Biting Dog Press

Since Biting Dog Press was nice enough to arrange for me to interview Nancy Collins for episode 81 of Horror Addicts, I thought I would write about who they are and what they have to offer. Biting Dog Press is a small independent book publisher that specializes in producing limited edition collectable books and e-books. All of their collectable books are handmade and limited to no more then 300 copies.

One of the collectable books they have includes  The Resurrection And The Life by Brian Keene which was limited to 250 signed hardcover copies. The book was produced in the style of a medieval manuscript and tells the tale of a shocking twist from the Book of John. They also have limited edition books from Edgar Allen Poe, Neil Gaiman and Jack Ketchum.

Biting Dog also has quite a few e-books available. Among them is Through Darkest America by Neal Barrett  Jr. Which I reviewed earlier in the season and its sequel Dawn’s Uncertain Light. The sequel follows a young man named Howie Ryder as he travels to Silver Island which was meant to be a symbol of how America was recovering after the great war. In reality the island is a concentration camp where genetic engineering is being done and his sister is being held captive.

Some other books from Biting Dog Press includes: The Transformed Mouse by Jack Ketchum which is a fable aimed at adults but not for people that fear mice. Murder Mysteries by Neil Gaiman which is about an angel who was murdered in heaven before the fall. Then there is Suffer The Flesh by Monica J. O Rourke which tells the tale of a woman named Zoey who was kidnapped in Manhattan and is about to learn what ecstasy and pain is really about.

Another good book that I just finished reading from Biting Dog Press is Knuckles And Tales by Nancy Collins. This is a collection of gothic short stories and novelettes all set in the South. Some of the things you’ll find in  this anthology include a half catfish half woman that lives in the Mississippi River, a half alligator half man that attacks fishermen, a traveling sideshow with a snake charmer, a geek that bites the head off of chickens, a voodoo priest who is leading his undead family out for revenge and an old witch who can turn your luck around for a price.

One of my favorite stories in this collection and really there isn’t a bad story in this anthology is Billy Fearless. Billy is not the sharpest knife in the drawer and hes not exactly stupid but he does have a tendency to take everything at face value and is immune to fear. Thinking that he is an idiot his father sends him away with some money and tells him to go out into the world,  make your fortune and never return. Billy leaves and comes to a little hotel in front of a haunted mansion on a lake. Billy gets dared to spend three nights in the mansion. Several people have been brave enough to enter the mansion but none have lived to tell the tale . Billy is not a normal guy though and the evil spirits that haunt the house may have met their match. I loved how Billy is presented in this story, hes a  nice person that wants to help people but because he is a little slow and never scared, people get the wrong idea. The end of the story is hilarious and I loved it when the evil spirit in charge of haunting the mansion confronts Billy. This story teaches that being righteous does have its rewards.

Another great story from Knuckles and Tales is The Two Headed Man. This is kind of a bizarre love story with an equally bizarre sex scene. It all starts when a man shows up at a diner just before it closes, he unzips his coat and the waitress and cook are surprised to see that he has two heads…or does he? I don’t want to tell any more about this story because it would ruin the surprise. What makes this story good is that it teaches that even people who are a little different can find love and never judge a book by its cover. Also the characters were beautifully written, I could relate to all of them and wanted to see them have a happy ending.

Nancy Collins makes the rural south come alive in Knuckles and Tales and I enjoyed the fact that three of the stories uses a traveling carnival and sideshow as its settings. If you like horror with a mix of comedy and old legends then you’ll want to check this one out.

Two takes on Vampires

I recently read two books that take a very different look at what vampires are like. There are a lot of vampire books and movies out there and each one has a different idea on what vampires should be like. The fact that you can have so many different takes on these mythical creatures is probably why people never get tired of them. We’ve had stories about vampires dating back to 1819 and vampires are just as popular today as they were in the 1800’s.

The first book I want to take a look at is from Nancy Collins who has written quite a few vampire novels including the Vamps series of novels and the Sonja Blue series. The book that I’m talking about here is the fourth book in the Sonja Blue series called  A Dozen Black Roses. This book was originally released in 1996, the version that I read was a revised edition published by Biting Dog Press last year.

A Dozen Black Roses takes place in part of a large U.S. city called Deadtown. The citizens of Deadtown are made up of drug addicts, alcoholics, gang members and vampires. There are two vampires that are fighting for control of Deadtown. One is Lord Esher who was good friends with a certain horror author from the 1800’s. The other is Lord Sinjon who founded Deadtown and is a much older vampire then Esher.

Everyone in Deadtown lives in fear of Esher and Sinjon but things change when Living vampire and monster hunter Sonja Blue comes to town to put an end to both vampires. Sonja soon discovers that destroying the vampires may not be as easy as she thinks when she meets a boy named Ryan whose mother is being brainwashed into marrying Lord Esher. Sonja promises to save Ryan’s mother but Esher practices black magic and has power that may be to much for Sonja to handle.

A Dozen Black Roses is a bloody good time. There are some great characters in this book, including an alcoholic priest with a troubled past and an aging hippie that doesn’t take crap from anyone. I really enjoyed the backstory on Esher and Sinjon. Both vampires even when they were human only cared about having power over others but their personalities are very different.  Also the way they gained their power is  different as well as how they conduct themselves. Esher has plans on expanding outside of Deadtown and through black magic has a more loyal following then Sinjon. Sinjon on the other hand is satisfied being the drug lord over Deadtown and still dresses and acts as he did in the 1700’s. Nancy Collin’s vampires have very unique peronalities but all have the same motivations which to me makes them more interesting.

My favorite part of the book was how Eddie and Sonja became surrogate parents for Ryan.  These two characters don’t have any experience with children but when Eddie finds Ryan eating out of a dumpster he does what he feels he has to do by taking Ryan in. Sonja on the other hand makes the promise to get Ryan’s mother back and shows a different side to herself when Ryan shows his feelings for her.

I also enjoyed the action scenes in this book. One scene I didn’t see coming was when the townspeople have decided they’ve had enough of hiding in fear and go through “changes” as they decide to rid Deadtown of  lowlifes. Another good one was when two gang members are forced to fight to the death naked, while suspended in a cage above an audience of bloodthirsty vampires. This scene will hurt to read if you are a guy. I also liked the suspense that buils towards the end as Sonja prepares to take on Esher.  A Dozen Black Roses is definitly worth your time.

In A Dozen Black Roses the vampires are after power. This is quite a bit different from the vampires in Vikings, Vampires and Mailmen by  Kevin Glennon. In Kevin’s book the vampires just want to eat humans, not just suck their blood, no thats to easy, these vampires want to eat you.

Vampires, Vikings and Mailmen is about the few brave men that make up the United States Vampire Service, a secret government contractor that is dedicated to exterminating vampires. The USVS is busy trying to stop a vampire outbreak in Alabama when they discover a strange hidden chamber that is drawing vampires to the south like a magnet. Can the five man team stop the horde of vampires that are moving into Alabama? It’s going to take a lot of firepower to stop them, but this crew has the weapons and the knowledge to kick some vampire butt.

This book has a lot of action in it but my favorite part was actually a non action scene. There’s a point where the  feds that fund the USVS is giving their theories on how they think vampires came to America. The people in the USVS laugh at them and tell them they’re wrong. Once they get away from the feds they complain that the feds have just figured out what the USVS already knows and now the feds are going to take credit for it. This to me represented the us/them attitude between management and workers which exsists on all jobs. I thought it was funny to see that it exsists with government funded vampire killers as well.

Another item I liked was how the book tells where the vampires came from and the history of the people whose job it is to stop them. I also liked how the USVS work together as a team in classifying vampires and on their battle plan to fight them. A lot of detail is given on vampire fighting procedures and I think people that have a military background will appreciate how the weapons and vehicles they use are described. The only thing I would like more information on, was how the secret chamber that attracts the vampires works.

Vampires, Vikings and Mailmen is more of a military action type novel then a horror novel but I think this book is still something that horror fans will enjoy. I noticed that in a lot of the reviews people say it would make a great action movie, I would definitly have to agree. If you want to read Knightmist’s take on Vampires, Vikings and Mailmen click here. To find out more about the book  go to the official website at usvs.info.

Through Darkest America and The Midnight Creature Feature

This book  may not fit the classic definition of horror but I think its one that the readers of this blog will enjoy. Its called Through Darkest America by Neal Barret Jr. Its set in a post apocalypse America several years after a nuclear war. The star of  the book is a 12 year old boy named Howie. Howie lives with his family on a farm. In this alternate reality there are no big cities anymore and there is no wildlife with the exception of birds which the holy scriptures call unclean and some strange hairy creatures called horses which are very different from the horses we know.

Howie believes that the government is always right, his dad is the wisest man around, his mother is the most beautiful woman in the world and his sister is a pest. Things change quickly though because a revolution is coming and Howie has to grow up and he quickly realizes that the world is very different place then he believed it was. Through Darkest America is a coming of age story set in a post apocalyptic world where everyone seems to have an agenda and no one can be trusted.

During the course of this book and within a short period of time you watch Howie go from a boy to a man, you see him survive a couple of horrible tragedies, fight in a couple of battles that he didn’t want to be a part of and watch him get tortured for information he doesn’t have. What makes this story great is you really feel for Howie, you feel for him as he asks his father to explain things he doesn’t understand and you are rooting for him as he tries to escape from a city during a war between the loyalists and the rebels. Through Darkest America was originally released in 1988 and  recently was rereleased through Biting Dog Press. I think this book deserves to be considered a classic.

I wasn’t sure I wanted to talk about this book here, because I kept thinking to myself that it wasn’t really a horror novel. but when I started to read it, right away there was a scene that made me realize that this book could be considered horror just as much as it would be considered speculative fiction. At one point Howie is told by his father to go see to the stock that they are taking to be slaughtered for meat. As the author is describing the stock you suddenly realize these aren’t pigs or cows. The stock is humans. So in Neal Barret Jr’s vision of a post apocalypse America, humans are keeping other humans as food, and to me that makes this book horror.

This book is very dark and there really isn’t a happy ending but at the same time it is a very well written fast paced adventure with a lot of suspense thrown in. I loved how Howie is forced, to soon to become a man and how little by little he sees that everything he believed as a child was wrong. you also see his quest to figure out what is right in this world and a new place to call home. I highly recommend this book.

If your a hard core horror fan then you should be familiar with the books of May December publications. May December has put some great horror anthologies together that any fan of the genre can appreciate. A good example of this is an anthology called Midnight Creature Feature. In the introduction the editor, TW Brown dedicates this book  to anyone who  stayed up late to watch scary movies after their parents went to bed. This book manages to take you back to a time when you we’re a kid and you couldn’t wait for the monster to appear on screen in a horror movie.

Every story in this book has some kind of monster in it, including zombies, werewolves, golems, aliens, demons and swamp monsters. Some of the stories are funny, some are scary and some are a little bit of both. A couple of stories here could easily fit into the science fiction and action  genres as well, proving that there is a little bit of everything in this anthology.

One of my favorites in this book is The Lure by Chantal Boudreau. This one is a fishing tale where a man has a vendetta against a fish. The problem is the fish is 10 feet long with teeth the size of daggers and has powers that make it a very hard fish to catch. What makes this story great is the use of imagery and how it makes you feel sorry for the man trying to catch the fish even though he’s a monster himself.

I also loved the story The Pit by Terry Alexander. The monster in this story is a werewolf and its being hunted by a man who is hoping to get his kidnapped daughter back. I liked this one because it was an action story with a lot of gore thrown in. I also liked the two main characters and how their personalities we’re described in the story.

My two favorite stories we’re comedy with a little horror mixed in. The Spine Tingling Tale of the Crystal Golem by Tom Ribas is a funny story about a monster made of crystals reeking havoc on a small town. This story makes the point that its not easy being a soulless killing machine. My other favorite was Frightening Cliche’s by Bernie Newsome. This one follows a horror author and his wife as they try to escape from an army of swamp monsters. What makes this story fun is the interaction between husband and wife.

Another great thing about this book is before each story there is a movie poster and the art for all of them is excellent. I mainly loved this book because it reminded me of why I fell in love with the horror genre as a kid.  When I watched a horror movie I wanted to be shocked, scared and hopefully get a few  laughs. I also wanted to see a monster terrorizing its victims. Midnight Creature Feature delivers the scares and the laughs and is a book that every horror fan should read.

Mr. Peepers and The Quarry

There are three books that I want to talk about in this post. The first one is a short story by a new author named Akela Cooper. Akela has written a few short stories that are available through Biting Dog Press and she has been a staff writer for ABC’s V, She was also a writer’s assistant on Dexter and worked on CBS’s Jericho. She is currently a staff writer for the NBC series, Grimm.

One of Akela’s short stories is called Mr. Peepers and centers around a cat that may be more then just a cat.  A woman named Genny just found out that her brother died mysteriously in a farm house that he recently bought. She goes to the house to investigate and finds out that three other people had also died mysteriously in the house over the last year. When the bodies were found there was a cat named Mr. Peepers by the body and the look in his eyes is not the look of a normal cat. Could Mr. Peepers be the cause of the deaths? If so does Genny have what it takes to put an end to Mr. Peeper’s reign of terror?

When I read Mr. Peepers it kind of reminded me of a Tales From The Crypt episode. It has some humor to it and it has some violent moments that come across as funny and creepy at the same time. The story itself  is well written and even though I thought the ending was predictable, it still worked.  One of the best scenes in the story is where a woman has a run in with Mr. Peepers and things get a little heated. After that, lets just say that she doesn’t see to clearly anymore. 

Another short story by Akela Cooper that I recently read is Tinderbox Blues. A confederate soldier returning from war one day comes to a house of an old slave woman. The woman offers him some treasure if he gets a tinder box out of a pit for her. The solider decides that if the box is more valuable to the woman then the treasure, he must have it for himself and steals the box. Little does he know the box is cursed and he now must suffer the consequences.

Tinder Box Blues has over the top violence with a story that’s a little confusing. It reads a lot like one of Grimm’s Fairy Tales or like a gothic ghost story of the 1800’s. I think the point of the story was to gross out and scare the reader and it does a good job of that. There is some great imagery to this story and it makes the story well worth reading, if you like scary old folk tales you will like this one.

The last book I want to talk about is a novel by Mark Allan Gunnels called The Quarry. The Quarry takes place at a picturesque college campus on the edge of a Quarry named Lake Limestone. The lake is 400 feet deep and the students are warned to stay away from it. It was formed in the 1950’s, when a work truck tapped into an underground spring, filling the quarry and leaving all the work vehicles at the bottom of the lake.  At least thats the story that everyone thinks is the truth.

One student on campus named Dale decides to find out what really lies at the bottom of the lake. He scuba dives to the bottom and comes back forever changed and this is when the horror really starts. People start dying on campus and something evil is stiring. Dale’s friends go on a search for answers to what lies beneath, but what they find has been there since the dawn of time and may be unstoppable.

The Quarry is one part mystery and one part horror. You dont know for sure what is in The Quarry and what is truely responsible for the killings until the very end. The book leaves you subtle hints as to what is going on, but leaves you guessing. The Quarry is not an over the top bloody horror story, its much more reserved then that. While none of the death scenes are gruesome or very long, they are still scary because  Mark Allan Gunnels makes you care about all of his characters and you don’t want to see them meet an untimely demise.

That is what maked The Quarry a great read, because you are invested in the characters. Even for the bad ones you get to know them, you feel for them and you see them change throughout the story. You see Dale change from a popular kid to a raging psychopath. You see his girlfriend go from self assured and confident to questioning everything she once believed and Dale’s freind Emilio goes from a timid coward, to finding out what kind of person he truely is. You also see the supporting cast go through changes, with each one being different from how they started out.

I had a couple of minor complaints about The Quarry. One was  that I wanted a little more action, I think the maint point of the stories was to build strong characters and see how their lives change when faced with extreme circumstances. So I guess to much action would have taken away from the character development, but I thought there were parts where a little more action could have made the story more interesting. My other complaint was that I was a little disappointed with the end. The ending was satisfying but I wanted a happy ending for all of the characters because I liked them so much. I guess its not horror if you don’t kill off a couple of people and make your main characters suffer. The Quarry is a masterpiece and I look forward to reading more from Mark Allan Gunnells.

Werewolves and Vampires

For this review we have to get in the time machine and go back to 1980 and take a look at  Moondeath by Rick Hatula. Moondeath was Rick Hatula’s first novel and was originally released by Zebra books. From 1977 to 1994 Zebra books was a major publisher of horror novels, but as the horror boom of the 80’s died down, Zebra books died with it. So for several years you probably couldn’t find a copy of Moondeath until late 2011 when Evil Jester Press re-released Rick Hatula’s Moondeath.

Moondeath takes place in the picturesque little tourist town of Coon Falls New Hampshire and follows the story of divorced teacher Bob Wentworth. Bob is looking to make a fresh start and has just moved to town to take a job as a teacher. Bob meets an unhappily married woman named Lisa and starts a relationship and things look good for Bob.

Things change though when a car with a young man and a woman he was having an affair with,  goes off of a bridge and into the river. To the people in town it looks like an accident but the young man was married to a woman named Julie and Julie has some dark secrets. After the accident people start dying on nights when the moon is full. The local sheriff and townspeople think there is a large dog or a wolf doing the killing, but Bob believes the deaths are the work of a werewolf.

Like Julie, Bob also has a dark secret and the townspeople are not willing to believe his story. The townspeople try to hide the fact that they have a werewolf problem but the bodies keep stacking up and secrets don’t stay buried forever. There is something evil in Coon Falls and there may not be a way to stop it.

If you read Moondeath remember that it is a product of the early 80’s because the story seems a  little dated. For one thing there is a scene where a werewolf is terrorizing a man in a phone booth. Also the story reminded me a lot of the slasher movies that were so popular in the early 80’s. You have people dying off in a beautiful small town one by one and no one in town seems to worry about it, until the bodies really start to pile up.

Another thing that makes Moondeath a little dated is the lack of strong women characters. One of the villains in the story is a woman named Julie. She comes across  as slutty and very one dimensional, I think if the story focused on her more and how she feels,  it would have made the story better. The other main female character, Lisa comes across as hateable because she is married to an abusive alcoholic and does nothing about it even though she knows who her husband is cheating with.  I also didn’t like how she wouldn’t  believe what is going on in Coon Falls despite the evidence that is in front of her.

I can forgive Moondeath for having weak characters because in a lot of books and movies in the early 80’s, women were not presented as strong unlike today.  My other complaints was that the book was a little slow moving and there was a couple  unanswered questions that annoyed me.

That being said there was a quite a few things that I did like about Moondeath. Rick Hatula does a great job of using forshadowing. For instance when Bob and Lisa meet for the first time, you see Lisa playing with her wedding ring which tells you right away that this couple is going to be more then friends. Also there is a point after a fight between two boys in a high school takes place and after being beaten up, one of the boys stomps down the hallway, you know we haven’t seen the last of him. Another scene that I liked was one day when Bob is showing up at the high school he sees an ominous looking cloud passing over the school and he thinks that something evil is coming.

I  loved how Rick Hatula describes the death scenes in the book and the parts where black magic is being performed. I also thought it was a nice touch how there we’re scenes in the church where what the preacher was saying was a metaphor for what was going on in the book. Lastly, I did like all of the  male characters in the book but would have liked to have seen more from the villains point of view. All in all I did enjoy Moondeath and would recommend it to anyone who liked horror in the early 80’s.

Also recently I read a short story from Biting Dog Press called Search and Destroy by Nancy Collins. Search and Destroy follows vampire hunter Sonja Blue as she goes to investigate why homeless people are dying at an alarming rate outside a small town in Washington.

If your not familiar with Sonja Blue, she was created by Nancy Collins in 1989. Sonja has had 5 novels written about her and several short stories. Search and Destroy is the first new Sonja Blue adventure in 10 years.

Sonja was only 18 years old when she was raped and fed on by a vampire. She was left on the street to die but miraculously survived and became a living vampire.  She now spends time hunting vampires, ogres and demons. Think Buffy but more powerful, funnier and a lot scarier.

My only problem with Search and Destroy is that I wish it was longer. Despite how short the story is, Nancy Collins does a great job of creating some characters that you quickly grow to like and she gives a good commentary on what its like to be an outcast from society. This is a fast paced story with a lot of action and is very well written, but I wanted more.  Hopefully we will see more of Sonja Blue in the future.

Help Wanted and Dark Blessings

I have read two anthologies recently that I want to talk about. The first one is Help Wanted: Tales of On The Job Terror from Evil Jester Press. This book is edited by Peter Giglio and has short stories by Joe McKinney, Gary Brandner, Henry Snider and many more. As if work wasn’t already scary enough, this book gives you more reasons to be scared. Help Wanted is an excellent anthology that includes some great stories by some master storytellers.

One of the stories includes Agnes: A Love Story by David C. Hayes, which tells the tale of a lawyer named Jack who feels unappreciated at work and by his wife so he starts a relationship with a photocopier. They get along well until the photocopier starts wanting the lawyer to kill for it. The thing I liked about this story was how the author makes you feel sorry for Jack. His two co-workers are happily married and love their jobs while Jack is married to a paranoid alcoholic and he hates and works at a job he can’t stand. You completely understand how he can fall in love with a copier because he is a lonely soul that no one understands except the copier of course.

Another story in Help Wanted is Work Life Balance by Jeff Strand. In this story a man works for a company that starts to let their employees do what they want at work. It starts with letting them come to work a little later than usual, then the employees are allowed to hug and kiss on the job. Things get really out of hand though when the company starts letting employees carry knives and stab each other, as long as it doesn’t interfere with their job. This story is meant to be more funny then scary but still has its scary moments. Jeff Strand does a great job mixing humor and horror in this story.

Another good story in Help Wanted: On The Job Terror is The Chapel Of Unrest by Stephen Volk. This is a gothic horror story that takes place in the 1800’s and has to deal with an undertaker who has the duty of capturing and embalming a ghoul who has been eating dead bodies in a graveyard. Stephen Volk through his use of  imagery in describing the graveyard, the chapel and the clothes of the time, transports you into an 1800’s gothic setting that reminded me of Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

One more story in this anthology that I have to mention is Expulsion by Eric Shapiro which tells the tale of a mad man going into a office to kill his fellow employees. This is a very short but very powerful story that gets you into the mind of a disgruntled employee but manages to end on a positive note. Though there were stories I didn’t like in Help Wanted, all in all its a very good anthology. I highly recommend this book but if this one doesn’t appeal to you the people at Evil Jester Press have some other good anthologies available including: Evil Jester Digest Volume 1  and Attic Toys.

The other anthology I want to mention is from Biting Dog Press called Dark Blessings by John Paul Allen. Included here are short stories dealing with a road trip to hell, a child with an unusual appetite and a closet lover with deadly intentions. Dark Blessings was really a surprise for me, I hadn’t heard of John Paul Allen but I read some good reviews and decided to give it a shot.

The first story in this anthology is called Pit Stop at Hoo Hoo Hollow which follows a young couple on their way through West Virginia who have made a career out of scamming the elderly out of money. During  a stop at Poogan’s Pass they end up where they didn’t expect to go and pay for their misdeeds. While this story is not bloody like some horror stories, it manages to scare in away you wouldn’t think about and makes a point that even if you think you are going to get away with something, karma will get you in the end.

The next story in Dark Blessings is called Runs Like Rabbit and follows the story of a native american boy named Runs Like Rabbit that has to give up his heritage and move with his family so his father can take a job in the white man’s world. The family gives up their names and rejects the gods that they once worshiped in search of a better life. The family soon finds out its not easy to leave their heritage behind as they become isolated. Runs Like Rabbit leaves the family and they all pay in the end. The thing I love about this story is it makes you feel the pain and loneliness that Runs Like Rabbit feels but then the story leaves you with a surprise ending that changes your feelings.

Keeping with the theme of John Paul Allen’s anthology which seems to be that all humanity is good but there is a dark self destructive side to it that makes us suffer. My favorite story in this book a love story called Marquee which has to deal with mistreating the ones you love, paying for your mistakes and letting go. The story follows a man named Scott who mistreats a mentally handicapped person named Duffy, but later finds out that he is connected to him through past lives. Duffy holds the key to Scott fixing his relationship with his wife. To talk to much about this story would give it away, it’s a different kind of love story that shows that sometimes to prove you love someone you have to let them go.

Each story here is a gem and shows humanity at its worst and best. Another story here that I found disturbing but illustrates how good comes from something bad was Prader-Willie which tells the story of three boys left to watch a girl with special needs. The story shows that things aren’t always what they seem. Dark Blessings is psychological horror at its best and I look forward to reading more from John Paul Allen.