More Anthologies

More Horror Anthologies

     I didn’t realize this until I was preparing to write this post but I bought a lot of anthologies this year.  While I’ve read a bunch of different stories out of each one of them I haven’t read any of them in their entirety.  Because I have so many of these damned things I tend to bounce around from one to the other.  Unlike last year I’m not going to review any of these anthologies but instead describe some of the stories I’ve read and the reasons why these anthologies were must haves for my collection.

The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian

     If you’ve seen the 1980’s Conan movies or read the comics you know these stories aren’t horror.  It should be noted though that Robert E. Howard appeared in some of the same pulp magazines that H.P. Lovecraft did.  The stories compiled here are arranged in the order they were written which can be quite confusing.  From one story to the next Conan can be a middle aged king, or a young thief, or a mercenary, or a pirate.  The way Howard explained it was when you talk to a great adventurer he relates stories out of sequence.  I’ve been meaning to pick up this book for years now and all I can say is it was worth the wait.

Shadows 3

     I’ll admit I judged a book by its cover, but I didn’t just buy this book because I thought it had a cool green skull on its cover.  I’ve read the odd Charles L. Grant story in different anthologies and I was curious about the kind of stories he liked or found scary.  I was also intrigued by his self-described “quiet horror” that he reserved both for his stories and the stories he collected here.  It didn’t hurt that it was really cheap either.  I paid 1 penny for the book and 4 dollars for the shipping.

     I’ve only read two stories so far.  “The Brown Recluse” by Davis Grubb is a Sherlock Holmes pastiche.  It was okay if not a little long and boring at times.  I did however enjoy “The Ghost Who Limped” by R. Chetwynd-Hayes.  The story has a twist that I saw coming a mile away but that didn’t stop me from enjoying it.

The Year’s Best Horror Stories VIII

     Might as well get these out of the way.  Karl Edward Wagner was not exactly what you’d the most prolific writer but he still remains my favorite.  It’s a quality over quantity thing.  I didn’t technically buy vol. VIII this year (I bought it at the tail end of last year) but I’m including it here because ya know what?  I didn’t talk about it last year and I figured since I’m featuring the other ones might as well feature this one.  I obviously bought these books to complete my Karl Edward Wagner collection.  Also as a lover of horror anthologies I wanted the see what he thought the best ones were of any given year.  Turns out me and Mr. Wagner disagree on some things but it’s not a bad anthology especially for his debut on the series.

     Later on in this list you’ll see Dennis Etchison’s “The Dead Line” and Hugh B. Cave’s “From the Lower Deep” in “Whispers I and II” and both are great stories and just goes to show how good this anthology is.  Also collected is two stories by Harlan Ellison and “Needle Song” by Charles L. Grant.  As with many editors Wagner was a little biased towards his friends.  Ramsey Campbell, Dennis Etchison, and Hugh B. Cave are regulars in this series but what sets these books apart from other anthologies is what and who Wagner picked.  You’ll see famous names like Stephen King but at the same time you’ll see an author who hadn’t written anything before or since his appearance in this series.  I would like to note that this book is in excellent condition despite its age not that that has anything to do with anything.  I just appreciate it when online sellers are honest about what they are selling.

The Year’s Best Horror Stories IX

     So far this is my least favorite volume in the series.  Some of the stories are a lot longer so you don’t get as many of them.  The first story in this volume is “The Monkey” by Stephen King, which I read a long time ago but you can’t fault a 30+ year old anthology for that.  It also contains a story by Basil A. Smith called “The Propert Bequest”.  I wasn’t able to find any information online about him but Wagner says in his introduction to the story that it “may seem at first a contradiction for a best-of-the year anthology to include a story by an author who has been dead for a number of years,” and describes him a clergyman who died in 1969.  After his death several manuscripts were found and later published.  As fascinating as that is the story itself is a little long winded and boring.  The copy I have is a first edition (also in great condition) and I did spot a rather amusing typo.  In the copyright page Ramsey Campbell’s story “The Gap” is listed as “The Gay”.

The Year’s Best Horror Stories X

As of this date I haven’t cracked this book open yet.  I bought it when I was out of town for a long time and had it sent to my address so it was months before I was able to recover it.  That coupled with the fact that I collect so many of these things I often forget to read them, at least for a time.  I’ll get to this one eventually though.  Once again we have Harlan Ellison, Ramsey Campbell (2 stories), and Charles L. Grant.  Dennis Etchison is for some reason absent from this volume.  My copy of volume X is in pristine condition, so much so I’m a little afraid to read it.  The binding is very tight and looks to never have been read.  You may have noticed that I keep these books wrapped in plastic.  I do this to preserve their condition, which brings me to my next anthology.

The Year’s Best Horror Stories XV

     As a collector I was furious when I received this one through the mail.  Just look at it, it’s in terrible condition and it was not listed as such.  The cover is absolutely trashed, there’s even a chunk missing from it.  The inside cover is filled with library stamps and stickers including a stamp that states: This Book Has Been Discarded By The Richland Public Library. 

On the side of the book is also a stamp that says Westover Hills.  I can only imagine that this book was discarded by two different libraries before it was sold by an unscrupulous seller on amazon.  I’m ashamed to have it next to the other three in the series but however bad the condition is it remains readable.  So I’m cheating again.  I ordered this the same time I ordered volume VIII but have yet to talk about it on this blog.  I ordered a book later in the series because I was more familiar with both the stories and the authors.  My biggest reason for buying it was the Joe R. Lansdale story.  It also has Robert Bloch and Charles L. Grant stories that can be found in “The Mammoth Book of Terror”.  All around it’s a good collection in very poor condition.

Whispers

     Because there are six volumes in the series I often refer to this as Whispers I, but the title on the spine of the book simply reads Whispers.  This anthology takes some of the stories published in the “Whispers” fanzine and also adds a few new ones.  Collecting Karl Edward Wagner, Robert Bloch, Fritz Leiber, Dennis Etchison, Brian Lumley, Hugh B. Cave, and Manly Wade Wellman “Whispers” is a powerhouse.  It is an excellent anthology.  Once again I was screwed by amazon.  I should have known from last time but I stupidly ordered this one and “Whispers II” from the same seller.  They were listed in Very Good condition for $0.01 and since I wanted to add as many as possible to my collection I figured why not.  Once again I got discarded library books.  Both are first editions which means they were in circulation for a very long time.  Volume one doesn’t even have a dust cover and still has the library card slip in the back. 

Because this has already happened before I wasn’t as pissed as I was with “The Year’s Best…” but I am curious about this book’s history, the places it’s been and the stories it could tell.  It’s in okay condition more or less.  It’s still readable and most of the pages are intact(the last page was torn out, the best I can tell it was an about the artist section that described the artists for some of the drawings from the magazine and book).

Whispers II

     Another discarded library book.  It has a dust cover (wrapped in protective mylar, you can see indentions where someone tried to trace the cover art) but is in even worse condition than its predecessor.  The binding is coming loose in some places.  Quality aside we have another great “Whispers” anthology consisting of Karl Edward Wagner, Charles L. Grant, Hugh B. Cave, Dennis Etchison, and Manly Wade Wellman.

Whispers III

     “Whispers III” is in decidedly better condition (and I ended up paying a lot more for this one but hell it was worth it) than the previous two books and the seller saw to it to include a mylar bag to preserve it.  The cover is also intact and beautifully colored.  Once again I am wary of reading this because it is such good condition.  As luck would have it I have already read a few of the stories in different collections.  I’ve obviously read Karl Edward Wagner’s “The River of Night’s Dreaming”, (I’ve achieved that accomplishment in two books now, why not a third?) and Dennis Etchison’s “The Dead Line”.  I have David Campton’s “Firstborn” collected in “The Mammoth Book of Terror”.  The rest are “Whispers” standards such as Hugh B. Cave and Fritz Leiber.

Whispers IV

     As good condition as 3 was in somehow 4 is in better condition.  This book is like new.  I’ve never bought a used book with tighter binding and the pages are bleach white.  It’s like this book was never read.  Unlike volume 3 most of the stories collected here I don’t have in other anthologies, except for Karl Edward Wagner’s “Into Whose Hands” which I only have because it’s in Wagner’s Centipede collections.   “Whispers IV” is a beautiful book and welcomed edition to my collection.

New Terrors II

     Not sure what possessed me to buy this book.  I don’t like Ramsey Campbell as an author so I have no idea why I thought he’d be a good editor.  I’m sure it was the cover that got my attention and the fact that it’s an early 80’s horror anthology.  Staring at that cover I could only imagine what the story which it’s connected to could be about.  The story titled “The Ice Monkey” by M. John Harrison is about a cursed object that may cause someone close to you to die in a horrible accident.  It wasn’t a bad story but at the same time it wasn’t great.  I’ve already talked about Robert Bloch’s “The Rubber Room” in the entry that precedes this one.  “Symbiote” by Andrew J. Offutt is a great story about a parasite that causes to a man fulfill murderous and sexual impulses.  Also included here is Charles L. Grant and Graham Masterton but I haven’t read their stories yet.  Finally R. A. Lafferty’s “The Funny Face Murders” has now taken the mantle as the worst story I have ever read anywhere.  After 31 grueling pages of nonsense I kept hoping it would start making sense but it never did.

Borderlands 2

     “From the Borderlands” is one of my favorite anthologies and I’ve always wanted to get more in the series.  I haven’t read that many stories from this one yet but the ones I have read are definitely very weird.  F. Paul Wilson, Charles L. Grant, and Joe R. Lansdale make appearances.  The book itself was reasonable priced and in great condition.  I bought this one from the same seller that I bought “Whispers III and IV”.  The pages are a little yellowed but other than that the binding is tight.

Best of Best New Horror: Two Decades of Dark Fiction

     This is another book I bought late last year and have yet to include it on this blog.  I bought this brand new at a second hand bookstore.  I believe it must have been an overstock from a firsthand store because there were a few other copies.  This one collects what Stephen Jones considers to be the best stories he’s collected editing “The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror” series.  I picked it up because I don’t have the full series (I do have 15, 16, 17, and 18 but I can’t say I have much interest in having a full collection) and I wanted to read some of the stories from volumes I don’t have.  Here we have Brian Lumley, Ramsey Campbell, Harlan Ellison, Christopher Fowler, Stephen King, Clive Barker, Joe Hill, Kim Newman, and Peter Straub.  A great collection but I tend to disagree with his idea of “best” with some of the volumes I own even though Stephen Jones tries to negate that title in his introduction.  If you’re interested the series is ongoing and still being edited by Jones, it should be on the 24^th volume.

In the Flesh and The Inhuman Condition

     I’ve got all the various authors anthologies out of the way so now it’s time for the singular author collections.  I acquired these books on a very fun and eventful day.  My great aunt had passed away and it was up to me and some other family members to claim and pack up her belongings from her house.  My aunt lived in a small town and I still have some family and friends there even though many of them have either died or moved away.  A cousin of mine was still living there and while we were working she mentioned a pawn shop where she buys movies and a used bookstore.  I didn’t have much cash on me but I told her the last day I was there that we should go to both places.  I’m an old school gamer and when I spotted a used Nintendo 64 I knew I just had to have it.  As it turns out after the 40 bucks I dropped on the 64 and a game I only had 3 bucks in my pocket.  At the used bookstore I went over to see if they had any Star Trek books I wanted to buy.  This is usually my first stop at any secondhand bookstore.  In a cardboard box I found a novelization of Batman’s legendary fight with Bane (the comic book version not the movie version) that I wanted but under it were two Clive Barker books.  Each book was in good condition and had a sticker over the barcode that read “Please Scan Inside Cover”.  I went over to the counter and asked the guy how much the books cost because I only had 3 bucks and he answered me back 3 bucks.  

     Although I already read “The Forbidden” in “In the Flesh” I’ve only read two other stories from “The Inhuman Condition”.  “The Age of Desire” is about a failed medical experiment involving aphrodisiacs that causes an ordinary man to turn into a crazed rapist and murderer.  It was very good and among the best Clive Barker stories I’ve read.  It’s more of a sci fi story than horror though.  “Revelations” is a quirky ghost story set in an Amarillo motel in Texas featuring two bitter ghosts who killed each other and an evangelist preacher, his wife, and associate.  It was okay but not quite what I expected.

 

House of the Restless Dead and Other Stories by Hugh B. Cave

     I am a great admirer of Hugh B. Cave’s work and that’s exactly why I bought this book… well not exactly.  Yes it’s true I’ve been wanting to buy this book for a while now but if I didn’t need a couple bucks to be eligible for free shipping on amazon I might not have bought it all.  It also took forever and a day to be delivered.  Looking at the very last page I think I know why.  The books copyright proclaims 2011 but at the very last page of the book is a barcode and a message that says “Made in the USA/ Lexington, KY/ 31 August 2013.  If this is true it is the only book I own that was made to order.  I never imagined a publisher would do that and my only guess is that they’re a small independent press that can’t afford to print books and have them lying around until someone orders one.

     The book collects Cave’s early and previously unpublished works from the pulps.  I’ve only read two stories so far.  The first story I read, “Daughters of Dark Desire”, had more typos than any story I have ever read.  I ignored the first two thinking they were simple mistakes but then started writing down the mistakes and their locations on an index card.  I noticed 9 more mistakes including the title which read “Daughter of Dark Desire” instead of daughters which is how it is presented on the index as well as at the top of every other page of the story.  Typos aside it’s a great story.  The book also features an informative introduction which talks about Cave’s life during and after the pulps.

Remember Why You Fear Me: The Best Dark Fiction of Robert Shearman by Robert Shearman

     Out of all my new anthologies I’ve read the most out of this one.  It is just that good.  Each story I’ve read is creative, original, and downright bizarre which makes setting down the book and leaving it alone very difficult.  I’ll bet if you buy this book and begin to read it you’ll agree you’ve never read anything or anybody that even closely resembles it.  There’s story about homicidal cherubs, very weird grandmas, odd Lovecraftian creatures that shouldn’t exist, Adolf Hitler’s favorite dog, and a man mourning the death of his wife who believes she’s coming back through his own face.


To check out my anthology post from last year go here: last year's anthologies

The Creep's Nightmares Vol. 1

Taking inspiration from another blogger (you can find his blog here: Singular Points) I’ve decided to compile my favorite short horror stories into a hypothetical anthology.  It should be no secret by now that there’s nothing I love more than a great short horror story.  Last year around this time I published a selection of my favorite short horror anthologies so likewise it should be no surprise that I have a ton of these books(go here:My Anthologies).  It’s always been a dream of mine to edit my own anthology so without further stalling here is

The Creep’s Nightmares Vol. I

1. Custard Cream by Robert Shearman

(Early this year I bought a book that was suggested to me by Barnes & Noble on a whim from an author I had never heard of.  This time it paid off but I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been sorely disappointed.  I bought the trade paperback but it is also available in ebook form and that edition contains a few stories not featured in the trade.  The following story can be found in “Remember Why You Fear Me” by Shearman himself.  “Custard Cream” effectively draws the reader in by use of second person perspective making you the subject of the story.  Having watched and read horror all my life it’s not easy to scare me.  With that said I was already terrified of spiders and this story doesn’t ease my mind one bit.)

2. Foet by F. Paul Wilson

(Pronounced feet as in fetus, you can only imagine what this story is about.  Wilson claims the story originated from an encounter with a female friend wearing a fur coat.  Wilson, offended by her poor taste argued she “would wear human skin if it were in vogue”.  You can find this one in Stephen Jones’ “Mammoth Book of New Terror” and Thomas Monteleone’s “Borderlands 2”.)

3. The Late Shift by Dennis Etchison

(This story shouldn’t be missing from any anthology.  In fact I have it collected in two volumes and can’t remember which I read it from first.  You can find it in Kirby McCauley’s “Dark Forces” as well as Stephen Jones’ “Mammoth Book of Terror”.  Without giving away too much about the story it involves some very unconventional zombies and is hands down one of my favorite short stories.)

4. Obsequy by David J. Schow

(Following one unorthodox zombie story with another, Obsequy poses the question, what if our dead loved ones rose?  Not what if our dead loved ones rose mindless, violent, eating machines, but just what if they remained what they were in life.  Although I read it in “The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 18” it feels like more of a drama than horror to me.  That could be an all new niche all to itself, the zombie drama.)

5. Time Was by David Morrell

(Short horror fiction often explores different themes.  While some are more graphic and brutal others are more cerebral.  I can’t help but think of “The Twilight Zone” whenever I read one of these stories.  This one reminds me of a season 3 episode called “Person or Persons Unknown”.  In the episode a man wakes up next to his wife but when she wakes up she claims she’s never seen him before.  And so it goes with everyone he knows.  A similar set of circumstances happens in “Time Was”.  A man on his way home from the office experiences some strange weather patterns out in the desert.  He then ends up at an old wild west saloon.  He buys a case of sarsaparilla and then drinks one.  The next thing he knows he’s waking up in the sand.  He goes back to his wife and she claims he’s a stranger as does everyone else he knows including bosses and coworkers.  This story can be found in “The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 17” edited by Stephen Jones.

6. The Silence of Falling Stars by Mike O’Driscoll

(Like the previous story this one is cerebral and explores themes of isolation, loneliness, and sensory deprivation.  The Death Valley setting only adds to the atmosphere.  This story can be found in “The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 15”)

7. The Rubber Room by Robert Bloch

(Following two psychological horror stories is another one by the father of the genre.  This story takes an in depth first person view inside the mind of a homicidal maniac.  Why he did what he did and the rationale that led up to it.  You can find this one in Ramsey Campbell’s “New Terrors II”)

8. Churches of Desire by Philip Nutman

(I’m just going to put all the psychological horror together in the middle of this anthology.  Why bother breaking the trend once I’ve started it.  While so far this anthology is filled with what you might call strange tales this one certainly is the sleaziest.  The story revolves around a struggling, desperate, broke, alcoholic horror writer when he travels to Rome in order to get an interview that may get him some recognition.  He spends a bulk of the story in dingy porn theaters and thinking to himself.  This story can be found in Thomas Monteleone’s “Borderlands II”)

9. Ladies In Waiting by Hugh B. Cave

(This creepy little ghost story signified a comeback for Hugh B. Cave.  After reading an article in a women’s magazine by a Hugh Cave, Karl Edward Wagner contacted the magazine asking if that was the same Hugh B. Cave of Weird Tales.  When the response came back he corresponded with Cave and then released an anthology of his earlier works through his own independent press.  When nostalgia for weird tales came back in the 70’s Cave began writing horror again.  This story was first published in the “Whispers” fanzine and later in the first “Whispers” anthology.)

10. Ever the Faith Endures by Manly Wade Wellman

(It seems only appropriate that I put these two veterans of the weirds back to back.  Most of what I’ve read of Wellman is his John the Balladeer stories, but I came across this one that I totally forgot I read in “The Best Horror from Fantasy Tales”.  The story begs the question what happens to a god when people stop worshipping it.)

11.  Pig’s Dinner by Graham Masterton

(“After a brief detour we’re back to the visceral.  “Pig’s Dinner” is about two pig farming brothers.  One mistakenly dismembers the other when he turns on a feed grinder.  The mutilated brother insists that’s he’s dead already so he may as well turn the feed grinder back on and finish the job.  Rather than ruin the rest of the story I think I’ll just tell you to look for it in Stephen Jones’ “Mammoth Book of Terror”.)

12. Dead to the World by Allen Ashley

(To some there is nothing more horrifying than the mysteries our own bodies possess.  These types of stories are among my favorites.  This one involves a man whose orifices are slowly closing up day by day.  You can find this one in “The Best Horror from Fantasy Tales”)

13. The Forbidden by Clive Barker

(No horror anthology is complete without a story from Clive Barker.  If you’ve ever seen the movie “Candyman” then you should be very familiar with this story as it is the basis for that movie.  If you haven’t seen the movie quickly read this story then see the movie and let me know which you thought was better.  You can find this one in Barker’s own “In the Flesh” or in “The Best Horror from Fantasy Tales”)

14. Where There’s a Will by Richard Matheson and Richard Christian Matheson

(A father and son who are both accomplished authors came together to write this one.  Unfortunately I can’t describe much about it without giving away the twist.  All I can really say is it involves a man digging out of a grave.  This is the second to last story in Kirby McCauley’s “Dark Forces”.)

15. Sticks by Karl Edward Wagner

(There’s a reason this one has made it into so many different anthologies.  It is Karl Edward Wagner at his absolute best and I’ve saved the absolute best for the absolute last.  All I can say is it’s moody, atmospheric, and tends to stay with you long after you’ve read it.  The only reason it’s so far down on this list is because I think it’s a story you need to ease yourself into not read right off the bat.  You can find it in “Whispers”, “The Mammoth Book of Zombies”, and Wagner’s own Centipede Press edition of “Where the Summer Ends”.)

Horror Anthologies

As evidenced by my small bookcase I’m a fan of short fiction horror(and horror in general) there’s nothing I love more than a good horror story.  On the flipside there is nothing I despise more than a bad horror story(except for maybe bad sci fi see: Mission Earth).   Because of this I have amassed a sizable collection of short story anthologies.  One of my favorite things about these collections is being exposed to authors I wouldn’t be likely to find anywhere else or had no prior knowledge or interest in.  I’m a big Joe R. Lansdale and Karl Edward Wagner(see: Complete Drive-In  and Karl Edward Wagner) fan and it’s all because I read their stories in one horror anthology or another.  Sometimes it’s not the author but the story I find more compelling.  Many authors will step outside their comfort zones to write a really good horror story.  Other times a short story will influence a movie or series, which is the case with Clive Barker’s "Forbidden"(The Candyman), "Hellbound Heart"(the novella that influenced the Hellraiser series), and "Haekel’s Tale"(Masters of Horror episode of the same title).

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz

It’s about time someone made a collection of stories for fucked up little kids like me.  The weird thing is I remember this being a very popular book amongst my other classmates in elementary and it was even featured in the monthly book ordering pamphlet our teachers would give us.  The stories in this book are macabre and downright terrifying.  I think that’s why we liked it so much.  It took the kid gloves off and wasn’t afraid to give us nightmares.  It was my first exposure to urban legend classics like the escaped maniac with a hook for a hand, the babysitter being taunted by phone calls from within the house, the ominous vehicular stalker who keeps turning on his high beams, and of course Bloody Mary(this one was particularly frightening to me because the myth got passed around a lot among my friends when I was young and we even tried it a few times.  To this day I don’t like to be in dark bathrooms for very long).  There’s a section in the back that informs the reader where all these stories originated from.  I must confess as a child I didn’t bother with this part but as an adult I find it interesting.  When I was 13 I was able to afford a casket shaped box set that contained the first Scary Stories with some fake blood and an audiotape of the stories being enacted.  I wish I still had that tape.  I’d pop it in the nearest tape player right now.  Accompanying the stories are macabre and quite frightening illustrations by Stephen Gammell.  Every time I read these stories the nostalgia makes me feel like a kid again and I’m reading them for the first time.  I own the omnibus that collects all 3 books in one and I highly recommend “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” both to children and adults alike.

 Scary Stories Amazon

Scary Stories Barnes and Noble 

From the Borderlands: Stories of Terror and Madness – Edited by Elizabeth Monteleone and Thomas Monteleone

The stories in this collection aren’t so much scary but just plain odd.  Most of the stories I’ve read from this one are more about inner turmoil rather than visceral physical threats.  There’s a story about a guy who has that certain special look that people just warm to and the man who claims he has the face of god and offers to make a deal for it, there’s a story where a man wakes up with different hands every morning, a man who is slowly disappearing, and my personal favorite about a man who steals a pair of panties from a woman he lusts after, plants them in the ground, and a woman grows out of them.  I originally bought this collection solely for the Stephen King story which is also good and fits with the theme of the book but not nearly as creative as the other entries.  It’s a good book and it gives me an impression of what the stories might have been like in early issues of Weird Tales.   Check it out but be forewarned due to the quirky nature of the stories they can be hit or miss and just like any good anthology when they miss they miss bad.

From the Borderlands Amazon 

 From the Borderlands Barnes and Noble

Dark Forces – Edited by Kirby McCauley

I briefly went over this in my Who Is Karl Edward Wagner article which you can view here:  Karl Edward Wagner

I got this book as a gift from mother in 1995 making it one of the oldest books I own.  If you’ve been paying attention to this blog you’re probably shocked to find as much as I read my oldest book is only 17 years old(if you want to get technical it’s one of the oldest books I’ve had in my possession not my oldest book).  When I was in sixth grade most of the books I was interested in were R.L. Stine and Christopher Pike.  Both authors released several books a year and usually when I was done reading them I would loan them out and wouldn’t really care if my friends lost or kept them.  To Stine’s credit there was a series called Goodnight Kiss about teen vampires that I treasured and if I still had it I might be tempted to reread and review it here.  And Christopher Pike’s Wicked Heart is a pretty good one too but I’m getting a little off topic.  Because I was more interested in reading young adult novels I wasn’t too interested in reading the more adult themed stories in this book.  There are several things that set this collection apart from the others I own.  It was first appearance of Stephen King’s “The Mist”, Karl Edward Wagner’s “Where the Summer Ends”, Dennis Etchison’s “The Late Shift”, and the Silver John story “Owls Hoot in the Daytime” by Manly Wade Wellman(see Who Fears the Devil?).  All these stories are amazing and make this collection worth buying.  But if that isn’t enough to convince you it also has stories by Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson and Richard Christian Matheson, and a grisly Christmas story by Robert Bloch.  If this book suffers from anything it’s the presence of both Ramsey Campbell and Lisa Tuttle.  As stated before I own a lot of short story collections and these two authors show up in quite a few of them.  I’ve read a few stories by them and time and time again have been sorely disappointed.  I can’t honestly call either of them horror writers because their stories are always watered down and have ambiguous endings that are left to the reader’s speculation.  They go for cerebral and emotional scares but they just end up flaccid and boring.  You can skip those stories but the rest of the book is pretty good and I definitely suggest it.  As a side note I’d like to go into the introduction because it is one of the better ones I’ve read.  It goes into the history of Weird Tales, August Derleth, Arkham House, and was responsible for my interest in H.P. Lovecraft.

Dark Forces Amazon 

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The Best of H.P. Lovecraft: Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre by H.P. Lovecraft

How many times have you read or listened to a “best of” collection and thought the title was fraudulent?  I don’t know about you but I’ve found a lot of things with Best in the title anything but.  Omitting a story here and there for length(“Cool Air” and “Herbert West Reanimator”), “The Best of H.P. Lovecraft: Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre” is not one of them.  The stories collected here, “The Call of Cthulhu”, “The Rats in the Walls”(influenced the Stephen King story and movie “The Graveyard Shift”), “The Outsider”(adapted as Stuart Gordon’s “Castle Freak”), “The Colour Out of Space”(adapted as “The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill” in “Creepshow”), and my personal favorite “The Shadow Over Innsmouth”(adapted as “Dagon” by Stuart Gordon) are among Lovecraft's best.  The stories in this volume are so influential they’ve gone on to be adapted into countless movies and TV episodes(uhhhh for better or worse, most often worse) not to mention influencing spin-off stories of their own.  The Cthulhu Mythos itself has been expanded with its own fan fiction(once again for better or worse).  This volume is a great introduction for readers unfamiliar with Lovecraft’s works.  I’ve read every story in this book and some twice.  It also features an introduction by Robert Bloch who credits Lovecraft with influencing him to become a writer.  “The Best of H.P. Lovecraft” is an amazing book and I can’t recommend it highly enough.

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Blood Lite: An Anthology of Humorous Horror Stories - Edited by Kevin J. Anderson

You’d think horror and comedy are two genres that don’t mix well and for the most part you’re right.  I was almost broke and stood around the book department of Wal-Mart debating with myself whether I should get this book or not.  My biggest argument was whether I wanted to waste $5.97 on this book just for the Jim Butcher “Dresden Files” story.  I’m glad I figured what the hell and bought it anyway because this has some really good and unique stories in it.  I feel the need to point out two of the worst stories in this anthology simply because I can never quite make my mind up which I hate more.  D.L. Snell’s “Love Seat Solitaire” is clearly the most poorly written in this or any of the anthologies I’ve mentioned.  You know how people complain about how the protagonists in modern horror movies are assholes so we don’t care if horrible things happen to them?  D.L. Snell has created the same thing only in short story form.  The story opens with 3 of the most reprehensible and stupid characters I’ve ever read playing “Street Fighter 2” in their dirty, disgusting, dilapidated house.  The house is haunted by the previous occupant and true to form they taunt and mock the ghost.  It should be obvious that the ghost gets pissed and kills one of them and for added gross out “humor” attacks the other while he’s on the can and he shits all over himself.  Due to the idiotic and immature fratboy dialogue in this story and the dated video game references this story was a chore from the very beginning and just got worse as it went on.  Charlaine Harris(whom we can blame for “True Blood” on showtime) gets top billing on the cover and her story, “An Evening With Al Gore” is almost as painful as Snell’s.  As you can imagine from the title this story has a heavy handed environmental message.  That normally wouldn’t bother me but it’s like reading the novelization of “Birdemic”.  Like “Birdemic” the environmental message is so obvious it’s like someone hitting you over the head with a heavy wooden mallet.  In it a couple invites the world’s worst corporate polluters to a benefit dinner showing “An Inconvenient Truth”.  At the end they ask for donations and accuse their guests of destroying the world.  Some agree to give money to the cause and halt their polluting but others refuse and then the couple turn into werewolves and kill everybody.  There’s many reasons why this story doesn’t fit here, it’s not funny, it’s way too preachy, and it’s downright boring.  The horror element only comes out in the last two pages of the story and the payoff and punch line is really lame.  It’s like watching a chronically unfunny stand-up comedian continually bomb onstage.  As bad as those stories are 2 out of 21 isn’t bad.  The “Dresden Files” story here is good, there’s a really weird story by Joe R. Lansdale about a werebear, a story about a cute newborn baby changing things for the better in hell, a story about a couple of thrill seekers who can only get in the mood when in mortal danger, and a ghost begging a medium to excise his friend who is stuck in a dead body.  My two favorite stories deal with Lovecraftian elements.  “The Sound of Blunder” by J.A. Konrath and F. Paul Wilson where two bumbling thieves steal the necronomicon and accidently start using it.  In “The Eldritch Pastiche from Beyond the Shadow of Horror” by Christopher Welch a troubled Cthulhu fan fiction writer goes to Fan Fiction Anonymous meetings.  He is later told by a representative of the real Cthulhu the only reason the dark god doesn’t destroy earth is because he enjoys their bad fan fiction so much and since he is the worst one he must continue writing.  Just like “From the Borderlands” some of the stories can fall flat but out of the 3 Blood Lites this one is my favorite.

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The Mammoth Book of Terror – Edited by Stephen Jones

When I said “Dark Forces” was one of the oldest books I own this one is no doubt the oldest since I acquired it before I got “Dark Forces”.  This is a pretty solid anthology.  Omitting the Lisa Tuttle and Ramsey Campbell stories every story in this collection is good.  The stories range from 1932 to 1991 making this a very diverse collection.  Clive Barker’s “The Last Illusion” features his recurring characters Harry d’Amour and Philip Swan.  Barker would go on to write and direct “The Lord of Illusion” featuring these characters.  David J. Schow’s “Bunny Didn’t Tell Us” is a dark comedy about grave robbers unearthing an undead pimp.  Just like “Dark Forces” this one has Dennis Etchison’s “Late Shift”(as stated before its first appearance was in “Dark Forces”), a story about zombie slave labor in Los Angeles.  “The Mammoth Book of Terror” was also where I was first exposed to Karl Edward Wagner’s “The River of Night’s Dreaming”.  Also featured is an F. Paul Wilson favorite of mine called “Buckets” and a gruesome story by Graham Masterton called “Pig’s Dinner” that was made to order especially for this collection.  “The Mammoth Book of Terror” is another collection I highly recommend if you can get your hands on a copy.

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Best New Horror Vol. 15 – Edited by Stephen Jones

While I’m on the subject of Stephen Jones I might as well add another of his collections.  I own a few of Stephen Jones’ “Best New Horror” series and this is the absolute best.  I recently bought “The Best of Best New Horror” which features stories from the first 20 volumes of the series.  I was shocked to find that not only was what I considered the best story of this volume omitted in place for a far weaker one but both Lisa Tuttle and Ramsey Campbell were in it.  Well maybe that last part isn’t so shocking since Ramsey Campbell and Stephen Jones are BFFs and he’s appeared in every single year of the series.  But I maintain that Lisa Tuttle and Ramsey Campbell should never appear in anything with “Best” in the title, unless of course it’s Best of Mediocre Horror.  My favorite of the stories in this volume is Mike O’ Driscoll’s haunting “The Silence of the Falling Stars”.  For some reason this story just really struck a chord with me.  I empathize with the main character’s loneliness and the story’s sense of solitude.  Even if this was the only good story in this volume “Best New Horror 15” would still be my favorite for exposing me to this story.  As it turns out “The Silence of the Falling Stars” is not the only good story in this book but it left the most lasting impression.

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The Best Horror From Fantasy Tales – Edited by Stephen Jones and David Sutton

Well why not add another Stephen Jones collection while I’m at it.  With the exception of Tuttle and Campbell this man really knows his horror and that’s why I own so many of his collections.  This is a collection of stories from a pulp magazine I had never heard of.  I picked it up brand new(I think it may have been an overstock) from a secondhand bookstore because it had Jones’ name on it.  Surprisingly Ramsey Campbell is in this collection and for once(and only once) his story doesn’t suck.  I couldn’t tell you why I read his story in the first place after so many disappointments but I think I may have been enjoying this book so much I didn’t want it to end.  Anyway his story is a pretty effective Cthulhu mythos.  Joining Campbell is Robert Bloch with another great Lovecraftian story.  Hugh B. Cave, Manly Wade Wellman, Karl Edward Wagner, and Clive Barker are among the other big names.  It’s not hard to believe that these stories appeared in a pulp mag.  I’d say compared to some of the other anthologies I’ve listed here this only is merely okay.

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The Night Shift by Stephen King

Just to get an idea of how good this collection of short stories is 9 of the 20 stories have been adapted for movies and television and in some cases adapted more than once.  Stephen King’s “Maximum Overdrive” was considered so bad that they remade it as “Trucks”.  Personally it’s one of my favorite b-movies and the Ac/Dc soundtrack features some of their most recognizable hits.  Even Stephen King admits he didn’t like it and he was “coked out of his mind” during production.  Despite its faults just like Plan 9 and The Room it is very enjoyable and includes some moments from the short story that were filmed exactly how I saw them in my mind.  “Children of the Corn”, a story about a small town populated by children who have killed all the adults, was adapted to the 1984 film starring Linda Hamilton.  “Sometime They Come Back” was very loosely adapted to the 1991 movie.  “The Lawnmower Man” however has absolutely nothing to do the 1992 movie of the same name.  “The Ledge”, “Quitters INC.”, and “The Boogeyman” were adapted for the 1985 movie “Cat’s Eye”.  This is one of my favorite King adaptations and aside from the butchered version of “Boogeyman” none of the stories are horror.  Some of my favorites in this collection to the best of my knowledge have never been adapted to movies.  “The Last Rung on the Ladder” is a melodrama about a man mourning the death of his sister.  “Strawberry Spring” is a story about a rash of murders culminating with the protagonist’s realization that he is the killer.  The reason why I am including this collection rather than any of King’s other collections is the stories in this collection have a different tone than any of the others.  There’s a prevailing dread and gloom throughout most of the stories that seems missing from his later work.  

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