Horror Fiction Help XVIII

These sound familiar to anyone? 

1. From probably 1960s and certainly not newer than 1972ish. The cover art had a pair of women's (I think) shoes and the shoes had scary, moaning faces.

2. Something to do with a nightmare and a haunting. It has three golden monsters on from '91 and it looks like a apple paper back or an Avon but it's not. I think a character's name is little Jack.

3. I thought it was called "Little Angel" or a variant thereof. I remember the cover was an illustration of an innocent-looking little boy, around 10 years old, sitting next to a broken birdcage with feathers and blood all over the place. And he's got this "Who, me?" expression on his face. It was a rip-off of "The Bad Seed," and concerned an evil little psychopath boy, around 10 years old or so, who lived with his parents. His mom spoiled him rotten, but his dad suspected that he might be evil. Of course, nobody believed him. I remember the little boy tries to kill his aunt at one point by throwing her off a cliff, but she's hanging on for dear life and somehow manages to attach herself to the side of the cliff with her belt. And the little boy is bitching that she spanked him for wetting his pants when he was younger, and how much he wants her to die. She survives, but her arm is all bruised and dislocated from hanging onto the cliff for so long. Then his teacher ends up with a broken arm because he bum-rushes her on the playground and knocks her onto a pile of gravel. The dad tries to talk to her about the incident, and ask if she suspects his son, but she thinks the boy is innocent and he's crazy. The dad and the aunt team up to stop the boy, much to the mom's chagrin. But then the mom somehow gets on the boy's bad side and he tries to kill her, too. But the dad somehow stops him, and I think he accidentally kills the boy. At the end, the mom lays dying in the hospital and gives her blessing for the dad to marry the aunt, because she knew all along that they were more well-suited for each other. I used to love reading this trashy pulp novel, but I lost it a long time ago, and I'd love to figure out what it was called, and maybe read it again. Found! It's: 

 
4. The book is set in a psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane in a very cold region of America where a new doctor is trying a new form of treatment for a particular patient. This patient was guilty of a series of murders of women where he strung them up and basically bled them dry, possibly showering in their blood. He is heavily medicated but the doctor thinks that he can "get through" to him by cutting his medication. The book basically goes through flashbacks showing how the killer developed into what he is and introduces characters and sets up future confrontations between staff and patients. In the end the patients revolt and escape setting up a chase between the main good characters and the main bad characters in a violent snowstorm. As I mentioned, I cannot remember the name of the book but it may have had "Snow" or "Winter"in the title, but I can't say for sure. Found! It's that perennial used paperback I see in virtually every used bookstore I visit but have never read:

5. I read a book in which the one of the main characters in this short story collection, I believe i remember this correctly, fell in love with a sheep. There was another story that involved necrophilia. There was nothing graphic or gross. Instead, it was this amazing depiction of loneliness. I think it took place in big sky country, maybe Nebraska.  Found! It's: 

 

Like It Was Written in My Soul from Me to You

Angels Borne in Devils Arms

Tasks of Unspeakable Horror

What I Don't Know Can't Hurt Me As Much As What's Behind the Mask

Disposable Hero

Modern Masters of Horror, ed. by Frank Coffey (1981): Two Minutes to Midnight

When I first saw this cover I thought that little tag read "The Best of the Scaries!" which I found disarmingly cute for an anthology of horror fiction. Turns out I just missed the final "t" and then the uniqueness disappeared. Modern Masters of Horror (orig. 1981, Ace paperback 1982, Berkley paperback 1988) offers up plenty of bankable names who for the most part are definitely "masters." Editor Frank Coffey has two '80s genre titles to his name, neither of which I've read but both of which I own thanks to some sweet cover art; otherwise I have no idea what relation he had with horror back in the day. His introduction feels rote, as he ruminates on why horror/occult goes through cycles of popularity. 

Neither Modern Masters paperback cover offers much to catch a prospective reader's eye (the Ace '82 resembles a Hitchcock crime anthology) and the only reason I picked up the '88 edition was because it was in pristine condition. Lucky too because inside are several standouts that aren't available anywhere else.

The unexpected star of this anthology is not, as one might think, the long Stephen King tale that starts it off ("The Monkey," which headlined Skeleton Crew [1985]; good but not great King), but the sole short story from one George A. Romero. "Clay" bears no resemblance to his zombie movies, but there are similarities to his excellent 1977 film Martin (and fine with me; Martin is my favorite Romero flick). With a careful and a vivid pen, Romero lays out a tale of two men in the New York City of decades ago: one a priest and one a neighborhood drunk. Compare and contrast: If the priest had ever visited Tippy's brownstone under the el, if he'd ever gone up to the third floor, he would have seen the beast of the city at its most dissolute... The matter-of-fact descriptions of horror and perversion elevate "Clay" to the top rank; one wonders what if Romero had written the story as a screenplay...!

 Romero & King, early 1980s

These days—if ever—I'm not crazy about the threat of rape used as a generic horror device, but hey, this was some three decades ago, times were simpler, so I take it as it comes. Written without any whiff of exploitation, "The Face" by Jere Cunningham speaks of secret selves to maintain sanity, but perhaps that's where we hide our madnesses as well. Robert Bloch's "In the Cards" is a terrible example of his old-man puns in short-story form. In Gahan Wilson's bit of playful metafiction, "The Power of the Mandarin," a mystery writer has created the ultimate villain for his Sherlockian detective—and doomed himself in the process. "The Root of All Evil" boasts a banal and cliched title but is a serviceable tale of ancient myths in the modern world thanks to Graham Masterton. Enjoyed William Hallahan's returns to the sort of astral projection he utilized for his 1978 occult thriller Keeper of the Children in "The New Tenant"; brief and to the point and dig that ice-cold climax.

Long-time SF/F/horror scribe William F. Nolan's piece was originally published in 1957, which I didn't now as I began "The Small World of Lewis Tillman." "What is this?!" I thought to myself as I read, "some shameless rip-off of I Am Legend?" Except instead of a last man on earth facing a vampire horde, Nolan's protagonist faces a horde of children. I honestly don't know which would be worse.

"Absolute Ebony" by Felice Picano (above) is a another gem. Set in a well-wrought 19th century Rome, it's about an American painter's discovery of the "blackest of the black," a charcoal so black it is like peering into infinity, somehow pulsing alive with the very negation of matter. This revolutionzies the man's art, but is cause for greater concerns. "Absolute Ebony" predates David Morrell's "Orange is for Anguish, Blue for Insanity" and the surreal mind-bending of Thomas Ligotti as it mines similar ideas and images.  Despite penning some lurid thrillers in the 1970s and early '80s, Picano is not associated with the genre; his prose has a confident panache often lacking in horror fiction which makes the story a highlight of the anthology.

Wasn't too taken with Ramsey Campbell's contribution, "Horror House of Blood." A couple lets a horror film crew shoot a few scenes in their home, and subtle weirdness ensues. I couldn't figure out what was happening in some places due to Campbell's opaque stylings but I do like the effect of ending the story just before the horror begins.

"The Siege of 318" is Davis Grubb's (above) tale of an Irish immigrant family living in West Virginia in the 1930s. Young master Benjy receives, as a gift from an uncle in Kilronan, an enormous crate of toy soldiers and attendant vehicles and weapons, enough even to reenact the Great War. At first father Sean approves: "'Tis time you learned the lessons of life's most glorious game." Except of course it goes slowly downhill as the "game" obsesses Benjy and enrages his father. You may be reminded of King's "Battleground" from Night Shift but this story is subtler, better written, with a tinge of world-weary resignation about the world's historic horrors that really chills. Another gem!

Two writers I'm not crazy about have two stories worth a read. "The Champion" from Richard Laymon is a competent bit of undeserved turnabout that wouldn't have seem out of place as an episode of Hitchcock Presents. Not a whiff of his retrograde approach to horror but features his trademark lack of believability. Laymon never bothers to convince a reader that the impossible is possible; he simply assumes it because, hey, this is horror fiction, right? Robert McCammon's "Makeup" I recall reading in his 1990 collection Blue World and thought it was merely kinda okay; this time I kinda enjoyed it more: loser crook in Hollywood inadvertently steals an old makeup case that once belonged to horror movie star Kronsteen (also featured in his novel They Thirst) and when he smears some on his face he—well I won't ruin it for ya.

Howling author Gary Brandner presents another type of body transformation in "Julian's Hand," a surprisingly straight-forward story about an accountant growing a hand under his arm. I liked it right up till its unexpectedly illogical conclusion. I mean, it just doesn't work, and an alternate ending, involving a coworker with whom the accountant has an affair, was up for grabs (pun intended, you'll see). There could've been a strange and happy ending instead of the lazy twist Brandner employs.

Another story marred by its ending is "A Cabin in the Woods" from John The Searing Coyne (above). It's a solid work of literally growing unease when the titular domicile is overrun by a fungus. The only problem is that the final line of the story, creepy as it is, is entirely too reminiscent of King's "I Am the Doorway." (And if you haven't read that story, you've got some treat waiting for you!)

Despite a few so-so fictions and lackluster cover art in all editions, Modern Masters of Horror is worth seeking out for the Romero and Picano, Grubb and Hallahan stories. I don't think you'll be too disappointed with the other stories included either. The "Scaries" indeed.

Chop Off Your Head So You Better Relax

Birthday Score!

A birthday bonanza of '80s horror paperbacks! Hit Powell's Books in downtown Portland today after a lovely birthday brunch with my wife (who found Monster in their Nautical Fiction section, of course). Really looking forward to Girl in a Swing, but I spent the afternoon drinking mimosas and re-re-re-re-reading this first paperback edition of Danse Macabre.

And Her Lovers Walk Through in Their Coats