I love this 70s style horror. Even though this was written in 1987, it has a very earthy British graphic horror feel to it very reminiscent of the earlier work of James Herbert. There’s something very honest, grounded and realistic about its gritty feel and it’s something I feel we have lost in modern horror fiction which has become glossy and in a way – quite sanitised. Some reviewers have described it as “pulpy” and it certainly hearkens back to a bygone age. Continue reading
Horror
A Coming of Age Story Perfect for Spring
Despite that spring is my favourite season, it seems that I’ve written few stories set during the three months between the end of March and June. It’s a period that defines new life, a new start, new beginnings and people tend to be blessed with a certain air of positivity and relaxation. Spring for me means bees and cider (amongst other things!) What sort of a new beginnings can we explore in our fiction? Continue reading
Book Review: First Aide Medicine by Nicholaus Patnaude
One of the best things about being an indieview reviewer is that you get requests for all sorts of stuff, the sort of things you might not ordinarily consider picking up. This one and the one I am about to read, might both qualify in that category. This is a short novella, around 17,000 words, but bulked out with a lot of illustrations. There’s no harm in trying something a little different. Continue reading
The Scariest Fiction – Part 3: Video Games
This is the introduction to Dead Space 2, one of the scariest games ever (definitely the scariest and most atmospheric in the series so far). Continue reading
The Scariest Fiction – Part 2: Books
123rf.com
So here is the second part in my trilogy of scares in fiction. Referring back to the date I had a few weeks back, the woman in question reeled off a list of books that had scared her as an adult. I struggled, personally, to come up with any books that I found genuinely terrifying. This is odd because I nearly always prefer the book to the film version and was able to come. Continue reading
The Scariest Fiction – Part 1 TV & Film
fastcompany.com
With Halloween coming up and this being the time of year I tend to start diving into horror (change of seasons, nights drawing in and Christmas is still far enough away that the jollity is yet to rear its head), I thought scares would be a good idea to write about. Plus, Daily Post had this interesting prompt just the other day.
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My Top 3 Stephen King Novels
This week has seen the release of a sequel to his novel The Shining – a book that divides fans firmly between “prefer the film” and “I hate the film for missing the point”. Is it possible for me to sit on the fence of this issue and say that I appreciate both productions for different reasons? For the record, King hates the Kubrick film – and as much as I enjoy it, I fully appreciate and accept his reasons for doing so (number three on the list).
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Book Review: Z 2134 by Sean Platt & David W. Wright
It is rather obvious from the start from which other works this book got its inspiration: 1984, The Walking Dead and The Hunger Games. Unfortunately, it has the depth of none of those things merely taking a few sample ideas and pumping it into this book. Voila! I would consider this a work of reverse alchemy, taking three great things and turning it into a useless piece of slush that is neither satisfactory nor particularly clever.
It is written in a rather juvenile way with lots of random swear words, needless sexual references and childish prose “All she wanted to do was smash his fucking fat face to show what she really thought of the little prick”. Yeah, move over Shakespeare. If this is YA literature then this form of writing will only appeal to the sort of teenagers who buy albums with explicit lyrics for no other reason than that they have explicit lyrics. Continue reading
Book Review: World War Z by Max Brooks
I was determined to read this before seeing the film and I have, looking forward to seeing the film now. So, is this worth a read or is it one of the most over-hyped zombie books ever released? Well, read on and find out.
Inevitably I am going to compare this to the Stephen Jones edited Zombie Apocalypse! series. That would be because the formats are similar. However, World War Z is purely a transcription of interviews talking to survivors, fighters, politicians, people whose lives changed and how they handled the situation around them. Continue reading
Book Review: The Strain by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo Del Toro
Last year I acknowledged that I needed to read more horror. Joining Read It, Swap It allowed me to do that and to break away from the Herbert and King work that had become the core of my genre reading. One of the works that pricked my ears up was this interesting nugget co-written by one of my favourite film directors.
JFK International Airport. A Jumbo Jet lands and immediately all of the electrical systems and engines shut down. It does not as instructed taxi to its allocated gate. What’s more, all of the shutters are drawn and all attention of airport staff is focused on this bizarre aircraft as it sits there, on the tarmac, doing nothing. After all attempts to contact any crew or passengers fail, security services decide to break in.
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