Delirium Books / February 2008
Reviewed by: Michele Lee

While many writers strive to establish themselves by spreading their stories as far and wide as possible in the early phases of their careers, there comes a time when writers with some respectable notches on their literary belts wisely create a collection for those readers coming late to the game or those who’ve just missed a few stories along the way. Collections are a perfect opportunity for genre fans to glean bits and pieces of a writer they may have glossed over in a table of contents or bypassed on a bookstore shelf.

Gleefully Macabre Tales, Strand’s first such collection, brings together thirty two of the dark scribe’s stories in a single volume for the first time. Strand's stories are often fast reads, even the longer ones. Generally, the stories contained within fall into one of three main categories.

The first category of stories consists mainly of tales of Strand’s trademark silly and gory variety. Stories such as "Really, Really Ferocious", "A Bite for a Bite" and Strand's infamous losing “Gross Out” tales from the annual World Horror Convention contests are stylistically more slice of life than plot-based. They are the literary equivalent of junk food; they taste good but are essentially empty calories.

At first glance, the second category of Strand's work represented here appears to be much like the first, but upon closer inspection, the reader will find something deeper. "High Stakes", for example, is a story that begins with a man winning a free game on a very special slot machine and ends with a pointedly insightful commentary on human nature. "Sex Potion #147" takes aim at human compulsions by telling the story of a sexually-deprived woman who uses alternative means of attracting partners only to discover that not all people love or lust in the same ways. Not even the obvious negatives of using a gypsy- made sex potion deter her for long.

In the last category, readers will find stories that aren't meant to be funny at all, or use only the slightest touch of humor to draw them into something quite serious. "Special Features" is a story told entirely through dialog that starts as a director's commentary on a movie – one that turns out to be a snuff film. "The Three Little Pigs" is a dark take on the increasingly time-softened fairy tale that harkens back to the Grimm Brothers roots of stories like "The Juniper Tree". Even "Everything Has a Purpose", which starts out in much the same way as some of the more comical tales, hides an ending that is less gallows humor and more profoundly disturbing.

Strand's stories in Gleefully Macabre Tales also run the gamut of genres - from the western-flavored “Them Old West Mutations", in which monstrous cockroaches devastate a town, to the more mainstream "Glimpses", in which the author peeks into a pair of characters' lives and reveals that kids often grow into terrible people. Strand has even included a short script, "Munchies" - the bemusing tale of a cannibal on a blind date - and a story aimed at young adults, “Calling Mr. Potty-Mouth".

Strand's creativity is on full display in stories such as "I Hold the Stick", the tale of a sadistic, narcissistic man who reins over an amusement park ride line, and "Howard Rises Again", a Christmas-themed story featuring a most memorable villain (think iconic 7-11 concession here). Several of the stories included in the collection are true marvels of writing, such as "Wasting Grandpa", a nonstop tale that blends Murphy’s Law and murder, or "The Bad Man in the Blue House", a genuinely creepy tale of stalking and psychosis.

Strand uses the short story format to shock, humor, and terrify his readers. From the sheer meanness of "The Bad Candy House", the tale of a elderly man at war with the neighborhood kids over Halloween pranks, and “Mr. Sensitive", in which a man is punished for his lothario ways with testicular torture, Strand's stories don't just play with words ("Quite A Mess"), pop culture ("Roasting Weenies by Hellfire"), and human behavior ("Abbey's Shriek") - they also play with readers themselves, using them as tools, even to the point of including them in the story ("Brainbugs") or making them work for their terror (as in the interactive decoding tale “Secret Message”).

Gleefully Macabre Tales, a collection likely to achieve cult classic status for good reason, is a must-buy for horror lovers.

Purchase Jeff Strand’s Gleefully Macabre Tales.

Doorways Publications / August 2007
Reviewed by: Vince A. Liaguno

Single-author short story collections are often hit or miss with readers. While some authors excel at the craft of the short story, others prove that the format isn’t everyone’s forte. Fortunately, Shaun Jeffrey falls firmly into the former category with this deliciously macabre collection of 15 twisted tales dealing with observations on death – often told from the viewpoint of the deceased or soon-to-be so.

The collection starts of strong with the whimsically titled “Flibbertigibbet”, a well-crafted tale steeped in Scottish lore and dripping with atmosphere. Jeffrey takes a jab at corporate life here with the simple story of a revived pagan God loose on the moors of a tiny Scottish island marked to become a commercial resort and the company man who learns that corporate dedication doesn’t quite hold the promises he thought. Jeffrey excels at description here, from the baleful mourning of the stag-like creature to the seaside fishing village and old pub.

While in “Flibbertigibbet” one marvels at how Jeffrey manages to pull off a fairly ambitious story in a mere ten pages, the second story demonstrates that economy doesn’t always satiate. “Watchers” boasts the most intriguing premise of the collection – a modern-day lover’s lane with a voyeuristic twist – and blends elements of impending dread with the erotic to excellent effect. The inherent problem here is that this is a story with long legs that’s chopped down at the knees. While satisfying, the story feels constricted and rushed in the short word count, leaving the reader to wonder what horrors the story would have held had it been allowed to breathe a little. It’s a bit like eating one’s favorite meal while standing up, on the go; you simply wish that you had the time to sit down properly and savor every morsel.

In “Paranoid”, Jeffrey puts a uniquely disturbing spin on Tooth Fairy mythology, here set against the backdrop of a thinly-veiled psychiatric wing and employing amnesia as an atypically clever red herring to keep readers sympathizing with the wrong character. One of the finest of the collection, “Paranoid” is a showcase for Jeffrey’s unmistakable talent in the short story format.

“The Tunnel” is a surprisingly effective ghost story that explores the bonds between brothers and how those bonds transcend life and death. Imbued with a sense of childhood nostalgia that evokes Stephen King’s own uncanny explorations of adolescence best exemplified in It, Hearts in Atlantis, and his short story “The Body”, “The Tunnel” spooks while tugging on heartstrings, leaving the reader with a satisfying mixture that’s simultaneously bittersweet and chilling.

It’s in stories like “The Quilters of Thurmond” that readers really catch a glimpse of the storytelling genius that Jeffrey seems destined for. With shades of How to Make an American Quilt crossed with The Witches of Eastwick, “Quilters” offers up a delicious dose of surrealism wrapped in a tidy little tale of rites of passage and how our own sense of tradition and history are integral to our future well-being. Jeffrey fashions a cautionary tale here, warning readers not to forget where they come from. It may very well be what saves us in the end.

Like the aforementioned “Watchers”, “Sin Eater” also suffers from its meager length. Jeffrey sets out to put a fresh spin on the idea of a creature who sustains itself by feeding on the sins of others, but the story fell quickly flat for this reader and left hunger pains in place of a full stomach.

Luckily, in the title story of the collection, Jeffrey again boils an ambitious narrative down into a breakneck-paced story in which every word counts and the reader is left engorged on a satisfying story of life and death and what happens when one straddles the line somewhere in between. A car accident, marital infidelity, betrayal and revenge come full circle in this action-packed story.

“Life Cycle” is a trippy, hallucinogenic tale of a drug-addicted mother-to-be and her offspring. Again richly steeped in atmosphere and mood, “Cycle” nonetheless feels slightly out of place in the collection. Jeffrey once again shows remarkable imagination here as he explores deeper themes in which the bonds between mother and child are put to the extreme.

Jeffrey channels Brian Keene’s Dead Sea in “Dark Inside” in which cruise ship passengers are overrun by some particularly nasty rodents carrying an unnamed plague that turns them into the living dead. Whereas much of popular zombie fiction is told from the survivors’ POV, Jeffrey adds a refreshing first-person narrative to his zombie contribution, allowing the reader to experience the transformation from living to dead to living dead first-hand. It’s a wise choice that saves the story from cliché.

As a reader, I’m again struck by King’s influence on Jeffrey’s work with the well-crafted “Clockwork”. With its distinctive Pet Sematary vibe, “Clockwork” is a creepy chiller in which a deaf boy uses his penchant for making clocks to reanimate some unfortunate critters. Jeffrey soccer-punches here with his King-esque ending.

“Venetian Kiss” is the standout of the collection. Building on the anxiety of its “stranger in a strange land” theme, “Kiss” tells the story of an ill-fated tourist couple on holiday in Italy during carnivale who run afoul of a secret society of decidedly carnivorous Venetians. Again, Jeffrey uses his carnavalesque setting to optimum effect – from the 18^th century masks and costumes to the classical music emanating throughout the narrow streets and gondola-laden waterways of Venice – and creates a thoroughly moody nightmare. It’s a shame that Showtime decided to axe its Masters of Horror anthology series because this reviewer could easily see “Venetian Kiss” being adapted for the screen.

Having explored the bonds between brothers and those between mothers and their children in previous stories, Jeffrey ventures into father-son territory for “The Peacock Lawn”. A malevolent marshland takes center stage in this story of a son who has failed to live up to a tyrannical father’s expectations and is reduced to a stuttering incompetent in the man’s paternal eyes. Strong imagery courtesy of shrieking peacocks, a labyrinthine hedge maze, and spectral visions in a foggy marsh add up to an effective little shiver with a competent Tales from the Crypt-like ending.

Narcissism and the idolatry of celebrity are the vices in need of otherworldly retribution in the red carpet shocker “Envy”. Perfect for this time of year as we are about to be inundated by an awards show season in which what dress someone wears overshadows actual artistic achievement, “Envy” tells the story of a rising actress who’s consumed by finding the perfect dress that will make her the stand-out at an upcoming movie premiere. In the most classic “be careful what you wish for” sense, the young starlet finds out that high fashion can have dire consequences. Brilliantly satiric in this age of Paris Hilton superficiality, “Envy” is another standout in the collection.

Even talented writers aren’t immune from current trends as Jeffrey proves with his uneven “The Snake Charmer”. What starts out as the promising and titillating premise of wife swapping gone bad (or more on the “be careful what you wish for” theme) quickly goes Hostel on the reader with a ghastly climax involving genital torture. Not for the faint of heart.

The collection ends somewhat abruptly with the shortest story in the compilation, “Park Life”. Jeffrey seems determined to show us what he can do in as few words as possible, and he ably accomplishes that with this page-and-a- half zoological shocker in which tables are turned and all is not what one thinks at first glance.

Reading Voyeurs of Death is like going to a wedding and gorging on the appetizers – delectable tidbits of taste that aren’t necessarily satisfying individually but satiate when consumed in volume. The handful of tales offered here show a writer of notable promise and talent, one who has a refreshingly original imagination and the lean writing chops to make us hungry for the full buffet likely to follow. Even when occasionally under seasoned (“Watchers”, “Sin Eater”, “The Snake Charmer”), Jeffrey’s five-star ingredients (“Venetian Kiss”, “The Quilters of Thurmond”, “Clockwork”, and “Envy”) make Voyeurs a mouth-watering stew of short fiction. Pick out the carrots and consume heartily.

Purchase Shaun Jeffrey’s Voyeurs of Death.

William Morrow / October 2007
Reviewed by: Vince A. Liaguno

It was inevitable that this collection of ghost stories by Joe Hill, originally published by PS Publishing in the UK in 2005, would find a second life following the massive success of his New York Times bestselling Heart-Shaped Box novel earlier this year. And it’s a good thing that it has because it would seem a shame to have the gems of short stories contained within relegated to the small press in which many first appeared without the chance for mainstream consumption.

Much ado has been made out of Joe Hill being his own man, one (understandably) reluctant to suffer the comparison to his famous father. In this collection of fifteen tales, however, it’s difficult not to read one without thinking of the other when Hill takes on so many of his father’s favorite subject matters and thematic backdrops: baseball, the bonds between fathers and sons, the trials and tribulations of boyhood.

The collection starts off with “Best New Horror”, the story of an uninspired editor whose obsession with tracking down the author of a disturbing short story leads him afoul of some seriously deranged literary rednecks. Solid and engaging, “Best New Horror” is an odd choice to kick off an anthology of ghost stories, and it hints less at twentieth-century ghosts than it does at 1980’s slasher movies. Even “Buttonboy”, the short story within the short story here, hints at the misogyny of the slasher era, so that by the pull of the first chainsaw ripcord at an isolated farmhouse, it’s clear we’ve crossed into Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Wrong Turn territory. “20^th Century Ghost”, on the other hand, would have been the ideal leadoff – obviousness of its title aside. The story of a haunted movie theater and the young girl who haunts it, “Ghost” offers a true ghost story in the most traditional sense – one that Hill imbues with an epic feel in a mere twenty pages.

Whereas it took years for King to develop his knack for subtler stories that speak more to the human condition than to the anatomy of fear, Hill bypasses this learning curve altogether with “Pop Art”. Told here in a loving, fable-like narrative, this deeply affecting tale of a teenage boy and his inflatable friend will surprise. Hill nails the bittersweet nostalgia of that first true, best childhood friend. Anyone who can remember the loss of that childhood friend – the one who moved away or was tragically struck by childhood disease or whose presence simply faded over time – will be awestruck by Hill’s poignancy. The last thing one expects when reading a horror anthology is the warmth of their own tears rolling down their cheeks; don’t be surprised when your eyes well up reading the final pages of this remarkable, heartrending story.

Hill switches gears from childhood poignancy to adolescent anxieties in “You Will Hear the Locust Sing”, in which a teenage boy transforms into a giant locust and wreaks havoc on the town he is otherwise doomed to suffer. While immediately reminiscent of those 1950’s, radiation-era B-movie monsters, “Locust” has some serious underlying post-Columbine subtext that warns of kids pushed to the edge. Likewise, “Abraham’s Boys” warns of fathers pushing sons too far in their desire to have them carry on the family legacy in this expansion on the Van Helsing vampire mythos.

It’s back to ghosts in “The Black Phone”, a chilling tale of child abduction, ghostly revenge, and the resiliency of children’s spirits that will ring especially relevant in this age of Amber alerts. Hill expertly blends the harrowing realism of kidnapping with the spooky surrealism of an antique phone that transmits otherworldly calls.

The fine line between heroes and villains is explored in the next two stories – “In the Rundown” and “The Cape.” In the former, Wyatt is an aimless video store clerk who finds himself an accidental Good Samaritan and makes a shocking discovery. The reader realizes that he’s been tragically set-up, caught between two equally hopeless situations just like the fateful Little League play that left him trapped between first and second bases and seemingly derailed his future. In the latter, brotherly rivalry and the roles brothers are relegated to playing in each other’s lives take the form of a magical superhero cape that enables flight. Both are well-executed stories, if middling concepts.

“Last Breath” is by far the creepiest tale in the anthology, a unique and clever spin on the classic ghost story. A retired doctor traps the last breaths of his dying patients, bottling them and putting them on display in a macabre “museum of silence.” The story is unnerving and atmospheric, with the perfect Twilight Zone ending. “Dead-Wood”, on the other hand, is the least effective entry in the collection. The shortest of the stories in the collection, it gets reluctantly swallowed up in the middle and almost comes off as a mindless distraction that interrupts the flow. Proving again that placement of stories within an anthology is key, “Dead-Wood” would have been better served as an italicized introduction to either an individual story or the collection itself.

Every anthology has a story or two that never quite hits its mark; “The Widow’s Breakfast” is that story here. Killian, a homeless drifter who hops boxcars and relies on the kindness of strangers for sustenance, is taken in by a kindly widow who serves him up a hearty breakfast and gives him some of her dead husband’s warm clothes. The story chugs along nicely as another fine example of Hill’s talents in literary realism, with themes of loss central to the tale. Disappointingly, the ending derails an otherwise likable story with an incongruous hint of horror in the form of a ghoulish game being played by the widow’s daughters. The reader is jolted by the abrupt turn in mood and is left hankering for a story that never comes in a creepy scene that seems to exist solely to support the (admittedly) killer closing line.

Ghosts of past memories haunt the protagonist in “Bobby Conroy Comes Back from the Dead”, a solid example of Hill’s ability to paint a literary fiction foreground against a horror-tinged background. When two ex-lovers unexpectedly meet on the 1977 film set of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead, the specters of unrequited love come back for struggling actor Robert Conroy. A poignant tale of humans reconnecting and finding acceptance when life moves us in different directions, “Bobby Conroy” is both an engaging portrait of two people trying to sort through the distance of years and an obvious fan letter to the creator of the Night of the Living Dead film franchise.

Hill returns to the surrealism of Twilight Zone territory in “My Father’s Mask”. Imaginary games, creepy masks, and some decidedly villainous playing cards masquerading as people are at the center of this eerily effective story about the relationships between mothers and fathers and sons, with allegorical whispers of marital infidelity, divorce, and the perceptiveness of children.

The collection wisely closes with the haunting novella, “Voluntary Committal.” As if the final paper in a masters course in short story writing, “Committal” bridges all the gaps, incorporates all the lessons learned, and deftly blends horror and literary fiction in one last hurrah of a tale. Essentially a story about the bonds between brothers, simultaneously tenuous and unbreakable, and the devastating effects of schizophrenia on families, “Committal” skillfully balances between the eerie and the earnest. There are plenty of genuinely creepy moments here amongst the labyrinthine cardboard box forts that double as otherworldly portals into the unknown. With this imaginative and layered story, Hill easily steps out from behind any lineage shadows others might be liable to cast him in.

But wait. Like the surprise ending in a horror film, Hill hides one last tale in the acknowledgements section. “Scheherazade’s Typewriter” concerns a ghost in the machine – in this case the titular IBM Selectric – and the notion that ghosts write about the dead with great authority. Following a frustrated writer’s death, his trusty electric typewriter maintains his nightly writing ritual – three pages a night – and the results amaze his family. Toiling writers take heart: success on the bestseller list is only a death certificate away.

Fans of Heart-Shaped Box will no doubt enjoy discovering Joe Hill’s literary beginnings with the stories included in 20th Century Ghosts. Although uneven at times in theme, the collection nonetheless succeeds on the strength of Hill's uncanny observations of the human condition. Consider the precision with which he nails the solitude of adolescence in this passage from "The Cape":

It was misery to try and keep up with other kids, so I stayed inside after school and read comic books. I couldn't tell you who my favorite hero was. I don't remember any of my favorite stories. I read comics compulsively, without any particular pleasure, or any particular thought, read them only because when I saw one I couldn't not read it. I was in thrall to cheap newsprint, lurid colors, and secret identities. The comics had a druglike hold over me, with their images of men shooting through the sky, shredding the clouds as they passed through them. Reading them felt like life. Everything else was a little out of focus, the volume turned too low, the colors not quite bright enough.

Not every novelist makes a good short story writer; not every short story writer makes a good novelist. But Joe Hill proves he is adept at both, showing a literary maturity that belies his years and a promise of even better things to come with stories here like “Pop Art”, “Last Breath”, and “Voluntary Committal”. Fans can settle in for a long ride. Cynics can blame in on the genes.

Purchase Joe Hill’s 20^th Century Ghosts.

Gauntlet Press / January 2007
Reviewed by: Martel Sardina

Closing Time and Other Stories is Jack Ketchum’s latest collection of short fiction. The nineteen-piece collection contains hard-to-find recent stories, a new, previously unpublished story, “Hotline,” and the 2003 Bram Stoker Award Winner for Best Long Fiction, “Closing Time.” Also included are afterwords for each story in which Ketchum gives readers a glimpse into the story’s origin and a bonus chapbook of Ketchum’s tributes to the late Richard Laymon in those editions purchased directly from the publisher.

The collection opens with “Returns,” an emotionally wrought tale about the connection between a man and his beloved cat that transcends life. “Damned If You Do” follows a man seeking therapy who has secrets that he is not yet ready to reveal.

In “Elusive,” the main character, Kovelant, wants to see a fictional movie called Sleepdirt but fails with every attempt. There is an old wives’ tale about not being able to die in your dreams, and Ketchum wonders if the same is true about movies here. If your death were captured on film, would you be able to watch it?

The standout in the collection in terms of craft is “Snarl, Hiss, Spit, Stalk.” The story is told in present tense, in a minimalist style with limited use of adverbs and adjectives and many one-word sentences. It is a testament to Ketchum’s skill as a writer to be able to craft such a fun, fully developed tale in as few words as he used.

Ketchum’s novels contain moments of humor or joy juxtaposed by some of the most horrific events imaginable. The same can be said of his short fiction. Story selection and placement are key factors in the overall enjoyment of any anthology or short fiction collection, and it is tricky business getting that balance right. This collection features stories like “At Home With The VCR” that are downright funny. “Hotline” is filled with irony and dark humor. “Consensual” is a nice mix of humor and erotic horror. Ketchum then progresses to some thought-provoking, gut-wrenching pieces such as “The Fountain,” “Brave Girl,” “Do You Love Your Wife?” and “Closing Time.” Readers will be pleasantly surprised by the juxtapositions, the way the pieces ebb and flow.

Gauntlet Press released three versions of Closing Time and Other Stories, a 500-copy numbered edition for $40, a 500-copy numbered edition with a leather slipcase for $60, and also a 52-copy lettered traycased edition for $150. The lettered edition contains four poems that are not included in the numbered editions.

For readers wary that $40 is pricey for a short story collection, this reviewer felt she got her money’s worth. Fans looking for a more reasonably priced collection, however, may want to take a look at Ketchum’s Peaceable Kingdom, which was released in mass-market paperback from Leisure Books back in 2003.

Purchase Jack Ketchum's Closing Time and Other Stories