recent read; Best New Horror: Volume 25 edited by Stephen Jones

It's hard to go wrong with any of these The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror anthologies from Stephen Jones.

This volume came out in 2014, and contains stories from 2013. It also includes a dense "Introduction: Horror in 2013" which informs about all manner of publications in the horror field for 2013. The only drawback is that titles are embedded in the prose. You'll need to distill your own list, if you are interested in following up on any of the mentioned books.

The stories are all quality, I don't need to review each one. A few weren't to my taste, which is nearly always a given with any anthology. Some of my favorites were "Click-clack the Rattlebag" by Neil Gaiman, "The Middle Park" by Michael Chislett, "Into The Water" by Simon Kurt Unsworth (an Innsmouthian tale,) and "The Sixteenth Step" by Robert Shearman.

The volume also includes the entire novella, "Whitstable" by Stephen Volk, featuring a fictionalized account of Peter Cushing's off-screen life as he deals with a real life monster. Well done and worth the read.

The thick volume ends with "Necrology: 2013," which, sadly, is an "in memoriam" essay. Many people were lost to the horror field in 2013.

As I said at the top, you can't really go wrong with any of these. Worth having. Worth reading.

p.s.; Jones has been republishing earlier volumes through PS Publishing for e-book editions. New ones are e-book and hardcover. (Dropping the The Mammoth Book Of... moniker.) They have new EC Comic style covers, too.

recent read; "Damned Ranker"

Lately, I've taken to reading short stories for a week between novel reads. I have many collections and anthologies in the bookcases and on my Kindle.

The other night, I turned to The Mammoth Book of Sword and Honor.

Some background; I work in software. Yes, my company outsources. We have a team in Kiev, Ukraine. As you might imagine, the current turmoil in the Crimea is very real to us. Although the nastiness in Kiev itself calmed down, and the Crimean fighting isn't directly affecting the Kiev office, it's still a jumpy situation. (One of our guys is from the Crimea, though I don't know where his politics lie and I certainly am not going to ask.)

One saying my father drummed into my head and which I still abide, "Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

So, I went with one of the Crimean War stories in the book, "Damned Ranker" by Paul Finch.

I really enjoyed it. It pulled me in, kept me reading longer than I meant to. It's hard-hitting, and gory with a good twist.

As for history repeating - between the story and now; I'd say no. But I did find it interesting how the Russians were described undisciplined rabble - racing forward, no concern for lines or formations, cavalry and infantry intermixed, smooth bore muskets and improvised weapons. I was strongly reminded of the opening of the movie, Enemy at the Gates, where the Soviet officers pushed the men into the carnage as so much cannon fodder. Advances in weaponry and tactics didn't seem to change that attitude much between Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union.

If you enjoy Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe, you'd most likely enjoy this one.

Book binges

No, not binging on the reading, but the buying. I found an eBay dealer with a bunch of overstock books. As though you were in the bargain section of B&N. But, he offers many paperbacks and many fiction titles that appeal to my interests. Combined for cheap shipping, these are new, though shelf-worn in very minor detail. In most cases, I also bought them cheaper than their ebook versions.

 I already scored a complete set of 5 Cosmos (Wildside imprint) Robert E. Howard mass market volumes (for reading copies of public domain REH stories) and a hardcover Saberhagen's Berserker Death omnibus a few weeks ago.

My second order came in today;

I've been stocking up on the Mammoth Books of.

I've wanted to read Midnight Mass for a very long time. I assume it is a rewrite of Wilson's short story "Midnight Mass." A story set where vampires have overrun our world.

The two Drake titles are from his newest TOR fantasy series. Unlike his Isles series, this one is supposed to close out at book number four, and was planned that way from the start. (One per classic element, I guess.) I did enjoy the Isles series though it had (intentionally) repetitive plotting.  I will be interested to see how this series unfolds.

I've been curious about the Gabriel Hunt books. It starts with At the Well of Eternity, I believe. There was a mistake in the eBay listing, the second one shown here was listed as being written by David Schow, but Schow wrote a different one. Ah well, I'm still glad I got them as they appear to have already been revamped with new, less interesting cover art.

More loot

I received a pile of loot that I had ordered from Amazon.

Scouring Amazon for various Mammoth titles, I came across The Mammoth Book of Sword and Honor. It occurred to me that aside from Ambrose Bierce's (American) Civil War Stories, I don't think I've really read historical/historical-military fiction in the short form. I was intrigued. I was extra intrigued because The Mammoth Book of Sword and Honor was in the Amazon Bargain Books, and they claimed to only have a few copies left.

So, we came blame most of this on that. ;) I didn't want to pay double the price just to ship it, so I piled on the other stuff to get free shipping.

At first, I wasn't sure about The Mammoth Book of Dracula. I have other vampire anthologies and Mammoth books and wasn't sure about an entire Mammoth book of stories directly related to Dracula. But, the authors in the table-of-contents finally swayed me to put the book on my wishlist. Amazon were down to their last copy, so I added it to my order.

Psycho Mania is a new book and according to the copyright page, not a reissue. But, for all intents & purposes, it is a Mammoth book.  It is edited by Stephen Jones and the layout is the same as a Mammoth tome.  If it had been published ten years ago or earlier, it would have been titled, The Mammoth Book of Psychos.

As a matter of personal taste, I am not one for slasher/demented-murderer horror. There is too much of that in the real world. I prefer my horror to have some supernatural element. But, the cover claims some of these tales do have a supernatural element. It contains the Bloch classic, "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper" which I have never read and I have wanted to read for a long time. That is the main reason I bought the book.

Charles Rutledge was kind enough to send me some wilder, early 1960s Sexton Blake stories. (which I sheepishly admit I still need to read.) I thought I should educate myself on some classic Sexton Blake tales. I was surprised how thick this book is! Most of the other Wordsworth Tales of Mystery and the Supernatural are half this thick.

Finally, I wanted to complete my mini Tarzan movie collection with Tarzan the Magnificent. It features Gordon Scott's last outing as the Lord of the Jungle, and his second outing as an articulate, modern Tarzan. Looking forward to watching it soon.

Going Mammoth

Yeahhhh...

Writing that Karl Edward Wagner post probably wasn't the best idea for me. I'm hankering to acquire more Mammoth books, now.  Heck, not hankering - have been.

I also wanted to try some noir/pulp in the short form, and The Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction caught my eye. It's my first used purchase from Amazon (I usually go with eBay or ABEBooks) but I was able to use Amazon credit and get it free.

That started the ball rolling, all right.

The Zombies! book is really The Mammoth Book of Zombies reissued.

I also grabbed a digital version of The Mammoth Book of Vampires (with the class action lawsuit credit that Amazon issued a few weeks ago.)

But, I've also been reevaluating which books I want digital (because, it's really a lease, not a purchase) and which ones I want physically. After a long time, I'm swinging back toward the print side of the needle for more titles - not all certainly, but more than before.

So, eventually I might end up with a print copy of The Mammoth Book of Vampires.

Like Zombies!, some of the Mammoth books have under gone name changes. In addition to the above, I already owned The Mammoth Book of Monsters, The Mammoth Book of Wolfmen(/The Mammoth Book of Werewolves,) The Mammoth Book of Frankenstein, The Mammoth Book of Vampires Stories by Women, and - branching out from horror - The Mammoth Book of Sorcerers Tales(/The Mammoth Book of Dark Magic.)

And yeah - I have more on order as we speak. I'll share when I get my hands on them!

I'm really in the mood for short stories lately - both as a reader, and as a writer with a few ideas bubbling for upcoming anthologies.  I'm getting motivated, being entertained and analyzing what makes a story work.

The Hypothetical Mammoth Book of Karl Edward Wagner

No, sorry there isn't actually a book named The Mammoth Book of Karl Edward Wagner, though there should be!

Recently, I started poking around my handful of Mammoth anthologies. I have mostly horror tomes edited by Stephen Jones.

I love those things, though I tended to grab them for a single story. Going back over the tables-of-content, I am noticing authors who I am now aware of that I wasn't aware of when I bought the books - Manly Wade Wellman, David J. Schow, Hugh B. Cave, et al.  (Which is why I should find more reading time.)

Some of these Mammoth anthologies have even found their way to ebook versions.

Sooo... - long story long, I thought I'd put together a list of Mammoth appearances of Karl Edward Wagner. For those who are interested in reading him but find acquiring the Wagner collections and novels difficult, maybe these can help. Some of the ebooks are pricey but there are lots of good stories alongside Wagner's tales. If not available as ebook, some can be found cheaply enough used.

The Mammoth Book of Frankenstein (Kindle)

“Undertow” (A Kane tale)

The Mammoth Book of Wolfmen (out-of-print)

(a reprint of The Mammoth Book of Werewolves (out-of-print))

“One Paris Night” (A Becker tale)

The Mammoth Book of Vampires (Kindle - yes, you can preview it, just click where the cover image would be)

“Beyond Any Measure”

The Mammoth Book of Monsters (out-of-print)

“.220 Swift”

The Mammoth Book of Zombies (Kindle)

“Sticks”

The Mammoth Book of Terror (out-of-print)
"The River of Night's Dreaming"

The Mammoth Book of New Terror (Kindle)
"The Fourth Seal"

Best New Horror 2 (Kindle) (technically, not Mammoth but edited by Jones and came up in my search)
"Cedar Lane"

In fact, there are also a large number of Best New Horror Stories. Wagner's name is on many of the covers, but I can't see the contents of the out-of-print ones. E.g.; number 4. (update; available for Kindle; number 3 and number 5)

Oh, of course, I just found this. I knew about it, but forget about it, too. Well, it doesn't have the Centipede collections or the ebooks or later Mammoth books, so my efforts aren't completely in vain.

Karl Edward Wagner Bibliography.

Also, according to that list, he had two stories in The Mammoth Book of Ghost Stories. (out-of-print)

Happy hunting!