Anthony Horowitz - More Bloody Horowitz

[dem bones]

Anthony Horowitz - More Bloody Horowitz (Walker, 2010)

Mick Brownfield

The Man Who Killed Darren Shan An embittered, failed writer plots a hideous revenge.
Bet Your Life What's the worst thing you've ever seen on TV?
You Have Arrived Two thugs are on a journey to hell in a stolen car...
The Cobra A tale of of poison and humiliation in the backstreets of Marrakech.
Robo-Nanny Two brothers face a nightmare when technology runs amok.

INTERMISSION

My Bloody French Exchange Monsters and murder ... and all he wanted was to learn French!
SheBay She was Daddy's favourite ... until she had to be sold.
Are You Sitting Comfortably? Some marriages end unhappily. This one ends with blood...
Plugged In They should have known there was something unusual about their neighbour...
Power The strange, unpleasant death of a strange, unpleasant boy.
Seven Cuts Final words from the publisher of this book.

While I’m in Borders I browse through Darren Shan’s new opus, Wolf Island. You may know Shan as a moderately successful writer of horror novels. I’m shocked to discover a character, a mad scientist, named Antoine Horwitzer in his new book. Antoine, although described as handsome and charming, is soon revealed to be a cad and meets a particularly horrible end. I have known Darren for years, but this is a Jonathan Ross moment where the envelope has been pushed too far.

Fortunately for Darren I’m not the litigious type, but I must draw his attention to a book of mine being published in 2009 - Aaagh: Ten Unusual Ways to Die - and in particular to one story: The Man who Killed Darren Shan. Let’s see who has the last laugh. - Anthony Horowitz, The Times online, November 2008.

Thanks to the staff at Watney Market library for turning up a copy of this. Four stories in and, in keeping with the two Horowitz Horrors collections, the stories read like a throwback to Mary Danby's 'seventies horror anthologies for Fontana. Horowitz has a fondness for the most manic, often ghastly, twist endings, so these books are not short of an E.C. chuckle or two either. The layout this time is mock pulp magazine complete with illustrations, mock advertisements, a crossword, even a comment from 'Professor Wendy Grooling' on Why Horror Has No Place In Children's Books. No surprise that the story which has attracted the most attention is the opener, Horowitz's supposedly furious retaliation on a fellow YA author for feeding a certain 'Antoine Horwitzer' to a werewolf pack in a 2008 novel.

The Man Who Killed Darren Shan: From childhood Henry Parker's solitary ambition in life has been to become a world famous horror author. At sixteen Henry overcame his shyness to present his English teacher with copies of Verbal Abuse (Latin master crucifies pupil for talking in class) and Tooth Decay (werewolf goes ga-ga at the dental surgery). Mr. Harris was not overly impressed: "Do you have to be quite so explicit? The paragraph here ... where the dentist's heart is pulled out and then minced - I read it after dinner and it made me quite ill." Henry rightly concludes that Mr. Harris has no business teaching English Literature and subjects him to a slow and excruciating death in his next nasty.

When Henry is nineteen his parents are killed in a bizarre circus accident. Finding himself penniless, he's forced to seek gainful employment and so begins a stint as an estate agent. Henry's not given up on his dream and spends the next eleven years writing his masterpiece, the greatest children's horror novel ever, Ring Of Evil. It is such a brilliant debut that no publisher would be stupid enough to pass on it. Except they do. In droves. The general consensus is that Ring Of Evil is too gory for a youthful audience and too dim for adults. Henry quits the estate agents before his colleagues find out that his life's work has been dismissed as junk and lands himself a job in a chemical warehouse next to Shoreditch station. His life in ruins, this is not a good moment for Henry to chance upon a copy of Darren Shan's best-seller Cirque du Freak! Parker writes to the mega-successful young author accusing him of plagiarism and demanding a generous cash settlement but all he gets for his pains is a note from Shan's agent, Fenella Jones, politely refuting his lunatic ravings. There is only one thing for it: Henry must come up with a method for destroying Darren Shan that is so superb in its fiendishness that nobody will suspect him of the crime. Within days the newspaper's are full of the 'Poison Pen Murder' - and that's when the supernatural horror fun and games really begin.

Bet Your Life: Sixteen year old Danny Webster is volunteered by his alcoholic, ex-postman father to compete in smash hit quiz show, Bet Your Life. Win, and its £10 million worth of diamonds and a snog from Bridget, the gorgeous blonde in the silver bikini. Lose, and ... don't even think about losing! Now that twenty five of the original contestants have been spectacularly filtered out by popular compere Wayne Howard, only four survivors stand between Danny and a fortune. Meanwhile, on a rival reality show, the MacDonald family from Sunderland plot an audacious heist ...

Mick Brownfield: SheBay

SheBay: Another parents-are-grasping-rotters offering. As the recession kicks in, so Jonathan Bailey's successful garden ornament business goes under, leaving he and wife Jane with no option but to auction off their twelve year old little-miss-perfect daughter. Dad duly posts Jennifer's details on SheBay and soon she's the subject of an insultingly small scale bidding war. Dr. Roderick MacNeil of the Cambridge Experimental Hospital thinks she'd be a suitable subject for dissection while Ethan Kyte and his Grimsby-based Satanic coven are in needs of a human sacrifice. As to the proprietor of swish Kings Road restaurant, Sawney Bean, we already met him in Harriet's Horrible Dream (Horowitz Horrors)) so are only too aware of his culinary capers. Only the elderly philanthropists, Gerald & Samantha Pettigrew of the Tall Trees Orphanage on Salisbury Plain, stand between Jennifer and a ghastly doom, but will they be prepared to pay more than the Black Sorcerers, cannibals and mad doctor? God, but i love the ending!

more to follow

[dem bones]

You Have Arrived: Hoodie horror on the outskirts of Ipswich. Since the mysterious disappearance of top thug Romeo, Harry 'Haz' Faulkner, twenty, and fifteen-year-old Jason Steel have taken over leadership of a seven strong gang of underage drinkers, dope smokers, vandals and petty thieves who terrorise the decrepit Kenworth Estate. One afternoon, Haz and Jason spot an unattended BMW parked outside The King's Head - and the owner has left their key in the ignition. Do they want it to be stolen or what? The two hooligans set off on a joyride to the sea and so far, so-so until they test out the state of the art technology. The Sat Nav barks it's instructions in the wheeze of a cantankerous old woman and, with darkness falling as Haz drink-drives them home, it's obvious that her directions are not to be relied upon. Hopelessly lost, they arrive at a pork farm - speciality: 'Aunt Marigold's Smoked Meat & Black Puddings' - and we've a fair idea what's about to happen as the accompanying illustration is a spoiler too cruel even for Vault! I wasn't expecting to like this - tower block misfits are a Daily Mail/ LBC target - but this is by far the creepiest to date and, again, a brilliant ending.

The Cobra: "Magic ... has a way of sneaking up on you and biting you in ways that you may not expect." Fifteen year old Charles Atchley - professional spoilt brat, fink and aspiring school bully - has been dragged away on holiday to Marrakesh by his doting parents, and boy, is he going to make them pay for it! Infuriatingly, no-one seems to notice his petty vandalism and downright rudeness and its only after he's insulted an ancient snake-charmer that the little bastard receives his comeuppance.

Professor Wendy Grooling - Why Horror Has No Place In Children's Books: The Professor fantasises about what she'd like to do to the likes of Horowitz and his youthful readers. Horowitz works in some sly digs at contemporaries including J. K. Rowling and R. L. Stine. Don't know enough of the politics to comment but i suspect that this time he has little liking for his targets.

[dem bones]

I knew i'd seen his work before somewhere. Mick Brownfield versus a pair of class Peter Haining reprints.

Robo-Nanny: It is the future again. A hectic work schedule means lengthy spells away from their plush Kensington Fortress apartment, so financial whizz-kid Sanjiv Mahal and his designer wife Nicole invest in a Robo-nanny to care for their sons. Not just any Robo-nanny, but the T-199 aka 'Tamsin', Cyber-Life Industrials most advanced model to date. Tamsin is lifelike in every respect save one, the severity-level control panel on her arm. Sebastian and Cameron (eleven and nine years old respectively) being relatively well behaved kids, a setting of number two should do the trick. The Mahals are advised to forget all about level five - that's the last resort setting, seldom put to use in even the most brutal of Borstals.

So now we all want to know what would happen if Tasmin were to sustain a knock which resulted in the controls jamming on level five, and of course, Horowitz obliges, whereupon events take a turn for the Pieces Of Mary. For once the author pulls his punch with a slightly disappointing twist ending, but no complaints about the ride to get there.

Plugged In: Jeremy is the most well behaved boy in North Finchley and, quite possibly, the world. There he goes now, calling on frail, elderly Hungarian mystery man Mr. Jakob Demsky, who has just moved in at number 66. Jeremy wants to know if there's anything he can do to help? Well, yes there is! The garden is in an awful state, so if he wouldn't mind spending three hours a day weeding? Of course not! Jeremy will even drag his mum along to help!

Mr. Demsky is so moved by Jeremy's selflessness that he gives him a jet-black MP3 player from the old country, a clunky contraption for sure, but it's preloaded with tracks by Coldplay, Killers, Beyonce, Oasis, Kings Of Leon - in short, all Jeremy's favourite bands! Incredibly, it seems to run on solar power as there's nowhere to slot a battery, but it never runs down. Better and better, "Three days before Take That released their new single, it magically appeared on his play-list."

Jeremy couldn't be happier! Well, actually, he could, because he's been struck down by a mystery virus, and by the time the Doctors realise what it is, he's already deaf and blind and his body is so shrivelled its disgusting. Mrs. Browne belatedly realises that her son's illness coincided with Mr. Demsky giving him the MP3 player and tears the plugs from his ears, but happily, she's too late!

I've no idea if Horowitz intended this as a hobnailed boot to the privates of David Cameron's nice big society and those who subscribe to it, but if so, it adds an extra dimension of fabness to an already delicious story. If You Have Arrived and Are You Sitting Comfortably are trad E.C. despicable-guys-get-their just desserts offerings, Jeremy Browne, like SheBay's Jennifer does absolutely nothing to warrant his appalling fate (the most sadistic in the book to date!).