New Horror Books

[Freyasfire]

I'm not sure when exactly this is going to be released, but this two volume anthology collection looks somewhat interesting:



The Century's Best Horror Fiction
edited by John Pelan
Cemetery Dance Publications commissioned a spectacular two-volume anthology project under the editorship of noted author and historian of the horror genre, John Pelan.
John selected one story published during each year of the 20th Century (1901-2000) as the most notable story of that year — all 100 stories were then collected in this amazing two volume set to be published as The Century's Best Horror Fiction.
The ground rules were simple: Only one selection per author. Only one selection per year.
Two huge volumes, one hundred authors, one hundred classic stories, over 700,000 words of fiction -- history in the making!
Table of Contents
1901: Barry Pain -- The Undying Thing
1902: W.W. Jacobs -- The Monkey's Paw
1903: H.G.Wells -- The Valley of the Spiders
1904: Arthur Machen -- The White People
1905: R. Murray Gilchrist -- The Lover's Ordeal
1906: Edward Lucas White -- House of the Nightmare
1907: Algernon Blackwood -- The Willows
1908: Perceval Landon -- Thurnley Abbey
1909: Violet Hunt -- The Coach
1910: Wm Hope Hodgson -- The Whistling Room
1911: M.R. James -- Casting the Runes
1912: E.F. Benson -- Caterpillars
1913: Aleister Crowley -- The Testament of Magdelan Blair
1914: M. P. Shiel -- The Place of Pain
1915: Hanns Heinz Ewers -- The Spider
1916: Lord Dunsany -- Thirteen at Table
1917: Frederick Stuart Greene -- The Black Pool
1918: H. De Vere Stacpoole -- The Middle Bedroom
1919: Ulric Daubeny -- The Sumach
1920: Maurice Level -- In the Light of the Red Lamp
1921: Vincent O'Sullivan -- Master of Fallen Years
1922: Walter de la Mare -- Seaton's Aunt
1923: George Allen England -- The Thing From--"Outside"
1924: C.M. Eddy, Jr. -- The Loved Dead
1925: John Metcalfe -- The Smoking Leg
1926: H.P. Lovecraft -- The Outsider
1927: Donald Wandrei -- The Red Brain
1928: H.R. Wakefield -- The Red Lodge
1929: Eleanor Scott -- Celui-La
1930: Rosalie Muspratt -- Spirit of Stonhenge
1931: Henry S. Whitehead -- Cassius
1932: David H. Keller -- The Thing in the Cellar
1933: C.L. Moore -- Shambleau
1934: L.A. Lewis -- The Tower of Moab
1935: Clark Ashton Smith -- The Dark Eidolon
1936: Thorp McCluskey -- The Crawling Horror
1937: Howard Wandrei -- The Eerie Mr Murphy
1938: Robert E. Howard -- Pigeons from Hell
1939: Robert Barbour Johnson -- Far Below
1940: John Collier -- Evening Primrose
1941: C.M. Kornbluth -- The Words of Guru
1942: Jane Rice -- The Idol of the Flies
1943: Anthony Boucher -- They Bite
1944: Ray Bradbury -- The Jar
1945: August Derleth -- Carousel
1946: Manly Wade Wellman -- Shonokin Town
1947: Theodore Sturgeon -- Bianca's Hands
1948: Shirley Jackson -- The Lottery
1949: Nigel Kneale -- The Pond
1950: Richard Matheson -- Born of Man & Woman
1951: Russell Kirk -- Uncle Isiah
1952: Eric Frank Russell -- I Am Nothing
1953: Robert Sheckley -- The Altar
1954: Everil Worrell -- Call Not Their Names
1955: Robert Aickman -- Ringing the Changes
1956: Richard Wilson -- Lonely Road
1957: Clifford Simak -- Founding Father
1958: Robert Bloch -- That Hell-Bound Train
1959: Charles Beaumont -- The Howling Man
1960: Fredric Brown -- The House
1961: Ray Russell -- Sardonicus
1962: Carl Jacobi -- The Aquarium
1963: Robert Arthur -- The Mirror of Cagliostro
1964: Charles Birkin -- A Lovely Bunch of Coconuts
1965: Jean Ray -- The Shadowy Street
1966: Arthur Porges -- The Mirror
1967: Norman Spinrad -- Carcinoma Angels
1968: Anna Hunger -- Come
1969: Steffan Aletti -- The Last Work of Pietro Apono
1970: David A. Riley -- The Lurkers in the Abyss
1971: Dorothy K. Haynes -- The Derelict Track
1972: Gary Brandner -- The Price of a Demon
1973: Eddy C. Bertin -- Like Two White Spiders
1974: Karl Edward Wagner -- Sticks
1975: David Drake -- The Barrow Troll
1976: Dennis Etchison -- It Only Comes Out at Night
1977: Barry N. Malzberg -- The Man Who Loved the Midnight Lady
1978: Michael Bishop -- Within the Walls of Tyre
1979: Ramsey Campbell -- Mackintosh Willy
1980: Michael Shea -- The Autopsy
1981: Stephen King -- The Reach
1982: Fritz Leiber -- Horrible Imagings
1983: David Schow -- One for the Horrors
1984: Bob Leman -- The Unhappy Pilgrimage of Clifford M.
1985: Michael Reaves -- The Night People
1986: Tim Powers -- Night Moves
1987: Ian Watson -- Evil Water
1988: Joe R. Lansdale -- The Night They Missed the Horror Show
1989: Joel Lane -- The Earth Wire
1990: Elizabeth Massie -- Stephen
1991: Thomas Ligotti -- The Glamour
1992: Poppy Z. Brite -- Calcutta Lord of Nerves
1993: Lucy Taylor -- The Family Underwater
1994: Jack Ketchum -- The Box
1995: Terry Lamsley -- The Toddler
1996: Caitlín R. Kiernan -- Tears Seven Times Salt
1997: Stephen Laws -- The Crawl
1998: Brian Hodge -- As Above, So Below
1999: Glen Hirshberg -- Mr. Dark's Carnival
2000: Tim Lebbon -- Reconstructing Amy

http://www.cemeterydance.com/page/CDP/PROD/pelan01

[matt cardin]

John's "Century's Best" anthology has been in the works for a verrrry long time now. At last check, it was still set for a 2010 release. It has experienced many delays, but as the TOC indicates, it's a major piece of work that will be quite welcome whenever it finally appears.

Also in the "looking forward to" category is The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Fictions, which is currently being edited by Jeff and Ann Vandermeer, and is scheduled for publication this November. The title isn't accidental: instead of a general-horror themed anthology like the Century's Best or Peter Straub's American Fantastic Tales, this one is devoted purely, pointedly, and exclusively to weird fiction as such.

Yesterday at his blog, Jeff shared a chunk of the afterword by China Mieville, which gives the idea:

Quote

These are strange aeons. These texts, dead and/or not, burrow, and we cannot predict everything they will infect or eat their path through. But certainly your brain, and they will eat the books you read from today on, too. That is how the Weird recruits. This is a worm farm. These stories are worms.

[Freyasfire]

Yes, I too am looking forward to the Vandermeers' upcoming anthology of weird fiction. I have been following it's progress closely on Jeff's blog. I am really looking forward to the unveiling of the massive book's table of contents!

[hopfrog]

Pelan's anthology looks great, but when I see him in January at MythosCon I shall scold him for not including something by Jessica Amanda Salmonson, a much neglected and BRILLIANT short story writer.

[starrysothoth]

Interesting choice of TL's "The Glamour" in the Pelan anthology. It's nice to see one of these mega horror fiction collections pick something written by Ligotti besides "The Last Feast of Harlequin." It's an excellent tale, no doubt, but overused (in my opinion) as a sample of his fiction in these types of books.

[bendk]

Here are a couple of new horror books that may be of interest. Don't quote me on the Table of Contents for this first one. I have seen a few different versions. This is the most recent one I could find.













The Year's Best Dark Fantasy & Horror 2010


To be published this October by Prime Books, this inaugural volume of the year’s best dark fantasy and horror features more than 500 pages of dark tales from some of today’s best-known writers of the fantastique as well as new talents. Chosen from a variety of sources by Bram Stoker and international Horror Guild award-winning editor Paula Guran, these stories are as eclectic and varied as the darkness itself.




Kelley Armstrong. “A Haunted House of Her Own” (Twilight Zone)
Peter Atkins. “The Mystery,” (Spook City)
Dale Bailey and Nathan Balingrud. “The Crevasse” (Lovecraft Unbound)
Elizabeth Bear. “The Horrid Glory of Its Wings” (Tor.com, 12/08/09)
Deborah Biancotti. “Diamond Shell” (A Book of Endings)
Holly Black. “The Coldest Girl in Coldtown” (The Eternal Kiss: 13 Vampire Tales of Blood and Desire)
Nadia Bulkin. “Everything Dies, Baby” (Strange Horizons 9/31/09)
Ramsey Campbell. “Respect” (British Invasion)
Suzy McKee Charnas. “Lowland Sea” (Poe)
Robert Davies. “Bruise for Bruise” (Weird Tales 353)
Kurt Dinan. “Nub Hut” (ChiZine 1/09)
Steve Duffy. “Certain Death for a Known Person” (Apparitions)
Gemma Files.”The Jacaranda Smile” (Apparitions)
Seth Fried. “Frost Mountain Picnic Massacre: (One Story124)
Gerard Houarner. “The Other Box” (Strange Tales 3)
Stephen Graham Jones. “The Ones Who Got Away” (Phantoms)
Caitlin Kiernan. “The Bone’s Prayer” (Sirenia Digest)
Marc Laidlaw. “Leng” (Lovecraft Unbound)
Margo Lanagan. “Sea-Hearts” (X6)
John Langan. “The Wide, Carnivorous Sky” (By Blood We Live)
Joe R. Lansdale. “Torn Away” (Twilight Zone)
Kelly Link. “The Cinderella Game” (Troll’s Eye View)
Maura McHugh. “Vic” (Black Static 10)
Gary McMahon. “Strange Scenes From An Unfinished Film” (Cern Zoo)
Sarah Monette. “White Charles” (Clarkesworld #6)
Stewart O’Nan. “Monsters” (Cemetery Dance #61)
Holly Phillips. “Long Cold Goodbye” (Asimov’s, 3/09)
Sarah Pinborough. “The Nowhere Man” (British Invasion)
Norman Prentiss. “In the Porches of My Ears” (Postscripts 18)
Barbara Roden. “The Brink of Eternity” (Poe)
Ekaterina Sedia. “Cherrystone and Shards of Ice” (H.P. Lovecraft Magazine 5)
Michael Shea “Copping Squid” (Copping Squid)
Lucius Shepard. “Halloween Town” (F&SF, Oct/Nov 09)
Michael Marshall Smith. “What Happens When You Wake Up In the Night” (Nightjar Press)
Peter Straub. “Variations of a Theme from Seinfeld” (Cemetery Dance #61)
Steve Rasnic Tem.”The Cabinet Child” (Phantoms)
Paul Tremblay. “Headstone In Your Pocket” (Weird Tales #353)
Catherynne M.Valente. “A Delicate Architecture” (Troll’s Eye View)


The Year’s Best Dark Fantasy and Horror 2010
Edited by Paula Guran
Prime Books
544 pages | trade paperback | $19.95
ISBN: 9781607012337








Occult scholar Donald Tyson plumbs the depths of H. P. Lovecraft's cosmic visions and horrific dream world to examine, warts and all, the strange life of the man who created the Necronomicon and the Cthulhu Mythos. Lovecraft expressed disdain for magic and religion, and most of his biographers have dismissed the mystical side of his nature. Tyson concludes that Lovecraft was a man in fundamental conflict with himself, and reveals Lovecraft for what he truly was—a dreamer, an astral traveler, and the prophet of a new age.


I swiped this one from Matt's site. If you haven't been over there to read it, I encourage you to do so.

http://theteemingbrain.wordpress.com/


I am not sure if I am going to get this one. I am interested in dreams, but I have little or no interest in the occult. The one review at Amazon is somewhat troubling. On the other hand, S.T. Joshi gives it a good blurb (which surprises me a little given the premise.)


“The Dream World of H. P. Lovecraft is a thought-provoking and intellectually stimulating book. Its fusion of sound biographical knowledge and critical insight makes it a must-read for Lovecraftians.”
—S. T. JOSHI, LEADING AUTHORITY ON H. P. LOVECRAFT

[Brendan Moody]

I have a copy of The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror 2010. I've only read a couple stories so far, but I'm looking forward to digging into when I can find the time. That table of contents is mostly accurate, but there's one additional story, John Mantooth's "The Water Tower."

[hopfrog]

Quote Originally Posted by bendk

Occult scholar Donald Tyson plumbs the depths of H. P. Lovecraft's cosmic visions and horrific dream world to examine, warts and all, the strange life of the man who created the Necronomicon and the Cthulhu Mythos. Lovecraft expressed disdain for magic and religion, and most of his biographers have dismissed the mystical side of his nature. Tyson concludes that Lovecraft was a man in fundamental conflict with himself, and reveals Lovecraft for what he truly was—a dreamer, an astral traveler, and the prophet of a new age. I swiped this one from Matt's site. If you haven't been over there to read it, I encourage you to do so. http://theteemingbrain.wordpress.com/ I am not sure if I am going to get this one. I am interested in dreams, but I have little or no interest in the occult. The one review at Amazon is somewhat troubling. On the other hand, S.T. Joshi gives it a good blurb (which surprises me a little given the premise.) “The Dream World of H. P. Lovecraft is a thought-provoking and intellectually stimulating book. Its fusion of sound biographical knowledge and critical insight makes it a must-read for Lovecraftians.” —S. T. JOSHI, LEADING AUTHORITY ON H. P. LOVECRAFT

I am one-third into ye Tyson book, and it is well done, mostly a regular "straight" biography of Lovecraft. The occult discussions are of little interest and of no importance biographically. The one thing I dislike is that Tyson paints Lovecraft as an unpleasant freak, and HPL was not that at all. Lovecraft was an Outsider, but he was not the strangely disturbed creature that so many want to imagine that he is. For an honest and authentic portrait of the real Lovecraft, I AM PROVIDENCE is the best.

[Brendan Moody]

Quote Originally Posted by Brendan Moody

I have a copy of The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror 2010. I've only read a couple stories so far, but I'm looking forward to digging into when I can find the time.

I finally found the time, and have written a brief review of the anthology on my blog.

[bendk]

A few that I am considering picking up.







Table of Contents:
With Acknowledgments To Sun Tzu
If I Should Wake Before I Die
The Passion of the Beast
De Fortuna
The Firebrand Symphony
Brushed In Blackest Silence
Pull
An Ounce Of Prevention Is Worth A Pound Of Flesh
And They Will Come In The Hour of Our Greatest Need
Re: Your Application of 5/5
Where the Black Stars Fall
When the Silence Gets Too Loud
Guardian
Hate the Sinner, Love the Sin
A Good Dead Man Is Hard To Find
Our Turn Too Will One Day Come
When the Bough Doesn't Break


Due to be published this Spring by Cemetery Dance. Nice cover art by Vincent Chong.

More info here:
http://www.cemeterydance.com/sh/hodge02.html









I think this is currently available only as an ebook.

A hooded figure wanders a lonesome road waiting for a special someone...A criminal returns home to face old memories and new nightmares...A man awakes to find himself living in a mirror image of reality...and diners at a restaurant find themselves confronted with a terrifying revelation about who and what they are...These are among the nineteen nightmarish tales that await you onstage in the THEATER MACABRE...

Table of Contents:

Head in the Clouds
How the Night Receives Them
The Acquaintance
Ravens
Keepsakes
Long Distance
The Wrong Side of the Bed
The Tradition
Turrow
Not Quite Ghosts
They See You When You're Sleeping
Stirrings
From the Wall, a Whisper
Visiting Hours
Outside the Theater
A Letter from Phoenix
Outside
Eight Minutes
912






Dreams the Ragman by Greg F. Gifune (Limited Edition HC)







As a young boy Derrick listened to his grandfather’s spooky tales of “The Ragman,” an old junk dealer and boogieman of sorts to the children in the neighborhood who he claimed had followed him throughout his entire life and stalked him from the depths of his own worst nightmares. But as an alcoholic ravaged with senility, his grandfather’s stories were dismissed as delusions.
When years later, murder comes to Derrick’s small hometown, he and his best friend Caleb—both teenage outcasts—discover that the killer is a hobo dressed in rags who rides the rails in and out of town when committing his crimes. They dub him “The Ragman” unaware of just how accurate that nickname may be, but the murders are never solved.
As time passes, Derrick weds and settles into a troubled marriage while Caleb moves to New York City and spirals into drug addiction and madness. Thirty years later, in a dying seaside resort town, the killings have begun again. Has The Ragman returned, or is something even more sinister taking place?
As Derrick and Caleb meet at the scene of the latest grisly murders, they soon find themselves confronted with an unsolved mystery that has haunted them for decades and an eternal evil they may never be able to escape. The rain falls, darkness descends, a train’s whistle blows, and the Ragman begins to dream...