John Wayne Comunale brings his usual irreverent humor and blasphemy to this tale of a working stiff who–like many of us–wishes he could find a shortcut to the life he would rather be living. Sometimes, that might be as easy as pushing someone in front of a bus, which–as it turns out–might be more challenging than you suspect. In this case, the desired shortcut comes in the form of a “Satanic” ritual.
A promotion at work, a life of ease, and the girl of your dreams, what would you do to have those things? Would you summon a peculiar little blob of a demon that resembles a demon about as much as the real Hell resembles the one you’ve always imagined from a lifetime of mythology and Christian upbringing–which is to say, not at all? Well, that’s what our protagonist decides to do, and he soon learns that there’s more work involved in making these dreams come true than it would have required if he’d just put in the effort in the first place. Mistakes were made.
Sometimes the shortcut isn’t much of a shortcut at all, but it’s difficult to see that until you’re already on the path, and by then it might be too late. Hindsight is 20/20, they say.
Comunale spins a fun little tale of a life spiraling out of control, the price of hubris, the hollow pleasure derived from cheating your way to success, and how important it is to be careful what you wish for. Along the way, he builds a new mythology of the realm we think of as Hell, the beings we think of as demons, and the harsh challenges associated with bridging that infernal realm with our own.
The author narrates his audiobook edition of the book, and there’s never any disappointment to be found in Comunale’s delivery. He knows just the right amount of sarcasm to imbue the narrative with, and the voices he has in mind for his characters.
Michael R. Collins takes us in a new direction with this tenth-anniversary edition of his indie horror novel, Night Shall Overtake. A shape-shifting P.I. navigates a dark and treacherous city populated by living shadows, demonic entities, and cosmic creatures that drive men mad with only a glance. The author’s skillful world-building combines with excellent storytelling that ensures we seamlessly fall into the world he’s crafted as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. Thankfully, however, this is not our world.
Hired by a mysterious client, Twila’s boss sends her out to locate a missing woman with ties to the horror-filled section of the city only monsters call home, a place populated by nightmares and creatures so inhuman as to be incomprehensible. What Twila discovers is a web of deceit and death spreading in all directions from whatever her missing woman seems to have touched. And though the subject of her search appears to be dead, there are terrifying forces at work that now have Twila and everyone she knows in their sights. Her investigation has drawn attention that no one anticipated–and no one ever wants.
As the mystery deepens and the the intrigue grows increasingly hazardous, our cast of characters soon discover that whatever they’ve stumbled into, it could have implications that threaten all life–not just their own. The question is, can Twila get to the bottom of it all before the tensions escalate into a turf war between forces that will destroy the world in the process?
This book is a fantastic dark urban fantasy weaving elements from all sorts of horror into a classic noir-ish detective story, complete with sexual tension, witty dialogue, and exciting mystery.
This title, along with others by Michael R. Collins, will also be available through http://www.godless.com at the link below:
Like much of what Jones has written, Demon Theory defies easy classification and mixes subgenres with fluidity and skill that borders on awe-inspiring. There’s a little bit of Watcher In the Woods, a touch of Jacob’s Ladder, a hint of Scream, and perhaps a taste of the first two Return of the Living Dead films serving as inspiration behind this book–that in turn serves as the novelization of three fictional films constituting the “Devil Inside” trilogy. Filled with pop culture references and nods to obscure horror flicks (for today’s audience), witty dialogue, meta-commentary, and as much dark humor as there is horror, this book is an excellent experience for fans of Stephen Graham Jones.
We begin on Halloween night as a group of medical students goes to Hale’s childhood home where his diabetic mother needs assistance. When they arrive, with Hale’s mother nowhere to be found, they soon discover they’re stuck in the secluded and rundown house as a snowstorm rages outside. As the story progresses, we discover the six med students aren’t alone, and it takes on a sort of slasher narrative as we learn more about Hale’s family, his childhood trauma, and the presumed identity of the killer. As the body count rises and the possible supernatural elements are introduced, we speed toward a conclusion that feels fitting, though slightly ambiguous.
The second installment of the trilogy begins with a familiar scenario that’s been touched on in the first, but things aren’t quite right. The deck has been shuffled and we’ve moved forward in time and simultaneously backward, it seems. Familiar faces appear but in different roles. The names may be the same, but the details are off…however, it isn’t long before we learn that recollection of the previous story’s events are clear to at least one of the returning characters–though Nona is treated as if these “false” memories are indicative of mental illness. It’s almost Christmas, and we ultimately find ourselves in a hospital where the staff prepares for a performance to entertain the patients. This installment skips the slasher element and dives right into the supernatural aspect we experienced in the earlier tale, amplifying the stakes and the danger. It’s no longer simply the cast of six facing the horrors that we witness arising in the hospital corridors–but how many people would believe that demonic entities are afoot before it’s too late?
The final piece of the trilogy comes as a direct sequel to the second installment, but following another time jump. We’re three years further along and many familiar faces have returned, this time taking the fight back to Hale’s childhood home, hoping to stop whatever nightmare they’ve been living in since they first stepped foot into that house. Nona has a plan, but can her judgment be trusted? Can anyone be trusted, as we delve deeper into the events that brought all of this about? Supernatural horror meets slasher meets brazen scientific experimentation as we learn the truth about Hale’s father, his sister, and the identities of the friends who accompanied Hale home in the first place. This one starts off with a splattery, violent bloodbath to up the ante as a group of punk criminals first arrive at the isolated house as a sort of initiation rite, setting the stage nicely for what awaits our returning cast of characters when they show up only a short while later.
Richard Ferrone’s narration is phenomenal, conveying a sort of homage to the voice of Ghostface from the Scream movies, which feels as perfect as could be with the self-awareness and referential nature of the characters contained within the narrative as well as the writing itself.
One part Cube, one part Saw, one part The Ninth Gate, and a dash of House On Haunted Hill, Duncan Ralston’s Puzzle House is an excellent book for fans of those movies. If you’re the kind of person who enjoys escape rooms, puzzles, and character studies–you’re in for one hell of a treat. When a mysterious puzzle master dies, his will brings together an assortment of strangers (all but his ex-wife, unfamiliar with the deceased as well)…but that is only the beginning of the mystery.
These people find themselves called to a house that has become something far more sinister, a series of escape rooms with a hefty toll to be paid and life-or-death consequences riding on the solutions. As they struggle to survive the sadistic gauntlet from which the only way out is through, secrets are revealed that connect these apparent strangers in ways that can’t be a coincidence. Somewhere at the core of it all is a mysterious organization with occult origins, and the rats in this maze are battling not only the clock but their own preconceived notions of what is–or can be–real. But will they be able to solve the puzzles that await them, and who will survive the journey into the Puzzle House? And is everyone who they seem to be? You’ll have to dare entry on your own to find out.
This one has one hell of an ending, and it leaves you wishing that you could stay with the story just a little bit longer–to find out what happens next. Ralston does a great job of leaving you hanging but feeling satisfied just the same–forced to decide how you, as the reader, might proceed.
Joe Hempel’s narration of the audiobook is spectacular as always…which should go without saying. He successfully brings the characters to life and pulls the story from the page, leaving the listener immersed in the nightmare environment.
I’d like to say something right away. I’ve been consuming audiobooks a great deal for the last few years. I listen to them when I’m driving, I listen to them when I’m at the gym, and I occasionally even listen to them when I’m relaxing at home. Normally, I’m a fan. In this case, I think I would have been better off reading the book in either physical or digital format. If you’re familiar with my reviews, I typically focus on the story first and mention the audiobook narrator at the very end. I’m deviating from that here. In most instances, an audiobook narrator should be virtually invisible–like the word “said”–in that they neither add nor subtract from the quality of the narrative they’re reciting. In the best cases, they elevate the narrative with the caliber of their performance. This is neither of those scenarios. I was not impressed with Louise Cooksey’s narration. Most of the performance was great, but her attempts to capture the individual voices of the male characters within the story left a lot to be desired. They universally sounded like whining, nasal, teenage boys who had recently been dumped. This was suitable for the character of SLAVEMASTER, but it made the audiobook harder to listen to than if she’d simply used her general narrative voice instead. None of this is meant to suggest she’s a bad audiobook narrator–she definitely was not–just that her voices for a couple of characters made it a bit of a challenge to stay in the story.
As far as the story is concerned, it was almost a cautionary tale about the online fetish websites of the 1990s and early 2000s…much of it focusing on the worst elements within that world. Naturally, that makes sense, when you’re familiar with the case of John Edward Robinson…the inspiration behind the story’s antagonist.
Rufty and White introduce readers to a world of depravity and torture–only some of it consensual. Readers familiar with bondage, domination, and sadism aren’t likely to be squeamish…and much of the content will be less shocking than one might expect from the authors. I don’t think the purpose was to be shocking…but rather to guide readers into a world they may not be familiar with–or may only have a 50 Shades of Grey introductory-level understanding of–before taking them beyond their comfort levels and urging them to shout out a safe word that will only fall on deaf ears.
It’s the hellish conclusion of the story where White and Rufty come out to play, no longer satisfied to play tour guides in the well-trod ground of S&M and B&D…desperate instead to take you somewhere you only accidentally discovered. If you’d only stayed somewhere safe, somewhere comfortable, somewhere you knew the rules…you would have been fine. But you let them take the reins.
I had the pleasure of reading this novella before the official release date to provide the author with a blurb. When I say it was a pleasure, I am absolutely sincere. The title is by no means misleading…everything does come to a horrible end, but that should be no surprise once you’ve made your way even a quarter of the way through the hellishly phantasmagoric tale Mike Salt has shared with us.
Coming home from vacation can often feel like returning to Hell. I think, upon reading this story, you might have a different perspective on that matter. A group of old friends spend a drunken and debauched vacation at a Disney theme park, sans children–only to return home, exhausted and thoroughly unprepared for the gift that awaits them. As they struggle to contend with forces they neither understand nor invited into their lives, they quickly learn that there are things in the darkness that are far worse than anything they might have imagined.
Salt holds little back in his depictions of torture, both physical and psychological–and he packs a whole lot of both into this slim volume. The characters come to life before your eyes only for you to witness as those lives are devastated and ripped apart with the same confusion and uncertainty the people on the page experience for themselves. Each step of the way, you find yourself wondering what comes next…and how much worse it can get. I assure you, it does get worse.
When you frequent literary circles you find yourself asked questions like, “What is the best opening line you’ve ever read?”
For many years now, my answer to that question has invariably been The Pig by Edward Lee. I won’t include the quote here, because it’s sure to force one algorithm or another to reject my review of this single-volume trilogy. Suffice it to say, it’s irreverent, humorous, captivating, and vile…all things that virtually insist that the reader keep on going. The discerning reader will be satisfied to discover that the rest of the tale is similarly irreverent, humorous, captivating, and vile. I had the pleasure of reading The Pig and The House in a single volume quite some time ago, but this new edition from Evil Cookie Press is a trifecta, in that it includes an additional installment, picking up the loose threads left behind and running with it until anything sane is unraveled. If there’s a trigger warning out there, this volume contains the associated trigger.
The meta commentaries from the perspective of the author are an excellent touch in this new installment, providing an amusing insight into the creative mind behind this perverse and sordid tale of an isolated house on an isolated tract of land where truly awful things have taken place over a handful of decades. If you had the pleasure of experiencing this unlikely vacation spot in the previous glimpses of the 1970s and the early 2000s, you won’t be disappointed. There’s a sense of coming home as Lee invites us to revisit the haunted house in the modern day–when everything comes full circle and we are truly introduced to the monstrous forces at work. If this is your first visit–well, then–I truly envy you the opportunity that awaits.
On August 3rd of 2021 I released Daemonica on the Godless platform. Daemonica is a stand-alone short story introducing readers to the larger story of Daemonica In Claritate, to be released at a later date.
Orphaned for the second time in her twenty-one years with the death of her older brother, Ethan, Layla Torres has been spiraling out of control. When she discovers the truth of what happened to Ethan and his friends, the secret stash of an entirely new drug in her brother’s belongings provides her with a chance for revenge. It’s a chance she’ll happily take.
Christopher Buehlman’s Between Two Fires transports readers to the region now known as France during the peak of the Black Death. The world was ending. Sickness had emptied whole villages, leaving nothing behind but decaying remnants and ghosts that haunted the vacant homes. The survivors, few and far between, were living through horrors no one had ever seen. Amid this nightmare of disease and human predation, a war unlike any witnessed on Earth was taking place. This tableau of terror, both human and spiritual, is the world Buehlman brings to life. When Thomas, a crude and disgraced knight, takes it upon himself to shelter and protect a young girl–who knows things she should not know and sees things others cannot see–he knows he’s set himself on a path that might end in tragedy. But nothing can prepare him for the madness and cruelty awaiting them on their journey to Avignon. The boundaries of reality are repeatedly blurred throughout the narrative, forcing the reader to question–as Thomas does–whether he’s awake or dreaming. The dead haunt the living, tormenting them with cruel assertions and distorted recollections of the past. Ghosts appear and disappear, leaving us to wonder which of these apparitions are truly beyond the veil, and which are drawn from the memories of Thomas and the weary priest who joins him on his quest. Will the trio arrive where they intend, or will the gates of Hell await them instead. Is there a difference? Steve West narrated this audiobook almost perfectly. The delivery of dialogue and narrative components were both handled with great attention to detail. The narration was almost as gripping as the story itself.
Todd Love continues raising the stakes with the third installment of the Platinum Blondes series. Love Removal Machine picks up where INXS left off, treating readers to deliciously deserved punishment and violence enacted against Troy. But something more is going on, faint glimpses of unnatural activity from the chair upon which Troy is bound are blurred with the frantic vengeance unleashed by the women of the Platinum Blondes Agency. Dark secrets have been kept from most of the women Gwen’s recruited, sinister mysteries that originate in her youth and the hubris of her father. Todd drags us through this sordid history, unveiling surprise after shocking surprise along the way, hitting the reader over and over again with the brutal pacing of a professional fighter. In the world of the Platinum Blondes, no one and nothing is as it seems. Todd Love adds new questions as quickly as he answers the ones we already had, but there’s no need to worry…the story isn’t over yet.
You can obtain the Platinum Blondes series for yourself by going to http://www.godless.com or by downloading the Godless app to your mobile device. The link is below:
Domus Necrophagous 