To start with I have to say that my initial intention was to do my standard, single review on a single work, because thus far I have only done a couple of reviews where I included more than one work by the same author (always a sign of an exceptional talent). I also have to state that it was my initial intention to have that review done about three weeks ago as well, along with an entire laundry list of other things that, as always, went on the back burner due to my recurrent migraines and other assorted and endless disasters.
But enough about my issues, let's talk about Lisa McCourt Hollar. If you follow this blog you may know that I first became acquainted with Mrs. Hollar's works back around Halloween when I read her short story Sam, a sweet little tale of a boy and his flesh eating, zombie, goldfish. I found it to be a quaint and endearing little story, and from the author's bio at the end I was really under the impression that Mrs. Hollar was mainly into the YA and "Children's" horror scenes, someone who told tales that were grodie enough to be cool, but safe enough for the local PTA to approve of.
A couple of months later, during the Twelve Nights Of Creepfest Blog Hop, I learned that Mrs. Hollar was a little more edgy than I though after getting a look at a work that was still somewhat in progress on her blog. I realized there was more to Lisa McCourt Hollar than I had thought at first glance, but yet I really didn't get the fact that she wrote the kind of things your local PTA wouldn't approve of. In fact it was not until getting through the following stories that I knew how gritty and edgy Lisa McCourt Hollar was, not only writing the type of story I love to read, but the type I love to write as well.
First up is a stand alone short story The Carnival. Pregnant at 15 Lucy has been confined to her home by her father, the mayor, to avoid a scandal, but she will do anything to be reunited with her lover Tom. When the little clown arrives at her house with a message from Tom to follow him she does without a single though, straight into an unimaginable nightmare.
It's pretty hard to say much more without giving too much of the story away. I can tell you it's not a tale for the faint of heart or prudish. The story itself is very well written, although it does becomes slightly predictable near the end. I give it Four Stars.
The second body of Mrs. Hollar's work up for review is a short story collection Halloween Frights. This is a fairly easy read, and most of the individual stories are only a few pages long, but their length does nothing to lessen their impact.
'Joe's Night Out'
A sweet little poem about crazy Joe heading to the cemetery to dig up a few friends for Halloween. Five Stars.
Happy Halloween
Sandra finally has what she's wanted since the day she married George. She's a widow. Unfortunately she's not quite as alone as she seems. Four Stars.
Taxidermy Nightmare
On Halloween Night most of the kids avoid the Harper house, because they say deformed Tom does some crazy things. They may be right. Three Stars.
Dolly
Francine's daughter Annie is acting out, but it isn't her fault. Dolly is the one telling her to do bad things. Three Stars.
Things That Go Bump In The Night
Tasha can't sleep. There's a monster under her bed that wants to eat her toes. She knows it. Just knows it. But who is more scary in the end? Five stars.
The Beast Inside
There are times when you shouldn't tease someone. There are times when you shouldn't be a bully. And a group of neighborhood kids is about to learn their lesson too late. Five Stars.
The Voices
Francine and her mother move into a haunted house where the past replays itself. Four Stars.
Eternity
There's a killer in the house, but it's okay because he can never, never, touch you. Five Stars.
Family Lore
A young woman discovers she is descended from a long line of witches, but it seems like someone else may have already known first. Four Stars.
Weekend Escape
A woman's unseasonal trip to her summer house becomes an exercise in terror when an escaped killer joins her on her retreat. Five Stars.
Vampire's Hollow
Judith dreams of a man coming to her in the night as her family crosses to America. Once she arrives she follows him into the wilderness, the mysterious Tiberius Crane. Then, she learns his plans for her, and her torment begins. Five Stars.
An overall Five Star collection. Some of the stories are easy to figure out, and you see the twist in them coming, and I never could find the little girl's motivation in Dolly, but Things That Go Bump In The Night is cute and The Beast Within is an awesome mix of anti-bullying tale and gorefest, while Vampire's Hollow is filled with the edginess and grit most stories out there are lacking.
The final of our trio of Lisa McCourt Hollar works up for review is the short story collection Flashes From The Grave, which was the work I had set out to initially review in the first place. As with the previous collection it is filled with very short stories which are to the point and impactful. Throughout this collection Mrs. Hollar also demonstrates her range as a writer, throwing in a little comedy this time out as well.
Zombie Beach
A woman attempts to save her young daughter from the zombie horde by swimming out onto a raft anchored in the ocean. Zombies can't swim, can they? Five stars.
The Rat King
A gritty tale of a young woman driven to seek revenge on the creature that murdered her baby sister, and made her into a thing like him. Five Stars.
The Vampire Hunter's Wife
Bride. Assistant. Prisoner. A madman's slave finds salvation in an unlikely source. Five Stars.
The Zombie Reunification Act
In a world overrun by zombies there's only one thing the government can do, put them to work. A taste of the lighter side of Lisa McCourt Hollar. Five Stars.
Don't Play With Your Food
A tale of cannibalism and revenge. A story so horrifyingly over the top it has to be read to be appreciated. Six Stars!
The Bearded Man
Tabitha dreams that the Bearded Man is coming to take her children, even though she has not had any yet. Four Stars.
The Birth Of Evil
A brother and sister learn too late that they are part of a plot to bring about the beginning of the end. Five Stars.
No Respect For The Dead
It's one of those old "There Goes The Neighborhood" stories with a twist, and another example of Mrs. Hollar's lighter side as a vampire has to deal with some undesirable new neighbors. Four Stars.
The Uninvited
The scene of a wedding reception ruined as the zombie apocalypse begins. Four Stars.
Dear Charlie
Charlie is a diligent worker with OCD. Nothing will keep him from getting his job at a small diner done, even death, a fact the local health department is sure to frown on. Again the humor of Lisa McCourt Hollar shines through in one of her funniest tales. Five Stars.
The Circle Of Life
A brief scene from the zombie apocalypse told from the zombie point of view. Five Stars.
Til Death We Meet Again
Every night Selina gets ready, waiting for the vampire she met when she was a young woman to come and take her so she can be with him forever. Now she is an old woman at death's door, and as her wait nears its end someone else's wait is about to begin. Five Stars.
Caged
Tabby deals in exotic animals, when your definition of what an animal is is broad. She captures them, cages them, trains them and sells the ones who live to the highest bidder. Four Stars.
Again with Flashes From The Grave Lisa McCourt Hollar delivers an overall Five Star collection. It may have been served a little better ending with Don't Play With Your Food or Til Death We Meet Again, but I have seen other collections end with far weaker stories than Caged, which is a pretty good story. Overall Flashes From The Grave is proof that Lisa McCourt Hollar does not just write "kid stuff" and neither is she a one trick pony. Looking at it against Halloween Frights it is plain to see that Mrs. Hollar's writing only continues to improve and advance as well.
Like Diana Trees and the author formerly known as Poppy Z. Brite Mrs. Hollar delivers in the above works tales that are real, gritty and sometimes uncomfortable to read, just as good horror should be. There has been a definite lack of this kind of story telling since the mid-1990s, and I can't wait for a novel length story to see what she does with a long and sustained story.
You can find all three of these works on Amazon:
The Carnival: http://www.amazon.com/The-Carnival-ebook/dp/B004YR77D8
Halloween Frights: http://www.amazon.com/Halloween-Frights-ebook/dp/B005PA94U2
Flashes From The Grave: http://www.amazon.com/Flashes-From-The-Grave-ebook/dp/B005A7QMZK/
Lurk for all three of these great reads and acquaint yourself with Lisa McCourt Hollar if you have not already.
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| Master Vyle |
It's time to take a little look at a novel from Jeremiah Coe in which he mixes his two passions, the American Civil War and zombies, to come up with a tale called Uncivil Dead. And who can resist a good zombie tale? Well, not my kids, that's for sure. To go with their new Kindles for Christmas I gave them copies of my holiday horror collection Frog Nog And Other Horrday Tales, as well as their own copies of Uncivil Dead.
Guess what they read?
Yep, Uncivil Dead.
Guess what they still haven't bothered to read?
Yep, zombies trump dear old Dad every time.
I found Jeremiah's story telling in this tale to be an improvement over his short story Vampire's Retribution, although much of it seems to read like a novelization of a screenplay, which means that I think this tale would come across better with on screen visuals as opposed to being presented as a written story. Taking that aside Uncivil Dead is a fairly entertaining read, and will definitely hold the interest of any hardcore zombiephile.
Coe presents us with the tale of a Union garrison stationed in an occupied Confederate town where the citizens aided the Union soldiers. Without warning a strange plague breaks out, causing the dead to walk and hunger for human flesh. There's gore aplenty in this one, even though it starts at a slow and even pace before picking up steam in the final quarter of the novel. Coe makes an attempt to get into the mind set of both sides on the human side of the conflict and presents the reader with Union soldiers who are not all great emancipators who are fighting for the rights and equality of Southern slaves.
As for the weaknesses of the story, well the "movie" feel that it has does tend to detract a little from the narrative, and Jeremiah sometimes presents up with characters who have long passages devoted to them before disappearing into the background, as well as characters introduced late into the story just for the express purpose of being zombie bait. The zombies themselves reminded me of the ones in CHUD II: Bud The CHUD, in that they only "nibble" on someone as long as they are alive, plus the dead revive as zombies as soon as they die. As with Vampire's Retribution he uses a few terms which seem out of place in the Civil War Era, such as describing someone being taken down like "a lion taking down a gazelle", size ten boots, numbers games, the gravity of the situation, and nervous breakdowns. However, Coe does show he knows his stuff, especially when it comes to the weapons of the era and their shortcomings. He even threw in a couple of baseball references that myself and sons agreed seemed out of place, and upon including my father in-law in on the discussion he looked it up and through Coe's references we indeed learned that baseball did predate the Civil War.
There are those who might have a problem with the fact that a whole town becomes zombies as the garrison protecting them is totally unaware, however I read into it the fact that the plague had started outside of town and had spread from other parts of the county first, which would account for the sheer number of walking dead at climax of the story. If anything Jeremiah gives us a look at the plague from near the beginning, as opposed to throwing you into it Night Of The Living Dead or The Walking Dead style, which I found fairly refreshing. He does try to add a few unique spins on the usual, and even unusual, zombie staples, some work and some do not.
Overall I rate Uncivil Dead Four Stars. Jeremiah, in my estimation, is still continuing to develop and grow as a writer, and he does deliver an engrossing and entertaining tale, that I know is going to hit home with zombie lovers and gore hounds. That said, the novel does have some bits of unintentional humor. With several wounds that erupt blood "like a volcano" (again a testament to that horror movie feel), and explosive diarrhea that runs like rivers (and yeah, I'm being just a little feceious there, extra heavy on the feces).
There are a few lines that are laugh out loud, such as:
"You can only fart for so long before you start to worry about mushing your pants if you fart anymore..."
Sage knowledge. :)
And:
"Mark Soltis had snuck off from everyone else to urinate against standing orders."
Which of course I found funny, because how often in history do you suppose a soldier wanted to urinate on standing orders for their superiors? Then again that can be applied a little to the white and blue collar worlds as well.
As with my review for Vampire's Retribution I can't express enough that Jeremiah Coe is an up and coming independent horror author that it is well worth your while to check out. I'm already waiting for his next novel. He's genuinely into the genre, and I've come to believe that he doesn't think about much else, which was what earned him a street and a subdivision in my short story It Came From Beyond The Midnight Clear.
You can get your copy of Uncivil Dead here:
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Uncivil-Dead-ebook/dp/B005PG5PWM
Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/uncivil-dead-jeremiah-coe/1107502752
Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/91569
Sony eBook Store: http://ebookstore.sony.com/ebook/jeremiah-coe/uncivil-dead/_/R-400000000000000547785
Keep a lurk out for Jeremiah Coe, because he's surely lurking out for you!
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| Master Vyle |
Right in time for the holiday season, that ghost wonderful time of the year, One Buck Horror strikes again, this time with a special All Zombie Extravaganza titled, One Buck Zombies. Of course you know I was jacked to know that there was a new volume coming out so close to the heels of the release of One Buck Horror: Volume Three, and that it was all about zombies, which of course are all the rage.
One Buck Zombies delivers a set of five zombie tales in the One Buck Horror tradition of being short, sweet and on the cutting edge. Each story has its own unique style and take on the Romero zombie genre, where the walking dead have a hunger for the flesh of the living!
Here's a look at the stories:
The Best Mother by James Owens
No one wants to play with Jimmy after his mother's accident. Even his father turns away with the passage of time. But he will never leave his mother, and she wall always be there to protect him. As always the editors at OBH have a way of picking the perfect lead in story. It reminded me of Brian Rappatta's The Dead March and that new classic, Fido, due to similar themes and story elements, but beyond that The Best Mother is its own story. Five Stars!
The Levees Of The Styx by David Dunwoody
A fallen scientist finds himself trapped in a tunnel with a young girl with a dwindling supply of food, and a gun containing only two bullets. The story starts out fairly strong, but then goes down a slight slope once an explanation of how the zombie plague started is added to the story. The story does however leave the reader hanging with an ambiguous ending that I though was great, because for the last few pages I was expecting to see a rehash of the ending of Stephen King's The Mist (the hopeless film ending that is). Three and a Half Stars.
Little Red Zombie Hood by Alana I. Capria
I spent a majority of the time wondering where this story was going, and what possible point Capria was trying to make with it. In OBH's guidelines it states they are not looking for "torture porn", and this story seems like zombies, werewolves and torture porn all mixed together. Little Red was a zombie baby in the womb, so of course she is born pretty much the way you'd expect. The Grandmother takes her in and arms her against wolves and man, which she dispatches with sick and gory glee for pretty much the entire length of the story. Again this is one of those stories that someone else might be able to find merit in, but I found it to be a mix of concepts from the Dawn Of The Dead remake, the Saw series, and Diana Trees at her harshest, though not done well. By far the weakest story in the collection from the standpoint that it is a story, as well as being the weakest story in the entire One Buck Horror series. Two Stars.
He Stopped Loving Her Today by James R. Tuck
A man hides out in a home repair and improvement store as a zombie horde that includes his wife mills around, ever circling. It is one of those stories you just know how it's going to end, but the fact is made up for by excellent storytelling that aims at the heart and tugs at it. If you've ever known true love then you can feel the pain of a man who has lost absolutely everything that he ever cared about. I do not want to give anymore away, as this story goes above and beyond. Six Stars!
Mother Sisyphus by Robert Davies
Reading this story you begin to feel that you've found a story that is unique for the gut munching zombie genre, a story of hope. Then you reach the hopeless and disgusting end to realize that at any rate the story is still unique. A well told tale that harkens back to the extreme films of the golden age of Italian cannibal/zombie films while adding its own legacy. Thus far the best ender in a One Buck Horror collection. Five Stars.
Overall One Buck Zombies is a five star collection that continues to prove that One Buck Horror is perhaps the best anthology series that presents some of the best stories from the new voices of independent horror. I'm not sure if there will in the future be specials that will be all vampire or werewolf, but I have a pretty good feeling that somewhere down the road there will be a One Buck Zombies: Volume Two! At any rate at least I hope there will be.
Here's where to get your copy of One Buck Zombies:
Amazon.Com: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005TVK6B8
Barnes & Nobel: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/One-Buck-Zombies/Christopher-Hawkins/e/2940013259706
Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/95193
Be sure to lurk for this one kids! Required reading for the ghost wonderful time of the year!
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| Master Vyle |
