5
Jan
ISBN: 9781906584122
I was given this magazine for review.
Issue 8 of Murky Depths is chock full of tight, short tales of speculative terror. It opens with a poetic ode to the corporate head honcho bad guy, “The Majority Shareholder” by Edward R. Norden.
Then comes an end of the world tale where the most important character is a cat, David Tallerman’s “Peachy”, followed by another chiaroscuro graphic strip from Luke Cooper, “The Wrath of God part 1”. This time Cooper’s favorite characters, Halo the Nephalim and Goulding, the cop with a heart of an angel, literally, still can’t escape getting the weird cases. They’re facing a vigilante that’s decided killing Halo is the way to get back to Heaven. It looks to be an interesting new storyline in Cooper’s wicked noir world.
“What the Tongue Will Taste” by Sam J. Drane is a money-and-power tale of what men who have it all and have done it all do when they get bored. There are clones involved making this tale a fun little masturbatory fantasy, depending on how you look at it.
Geoffrey Girad’s “Collecting James” is also a tale of a rich and powerful man getting what he wants. In this one he wants the gifts others have he doesn’t, and takes them from his victims in the form of trepanning and discs of bone that retain their former owners’ memories. But the twist in this one is better than readers will expect.
“Hero in Hell” by James Johnson (the piece that inspired this issue’s awesome cover) is a great concept, a super hero finds himself in hell after death, but it suffers from the most common problem in these graphic shorts, there’s just so much more story to be told than can come out in this space. It was sad to see it end.
“Out of Time” by J Westlake is predictable, but the storytelling here is more about experiencing the story, which is a very accurate and interesting portrayal of depression. Readers can walk in the experiences of the depressed main character as his isolation and uncontrollable sadness take literal forms in the story world.
Following the mental illness theme (and the writer theme established with “Collecting James”), Christine Luca’s “My Muse Wears Army Boots” is a tale of hypergraphia, the compulsion to write, sparked by a sadistic and abusive muse. The interesting early set up of a wanna be writer who can read corpses is dropped in favor of the hypergraphia angle, making this tale feel like two in one. The plot line at the end is easy to anticipate, taking some of the umph out of the story, even if the visuals are strong.
“Recall” a graphic strip by Chris Huff follows, pitting eternal youth against fate. It’s immediately followed by a glimpse at another artist’s vision of Huff’s tale, as the first artist was forced to abandon the tale. It is interesting to see how two people visualized and affected the same story.
“The Undead” by Lawrence Buentello is the best of the issue, and the kind of story you want to point out to other people, saying “Read this one.” J T is suffering from the loss of his wife, but his lasting love with her leads to the power to bring back the dead—all the dead—within the vicinity of J T, except for the one thing he wants back. With a chilling, almost beautiful end it shouldn’t be missed.
“Endless” by Sylvanus Moxley is the second poem in this issue, and not altogether a dismal or depressing one. In fact, in a way, it’s an almost hopeful tale of a man trapped in a ship orbiting the moon.
“Monitor” by Richard Rippon delves somewhat into postpartum depression, except poor new mom Sarah is dealing with a truly evil little newborn. Uncomfortably creepy it’s also an excellent read.
“Nosing with the Four-Stroke Kid” by KC Ball is another short, spiky addition to this issue, the tale of a unique motorcycle and its rider. Finally comes “The Pilgrimage” a last graphic offering by Kristopher Barker, about a woman who will go to any means to find her path to salvation.
Another fine collection of tales, Murky Depths bears a resemblance to the classic Tales from the Crypt publications, only with significantly better stories.
19
Oct
Murky Depths 7
ISBN: 9781906584115
Murky Depths stands out among the offerings of the small press, largely because it contains graphic strips and illustrations, as well as the mix of dark genre work that I find simply tantalizing.
Issue 7 features a large number of dark science fiction tales, each one excellent examples of the genre.
“Scratch” by Jason Palmer is half mystery and half psychological science fiction where people wear their obsessions and addictions on their arms, or legs, or tongues, and the battle to resist self destructive tendencies overshadows the battles of good and survival and everything else.
The first graphic offering, “A Brief History of Dogfighting” by James Johnson is a silent film, of sorts, with a deeply ironic tone and a fast pace. Following it and backing up the silent film feel, is a behind the scenes feature which chronicles the evolution of the storyline and the story as a piece of art.
“The Longest Road in the Universe” by CS MacCath is an incredibly emotion piece, easily the kind one might find in a larger publication, following a member of a species bred and genetically manipulated to love and serve a “higher species”. But when their parental figures who used and abused them vanish a whole race has to face their own abuse, with varying, and in this story almost lovingly detailed, results. This is definitely one not to miss.
The immediate follow up, “A Healthy Outlook” by Bill Ward, is a short, tight piece that shows the same sort of mental turmoil, from the point of view someone so die-hard-determined not to be a victim that the farce reaches a morbidly funny point.
“Viewer’s Choice” by Willie Meikle keeps to the themes of obsession while softening the science fiction focus. Here the lead can’t break away from his television, to the point that all the major memories in his life have a direct link to a television event. A situational story, it nonetheless clearly comments on our favorite societal past time.
“Bite the Bullet” also by James Johnson, is a fantastic romp through the limits of future technology, exploring how technology affects us, for good or ill.
“Psong” by Ian Rogers has less focus. A story about a futuristic assassin, the reader is loaded down with personality and detail without much context. Of course since the lead is a telepath and an object reader this adds more strength to the point of view of the assassin, but readers still have a very limited view of why this story is taking place at all.
“Survivalist” by Kevin Brown is one of the best vampire stories I’ve read lately, bringing the old Gothic critter into the modern world without turning it into a sex idol.
“Bait” by Paul Milliken follows the vampire story with its natural counterpart, a shape shifter story. This one follows the more traditional formula of an ordinary person whose life intersects with a monster. But this monster comes from the sea and remains more of a mystery than readers might like.
Luke Cooper’s “Flashback” adds another tale to the collection surrounding his gritty detective neck deep in the war between Heaven and Hell. In this addition to a potentially interesting plot, readers learn how Goulding got sucked into the Big War in the first place, but his role in it still remains a mystery.
Finally comes “Haruspex” by William Douglas Goodman, a second place finisher to the earlier “The Long Road Home” which brings the issue back around to tales of twisted mentality. In this story a boy finds that he’s gained the ability to get visions from dead animals, which has interesting results when your father is a trophy hunter.
All together here’s another fine issue that shows the people behind Murky Depths have their head on straight. I look forward to more.
ISBN: 978-0981639000
Despite the flavorful title, Gene O’ Neill’s Taste of Tenderloin doesn’t feature eight stories dedicated to culinary tales, but instead it’s his ode to the San Francisco Tenderloin District, bent on making the area a vivid, magical place all its own.
The first story, “Lost Patrol”, is not necessarily a traditional story with a beginning, middle and end. Instead it’s a character profile, short, but vivid, with a delicate stretch of story surrounding it. Like an appetizer, there’s not much here, but enough to get a good taste of what’s to come.
Next comes “Magic Words”, an old school urban fantasy tale of dark magic and a mysterious homeless woman who one night, taking only a promise for the future as payment, gives a man the exact words he needed to move forward in his life. Unlike a lot of other stories, this one doesn’t try to present a “be careful what you ask for” moral. Instead it just presents itself as it is, adding an element of mysticism to the Tenderloin.
“Tombstones in His Eyes” tackles the overlapping tales of the junkies on the street, using some very interesting symbolism. Again, O’ Neill doesn’t so much tell a story as present a character and their tale, in the good and bad, for the reader’s viewing.
“Bushido” is also lovely, the tale of a man who finds salvation in the streets walking alongside doom. But the imagery and the climax bear a strong resemblance to the previous tale, and so it lessens some of the impact.
“Balance” follows a vet suffering from a disconnect with reality. It’s hard to watch Declan’s version of getting more control over the world around him, since he can’t seem to control his own brain functions. But this story, like the other so far, is present unflinchingly, with little effort to make the reader sympathize with the characters. Instead O’ Neill just beckons you to come and listen.
With “The Apotheosis of Nathan McKee” O’Neill ties the people of the Tenderloin and the stories in this collection together firmly, making each minor, barely mentioned character the owner of their own story. Nathan, interchangeable with the attack victim in “Bushido”, discovers a beating has left him not only for with a complete lack of desire for the booze he used to drug himself, but it’s given him a unique ability. Only he’s not quite sure what to do with it. The first overall positive tale, without a bittersweet touch, it possesses a delicate aspect of intriguing urban fantasy.
In “Bruised Soul” Mickey D, an ex boxer abandoned to the streets by time and suffering from damage taken through the length of his career, hits the streets after a stint in a mental facility, only to discover the good things have gotten that much worse in his absence and the bad things, of course, never change. It’s his new neighbor that piques his interest this time around, an exotic woman named Jenna who seems to have a peculiar ability. Threaded just as finely is an end question, what is real and what has Micky D imagined, without the heavy-handedness of other stories.
Finally is “5150”, the first first person story in the collection. Here the lead might not seem like a true member of the Tenderloin, but by the sad, shattering end of this cop’s life you can see every character story so far caught up in this one tale.
Readers should be warned that these characters seem fleshy and real, their tales often dark and hopeless. It is easy to get pulled into the hopeless feeling of this collection.
Taste of Tenderloin is a tight network of precise details and emotion presented, but firmly held back from influencing the reader in each story. A delicate balance of realism, surrealism and unique storytelling makes it a compelling read.
The Queer Wolf collection kicks off with “Wolf Strap” by Naomi Clark. Ayla gave up a lot to be a lesbian, like her entire family, who raised her to believe her role was to get married and pop out a lot more werewolves for the good of the species. But when a child, a member of her family pack, is killed she and her partner Shannon head back to her childhood home. Its clear that things have changed since she left, but how much have they changed in this city where the human and wolves used to live in peace? The only flaw in “Wolf Strap” is that it’s too short. The plot and setting could have held a full novel and while the pacing doesn’t feel rushed it’s hard not to want more of everything Clark has to offer.
“Moon Sing” by Laramie Dean is a beautiful love story between a wolf and a witch. Acting as a metaphor for being queer in a straight world, even Drew’s pack can’t accept him falling for someone not of the Breed. It doesn’t have much plot outside the romance, but that alone is taken to a haunting, yearning level that’s purely magnificent.
“Wolf Lover” by Michael Itig is a cruder, more raw, sex-centered tale of fetishism and, of course, werewolves. Nige is an impatient, sex-charged gay man with a passion, shall we say, for werewolves. So much so that he lures them to his home and tricks them into shape shifting during sex. But the man he meets at a club for those trolling for werewolf hook ups turns out to be something else altogether. “Wolf Lover”gives readers a more raw look at the psyche of a gay man, but doesn’t feel cliché, preachy or stereotypical in the end.
“Shy Hunter” by Ginn Hale centers on David, scent dog and queer man, and not sure how to balance the two. Until he falls for a man who is being stalked by the monster who attacked David and turned him into a werewolf. This is another excellent tale, with equal parts action, emotion and mystery.
Anel Viz’s “The Stray” is the lightest tale of the book so far, making nearly every canine joke and pun, without being completely cheesy as it tells the story of a couple making a major commitment to each other.
“New Beginnings” by Cari Z focuses on the only pack that accepts gay wolves in this paranormal world and a bitter curmudgeon of a wolf, Michael, who finds himself attracted to and depended on by their newest rescue. But exile wasn’t enough for Tori’s family. They want him dead and Michael must keep him safe in this action-adventure-romance.
Jerome Stueart’s “Where the Sled Dogs Run” is another lighter tale, focusing less on the romance angle and more on creating a sweet sense of wonder. In this story the werewolves are a group of shamans, immortal, reluctant and shy, who want to reconnect with the world around them rather than hide from it, but they don’t know how. It fits the anthology, but it could have been found in a number of other fantasy-themed magazines just as easily.
“Pavlov’s Dog” by Andi Lee shifts straight back to hardcore erotica, and is nothing but. This tale is all set up, Josh and Caleb have just been approved to start their own pack and decide to celebrate. It’s not bad, there just isn’t much story to it.
Charlie Cochrane’s “Wolves of the West” is the most civilized story of the book, a tale of a pack that meets in an English museum for what is far from a mess of drooling, carnivorous monsters. Here Rory and George, who put the pack together and have run it for quite some time, work to create a haven for both their fellow queers and werewolves and must work to keep certain indiscretions from public light. It’s an amusing, but meaningful addition to the collection’s theme.
“Family Matters” by Moondancer Drake is another example of a solid piece, featuring a lynx and wolf lesbian family and pack, that feels less like a short story and more like an opening to a book. This piece could easily be stretched and expanded, in fact there are fight scenes that are glanced over and while werebadgers, lynxes, Fae and witches are all mentioned they aren’t very fleshed out. Drake is a good writer though, so one can only hope more than this story comes from her world.
In “Wrong Turn” by Stephen Osborne a young gay man finds more than he bargained for when he stops at a bar for directions and a drink and ends up smack in the middle of a werewolf tift. This falling in love story is simple and sweet, with a wrap up that seems to come too soon.
“Leader of the Pack” by Robert Saldarini is a historical werewolf tale, told by flashback, about a pair of men who survived World War II. Being steeped in the time period adds a weight of interest and credibility, but again, the tale’s flaw is its brevity.
“War of the Wolves” by Charles Long is the first to include (by a brief mention) an intersexual character. This tale also takes a more fantasy-angled approach, embedding a strong sense of the surreal into a story of people coming together, not just trying to find their place in the world, but willing to fight for it.
Lucas Johnson’s “Flip City”is a more traditional horror take on werewolves, a cliched take, unfortunately. The first real hiccup in the book the lead is not gay, so much as a borderline rapist and killer. Luckily the speed of this one is stuck on fast forward, burning through the story with little depth.
In “Night Swimming” by RJ Bradshaw, Joseph is indulging in a secret night swim when a wild-living werewolf finds him. They catch scents and Todd, the wild-wolf insists that he can smell that they are meant to be lifemates, and also proposes that they begin their life together by spending half the year in the city and winter helping Todd’s pack in the woods. After some thought Joseph agrees, they hash out the details, and unfortunately that’s all there is to this tale.
“In the Seeonee Hills” by Erica Hildebrand leads with a lesbian who contracted lycanthopy from a lover who got a bit too rough in bed. Claire is new to the paranormal world and caught between two packs who want to use her for ill means. It’s part Romeo & Juliet and part something all it’s own. Like some of the other tales there is room for more expansion, but it doesn’t feel unfinished or sped up for the sake of the short story form.
“A Wolf’s Moon” by Quinn Smythwood is certainly different. But three pages in I had no real clue what was going on or what the characters were hinting at, which left me feeling completely disconnected from the story and the characters. A depressingly weak end to this collection of tales.
Overall, there is a lot of good in Queer Wolf. It manages to represent the scope of urban fantasy, from a queer angle, though it leans heavily toward m/m paranormal romance. I really would have liked to see more f/f or even a transgender or bisexual story or two. From a genre point of view I’d have liked to see more mystery, traditional fantasy and even horror-based tales. But that’s what second volumes are for.
27
Jul
Paperback: 78-0-9550631-3-8
Bizzaro fiction is something of a new experience for me. I’ve read small bits of it before, but it’s not a genre I consider myself well versed in so this is going to be a less neutral review that takes the experiences of an inexperienced reader into account. What I’m looking for in a good weird story is intelligence despite absurdness, a story I’m capable of understanding despite skewing the idea of reality and an emotional response with some aspect of the story.
Polluto # 2, dubbed “Apocalypses & Garden Furniture”, is a hefty collection of tales.
21
Jul
Reviewed for MonsterLibrarian.com’s Werewolf Month.
Red by Paul Kane
Skullvines, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-9799673-5-1
Available: New
Red is a fairly short, straightforward retelling of “Little Red Riding Hood” that breaks both the monster and the fairy tale form back down to their horrific beginnings. Kane’s monstrous wolf is a creature out of our nightmares, all appetite, both sexual and digestive. He’s a true shapeshifter, a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” who takes on the forms of people around him in order to get closer to his victims. Also true to the first fairy tales, this isn’t a light-hearted tale with magical creatures that is tied up in a nice happy bow. It’s a brutal tale of stalking and hunger. The only down side is that it doesn’t deviate from the traditional story much, making it a simplistic and quickly read tale. Recommended for private collections due to the sexual content and cost vs. length factors.
Contains: Violence, gore, sex
23
Jun
Trade Paperback: 9781906584078
If Dracula and Chelsea Quinn Yarbro’s Count Saint Germain mixed you’d have Gabriele, the lead in Sam Stone’s throwback vampire novel, Killing Kiss. Stone takes readers on a ride back to when vampires were ageless, alien creatures only pretending to be human, where they mourned or celebrated their liberation from the species, found themselves constantly drawn to it and they didn’t sparkle.
Gabriele was a well-off Italian singer who fell prey to a woman, who quite accidentally made him a vampire when she fully intended to kill him. After his own tragic attempts to maintain a human life Gabriele gives up and instead once a year he ventures into the human social world to find and attempt to change a woman to become his mate. Four hundred years, and four hundred failures later sees Gabriele assuming the life of a college student, and almost given up on finding an equal, intent just on surviving.
As his new persona Jay, he runs into shy, quiet, bashful Carolyn, exactly his type of victim. For he must be a serial killer, even if he’s only killed once a year, for leaving such a trail of lost loves behind him. Then there’s Lilly, who is most definitely not his type, until spiked drinks from a frat party cause Gabriele to drop everything, his identity, his game and his defenses to whisk Lilly away.
Killing Kiss could never be dismissed as mere “vampire porn”. While the plot is foresee-able it’s also a return to vampires as predators on humanity, yet creatures utterly charmed by and weakened to us. Flashbacks are mixed in with modern events, giving the book the feel of slowly backing away from a painting to see the full picture.
Vampire fans, especially those feeling left behind by romance’s siege on the genre, will find Killing Kiss (the first in a trilogy) has a lot to offer and shouldn’t be missed.
Click to buy
Trade Paperback: 9780982159613 , $15.95
The Monster Within Idea, R. Thomas Riley’s collection from Apex Publications is an exploration of monsters in all their various forms, supernatural and dark, beneficial and very, very malicious.
“Attrition” the first tale in this collection, is the story of an incarcerated man who is preparing for his release day. To be free all he has to do is walk out, where a vicious tunnel will either deem him worthy of being a part of society, or turn his sentence into a self-fulfilling death penalty.
“Touching God” is a surreal story of two boys trying to escape a personal darkness, only to find that something follows them back to the mundane world. A story of family tragedy, it’s heavily character based with an open ending that implies the worst is yet to come. Continuing with a child’s point of view, “Too Little” tells another short, dark story of victimization and revenge in a lilting, almost playful tone.
“Jenny” is the tale of a jealous lover, a woman who will possess or punish the man she loves. It’s a little too obvious, but a darkly amusing addition to the collection.
“Perfect” also uses a very female point of view, as a woman obsessed with body image imagines that as she airbrushes models’ pictures she also cleans them of their other flaws. If only she could fix her own life as easily.
The next two tales are both zombies stories. “Haven” is a wholly depressing story of a boy who is trying to get to his older sister after a zombie uprising. After days of traveling and barely surviving, he reaches the hospital where his sister works in the maternity ward, which has been overrun with zombie infants. As is often found in zombie tales the desolation is overwhelming and there can really only be one end.
“In the Beginning” could be the start of a longer zombie tale. The imagery of a bio weapon going off at a Six Flags amusement park is chilling, but the story is one readers already know.
Taking readers to the Old West, “The Run” is about a man hired to transport a mysterious package from one town to another. He’s warned not to look at or open the package, but a busted wheel leads him to being trapped in the growing dark, in the woods, with its contents. There’s a feeling of filler to this story, though it fits the theme. The setting doesn’t quite come alive, though the monster within certainly does.
Tales of love gone wrong is one of Riley’s strength, as is evident by the next two tales, both tackling the topic. “Twin Thieves” is a surreal tale, tinged with sadness, of a man trying to make things work between himself and his wife, at any cost, when some things are just meant to be broken.
“Tautology” is darker, displaying a different form of co-dependency and depression with a side order of stalker. As short as many of the other tales, this one is also stronger, despite the only action being the emotional ex-boyfriend repeatedly calling his love. It has a killer and an unexpected ending that makes the tale one of the strongest in the collection.
Going back to the Old West “A Pair of Aces, a Pair of Eights” tells of a gunfighter so loved by the people around him that even Death himself seems to want to take revenge on his killer.
The following tale, “Bubo”, is also primarily set in a bar. But in this bar a yuppie with a last wish finds a creature that shouldn’t be on Earth and learns that most wishes are better off just in your head.
“The Day Luftberry Won It All” is a surprisingly imaginative tale of Luftberry, a pool shark living after the apocalypse when other players are a fast fading commodity. In one of the last “Sin” bars in this semi-science fiction world, he is challenged by a strangely serpentine man. In a game for his soul, literally, Luftberry becomes so preoccupied with winning that he never stops to consider that the prize might not offer much of a victory.
“Just Decoration” is a revenge story that’s simply too short. The revelations are fired at readers like bullets, rather than slowly revealed, making them feel contrived. There’s no time to build up the character, thus their relationships, before suddenly they’re all dead and the reader is left feeling out of the loop.
“The Lesser Evil” pits the young black, ex-thug trying to do good against the stupid white corrupt congressman. A voyage that touches on the splatter scene with a grisly pair of murders with no solid explanation, “The Lesser Evil” is part discourse on racism and politics and part murder mystery.
“The Monster Within Idea” is remarkable for how very little it reveals, which only emphasizes the quest of the mysterious girl trapped in a closet trying to determine what’s real and who she really is. Where it could have delved into stark realism and drama, instead Riley merely hints and leaves the true horror for the reader’s minds to make up.
“Brittle Bones, Plastic Skin” is one of Riley’s best, and it’s a pleasure to say it’s been included in this collection. Here he walks the line between surreal and reality, pitting a man against an ancient evil with the lives of children at stake. Other tales have been told in the same style and fail, but this story maintains a level of dark, paranormal questioning through out, making the point of view changes only add to the robustness of the tale.
One of the longest additions, “The Core of Forgotten” pits a pair of children, bored and a bit criminal on a long summer vacation, against the neighborhood witch, who’s genuinely evil. When the kids’ stop watching the witch and instead break into her house they get more than they bargained for, ending up in a bloody, ruthless showdown with the witch, a demon and stand byers whose interests have turned from merely malicious to wicked.
Finally is “Only Spirits Cry”. An excellent way to end the collection this one is the long, emotional tale of a man who is willing to do almost anything to save his mother from death, because he’s done so before. A delicate weave of old magic, modern setting, childhood magic and unconditional love it’s one hundred percent pure adventure.
Riley’s strength lies in spinning emotional tales, often ones that involve or are told through the point of view of children. While not all the tales in this collection are the best of the best, there are several darkly brilliant gems that readers can be happy to have in one bound volume.