Horror World Book Reviews
March, 2005

Editors Note: We're proud to present one of the first reviews of Tim Lebbon's upcoming story from Necessary Evil Press

BERSERK by Tim Lebbon
Reviewed by Ron Dickie

Ten years after his only son's death, Tom Robberts is still in mourning. He drops by the pub for a pint or two, or more, on the way home from work every Friday to drown his sorrows and to be alone in a crowd of people. He's always had his suspicions about his son's death. "Training accident" was the given cause from the military, but Tom could never accept that.

One day, at his usual pub, Tom's attention is caught when he overhears two men mention the place where his son died. Listening more closer, he then hears one of them say, "They kept monsters."

Finding one of them to be sympathetic, Tom is given directions to the real location of his son's death, the place where his body is supposedly buried. Like a man possessed, Tom digs in the earth to find his son's remains, to know the truth, but instead finds something else.

Something he did not expect. Something not truly alive or dead.

And unfortunately, one of the people who buried it there have found out what Tom has done, and he will stop at nothing to hide this secret.

With bits of the truth revealed, Tom sets out to discover what really happened to his son Steven, including whether or not Steven is actually dead after all.

I have to warn you right now, exercise caution when reading BERSERK. Otherwise, you will wind up setting the pages on fire from flipping through them too quickly. This is a one-sitting book, and you will be hard pressed to put it down once you begin. Make no mistake, this is not a short novel. This is a full-length, action-packed thrill ride that you'll want to devour in its entirety.Longtime fans may notice a slight style change from Lebbon's earlier work, but the quality of the writing and the wild imagination is still there. The main characters all shine through in this one, and you'll find yourself sympathizing with not only Tom Robberts, but with the antagonist, Cole, as well. Both men believe what they are doing is right and just, and we the readers are kept happily guessing throughout as well. The final solution will shock you.

An excellent story, coupled with NECESSARY EVIL PRESS' usual standard of quality will make this a must-own for collectors. NEP will only publish as many copies as are pre-ordered, so don't delay or you will miss out. Order it today from Necessary Evil Press.

***************

DARK DISCOVERIES
By Steve Vernon

I was one of those writers lucky enough to discover Cemetery Dance, way back when it was just getting started. Richard didn't pay much, and the physical quality of the magazine left a lot to be desired, but you could sense the determination behind this budding young publication.

I feel that same humble thrust behind DARK DISCOVERIES. Published out of Milwaukee, by James R. Beach, the physical quality of DARK DISCOVERIES is remarkable for a fledgling publication. The covers are dark and well laid out. The black and white covers, obviously a necessity of budget, add to the magazine. To me they conjure up those glorious old black and white movies. I kind of like the black and white, and don't look forward to the time when this magazine moves on to color covers.

And move on it shall. I'm very impressed with the fiction line up in the second and third issue. Issue 2 has tales from Edo Van Belkom, Bill Gauthier, Brett McBean, and William P. Simmons. Issue 3 gives us Gary Braunbeck, William P. Simmons, Simon Clark and Tim Lebbon. There's interviews with Gary Braunbeck, Tom Piccirilli, Simon Clark, Tim Lebbon, Bev Vincent, David Niall Wilson, Kealan Patrick Burke and others. Meaty magazines, with a nice balance of fiction, interviews and review columns.

As I'm writing this the 4th issue is hitting newstands and is available through Shocklines. I recommend checking this magazine out. In a year or two the early issues may be something of a collector's item. I believe DARK DISCOVERIES is a bit of a discovery.

***************

IN THE MIDNIGHT MUSEUM by Gary Braunbeck
Reviewed by Nanci Kalanta

Martin Tyler is at the end of his rope; with no family, no friends and no prospects he decides it's time to check out. With a belly full of pills and detailed plans for the final call he decides to drive through Cedar Hill one last time. During his travels he sees a much younger version of himself accompanied by a weird and fantastic creature, stopping to investigate he finds himself in front of a crisis center. Entering, he is immediately admitted to the local health care facility for observation.

Martin sees and hears things while under observation that leads him to believe that his life isn't as empty as he first believes. He meets Jerry who shows him the world behind the veil of blindness we all wear and charges him with saving that shadow world and the world that we perceive. One of the architects of this world is dying and Martin must enter the architect's world and destroy the evil within.

Gary Braunbeck uses words as an artist uses a brush. Painting fantastical imagery and raw emotion that leaves the reader breathless. This is a story that needs to be read more than once to capture all of the strokes of Gary's brush and the hidden nuances and emotions that makes Gary one of the grandmasters of the genre.

Available Spring, 2005 from Necessary Evil Press

***************

DEAD IN THE WEST, by Joe Lansdale
Review By Steve Vernon

You talk to a lot of folks about champeen mojo storyteller Joe Lansdale, 'en their eyes'll kinda go flat like steamrolled pennies. "That horror writer feller? The guy who's always making fun of Texas?"

Well sir, it ain't necessarily so. Joe Lansdale, champeen mojo storyteller, hardly ever writes in horror. It scares the beer-sweat of him too badly, I think. Mostly he messes with that Hap and Leonard amateur detective act he's got going for him, and a bit of new-wharish, mystery stuff he writes. The only horror he knows is the fat Mexican chick with the moustache who takes in Saturday night oil ranglers for twenty dollars a pop, (no matter how hard he claims he never knowed her).

Well, I can tell you something about Mr. Lansdale. Something he might druther like to ferget. One of his earliest books, way back in 1986, DEAD IN THE WEST, is an honest to piss-in-your-silk-knickers horror novel. We're talking walking spider vampire Indian spirits and whole townful of unrested dead. He don't ever come out and say zombies, but a cactus is a cactus, especially if you're sitting on it. Whether or not he'd like to admit it, that gent's a horror writer, and I ain't just singing in a coyote key.

DEAD IN THE WEST opens up with a stagecoach ride through hell. A dark stranger walks into town. A curse laid upon the townspeople. Holy ground and unclean demons. Gunpowder and guts a'hanging like crepe paper in a trailer park marriage. It's a fast read, made faster by Lansdales bear-trap-tight prose. You all ought to run on down to the Amazon and hunt up a copy, because right now the 1986 Space & Time paperback is an honest-to-Houston collector's item. Don't wait too long though. The party-poopers at Night Shade Books are coming out with a brand new hardcover at the end of March, for a measly price. They've got a brand new introduction cluttering up the scenery, and have gone and cleaned up all of those highly collectible typographical errors'n such.

I recommend you shovel out your fifty or sixty bucks for your collector's item Space & Time paperback, all the way from 1986, so that you can get the hoss-laugh on all those poor hombres who waste their twenty five bucks on a brand new Night Shade hardcover copy, with cleaned up text and nonessential introduction. Why bother cluttering up your bookshelf with such brand new fancy economically priced literature, when you can grab yourself a genuine ratty old paperback?

Or maybe you just better hotfoot on over to Shocklines and place yourself a preorder to Nightshade, before the rest of them mule wranglers swoop down like a hawk onto quail and snag up this jim-dandified bargoon of the century.

Now where'd I put my spitoon? Here, hold this would ya?

Previous reveiws now appear in the Archives

 

Sponsored by: