Horror Fiction Help XXVII

I'm calling upon you again, dear readers, for assistance in identifying some forgotten horror tomes of yesteryear. Several are apparently from horror comix/magazines of the 1960s/70s, which are not really my area of expertise. Thanks in advance, everyone!

1. I read this story in the late 70s - early 80s, I think its from one of the DC horror anthologies as I definitely read I, Vampire in them at the time. It feels EC but I don't think I had access to any EC reprints.  Ive had no luck finding it since.  Here's what I remember.  A rich businessman decided to fake his death and live isolated from the world.  He has built an entire computerised home under his tomb where he plans to live with the help of his assistant who he contacts via his computer.   The assistant double crosses him and the air starts running out.  He flees to his escape tunnel but finds it filled in with dirt.

2.  All read in my teenage years, (1960's). All from paperbacks or comics from the time. If I had the authors names I would probably have had more success, but unfortunately, no. The first was entitled "Talent" about a precocious young boy who possessed the gift of being able to make things happen or change just by thinking about it. The spell lasted as long as he kept thinking or concentrating on whatever it was, then, when distracted or bored, it would revert back to whatever it was. During a visit from his parents friends/relatives, he demonstrates this power to a little girl who comes with them out in the farmyard by turning a pig scratching itself against a post in it's pigsty into a life size porcelain piggy bank just by thinking it. The girl asks if it will stay like it and he explains that if he stops thinking about it, it will regain it's original form, but when he tried it with a piglet sometime before, he smashed it with a hammer. Then, later, when he'd forgotten about it, the piglet retuned to normal but was " all broke up and bloody...". The nasty little shite gets his comeuppance at the end of the story in a pretty similar fashion. Found! It's "Talent" by Theodore Sturgeon; widely anthologized but first appeared in "Beyond Fantasy Fiction" in 1953.

3. It concerns a university student desperate to pass his graduation in maths, trigonometry and geometry. Being lazy, he decides to try an alternative route of passing his grades with black magic and proceeds to bone up on how to elicit the help of a demon held under his control whilst within a pentangle drawn on his study floor. After careful preparation, he goes through the ritual and succeeds in summoning a demon within the chalked area before him. After the initial shock he tells the demon he will keep him there forever if he doesn't help him pass his grades.  " You see...." he says to the demon,  "...I'm absolutely hopeless at geometry...."  Before he can continue, the demon, looking down at the floor replies "....you're telling me..." and steps over the useless pentagon he had drawn. Found! It's "Naturally" by Fredric Brown, which has been anthologized many times, and can be found in his 1958 collection Honeymoon in Hell.

4. The plot of the horror story involved a man who survived an awful killing? lived in a mental home. He drew pictures with white shoe polish and charcoal. There were teenagers and one of them had an older sister who was taking care of the crazy old man while she was having an affair with the local policeman. Two of the teenagers were caving and found luna moths, which had something to do with the plot. There was a woman named Birka who had become one of the creatures that killed the crazy man's family--she might have been his mother but she was with the creature. They were using strangler vine to stop the creatures and if anyone got one of the killer's thorns embedded in their skin they'd turn cold and deadish like the creature. It seems like it ended with one of the teenagers getting a thorn in his foot. Found! It's Fiends (1990) by John Farris.

5. I saw it in 1984, so it was likely published in that year or 1983. The cover showed a body on an operating table, covered with a sheet, and with those big electrode things overhead (like from the Frankenstein movie).  I only remember the blurb on the back cover. It went something like this: "_________ asylum. They warned him not to go there. But his son has disappeared, so he must dare. Now, from a window in a cell in the asylum, he watches as a group of lunatics lower a child-size coffin into the ground. The coffin moves. The boy is still alive. But no one can hear his screams over the howls of the patients, no one except the woman who is waiting in the asylum, and the doctor who is preparing the final experiment." Found! It's The Bad Room (1983) by Christopher Cook Gilmore.

Horror Fiction Help XXVI

Time once again in which I seek identification of these forgotten horrors for fellow blog readers. Thanks in advance!

1. In the late 1990s or 2000 I read a paperback about a married couple who move into a new house. The wife somehow disappears in a room or door in the attic that leads to another world or dimension. 

2. A horror/supernatural/ghost anthology published 1985-1993. One story was set in the last years of the 19th century/first years of the 20th century, probably 1890s. A young woman is involved with seances or psychic research in some way, and an older, unattractive man is pursuing her sexually. She's not interested. The older man dies, but she gets no respite : Now his GHOST is harassing her, and publicly covering her with "ectoplasm". It is not blatantly pointed out  that the "ectoplasm" is similar to semen, but that was sure the impression I was left with. The story ends with the young woman retreating back to her home, where her sister(s) lock her in her bedroom with a lock they had  surreptitiously  put on the OUTSIDE of the door... And the reader is left with the impression the girl might be locked up for the rest of her life, because the haunting is so embarrassing for her sister(s). Found! It's Lisa Tuttle's short story "Mr. Elphinstone's Hands," first published in 1990's Skin of the Soul.

3. Circa 1988-1993, probably more towards the end of that range. The cover painting showed a blonde woman using her fangs on the neck of a dark-haired man, who I realized looked a lot like Hitler. So I read the blurb on the back, confirmed the blonde was Eva Braun and her victim was Hitler, and I put it back as probably dumb and trashy. I've been regretting it ever since. No clue as to author or title, I just remember the cover painting.

4. A forty-something guy and teenage girl are harassed by an Aztec god's cult that want to sacrifice one of them,don't remember if they were father and daughter or  just neighbors, but I remember the girl's boyfriend is part of the cult.

5. Little girl is possessed by the soul of a pedophile serial killer that was executed in the electric chair, it follows the father of one of the little girl's friends.

6. A bizarre short story in some anthology long ago when I was a teen where a father is out for revenge over someone in a carnival raping or killing his daughter I think. He finds the guy and essentially turns him into an animal. Breaks his knees, cuts out his tongue, sews him into a be a suit and at the end the guy is a sideshow attraction crawling and grunting. Found! It's Robert Bloch's oft-anthologized short story "The Animal Fair," first published in the May 1971 issue of Playboy.

Horror Fiction Help XXV

Thanks in advance to anyone who can help ID these books!

1. 1980s. A man contacts various individuals and tells them they have magic potential, and he will chose one to be his successor. They all travel to his big ol’ gothic home to compete. The story switches perspective between the people. They kill each other off in magical ways over the days, until one person is left who (I think) didn’t kill anyone. Turns out the gothic house guy actually wants them all dead as threats rather than looking for a successor. The last man standing is special (of course) and more magical and can transform into animals, which is this big deal. The last man and gothic house guy do battle as various animals, last man manages to kill gothic house guy, the end. I know there’s a scene where one of the characters is on a commercial flight headed to the gothic house, and another character almost succeeds in bringing down the plane through magic - the character on the plane stops it, also through magic. Found! It's:

2. It wasn’t scary but it was all about ghosts. I think it was about a kid that moved into a new house that had a whole family of ghosts living there. There was a bit where the family of ghosts went on a trip to the beach but the moment that really stuck with me but I can’t seem to turn up anything on was that the little boy ghost got stuck between the sheets of double glazing when trying to pass through the window which turned out to be a big hazard for little ghosts. I must have read it ten times and this is all I can remember! It had illustrations throughout and I believe the front cover might have been the beach scene. It might be that it’s some very niche little British book that just happened to be in my library.

3. Very early '90s, vampire performs oral sex on women and drinks their menstrual blood (not Memnoch the Devil). A scene early in the book.

4. Scientists have literally run out of things to study -they know everything. One scientist comes across a spell for conjuring a demon. Hmm, something that hasn't been studied. He runs it through his computer and presto! a demon appears and asks his bidding. Scientist has a back and forth with the demon, demon surprised humans are no longer grasping and lustful, so decides to kill/eat the scientist. Scientist pulls out a ray gun and stuns the demon and locks him up for further study.

Horror Fiction Help XXIV

Some recent emails I’ve received from people hoping to find these forgotten horrors. Thanks in advance for helping to ID them! 

1. A children's horror book from the late 80s or early to mid 90s, a collection of short stories. One was about a party of kindergartners who make paper lanterns and march around, disappearing over a hill never to be seen again. Another about a child in a yellow raincoat getting hit by a car. It also included a story about a kid staying home from school "sick" but the sickness was actually that he was a werewolf or something. Found! It's a 1989 Scholastic collection:

2. Cover art: a man sitting down at a table, either with silverware in each hand or eating food, and a pig standing on two legs (possibly dressed in an apron or chef's outfit) holding a butcher's knife behind his back. (ed.—Argh! This one sounds sooo familiar!) Found! It's the 1968 Penguin edition of: 

3. 1970s: Two boys are abducted by a flying saucer, controlled by what seem to be human-sized aliens with an insectoid look. But the kids figure out all's not as it seems: the "aliens" are really evolved ants who have been living underground for ages, and they're using the UFO as a cover story for whatever their real plans might be. I don't remember much else, except that 1. I learned the word "chitin" from this book, and 2. in the scene where the kids first discuss this theory, they know the ants are listening in, so they use a private code where you spell out words with the initials of made-up names (e.g. for "ants" it'd be something like "Remember when we hung out with Amy Nugent and Todd Smith"). Found! It's a 1981 kids' book:

4. Two or 3 young kids (a teen and one much younger I think) visiting an aunt or similar. They take a train, I think, and the woods surrounding the station are covered in nightshade/belladonna. The aunt lives in some kind of old mansion and has a weird man servant/sex demon named Jared or Jarad.

Horror Fiction Help XXIII

Can anyone help identify these? The first query sounds maddeningly familiar, but damn if I can't quite place it!

1. Late '70s/early '80s: The cover came straight out of Animal Hell, with an illustration of an oversized rat standing on its hind legs, holding the decapitated head of a cat in one hand and gouging its eye out with a bone in the other. Some other vague recollection of the cover includes a pile of bones. I think there also was a little more text on the cover than most books, which leads me to believe it was an anthology of some sort; however I am not positive about this. I remember absolutely nothing about the author(s), title, or back cover. Found! It’s Dr. Rat, 1977 Bantam edition. 

2. Unusual horror anthology that came out in the early '60s. It was paperbound, rather thin, and oversize, roughly 2X the dimensions of a paperback. The cover was dark blacks and purples with creepy drawings overlaid (I believe, going from a half century old memory!), and each of the short, 1- to 3-page stories had an illustration with it. Each story had an EC-like twist ending.

3. '90s or early '00s. It was a book of ghost stories, possibly British or Irish. I think there was a story about a banshee, and another about a ghost carrying a coffin and then appearing in an elevator as a warning, but the story I really remember is one where this girl, every birthday, tells her family a man (possibly named Billy, or William) will come for her. Year after year, he doesn't show - until her 18th(?) birthday, when the candles blow out and he appears on a horse and takes her away.

Horror Fiction Help XXII

 

None of these ring a bell for me, so I'm hoping one of my lovely TMHF readers will recognize them:

1. Possibly as early as 1969, no later than 1973.  COVER ART: in the background, there is a huge hulking silhouette behind a house window--inside the house. In the foreground is a shotgun--from the shooter's POV--blasting away at the silhouette.  CONTENTS: A group of suburbanites are under attack and running from an enemy--I can't remember now if it's gang members, the Commies, space aliens or who. The main gist of the story was the way that the worst in a lot of these people came out, and what they started doing to each other. Sort of an R or X rated variation on THE MONSTERS ARE DUE ON MAPLE STREET.  It also delivered on the violence promised by the cover.  There were a lot of raunchy situations and dialogue.  At one point, a villain gets the upper hand and threatens to rape one of the women all three ways…”Maybe the seed’ll meet somewhere in the middle!”

2. This was a paperback I read back in the late 80s-90s, out of my dad’s collection. It may have been published earlier. Not a typical incubus-succubus story, the main villain is a mythological immortal, half woman half-snake creature, possibly called Lamia or Naga, who feeds on blood and can possess people's bodies.  The plot I can remember: The protagonist is a single woman with a teenage son. The creature possesses the body of her sister and then comes to stay with them. The woman begins to notice odd things, and the sister begins killing random people, transforming from human into its snake woman form and draining them of blood. The first of the attacks is a girl from the local high school, very athletic, and the creature finds the smell of her blood irresistible.  More people die. There is a hint of a past lesbian relationship between the protagonist and another woman—the other woman ends up being targeted and killed by the creature as a warning not to pry. At some point, the sister leaves and takes the teenage son with her and seduces him. He returns later, but the only thing he remembers is ‘she kept putting me to sleep.’  The woman contacts the sister’s employer and discovers that her sister had been ill for several weeks before coming to see them. I think she learns about the creature possessing her and decides killing her sister is the only way to stop the evil. Thinking that’s the end she walks to the body, but the creature is waiting for her, thinking something like ‘It was a good body” and starts to speak the words for possession. Found! 1981's Ludlow's Mill.

3. On the cover, background was black or very dark blue, and it the extreme foreground was a noose.  A young man was coming up behind it.  He was white with short blond hair that curled on top, and wore a blue suit with a white dress shirt and dark tie.  On the left side the man's face had a look of horror, but on the right the face looked more eager, the mouth closed.  It looked like it might have been two of them coming up to the noose, but the outer edges of the noose covered part of their faces so it looked more half and half. Found! 1988's Surrogate Child.

4. The cover was dark, and depicted a sort of "Solid Gold" (the tv show) stage set, with large squares. It was a photograph, not a painted cover. And there was a single hand extended from behind one of them.

5. 1966, 67, somewhere around there, I read a story involving a boy who wakes up to witness small, lizard-like creatures entering his body and carrying away bits of it. Of course no one believes him, and this keeps happening. He discovers the creatures are somehow taking the place of the bits they carry off. In the end, he meets a copy of himself, assembled from the bits that had been stolen, and when this copy announces itself as the real boy, our protagonist disintegrates into a swarm of the lizards.

6.  The basic plot was a newlywed guy discovering his new wife was a member of some cult. She slips him a sleeping pill and sneaks down to the beach every night to engage in some weird ritual that involves crocodile critters coming out of the sea (they were called Sobeks, like the Egyptian gods) and eating dead bodies, and the cult leader sucking the life force out of his underlings.  Over the course of the novel, we find out that he was from Atlantis, and became a life force sucking vampire who can shape-shift. He is looking for his Atlantean lover who fled from him. Found! It's 1984's The Fellowship.

Horror Fiction Help XXI

Wow, Horror Fiction Help is old enough to drink! We've had some great success tracking down the forgotten titles of yesteryear, so how's about a few more? I and the folks looking for these books thank you, so cheers—you know who you are.


1. ’66/’67: Story involving a boy who wakes up to witness small, lizard-like creatures entering his body and carrying away bits of it. Of course no one believes him, and this keeps happening. He discovers the creatures are somehow taking the place of the bits they carry off. In the end, he meets a copy of himself, assembled from the bits that had been stolen, and when this copy announces itself as the real boy, our protagonist disintegrates into a swarm of the lizards. End of tale. 

2. My mom had a paperback book that I read a few times when I was a kid that I thought was called Black Mass or Black Sabbath. It was a black cover with a pentagram embossed on it and (I think I’m remembering correctly) a satanic goat head. The story was about a girl, deja-vu with a tree (because she was reincarnated), and a man she falls in love with who ends up being a satanic priest out to kill her (again). I THINK this is right, but not entirely sure, as it’s been about 40 years since I read it last. Found! It's Black Sabbat by J.B. Herman:

3. Sometime ’80s, purchased at a grocery store, drugstore, or Kmart. The cover is black-embossed and it is I believe a large black cat, jaguar or something. The cat is or is possessed by an evil spirit, attacking the people of a woodsy lake area or island... like in New England, not somewhere tropical. The main character is a detective/cop trying to hunt the beast. I believe the large cat is a female, maybe referred to as a she-beast by the main character. Found! It's Moonslasher by Douglas D. Hawk.

4. ’70s/early ’80s: the cover was purple and had the embossed, in black, wide-stretched jaws of a big cat, all fangs and stuff, alluringly emblazoned upon it. Or maybe it was the open maw of a panther of some sort, open mouth that sort of encompassed the book’s title, more a line drawing than a painting, and embossed. I could have sworn the book was about an ancient evil/demon being released and its grisly killing spree in a museum of some sort (*not* The Relic and *not* Panther!). 

5. ’70s/early ’80s: had to have been a best seller, because it was in the supermarket. This was the rural south, so they weren't gonna waste shelf space. The cover was dark and depicted a sort of "Solid Gold" (the tv music show) stage set, with large squares. It was a photograph, not a painted cover. And there was a single hand extended from behind one of them. It was inexplicable, and SO eerie, and scared me silly, and I don't even know why.

6. ’89 or ’90. It's a compilation of horror stories. The cover is black on top with a square of illustration covering the bottom. It features a man in ill-fitting clothing. Ripped jeans, letterman's jacket (red?) and I know there's a severed leg somewhere in there (the memory of it is kind of fading). He's crouching in the middle of a forest. A few items are around him, maybe from his victims (a red shoe?). He looks animalistic, perhaps not to the extent of being a werewolf, but like he degraded into insanity.

The one story I read was written in the form of log entries by the captain. His crew is in space looking for a habitable planet, from what I recall. The planet they land on is full of vegetation and the only life they can see are butterflies. The planet is full of butterflies. Previously I had thought that by eating some of the vegetation that the crew, having landed there, had turned into butterflies, themselves. I don't even remember what happened to them. Eventually, the captain's log degenerated as his mind failed him. The last page was full of big loops and curly cues as he forgot how to write.  
Found! It's "Gestation" by Bruce Jones:

Horror Fiction Help XX

Wow, the 20th post in my quest to help horror fans find forgotten books and stories! These descriptions have me stumped, so can anyone help ID these works? Thanks in advance y'all!

1. Paperback, cover mostly black, front cover illustration of an evil or feral-looking naked woman lying on grass, glaring angrily up at the us, the viewer. She was on her side in a semi-foetal position, so no NSFW frontal nudity is visible, her head is totally bald, her skin seemed to be overly veiny or tautly muscled (to emphasize she isn’t meant to be attractive or alluring) and she may have been clutching a kind of laurel wreath to herself. The synopsis described a little boy discovered alone with his entire town/village community vanished, and when questioned about it he can only furiously draw a naked bald woman on the ground, like the one on the cover. I can’t remember if he is the main character grown up, or the main character. Found! It's the UK edition of John Farris's Fiends:

2. My aunts left a paperback around in the early '80s, might be a late '70s publication. Simian hybrids reminiscent of Lovecraft's Arthur Jermyn live in tunnels below a town. They're extremely sexually voracious and the author lavishes detail on how their massive and agile genitalia turn women into blissed-out hostages. (There's a mutation where the tip of the urethra can extend as a kind of "mouth," with its own tongue if I recall correctly.) There's an assault on the tunnel system that fails, leaving the women happily pregnant. I'm sure there's a lot more context but it was a lot to process. Found! It's one of Laymon's Beast House novels:

3. Late ’70s or early ’80s: the cover was purple and had the embossed, in black, wide-stretched jaws of a big cat, all fangs and stuff, alluringly emblazoned upon it.  Or maybe it was the open maw of a panther of some sort.  I could have sworn the book was about an ancient evil/demon being released and its grisly killing spree in a museum of some sort. 

4. An orphan who goes to live with some wealthy relatives, an uncle (I believe) who seems nice but is actually super creepy. There's also either a young girl who might be another relative or maybe household servants who is not mentally stable and has been raped by someone (there was a real ick factor in this one that really didn't compare with other gothic books I've read). I feel like puppets or dolls might have been involved - like the uncle collected them or made them as a hobby or something).  I know the writer was responsible for at least several more gothics. I also know they weren't one of the super famous/more talented writers. No Victoria Holt (under any name), Daphne Du Maurier, or Mary Stewart here. It was also definitely not Phyllis Whitney, Dorothy Eden, or Dorothy Daniels as I've read and own many books by them and would have remembered that.  

5. A werewolf tale. A homeless man, or a hobo, or some kind of derelict, unfortunate soul, cursed with lycanthropy. He lived in the basement of an abandoned building of some sort, maybe a house, or a factory. The story might have been told through his journal entries, but I'm not sure. What I remember most vividly though, was that he had a radio that he would turn on occasionally, as a sort of reward to himself. He didn't want to use up all the batteries. The story might have taken place in the 50's. Found! It is a short story by Kathe Koja, "Angel's Moon," published in 1991's Ultimate Werewolf antho.

6. A magazine in the 1970s (one of those with lots of sci-fi and horror tales) and featured a monster that lived in a junk yard named Otto. That's about all I can remember about it. I was wondering if you might know the story name and author. Found! It's "The Dump" by Joe Lansdale, published in a 1981 issue of "Twilight Zone" mag.

Horror Fiction Help XIX

Can you help ID these forgotten horror novels and stories? Thanks in advance!

1. I think it's from the 1980s and it takes place in the country. A young boy begins to receive body parts in the mail and I think the killer ends up being the town doctor? Towards the end, one of the boy's family members goes on a shooting spree and kills most of his family. Maybe there was a grim reaper on the cover?

2. Published between 1980-1983, featured a “butcher cleaver” on the cover that I think is smashing through glass or a window or something. Found!

3. The best description I can give of it is that its set in a semi modern urban environment, a western city, not dystopian of any kind. It follows a couple characters, and the discovery of a creature that follows a victim based on a gifted object, secretly containing a foul smelling scrap of fabric. Its slowly understood that this item and the ‘curse’ of death via this creature can only be passed on by gifting the object to another person and thereby transferring the way the creature tracks you down. Its a pale hunched creature, (I always imagined it looking much like the urban legend of The Rake that circulates the internet every so often, but not inspired by it as I read this novel far before I knew of the legend) and comes for you while you’re asleep, and you are seemingly unable to escape it. The characters discover that the creature travels through the sewers, and is very old and has been around the area for a while. After finding an entrance to the sewer through a cupboard in a house they discover the bodies of all the creatures victims hanging from the ceiling in the creatures lair/home rotting and they realize this is where the scrap of fabric came from.

4. It was a white or cream colored paperback on the slim side and I remember the copy on the front maybe said “more terrifying than Psycho” (definitely something relating it to Psycho)-it looked 60s and like it was definitely written to cash in on the Psycho hype. The picture, I THINK, was almost like a big drawing of a cracked egg with something unidentifiable and ominous seeping out-very odd because it didn’t seem to relate to the plot. I think the lettering was in black or red. The plot centered on a teen (or slightly younger) girl who, in some way, “wasn’t quite right.” I think she was described (unfortunately) as being “slow” in some way, but there was the suggestion that there was more of a calculating mind hidden behind the mask. I remember a sinister and possibly alcoholic mother, and the story began with the girl’s new tutor showing up, a college coed (I think). She was replacing the odd girl’s previous tutor who I think was a college guy (possibly the boyfriend of the new tutor?) and also was mysteriously missing (I bet you can see where this is going). I didn’t get further than about 10 pages in, so don't know much more, but I get the sense I put it down just before a series of people are dispatched in suspicious ways-clearly in some way by this underestimated kid (I remember thinking the plot really paralleled Psycho, with the girl being like a seemingly harmless Norman Bates type, and the story starting with the missing person in her orbit).

5. A book that I owned during the late nineties/early 2000s (I'm thinking 2000s more than the 90's) that was about a woman's husband was murdered in a way where he was badly burned and after , looked like a ' monster '. The woman had bad dreams every night about him and she stopped dressing in ' sexy ' clothing after his death and only wore baggy clothes and his shirts. The villains in the story were an older woman that was a case worker / social worker (?) who liked torturing her female clients and a younger man (he may have been a gang member?). They were in a Satanic cult and had a mother and son type of friendship. I remember clearly one scene where the older woman ties up a young woman in the kitchen and fixes the ice maker to keep dumping ice on her. The pair kidnap the widowed woman for their sacrifice and raising demons (or) the Devil in a mall. The murdered husband , back from the dead, goes to rescue his wife and heads through the sleazy parts of the city / town where he meets a young woman who is blind or a prostitute or both. She falls in love with him but he won't have sex with her because he still loves his wife.

6. It was about a couple struggling to have a child who move to a small town (American setting I think) with a doctor with some unusually high success treatment for conception via IVF methods.The lady becomes pregnant but notices the others Kids turn out weird and disturbing. really violent etc, I remember it was incredibly gratuitous in its violence, gore etc. Other things i vaguely remember are there where lots of twins as a result of the experiments in it and I seem to remember one of the messed up kids killing a crow or eating it or something, and an evil doctor and a monster of sorts providing the sperm.

7. I'm looking for a book that was released maybe 20 years ago. I actually never read it; I didn't have the money to buy it and then when I did I could never remember the title. Anyway, the only things I remember is that it was a horror novel that took place after something snuffed out the sun - everything was in perpetual blackness; and I feel like maybe the author was some sort of martial arts expert. (It's not Lansdale's Drive-In!)

8. A teenage boy dies in an accident, wakes to find his brain and eyes have been removed. Part of his brain gets put into a computer and given to another kid. The computer makes kid suspicious, so he takes it apart and discovers the chunk of brain inside. Slutty teenage girl gets abducted and raped by some pink tentacle machines hooked up to a blue alien dude. Other girls are there and pregnant. Bluish hybrid people run the "prison" and are children of the alien and abducted girls. I swear the cover of the book was a white on black drawing of a house that was screaming or looking angry, with swirls around it. Found!

9. From what I remember it had an eyeball in a Petri dish or something like that on the front cover, the cover was red, it was a collection of short stories, can’t remember if it was adult or teen, doubt it was goosebumps though.. one of the stories was about an old recluse who lives in a shack that was surrounded by thorns, then the recluse disappeared, some kids spurred on by this old legend, decide to visit the shack, but one by one the meet an untimely end in the Thorns. I remember something about spiders that bore the resemblance to the old hermit as well, they may have contributed to the kids' deaths.

Horror Fiction Help XVIII

Hey y'all, it's another installment of Horror Fiction Help! Readers have emailed me their descriptions. Anyone recognize these forgotten horrors? Much appreciated!

1. A slim paperback and the cover was of a man wearing a pig mask and the book had something to do with astral travel. Found! It's:

2. YA thriller/horror from some point in the '90s. I recall this being part of a series, don't think it was from Point Horror as none of the titles on its wiki article jogged my memory but I could be wrong. I do know for sure it wasn't from Fear Street or Nightmare Hall. Cover art was spooky-looking picture of guy on motorcycle, which probably doesn't narrow it down much but plot-wise... Plot concerns girl being haunted by the presence of her jerk biker ex, though he didn't die only moved away, and it was somehow determined the spirit was lingering about because she hadn't emotionally let go of him yet. Found! It's:

3. Paranormal horror novel written around 1981 set in late '50s, small Midwest town. A little girl cursed by a weird pedophile that tried to lure her in his home with candy, but the girl fled and he cursed her under his breath. He said something like “to hell with you The girl was a normal person until she turned (I believe 18) and still a virgin although she was engaged. When her fiancé tried to go too far a malevolent spirit would interrupt in some manner. She broke her engagement and announced to everyone that she wanted to become a nun. She enters a convent and begins her training as a postulate. While she is there strange things and supernatural occurrences began, soon they realized that they are under demonic attack and they request an exorcism on the young woman. One of the scenes that occurred and I remember well is on a thanksgiving day the sisters prepared a large amount of traditional Thanksgiving food. One of the sister was in the process of setting the table and left to get another food dish, She was shocked to see that the food already place on the dining table had changed into feces within a few minutes. A priest was sent to investigate and to do the exorcism on the young woman. Found! It's:

4. Short story about the dawning of an "age of plastic" where a boy wakes up one day and finds that he's completely made of plastic. He rearranges his facial features and then his parents don't recognize him, causing him to go on the run. He eventually comes home to realize his parents are now made of plastic as well and that this apparently is the new norm. I want to say it was in a Hitchcock anthology of sorts, but it was in a book prior to 1987-8. Found! It's "The Plastic Age" in:

5. A young girl abused by her father, younger brother finds out and I think the father kills him and blames the girl who is then institutionalized. The murder weapon is some type of tool like a wrench, cover had a blonde girl holding it. Remember them playing Manhunt near beginning, brother's name Bubba maybe.

Horror Fiction Help XVII

OK horror fiends who can help out here?

1. Sci-fi/horror novel about insect aliens taking over a town, people getting body-horror mutations, place gets quarantined by the government, turns out the aliens are harvesting psychic energy to power their spaceship. Pretty standard for the genre I guess. Must have been from the '80s (maybe early '90s), the cover art showed human faces cracking open with insectoid features emerging, the title was one of those unpronounceable sci-fi words that's all Xs, Ys, and Zs. Found! It's:

2. When I was a kid my grandma had a copy of a paperback that freaked me out enough I threw it behind the basement steps. And then when she caught me I made her throw it away. I remember the cover as being artwork of a dead looking bride soaked from head to toe in blood. (I've thought about it being Carrie and mixing a prom dress and wedding dress up, but I've never found a Carrie paperback that looks like my memory.) This all took place probably around 1988 to 1991.

3. The title I remember as The Secret (I think) and had a silver quasi-swastika on its cover. Found! It's:

Horror Fiction Help XVI

1. Comics series in mid to late '80s, one issue was a about a woman whose husband was a giant wasp-man creature. Cover featured nude woman carried through the air by a giant wasp. Found! It's

2. Three people stuck on an evil, malevolent train that tries to eat the passengers

3. Story about a man who followed people that were abusive to their pets around in I think New York and exacted revenge on them in a typical fashion (he sees a guy kicking his dog in Central Park and breaks into his house or accosts him on the street and wails on him with steel-toed boots). In the end he goes a little over the edge on someone who is using flypaper, breaks into their apartment while they're on vacation and glues the entire floor. Can't remember for sure but I think the plan backfires and he ends up either painting himself into a corner, as it were, or gluing himself to the floor and starving to death. Found! It's "How Would You Like It?" by Lawrence Block from Monsters in Our Midst.

4. Novel about a couple who hired a maid or possibly an au pair, I think there's a baby but not sure, the maid immediately starts trying to psychologically control and also seduce both of them. Husband figures out something is up, one of the key points is him hunting down her references and finding out that her previous employer is horribly burned to invalidism, afraid of the maid, who faked her own reference. Turns out the maid was a witch centuries ago, I think, cursed to something-something till someone loves her. Husband burns down house trying to kill her, is arrested/thrown into an asylum. Novel ends with the maid, reincarnated into a new body, having an interview for another job... Found! It's:

5. Story in which Harry Houdini dies (as the reader understands; he just wonders why he has suddenly woken up back in his childhood home with his beloved "Mutti" [mother]). As the story progresses, it becomes obvious to both Houdini and the reader that "Mutti" is not his mother and that he maybe trapped for all eternity in his own special hell with a thing that looks like his mother but isn't, giving (against his will) fallacious words from the afterworld to people at seances.

6. A vampire novel very much like 'Salem's Lot except set in the '60s after Kennedy was assassinated. I think a reporter comes to the town and finds it overrun with vampires. Head vampire is very handsome and sleeps in a coffin in the basement of a dilapidated old house. He has the power to enter people's dreams in order to control them. Found! It's:

7. Maybe the book came out in 1999 or so. Mostly white cover, close up of a pale white vampire face with mouth wide open showing fangs and blood around lips. Eyes red and yellow I think. Face filled the whole cover, framing the face so that just above the eyes down to just below the mouth were visible. Maybe a Pinnacle book. Found! It's:

Gah, some of these sound so familiar, but are just maddeningly out of reach! All help appreciated.

Horror Fiction Help XV

As Halloween approaches, I'm finishing up a couple novels and hope to have reviews up soon, and I'm also watching 1970s made-for-TV thriller/horror movies on YouTube. Meanwhile, folks are still looking for forgotten horror fiction. Who can help?

1. A late 90's paperback cover, predominantly back but with a large white and red clown leering down at the viewer. I remember the author being obscure to me but he had made it big enough to be in Barnes and Noble. Thought it might be Al Sarrantonio but it's not. If I remember correctly it was either a jester or one of those European whiteface clowns. Anyhow... I bought it and the book sucked and had no scary clowns in it whatsoever. Found! It's:

2. A short story about a botanist who created a plant from an ill or dying boy.  I think the twist of the story was the parents' shocked realization.

3. A Caucasian fellow goes to see an old Indian (Native American) in his tepee to make a deal involving some kind of vengeance demon/spirit--I forget what for--and the Indian was in over his head; the demon came and killed him and took off wreaking havoc in the white guy's life. I think it raped his daughter or threatened her somehow. Anyhow, one of the details that stuck in my memory is that he didn't like his daughter's boyfriend because, for one thing, he was too audacious, i.e. he didn't even try to hide where his fingers were stained from smoking pot. Which he was doing out on a country road alone when the demon got him. Best I remember the cover showed the old Indian conjuring in his tepee and maybe the demon coming up.

4. I was reading a magazine a couple years ago, for the life of me I can not remember which but it had reviews for horror/thrillers, etc.... it described one book's plot, about a snowstorm and a group of people holed up in a roadside truck stop type of thing, and they soon realize there is a sniper outside, and won't let them leave. Found! It's:

5. Any information on a story about an escaped killed called "Mad Maurice."  It was in a kids' horror anthology.  I read it in the 80s but it may have been much older.  There was a bit about branches scratching a window but it really being the killer.  It wasn't really that great, but it is a story I have never forgotten. Found! It's:

6. 1980s Playboy paperback... A rapist gets caught... and nether regions are put in his taped-shut mouth.