http://www.silverleafbooks.com/ Okay, must say, this really is one of those cases that proves the rule about not judging a book by its cover … I was sent a PDF and didn’t even see the cover until I looked up the website … and good thing too because I might’ve been disinclined to give the book a chance otherwise.
That would have been a shame, because All Souls Day is a darn good read. Set in an alt-timeline aftermath version of the 1980s, the community of Chatham Forge survives intact, thanks to the intervention of the great dread god Moloch.
A mysterious Wall surrounds the town, protecting its inhabitants from the blighted world beyond. Select groups are permitted to venture through for occasional battles or raids on the Muties outside, but most are content to stay put and be safe. After all, Moloch only demands one Virgin Sacrifice a year, and is that so much to ask, all considered?
They’ve adjusted their society to a new set of laws and religion, retconning history, revamping church services and holidays. And high school. Yes, high school. The stereotypes we all know - Jock, Nerd, Punk, Slut, Nice Girl, and others - have become a rigorous caste system. Your caste determines how you must dress and behave, who you can date, how you’ll be treated, and what your adult life opportunities will be.
So, in a sense, it’s kind of a YA dystopia, but it’s one of the better-handled takes on the theme I’ve seen. Well-thought-out, internally consistent, taking fun but sharp social-commentary swipes. I was reminded in good ways of Robert Deveraux’s Slaughterhouse High.
The particular story is that of Amos, a Nerd with dating aspirations outside his caste, and Suzie, a Nice Girl with a streak of frustrated rebellion. They soon discover that not everyone in Chatham Forge is as happy with the arrangements as they pretend, and a plan gets put in motion to see about getting rid of Moloch once and for all.
My only real complaint (besides the cover) is that the ending was on the abrupt side; I wanted a bit more resolution and final wrap-up answers. All in all, a solid and satisfying good read.
**
Title: Skullcrack City
Author: Jeremy Robert Johnson
Publisher: Lazy Fascist Press
Website: www.lazyfascistpress.com
This is a staggeringly well-written and amazing book. The scope, the skill, the story, everything about it is just fantastic. Deep and complex, yet funny. Gory and scary, yet heartwarming.
You know that bit in Hitchhiker’s Guide about the wall of Magrathea’s factory floor? How it’s described as not just defying the imagination, but seducing and defeating it? That’s what this book does. To the imagination, to genre, to literature.
It’s … a cyberpunk Lovecraftian gritty horror thriller screwball cult action comedy conspiracy with elements of romance and family drama … the ultimate combination of so many awesome things into a gestalt beyond gestalt … all things to all people … Brian Keene referred to it as “a total mind-(bleep)” and that’s pretty much it in a nutshell.
To attempt to summarize: would-be whistleblower plunges into a drug-fueled crazy world of paranoia with extradimensional demons AND brain-eating genetically engineered monsters; desperate race against time, fate of humanity in the balance. Plus, a pet turtle who somehow, despite a spectacular cast of great characters, still steals the show.
A truly masterful masterwork. I’m calling it now: next Wonderland Award Winner, right here.
**
Title: Ghost in the Cogs
Editors: Scott Gable and C. Dombrowski
Publisher: Broken Eye Books
Website: www.brokeneyebooks.com
An anthology of 22 steampunk ghost stories … I like steampunk, I like ghost stories, I like combination themes … if you do too, then this is a book you’ll want to read. It’s got all the apparitions and automatons you could want, and then some.
My top pick this time came down to a tie:
“The Lady in the Ghastlight” by Liane Merciel for its sheer beauty of language and imagery, and its unexpected yet highly poignant and satisfying outcome … and Jonah Buck’s would-be-debunker getting a big surprise in “T-Hex.”
I also noticed a tie for my top picks of outstanding opening line, and just have to share them:
The day she turned eleven, Effie’s father showed her how to die - “Asmodeus Flight” by Siobhan Carroll.
It is winter in Pal-em-Rasha and all the roosters have been strangled - “Golden Wing, Silver Eye” by Cat Hellisen.
I mean, because, well, wow, how can you NOT read on after grabbers like those?
Other faves include:
“The Shadow and the Eye” by James Lowder, who may be known as an anthologist and gamer, but is certainly no slouch in the writing department and more than proves it in this ominous tale.
Elsa S. Henry’s “Edge of the Unknown,” in which we’re shown, whether it’s Tumblr or a Victorian finishing school for proper young ladies, that one should never underestimate the power of the fangirl.
There are, of course, a couple of nods to Carnacki, because where better for a famed occult detective? “The Twentieth-Century Man” by Nick Mamatas and “The Blood on the Walls” by Eddy Webb both play well with the familiar frame narrative.
So yeah, if you like ghosts, gears, gents in goggles, gutsy gals, and gaseous gadgets, this one is a definite don’t miss.
**
Title: Reincarnage
Author: Ryan Harding and Jason Taverner
Publisher: Deadite Press
Website: www.deaditepress.com
It’s been, what, more than thirty years now we’ve had the unstoppable slasher-killer as a genre? We know them like rock stars, some of them needing only a single name. Like the Universal Horror classic monsters, they’ve spawned tons of sequels, would-be successors, and shabby imitators.
You might think that, after all this time, there’s nothing new under that particular sun. That there’s only so many ways teenagers or hapless vacationers can get dismembered by garden tools and other creative around-the-house DIY mutilation.
But, in Reincarnage, Ryan Harding and Jason Taverner find a way. What if, they ask, it happened for REAL? What if there WAS a killer who couldn’t be killed, not for keeps? Who DID keep coming back, somehow, even after being seemingly put down again and again?
People would DO something, wouldn’t they? The government would have to DO something, right? National security and all that. Like if there were real, live supervillains, or aliens, right? Stick ‘em in a mega-uber prison or lab or something.
Or something. Welcome to the Kill Zone, home and stomping grounds of the maniac known as Agent Orange. Walled off and secure, monitored, it’s like a wildlife preserve without the tourists … not counting the occasional death-defying thrillseekers and daredevils … at least, that’s what most of the world thinks.
To the random group of strangers who wake up and find themselves there, well, the truth’s a rude surprise. What follows is a frantic struggle for survival as well as unraveling the mysterious conspiracy of how they ended up there.
What also follows is a grim and grisly spectacular body count. The up-close-and-personal POV style does a great job of making this anything but your usual cheer-the-mayhem slasher flick; even when it’s the obnoxious characters you thought you couldn’t wait to see get picked off in horrific, gruesome ways.
As a bonus, the entire book is laden with wonderful zingers, descriptive bits, groanworthy jokes, and fantastic turns of phrase. But it is, don’t forget, very, VERY gory!
**
Title: I Will Rot Without You
Author: Danger Slater
Publisher: Fungasm Press
Website:
http://eraserheadpress.com/ I’ve been familiar with this guy through his readings and appearances at various events, but had somehow not until now sat myself down to read one of his books. And, of course, having finally done so, it blew me the heck away. I mean, I kind of expected it … this is Danger-Bleeping-Slater we’re talking about here, a barely-contained one-man-storm of raw talent.
His way with words is staggeringly awesome, poetic, and grotesque. A person could, like in that one South Park, get physically barf-your-guts sick from this stuff, yet keep going back for more. It’s that potent. That vividly, viscerally, in-the-face, full surround sound sensory experience potent.
If you - like me - get squicky about stuff like mold, roaches, decay, and peely dismemberments, um, well, I don’t know what else to tell you but tough up and read it anyway.
I Will Rot Without You is, in a sense, the ultimate break-up novel. It’s the story of Ernie, whose life has been falling apart in just about every way since his girl left. His apartment’s bug-infested and there’s weird stuff growing in the bathroom, his landlord and neighbors are each freakier than the next, and to top it all off he seems to be coming down with something.
It just gets weirder and grosser, more surreal and more bizarre, from there. A complete inside-out upside-down trip through the wringer, fascinating, impossible to walk away from or forget. Even as it feels like things are crawling on, growing in, sloughing off, and squiggling under, your skin.
And if you ever have the chance to see him do a live reading/performance, seize the day, people. Danger-Bleeping-Slater. Great stuff.
**
Title: Paper Tigers
Author: Damien Angelica Walters
Publisher: Dark House Press
Website: www.thedarkhousepress.com
I still have not seen Crimson Peak, and after the reviews of it, might be a while … because, THIS book is much more the sort of thing I would have expected/wanted from a lavish, moody, atmospheric, gothic mystery-drama. Anything less, really, is going to be a major let-down.
Okay and so maybe I could totes see Hiddleston as George, so what?
The point is, Paper Tigers is a gorgeous tapestry of pain from an author who specializes in just such intricate needlework. It’s about suffering, and wholeness, fear, longing, insecurity, self-loathing, and the prices we’d pay to get back what we lost.
Main character Alison is a burn victim. Not a survivor, but a victim, because her condition consumes her every waking moment and rules her world. Half her body is a disfigured mess of scar tissue. She thinks of herself as Monstergirl, having lost her hopes, her future, and everything but a hollow and reclusive existence.
Despite the efforts of her mother, her doctor, and her physical therapist, Alison hardly even ventures outside. On one of her rare excursions, she finds an old photo album at an antique shop and adds it to her collection - she enjoys looking at these images from the lives of others, making up stories to fill in what’s captured in the pictures.
There’s something strange about this particular album, though. It has an entire haunted house of dark history within its pages, and its inhabitants want Alison to join them. The offer is tempting - in their world, she can lose her scars, she can lose her pain … but at what price?
So, yeah, movie-making people, this is the one you need to do. It’s awesomely written, the sets and effects and costumes would be beautiful, it’s got tragedy and romance, it’s got it all. Somebody get Hiddleston’s people on the phone. And if he’s not available, how about Radcliffe?
**
Title: A Coin for Charon
Author: Dallas Mullican
Publisher: Winlock Press
Serial killer … or angel of mercy? Sadistic, murderous butchery … or divinely-guided release from suffering?
To the perpetrator, and even the victims, the distinction might be up for debate. To the cops, however, it doesn’t matter. You don’t just go around leaving a string of ritualistically displayed corpses all eviscerated and partly skinned without causing something of a stir.
In this nicely-turned thriller, the main characters are all deeply damaged people, in understandable, sympathetic, and sometimes frustrating ways. From the terminal cancer patient stubbornly keeping the truth from his family, to the counselor who’s able to talk others through the worst of lows while herself trapped in an abusive situation … from the detective trying to cope with devastation and loss, to the well-spoken young man who seems so gentle and polite … and all of them drawn into a grim world of violence.
I think the only real thing I tripped up on in this book had to do with Max. Did he have insurance? How was he paying his doctor bills? Wasn’t he worried about leaving debts? Those pesky questions did some interfering as I read, but not enough to knock me out of the story.
The mixes of theologies and mythologies worked well, I like the way the killer’s selection of targets is handled, and his backstory. Good descriptions, some touching moments and a lot of compassion and tension throughout, leading to some surprises and a fairly satisfying conclusion.
**
Title: Thunderpussy
Author: David W. Barbee
Publisher: Eraserhead Press
Website: www.eraserheadpress.com
The ultimate cyberhanced superspy, the manliest of man’s man men and ladykilleriest of ladies’ men, his mustache alone is licensed to kill … he’s Agent 00X, Declan Bruce … and his new mission, should he choose to have no choice but to accept it, is to save the world!
This goofy, gonzo, spy-spoof thriller has all the elements you’d expect and some no sane mind has ever thought of. It’s nonstop action, with femmes fatale galore, megalomaniacal villains, death traps, doomsday devices, robots, dinosaurs … and it’s still more tightly plotted than some of the action movies you’ve seen.
Deliberately tacky, sexist, over-the-top outrageous and offensive … crazy-good and highly inappropriate fun throughout!
**
Coming up soon, reviews of: Monsters Don't Cry, Tribes of Decay, None So Deaf, Undead Fleshcrave, Texas Chainsaw Mantis, Tomorrow's Cthulhu, Exponential, and more!