The Night Boat By Robert R. McCammon

The Night Boat
By Robert R. McCammon
1988 Pocket Books
Paperback, 346 pages

                Robert McCammon was one of the titans in the Golden Age of Paperback Horror. His books were everywhere and unanimously praised. I even bought Mystery Walk back in my youth but I never got around to reading it. His books are long, between 350 and 500 (or more) pages and that usually puts me off. I do have a bunch of his books in my “To Be Read” pile so I picked the slimmest one with which to break my cherry. First published in 1980, I had the 1988 Pocket Books first print paperback of The Night Boat sitting there and went for it. Pretty damn good book. I love when that happens.

 

                David Moore is diving in the water outside of Coquina, a Caribbean island that he’s adopted as home, exploring the deep, when he sets off an old depth charge. This uncovers and releases an old World War II Nazi U-Boat which rises to the surface and sticks on the rocks there. Coquina is a small island that was almost burned to the ground during the war and the villagers are not happy to see the boat. They know… it is evil.

 

                They’re right. Moore and the local constable Kip go into the boat and discover the mummified crew. Did they actually see one move? Damn skippy, they did. The skeletal crew go on nightly raids in Coquina, seeking human blood and flesh. This is where the book really worked for me. McCammon’s gory descriptions are fabulous and I was wiggling my feet as I read about the carnage. Drinking blood from bite wounds… “They broke open new rivulets of fluids, like dark wine from fleshy casks.” Oh yeah, that is my kind of poetry! The attacks are pretty chilling and a few times I wondered if skeletons with dried, brown flesh and tattered clothes were standing in the dark outside my bedroom door as I read.

 

                The book is not without its problems, though. Until the halfway mark, every woman is a prostitute, then we get a woman who researches wrecks and seems pretty courageous and capable but she never really gets to shine and she becomes little more than a love interest for Moore. Many of the islanders are referred to only as “the black” by the narrator which just feels wrong in today’s world. (I know, this was written 40+ years ago.) With 100 pages to go to an exciting and fiery climax, a new character is introduced for nothing more than exposition and a barely mentioned character becomes the top dog in the fight against the zombies. It seemed to me that the book could have used some editing or rearranging, but overall I enjoyed it a lot and I look forward to my next McCammon book. Luckily, all of the ones I have on deck have beautiful covers by Rowena Morill, like this one does.

The Curse of Loch Ness By Peter Tremayne

The Curse of Loch Ness
By Peter Tremayne
1979 Sphere
Paperback, 230 pages

                The horror novels of Peter Tremayne (nee Peter Berresford Ellis) are really hit or miss with me. Some have been a real chore to get through (Kiss of the Cobra, Zombie) while some have been excellent and fun reads (Swamp, Snowbeast). With The Curse of Loch Ness, I have finally found my (new) favorite, an exciting tale of family curses, back-stabbing locals and a big lake monster that is more than meets the eye.

 

                Being the last remaining member of her family, Jeannie Millbuie inherits the old family castle situated overlooking Loch Ness. It’s not an entirely welcoming old pile of stones; there are weird sounds, endless shadowy corridors and the weird caretaker Mrs. Murdo obviously hates her. Most of the old-timey locals seem to have ulterior motives when it comes to Jeannie’s presence, while others just tell her to leave. Just what is going on in Balmacaan Castle?

 

                The tale is told in two parts. The first is Jeannie’s arrival, her exploration of the castle and the area and then, her abduction. The second part involves her boyfriend Tim, who was summoned to meet her in Inverness but now she has disappeared. Granted, things slowed down a tad with the start of the second part. The first section has you guessing and wondering what the curse is, the secret is, then it backtracks while Tim catches up. But he does so quickly enough and the story charges forward.

 

                The monster? Yeah, he’s in there but he’s unlike any theory of the Loch Ness Monster that you’ve ever heard of. First off, in the chapters from the monster’s own point of view, he is referred to as the intelligence. No dumb dinosaur here, though he is a leftover from prehistoric bloodlines. He is the single most sympathetic character in the book, though Jeannie, Tim, and a handful of other interesting humans are also engaging.

 

                Tremayne’s usual flaw of over-explaining and too much exposition are kept in check this time by having the history of the area and the curse told by a few different people at different times. While one of the baddies is explaining it to Jeannie, the narrative is broken up with her being bored and disinterested in the history lesson. Kind of how I felt reading some of the above-mentioned novels. But this one moves quickly and for the most part kept my interest throughout, making for a very satisfying read. The cover art (some say by Terry Oakes, and I can’t see anything to make me disagree) alone is worth the price of admission.

The Tribe By Glenn Chandler

The Tribe
By Glenn Chandler
1981 Hamlyn
Paperback, 187 pages

                This is Chandler’s second and final novel in the horror genre and, hot on the heels of his book The Sanctuary, and the second one of his to earn Hamlyn’s “nasty” designation. I can’t tell you how much I love the fact that Hamlyn has “nasty” as a category! Does this one earn the right to be called a nasty? Yes. Yes it does. Much more so than his previous book.

 

                A bizarre string of cannibal murders have been popping up across England and Detective Chubby Holroyd is put in charge of the perplexing investigation. Trying to find a connection between these homicides is no easy task. A woman eats her fiancé, a man eats his brother, a man kills and cooks his daughter and force-feeds her to his wife… these are the cases that Chubby has to figure out. Looks like a good time to go on that diet; at least give up meat.

 

                Meanwhile, Herbert and Maggie Gunter are at the end of their vacation and back in England. They find themselves in a small village in Kent whose name is familiar to Maggie; a lovely man they had met while on expedition in New Guinea lives there. She calls their daughter and grandson to say they might drop in on him, but they’ll be back home in time for the grandson’s birthday. They don’t make it. Neither of them ever leave anthropologist Allen Briathwaite’s mansion ever again.

 

                With no main characters except for Chubby and his fellow investigators, the first half of the book tends to be a little confusing. You meet a number of characters, but they’re all just set-up for their descent into cannibalism. And what’s with the leering, seemingly alive shrunken heads? After the Gunters get involved, it starts tying together, for both the reader and dear Chubby. It’s a good thing Maggie called her daughter because when they start to investigate as well, you know you’re going to get an explosive ending. And you do.

 

                This is top-shelf gory pulp horror, and it is the very thing we all love about 80s gross-out books. This one is certainly next level (though I would say it is less vile that L.A. Morse’s The Flesh Eaters, 1979 Warner Books) and Chandler’s descriptions hold nothing back. The man roasting his brother’s head and peering “down at the golden brown face” is a scene that stays with you. Nasty for sure. This book gets quite expensive these days, but it is worth the extra dough. You just don’t get books that are this brutal very often.

Return of the Living Dead By John Russo

Return of the Living Dead
By John Russo
1979 Hamlyn
Paperback, 176 pages

                           

                This is the true sequel to George Romero’s classic film Night of the Living Dead (1968). Russo had written the novelization for that film in 1974 from his and Romero’s screenplay and this book is adapted from a proposed screenplay by Russo, Russell Streiner, and Rudi Ricci (credited as Ricci Valentine in the book) that never got made. This is not a novelization of Dan O’Bannon’s 1985 zombie comedy Return of the Living Dead, although Russo did eventually write that in 1985. Confused? Don’t be. The film was a comedy and this story is bleak and deadly serious. It carries Night’s grim tone throughout its pages.

 

                Ten years after the original zombie epidemic (which has ended), Bert Miller and his three daughters (one of whom, Karen, is expecting) are heading to a funeral. In this area, it is common to drive a spike into the skull of the deceased, because nobody wants a repeat of the previous decade’s trouble. While there, the mourners learn of a bus crash nearby and Bert takes his daughters with him to retrieve the bodies and spike them in the noggin. When the cops show up, the Millers screw out of there only half done. Guess what happens! Bert barricades the farmhouse but one daughter runs away, leaving the door unlocked and Bert becomes Zombie Chow.

 

                A group of looters (and rapists, we’re reminded of numerous times) show up at the farmhouse and settle in with two tied up prisoners. Dressed as cops, two of them give orders to the daughters but the two bound prisoners are the real cops. The daughters are taken with the gang (except Karen who is in labor) and the cops are left to feed or be fed upon. Who will survive this pickle? Will the kid be born healthy, or at all? Will the looters (and rapists) get their come-uppance? You will read this one with dizzying speed to find out. I am a slow reader and read it in two sittings.

 

                Don’t worry; in that short time, you’ll get everything you want. Flesh eating, corpse bonfires, good ol’ boys having too much fun, and bad guys using the outbreak to their advantage. “Warm human flesh was the only kind that could nourish the living dead.” The story stays in a rural farmland area and, even though it is more spread out than Night, Russo achieves the same claustrophobia. Of course the real danger here is humanity, or lack thereof. The looter (and rapist) gang are more bloodthirsty than the ghouls, proving again that man is the scariest monster.

 

                First released in the US by Dale Books in 1978, I, as always, prefer the first UK edition from Hamlyn because their covers always rule. Two different covers were available, one for Australia, and they’re both great. The green ghoul cover even has a rare photography credit for one Ken Adams, which makes me wonder if he was responsible for all of Hamlyn’s great photo covers. The book has also been reprinted many times, most recently by the reliable Fathom Press. If you’re a fan of Romero’s first foray into zombies, this book will check all of the right boxes for your zombie loving soul.

The Death of the Führer By Roland Puccetti

The Death of the Führer
By Roland Puccetti
1973 Arrow Books
Paperback, 224 pages

                First published in 1972 by St. Martin’s Press (in hardcover!), this book wasn’t on my radar until I saw the magnificent (and spoilery) Arrow paperback cover. Reading a few reviews forced me to find the book (the Arrow edition, of course) and it has changed my life for the better. Another death-bed-bookshelf tome. They saved Hitler’s brain, all right, and had a lot of fun with it!

 

                The story is told by an elderly Karl Gisevius, who had been given private information that Hitler did not commit suicide in his bunker, that the Russians had found his body, but without a brain. So, twenty years after the war ended, in the interest of a spectacular news story, Karl heads to Berlin to get into the bunker and have a look around. Seems reasonable. Miraculously, he does get in and gets a clue as to who might have taken the brain… his old pal/ rival Willi Tränger. Now, to find him.

 

                Cut to the chase. He did. To get into Tränger’s well-guarded castle, Karl has a motorcycle accident, and his old pal recognizes him (this would be many years since they’d last seen each other) and lets him convalesce in the castle. That’s certainly more good luck! There, he meets a crazy cast of characters who refuse to let the Third Reich die, including the hot Baroness. She is so attracted to Karl that they have a romantic rendezvous in her room. While screwing, at the point of their simultaneous orgasm, she screams “Ich ben der Führer!”. And then it starts to get really crazy.

 

                This sci-fi/ horror/ hysterical history novel just keeps chugging along, with Karl performing the most amazing stunts, including self-brain surgery, and he never gets flustered in the least. Puccetti actually made me squirm claustrophobically a few times, like going down the Bunker’s airshaft and climbing the castles’ chimney for espionage reasons but I knew Karl was going to survive. He was telling the story. And telling it in such a matter-of-fact way that it seemed that having his life in danger was a mere inconvenience.

 

                Stupid, hilarious, visionary and actually pretty well-written (except for confusing time-lines), this book is a gem of balls to the wall insanity. This is the kind of pulp novel that only comes along once in a blue moon and you have to grab it, read it and treasure it always. Now go listen to legendary Boston punk band Unnatural Act’s song “They Saved Hitler’s Brain” and thank me later.

    A much needed reprint is forthcoming from the great Fathom Press in 2026.

The Possession of Jessica Young By Russ Martin

The Possession of Jessica Young
By Russ Martin
1982 Tor Books
Paperback, 316 pages

                Russ Martin is back with another Satanic mind-control saga, the first one for Tor Books. Tor picked up the slack from Playboy Press who had just been sold. This one is another male wish-fulfillment fantasy if the male happens to be a total misogynistic asshole weakling.

 

                The book opens with Jessica Young, a whip-smart and beautiful woman, who has broken free from her captors. Among her credentials, she has psychic abilities. The story is told in chapters from “Then” and “Now”, unraveling a sordid tale of sexual abuse, degradation, betrayal, slavery and greed. Jessica’s captor is one Stephen Abbott, a rich, good-looking man who holds a prominent position in The Organization. His boss? It seems to be Old Scratch himself.

 

                Jessica’s escape from Abbott’s clutches are but a bump in the road for The Organization who are looking to steal her powers for the great good of mankind and Satan. Read that as MAN-kind. Abbott and his male cronies own their women. Maids, slaves and sex toys. In order to find the missing Jessica, Abbott seduces her 17-year-old sister Heather to help find her in Los Angeles. Jessica has a cop friend that she has been seeing so she seems safe. But is she?

 

                Jessica is a good character; a smart woman who can easily take care of herself. It is therefore very uncomfortable to watch her be reduced to a family-murdering trophy by Abbott in the “Then” chapters. Admittedly, I cringed quite a lot watching her, and later her sister with her teenage “boyfriend”, getting used and abused. I’m not comfortable with rapey scenes and this book has many.

 

                That said, Martin (whoever he really is) weaves a compelling story throughout, with the flashbacks and current scenes keeping the pages turning, hoping to see Jessica decimate her adversaries. This is a much more uncomfortable narrative than some of his other books with a similar subject matter. The cringe-factor is high, unless you really are a weakling man who needs to see women “put in their place”. It makes you wonder what kind of person Martin was (is?). This appears to be the first in a kind of trilogy that use some of these same characters. On deck is The Obsession of Sally Wing.

Mystery Walk By Robert McCammon

Mystery Walk
By Robert McCammon
1984 Ballantine
Paperback, 419 pages

                            
                                                                                                  Art by Jim Thiesen

                This is another one that I bought way back when it first came out and never got around to reading. That’s fine because if this had been my first McCammon, I might not have gone on and read any other books by him. Not that this one is bad, it’s just not very satisfying to me for a lot of reasons. One reason is not the writing. McCammon is an excellent writer, even when the story isn’t super engaging. That’s how I was able to finish this behemoth of a paperback.

 

                Hawthorn, Alabama is where John and Ramona Creekmore and their 10-year old son Billy live. Ramona is one quarter Choctaw and has the ability to not only sense someone’s impending death (a black aura surrounds them) but she can take on the pain of wandering spirits and put them to rest. Of course, in racist Alabama in 1962, this makes her the Hawthorn Witch and she is ostracized by the community. Now, Billy is showing signs of having similar extraordinary abilities and churchgoing John and the local shitheads are mad that there are two of them. At a tent revival in town, with charlatan J. J. Falconer and his son Wayne (who is a faith healer), the Mother and Son cause a real scene and are forced to leave.

 

                The story follows Billy as well as Wayne, two kids of the same age, both seeming to have special abilities. It follows them to their teens and high school, up through their late teens and into their early twenties. It is a good versus evil thing going on but Billy, despite being unchristian, is not the evil one. The Falconers have been all about the money all along, being the crooked Evangelicals that they are. Once both boys are fatherless, their true emotional boundaries are revealed and they hitch up with very different groups of people who “help” them on their way through their personal Mystery Walks.

 

                It is an epic tale, for sure. Unfortunately, it reads as though McCammon thought up the next part each time he got to it, stringing together a bunch of different ideas and scenarios with the characters playing along. I guess it all fits by the end but there’s so much extraneous exposition that I was getting fidgety. The typeface is small and dense (41 lines per page) and the book just went on and on. I stayed with it thanks to McCammon’s excellent writing style but the story meandered and the characters, even though the story is about the boys’ personal growth, never really develop. Incredible things get accepted too rapidly and, well… it made me sigh a lot, wishing I was finished.

 

                This was McCammon’s first book to be published in paperback, the Ballantine book coming out a year after its hardcover from Holt. The first edition Ballantine cover pretty much sucks but later printings had a nice crawling corpse cover by Jim Thiesen.

Legend of the Werewolf By Robert Black

Legend of the Werewolf
By Robert Black
Based on a screenplay by John Elder
1976 Sphere Books
Paperback, 158 pages

                                                 

                As a Peter Cushing fanatic, I have long been a fan of Tyburn Studio’s Legend of the Werewolf (1975). I am the proud owner of the kick-ass one sheet poster and as I wait for Tyburn’s Kevin Francis to become less insane about licensing the title for Blu Ray release, I wanted to revisit the story via the novelization. While Les Edwards’ amazing cover is enough to make me open my wallet, I wondered if Robert Black’s (Robert Holdstock, 1948-2009) adaptation of John Elder’s (Anthony Hinds, 1922-2013) screenplay would do the film justice. I need not have worried. Even though “Elder’s” name isn’t on the cover or title page, “Black” follows the script to a T and does so with excellent, descriptive and often eloquent prose.

 

                If you’ve seen the film (and you should seek it out if you haven’t), you know the plot. Etoile is a young man who was raised by wolves who joins a traveling circus and then winds up in Paris. He finds work with crusty old Duvic, a sleazy zookeeper who gives Etoile a place to live and a tiny bit of money for his services. While there, Etoile meets Christine and becomes smitten, not knowing she’s a prostitute. When he does discover her line of work, the men who see her wind up shredded. Morgue doctor Cataflanque (the Cushing character) starts looking into what is making Christine’s clients become his clients despite the police’s warnings to back off the case. Meanwhile, Etoile is obviously conflicted for many reasons, as is Christine.

 

                As noted, the novel follows the script quite closely, but Black fills in a lot of background detail and employs many colorful descriptions to make this much more than a carbon copy. Cataflanque’s detective work is very exciting despite the reader knowing a werewolf is at large. The scenes in the bordello are perfectly elegant and sleazy and provide a welcome sense of humor while Cataflanque investigates. It was easy to read that character as played by Cushing and that made my experience with the book that much better. The written gore is plentiful and the suspenseful ending is a rip-roaring good time. This is one novelization that gets it just right and I recommend it howlingly!

 

                Now, Mr. Francis… don’t be a putz. Get this film out on home media soon. My creaky old VHS tape wants to retire.

                                   

                                                            My one-sheet from the film.

Moonbog By Rick Hautala

Moonbog
By Rick Hautala
1982 Zebra
Paperback, 410 pages

 

                Rick Hautala (1949-2013) was one of the more ubiquitous names on the Zebra roster in the 1980s, but this is the first time I settled down to read his work. No question about it; he is a very good writer, and he tells a compelling story. He manages to go from a setting like a Pepperidge Farm commercial to a violent rape/ murder without really changing tone. Not easy to do, but does that make this a great novel?

 

                New York yuppie David Logan goes back to his hometown of Holland, Maine to settle his family’s estate. He brings along his ever-complaining girlfriend Allison and leaves her in the motel room while he revisits his past. Chief among his memories is the Bog, a huge, dangerous swamp that always had scary stories and tall tales told about it in his youth. It looks no more friendly to him as an adult. Especially when he finds a mutilated dead kid in there with his pecker cut off.

 

                The bog had been blamed for a few missing kids the year before, as well. Then more kids go missing and search parties scour the bog. It seems that Holland has a child killer who is sexually assaulting his victims as well. Can the old sheriff find the perpetrator? Can David be of any help or is he a suspect? David’s Uncle Marshall sure is an odd duck. We, the reader, learn halfway through who is responsible and only then does the real cat and mouse game begin.

 

                The book does feel a bit padded to me, with characters and situations that really add nothing when all is said and done, but I guess that’s fine while trying to keep the secret of the killer’s identity. And I’m sure that having all of the town’s kids have cutesy “ee” names (Bobby, Sammy, Jeffy, Robbie, etc.) is to add to the horror of the brutality when it appears. From loving family values and treacly small-town values to disharmony to violent assault, torture and murder, Hautala manages to keep you from getting whiplash with his deft writing skills.

 

                True to form, Zebra’s cover art and back cover blurb have nothing to do with the actual story inside. If you think you’re getting a supernatural Bog Beast, you are wrong, but that shouldn’t reflect on your opinion of the book. Moonbog goes by quickly and is a satisfying read even if you can’t stand any of the characters and the children’s dialog makes you ill. My first impression of Hautala is not entirely horrible.

The Nameless By Ramsey Campbell

The Nameless
By Ramsey Campbell
1985 Tor Books (Macmillan, 1981)
Paperback, 312 pages

                Man, Ramsey Campbell can sure write a pretty book. His descriptions and similes are second to none. “Cigarette butts snaggletoothed the ashtray.” “The sky was the color of steam.” Everything is so easy to picture and the words flow beautifully. That, of course, makes it a slow read for me as I go back and admire the wordsmithing. Campbell is a master. This is the first full length novel of his that I have read. Would his florid style be too much over 300 pages? Hell no.

 

                Barbara Waugh is a literary agent whose husband died before their daughter Angela was born. Angela was kidnapped and murdered when she was four years old. Now, nine years later, Barbara gets a phone call from a young girl, calling her Mummy and asking her to come and get her. This, of course, sounds impossible but the calls persist and Barbara is convinced that her daughter is not dead. This opens up a lot of searching for answers that might be very hard to find.

 

                Her searches lead her into many seedy, dusty, abandoned buildings and meeting many different strangers who may or may not be able to help. It seems a nameless cult (that even the Manson Family thought were too crazy) might have taken Angela to tap into her possible psychic power. (Angela could be heard talking to her late father on the baby monitor in the past.) People who try to help Barbara out always seem to wind up dead. She scours the United Kingdom, searching with the slimmest of clues, but her lover seems to have found an address where the cult, and Angela, might be.

 

                There are a few harrowing scenes where Barbara’s helpers are caught in a hell-like situation. Margery, another mother who lost her kid to the cult, explores a dark, dusty, abandoned house in a chapter that had me squirming, just knowing something could grab her at any moment. Gerry is an investigative reporter who infiltrates the cult and has a nail-biting walk through the darkened building where sleeping cult members could bust her at any moment. Campbell really knows how to ratchet up the suspense, raise your blood pressure and make you uncomfortable, albeit with gorgeous prose.

 

                The chill factor stays high right up to the end, though I must admit that the ending was a bit of a letdown. Even Campbell has admitted that it feels forced, but that in no way will take away from my high recommendation of this book. I felt a lot of compassion for Barbara and was in her corner the whole way. The Nameless was first published by Macmillan in 1981. It was made into a movie in 1999 by Spaniard Jaume Balagueró, entitled Los Sin Nombre and remade as a six-part miniseries in Spain in 2025. The handsome Tor cover features a flaming Angela painted by an uncredited artist.

Shadow Child By Joseph A. Citro

Shadow Child
By Joseph A. Citro
1987 Zebra
Paperback, 366 pages

                You really never know what you’ll get with an old Zebra paperback. The title and the blurb on the back make it sound like a typical creepy-kid Zebra novel and the cover makes it look like a creepy clown story. It isn’t either. There is a kid in it (who has a clown-with-balloons nightlight… that’s it) but the kid is really just a catalyst, a plot point to make the evil more evil. As I dug in, it appeared that there would be whimsical “little people” in it and I became wary again. I decided to just shut up and read and I was rewarded with a well-written book that actually gave me a few tingles along my spine.

 

                Suffering from the death of his wife, Eric Nolan accepts an invitation from his cousin Pamela Whitcome to join her and her family at their grandfather’s former house, now owned by Pamela and her husband Clint. The cousins, Clint, and Luke, the kid, all get on very well, even though this is the place where Eric’s brother disappeared all those years ago. Well, a few more disappearances occur, a few deaths and they have all happened since Eric showed up. A historian becomes interested in a stone “root cellar” on the Whitcome property, which also sparks Eric’s interest in the local folklore. Too bad the historian becomes one of the missing. Then Clint thinks he shoots a kid up on the hill and soon he is among the missing. Just what the hell is going on?

 

                This is an excellent folk-horror novel that manages to keep the pages turning, even during slower passages, with a town populated with excellent, full-blooded characters and a sense of impending dread that never lets up until it fully explodes. These stone cairns are littered throughout the Vermont mountains in real life, so that lends an extra layer of creepiness to the tale. While one’s suspension of disbelief has to be turned up to eleven in the third act, Citro’s prose is good enough to make that not so difficult. His “monsters” are pure badassed evil and will do everything to keep their secret. You get some suspense, some gore and plenty of secluded hopelessness.

 

                One gripe, for me, was the character of Pamela. While all of the men in town had full-blown storylines and dimension, Pamela was merely there to be a wife and mother, plan meals and read Redbook. When Clint is missing, she becomes a possible “will they or wont they” incestuous partner with Eric, or am I the only one that thought that? At least local historian Elizabeth McKensie, a wheelchair bound elderly woman, gets to use her brain to help out the troubled family.

 

                Better than a lot of Zebra releases, I have no problem recommending this one, warts and all. Citro is a good writer and I will look for more of his stuff. (I have no idea how I came into possession of this one!) A sequel, Guardian Angels, came out a year later, also from Zebra. I have that one, too but again, I know not from where it came. Maybe the little people dropped them off.

Home Sweet Home By Ruby Jean Jensen

Home Sweet Home
By Ruby Jean Jensen
1985 Zebra
Paperback, 317 pages

                This is the second of many books published by Zebra from everybody’s favorite grandmother. While many of her creepy kid books have a supernatural leaning, this one does not. In fact, even though it’s about children (usually a big NO for me), they are not the creepy ones. And despite starring kids, I really enjoyed this book. What do you know? Maybe I’m maturing!

 

                Connie had to have some uterus surgery, and her husband Steve wanted to be right by her side. The problem is, they weren’t sure what to do with their 10-year old son Timmy. He couldn’t just hang around the hospital for a couple of weeks. In steps Steve’s pal Dan Walker, who generously offers to take Timmy along with him on his own vacation into the mountains of Alabama. Connie and (especially) Timmy think it’s a horrid idea but for some reason (that reason being that this is a fiction book) it goes down and the boy finds himself in a van with “Uncle Dan”, heading into the wilderness.

 

                Dan starts getting a bit more creepy than usual before their long journey is over, getting touchy-feely with the boy, but they get to the cabin safely. To Timmy’s surprise, when he wakes up he sees he is among other kids who are all orphans; 13-year old Rex, two younger boys and 5 year old Susie, a very timid child. Uncle Dan’s insanity comes to full fruition now as he thinks he has put together a perfect family, just the 5 children, him and “Little Mama”. Presumably, she is behind the locked door and to make her mad is to get a beating. Or worse.

 

                Anyone who has ever seen Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) knows exactly why Dan puts on the frilly apron and acts funny and what is behind the locked door. But the kids in the book haven’t seen or read it and that’s where Jensen’s writing prowess gets put to good use. The suspense builds rapidly, even though the reader is aware, as the kids learn the secrets of the house. Those who survive, anyway. If children in danger/ being tortured or hurt is a trigger, you might skip this one. Dan also films the kids skinny-dipping, which is pretty gross, though no hands-on sexual activity is ever related.

 

                RJJ does an amazing job voicing the children. Their dialog and actions are believable, though sometimes their thoughts get a little poetic enhancement, but it’s just the author flexing her muscles. The writing is tight and the narrative bowls along at a rapid pace. I finished this one quickly. Richard Newton’s amazing cover does nothing to hide the Psycho-ness of the story inside. As a Bostonian, I love that the skeleton is clutching a Red Sox hat!

Beneath Still Waters By Matthew J. Costello

Beneath Still Waters
By Matthew J. Costello
1989 Berkley
Paperback, 266 pages

                It sucks to try to review a book the day after you finish it and you really don’t remember much about it. This one is a slog to recall. Admittedly, I only wanted to read it in the first place because of the cool (uncredited) cover art.

 

                Perhaps taking a cue from Guy N. Smith’s Demons published the previous year, this one is about the small, evacuated New York town of Gouldens Falls that is flooded to make a new reservoir. Just prior to the flooding, two local boys hop the fence to explore the abandoned buildings. One disappears and when the other one looks for him, he’s almost caught by some sinister people that have grabbed his friend. Something fishy was going on and he runs to safety. Fifty years later, in the present, journalist Dan Elliot wants to do a piece on the buried town so he visits nearby Ellerton and gets more than he bargained for when people go missing in the lake. Even two divers who were looking for a drowning victim don’t come up. Local journalist Susan Sloan is also interested in the big story. Plus, her daughter Claire is having watery nightmares.

 

                Or something like that. There is plenty going on for the length of this novel but none of it is very exciting and the scary bad guys are ill-defined and seem somewhat glossed over. Save for Claire, no character really gets into your heart enough to give a shit. Admittedly, I read this fairly quickly because it always felt like something important was about to happen but it never did. The crack in the dam discovered mid-way telegraphed the obvious climactic action way too soon. (That is not a spoiler in any way. Even the back cover tells you the problem.) The horror elements are weak and the whole thing just seemed like a wasted premise to me. (And GNS’s Demons, the sequel to Deathbell (1980), did the flooded town thing so much  better!)

 

                There are few good moments, like when the rescue divers, and later on Dan, are under the water searching the flooded town in dim light, searching for bodies (or in Dan’s case, clues to the mysterious happenings). Costello manages to write the slow-motion, drifting scenery rather vividly and it creates a few chills. But other than that, I didn’t get much satisfaction from this one. Not a keeper for me.

The Howling By Gary Brandner

The Howling
By Gary Brandner
1977 Fawcett
Paperback, 223 pages

Yes, we’ve all seen the movie The Howling (Joe Dante, 1981) but who has read the source material? I never had, so I thought it was about time to correct that. If you plan to take a first read of this novel, do yourself a favor and forget the movie completely. John Sayles’ script for the film bears almost no resemblance to this book. I can’t imagine what the folks who bought this after seeing the film thought of it, especially Fawcett’s reprint with the movie poster art.

 

Karyn and Roy Beatty are the perfect California couple; blonde, wealthy and happy, with a little bun in the oven. All is well until Karyn is sexually assaulted in her home and she loses the baby and, obviously, develops some serious post-trauma problems. Loving Roy rents a place far enough away from Los Angeles, in the town of Drago, to help his wife recover in relative safety. The tiny town is peculiar, but Karyn tries to make the best of it. The Beatty’s sex life is in shambles, though, as you might imagine. Roy, who is a scumbag after all, soon succumbs to the dark charms of Marsha, a shop owner in town. Meanwhile, Karyn keeps on hearing… something howling.

 

Sure that it is a wolf she is hearing, she orders a stack of books from a neighboring town’s library, and they are delivered to her by Inez, a woman who knows quite a bit about wolves and, more importantly, werewolves. Could someone in town actually be a werewolf? Eventually, Karyn shoots at a wolf-like figure in her yard and blows off its ear. Seems like it should be easy to figure out who is a werewolf now, but the long list of suspects and the speed at which werewolves heal are two things that make the investigation difficult. And Roy is no help because he’s getting laid on the side and feeling quite canid himself.

 

The book is slathered with plenty of gore, attacks and sex. The rape scene is particularly rough and, of course, hiding away the victim and keeping her drugged might not be the best treatment. Karyn’s isolation is well established; she doesn’t drive, it’s a two mile walk into town, and Roy isn’t any help after he goes Marsha-crazy. Karyn and Inez are a team worth rooting for.

 

Brandner was back with two sequels to this one with The Howling II (1978) and The Howling III (1985) (both Fawcett), the first of which continues this storyline. The third entry goes back to the olden days. A film was eventually made that was closer to this first book, Howling IV: The Original Nightmare (John Hough, 1988). The British editions of the three books, all published by Hamlyn, have great covers and different titles for the two sequels; The Return of the Howling and The Howling III Echoes.

             Hamlyn's 1978 edition                                                      Hamlyn's 1983 movie tie-in

                                                                           

Ogre By Mark Ronson

Ogre
By Mark Ronson
1980 Hamlyn
Paperback, 198 pages

 

 

    Forget Shrek and all of that fairy-tale ogre bullshit. This ogre is a massive blob with reaching tentacles that would eat that green goofball and never look back. This is actually a Celtic wormlike deity called the Ooga but the folks involved call it the ogre so they won’t sound quite so stupid.

    Richard Finlay moves from the city into the rural farmhouse in Cumbria that he inherited from his all-but-unknown relative. Why does this happen so often in horror fiction, yet it still has never happened to me? Anyway, the townsfolk hate him, and a kid went missing on his property so he’s not the most welcome resident. There’s also a serial killer on the loose in that part of the country. Finlay and his hot houseguest Patricia have to endure a home invasion scene straight out of Sam Peckinpah’s film Straw Dogs (1971), complete with throwing boiling water onto the drunken villagers.

    Like in Mark Ronson’s (New Zealand author Mark Alexander) previous two horror novels and the subsequent one, an ancient evil is unleashed by way of modern means. This time around, a pipeline being laid through Finlay’s property opens up the mineshaft that the giant blob was preserved in. The ogre itself is a fun beastie, similar in form and action to the aquatic blob in Ruby Jean Jensen’s The Lake (1983), with little tentacles reaching from the ever-changing main blob. As with all good blobs, the more it eats, the bigger it gets.

    The book slowed down a bit for me at around the three-quarter mark when scientists and ministry members set up shop in the Findlay house (because they finally believe the people who say they have seen the ogre). No problem, though, as every time the ogre shows up, fun happens. The characters are pretty basic, a few affectations but otherwise straightforward cookie-cutter folks, but the story moves quickly and pulls you in, even if most of it has been done before and since. I liked Ronson’s Plague Pit from the following year a bit more, but this one is good, and I heartily recommend it. The Hamlyn paperback has a nice gnarly cover of a mannequin head covered in green gunk that looks like it might be a photograph.

The Desecration of Susan Browning By Russell Martin

The Desecration of Susan Browning
By Russell Martin
1981 Playboy Press
Paperback, 254 pages

 

                This is Martin’s second foray into the world of Satan and his loyal followers, hot on the heels of 1980’s Rhea. His writing is crisp and fluid and I even had to look up a few words! Educational! While this isn’t an entirely satisfying read, it is quite good, and it moves by quickly.

 

                Marty and Susan Browning are two Hollywood up-and-comers who have a wonderful marriage. On the way to their car after a movie date, they witness a woman being assaulted in the parking lot and Marty comes to her rescue. Three days later, the Browning’s get a visit from the victim, Wanda Carmichael, with an invitation to a swank party at her mansion. From there on, the desecration begins.

 

                Wanda takes over Marty, makes him (willingly?) divorce Susan and grinds Mrs. Browning’s life to dust. Just what does Wanda have that enthralls Marty so much? Susan’s friend Max tries to comfort her but soon his constant presence starts to be annoying… until she becomes his willing sex slave. Yeah, things are in a weird slide for poor Susan! Why is all of this happening? Perhaps the sleazy private dick will find answers, or perhaps the cute, young Father Crabbe can help her sort things out.

 

                Yes, this is like an X-rated soap opera and that’s exactly why it is so much fun. None of the characters are particularly likeable; Susan herself has many flaws, so we just sit back and watch the shitshow. While God and faith do come into play, it is never heavy handed. My only real complaint story-wise would be that I wanted more Satan!! Rituals are fine but gimme some Ol’ Scratch!

 

                Being that one of the main characters is transsexual and this book was written in 1981, there is a lot of dated transphobia that will make the modern reader cringe a bit, but that’s the way things were (or are for some of the shit slices out there). It’s all part of 80s Hollywood where life is cheap, property is expensive, and Satan brings good things to evil people.

 

                I found this in the children’s books section at a thrift store!

When Darkness Loves Us By Elizabeth Engstrom

When Darkness Loves Us
By Elizabeth Engstrom
1986 Tor Books
Paperback, 249 pages

 

                What an extraordinary book! Writing that flows as smoothly as a gentle stream, weaving tales of angst, horror and heartbreak with such compelling prose that the book is nearly impossible to put down. Iconic sci-fi author Theodore Strugeon, with whom Engstrom took a writing course, provides a forward here where he says he saw her greatness early on. And boy, was he right! The two stories contained in this book are unlike anything else I have ever read and both of them satisfied me one hundred percent.

 

                “When Darkness Loves Us”, the first story, clocks in at around 70 pages but effectively covers a huge timespan. Newlywedded Sally Ann is watching her husband plow the fields and slips down some stairs into a tunnel below the woods, a place where she played as a child. While down there, someone closes and locks the safety doors at ground level, leaving her lost in complete darkness. And she is pregnant. What happens from there is an amazing story of adaptation, loyalty, fear and evolution, all expressed brilliantly within that short page count.

 

                Clocking in at 164 pages, “Beauty Is…” tells the story of Martha, born without a nose, shunned and abused by her father, loved by her mother (a healer) and left mentally challenged after an incident during her childhood. Now an adult living on her own, she is childlike in a small town of people who look out for her. But Martha has a drive and despite her disabilities, she has a will to learn and love and be loved. When young Leon comes by to help fix up her house and stays on, she develops a closeness with him that seems to open up new feelings and lost abilities. But surely that creepy asshole who knows she has some money in the house will louse things up for our protagonist.

 

                I must admit that both stories reeled me in completely and held me tight. I got all of the emotions while in Sally Ann’s and Martha’s bleak worlds. I felt all of their pain and their triumphs, their determination, and plenty of heartbreak. Engstrom is an incredibly effective writer and she pulled me in hook line and sinker. I find her writing in this book right up there with Michael McDowell in her ability to transport me into another place completely. I can’t recommend this book highly enough.

 

                Luckily, Valancourt reprinted this book as part of their Paperbacks from Hell line and kept Jill Bauman’s amazing cover from the Tor paperback (which illustrates “Beauty Is…” rather than the titular story). According to the author via her website (http://www.elizabethengstrom.net/), both Spanish and German translations are forthcoming. Muy bueno! Sehr gut!