Night-Shriek by Michael Wolfitt

Night-Shriek
by Michael Wolfitt

1983 Granada
Paperback, 223 pages

                I swear I thought I was reading a William Johnstone novel except there was no right-wing agenda and it took place in London, not Louisiana! But holy hell, it’s just as batshit crazy as anything in the Johnstone oeuvre!

 

                A couple, Roger and Hilary, get into an accident on the way home from their friends’ house and wind up in the hospital. Hilary was pregnant and loses the baby. The fetus was a weird looking thing, so the doctor saved it to examine later. The fetus breaks out of the storage cupboard. Cats start spying on people. Nurses die. Everyone involved with the case start dying violently. It seems Hilary had the bloodline of the ancient Cat Goddess Bast. See what I mean?

 

                You know me. I can’t resist cat-horror. There is plenty of feline fear in the pages of this book, be it a sleek black cat staring a victim down through a window or a person actually becoming a cat. The more convoluted the storyline became, the more I had fun with this absolute mess of a book. Egyptology often loses my interest in books but this time, it all worked for me because of the laughably over the top audacity of the story.

 

                I’m not saying this is a terrible book. I found it thoroughly entertaining. Yes, it is batshit crazy, but it never dragged and kept me smiling throughout. And if the cover art by Tim White (actually credited on the back cover!) doesn’t grab you, then I don’t know what will. Filled with kinky sex, mutilations and mind-control… they just don’t publish books like this anymore.

 

Online sources say that Wolfitt is actually Mystery writer/ poet Mike Fredman but I haven’t seen Fredman himself admit that anywhere. I won’t be searching out his recent poetry or any of his Willie Halliday detective novels, but I will cherish this strange little piece of pulp forever.

Toy Cemetery By William W. Johnstone

Toy Cemetery
By William W. Johnstone
1987 Zebra
Paperback, 412 pages

 
    Old Scratch is running rampant in a small town in the South and it’s up to a rough and tumble Viet Nam vet to stop the madness! It sounds like every other William W. Johnstone book doesn’t it? But wait, there is much more. So much more that I really have no idea where to begin. This is top shelf Johnstone kitchen-sink madness.

    New York divorcé Jay Clute (the war veteran) has inherited his aunt’s fortune down in Victory, Missouri and he and his 10-year-old daughter Kelly take a trip down to his hometown to settle his affairs. As memories flood him, the two notice lots of strange things going on, not the least of which is little dolls running around. They stay in town, meet up with Jay’s old friends and Kelly meets some local kids. But there is an evil grip on the town that has everyone acting strangely and weird creatures skulk in the shadows.

    I’ll let Deva, Jay’s high school sweetheart, and her sarcastic retort to Jay’s suggestion that it must be an explainable phenomenon reveal some of the weirdness… “Grown men and women are thrust into near-incestuous relationships with their kids; creatures roam the night; toys come alive; and the personalities of nearly everyone in town have been altered. Explainable phenomenon. Sure, Jay.” All this and more and yes, Johnstone goes there with a lot of incest, rape and pedophilia in this one.

    Truthfully, this is so chock-full of strangeness that it gets confusing but it’s all good because the gore splats freely and despite the cringey mean-spiritedness of some parts, there is no shortage of intentional humor. My favorite character is old man Milton, Jay’s next-door neighbor who rocks in his rocker, cheerfully calling Jay and his crew assholes every time he sees them. There is an explanation for everything, and it slowly unfolds during the course of this overstuffed tome but don’t worry about logic; this is Johnstone at the peak of his batshit craziness. Just go along for the ride and try to picture the author tapping away at the typewriter, chopping out this stream-of-consciousness prose, wondering himself where it’s all going to end up.

    Johnstone will never be mistaken for a great writer, but his work is fun as hell and this one is as over the top as it gets. And even though good ol’ God is mentioned a number of times, he doesn’t play a huge role in this novel. Thank Him for that!

Cat’s Cradle By William W. Johnstone

Cat’s Cradle
By William W. Johnstone
1986 Zebra
Paperback, 412 pages

 

                Oh, William Johnstone, how I hate to love you. But I just can’t help myself! We would never agree on anything in real life but you sure can write an entertaining horror novel.

 

                Every 25 years, a small girl and her cat, born of the same mother (so I guess they are twins), emerge from hiding to devour a few people and get ready to invoke the big guy… Satan. They are awakened early this time, but the murderous rampage begins anew. Their victims age rapidly, mummify, and dead or not, become instruments of evil themselves. Large groups of cats gather to shred the population. One of the mummified arms starts spewing forth millions of huge, flesh-eating maggots. Pools of curdled blood are passageways for the Old Ones, demon minions of the big guy himself. Man, Ruger County is fucked.

 

                As you can see, this is typical Johnstone kitchen-sink storytelling but by god it never gets dull. When the government (The OSS, Office of Special Studies) gets involved and begins a cover-up, it makes things even more difficult for our manly-man cop hero Dan. With so much going on and a lot of characters, many chapters tell the tale with short paragraphs checking in on different situations happening around the county. I kind of liked this, it kept my lazy brain up to date with the turmoil.

 

                This book doesn’t utilize all of Johnstone’s usual tropes. The action takes place in Virginia, rather than Louisiana, and Dan is ex-CIA rather than a Viet Nam vet. Most of the right-wing viewpoints are saved for picking on an intrepid female reporter; one of the OSS crazies is even called a right-wing fanatic for his overt, dangerous patriotism. But Christianity is still big and is called on in hopes of saving the day. Admittedly, I got confused by all of the characters a few times, but you can’t deny Johnstone’s gory, eyeball melting, flesh-shredding madness. If one bonkers horror scene doesn’t tickle your fancy, the next one will. Or the one after that. Richard Newton's lovely cover has nothing to do with the narrative but it might as well!

 

                Oh, and there’s a phone call from Satan. In the days before caller ID, that was possible.