Richard Laymon - One Rainy Night

[glampunk]

Richard Laymon - One Rainy Night (Headline, 1991)

Steve Crisp

Blurb:
THE KILLER RAIN

The water drops like a shroud on the town of Bixby. Warm, viscous and unnatural, it coats the inhabitants in an unending torrent — and turns them into crazy, hate-filled maniacs. A helpful stranger at a gas station shoves a petrol pump down a customer's throat and squeezes the trigger. A soaking-wet queue of cinema-goers smashes its way inside the movie house to slice up the dry people within. A loving wife attacks her husband, bouncing the back of his head on the marble floor until, it sounds like sloppy wet meat...

"LETS GET THE DRY ONES!"

We already have way too many bloody Laymon threads (see below), so here's another. In terms of premise, One Rainy Night is like James Herbert's The Fog with a voodoo slant. We begin with what appears to be a racist murder, seventeen year old Maxwell Chidi, burned at the goalpost in the new stadium at Lincoln High School, Bixby, California. Maxwell had been dating a white classmate, Lisa Walters, and prime suspects are her ex, Buddy Gilbert, and his pals, Doug Haines and Lee Nicholson, who'd been drunkenly abusing Maxwell at the dance after the game. The Principal threw them out. Lisa is due to babysit Kara for the Foxworths the following evening, but her mom insists she cancel and call in at the police station instead, tell everything she knows about what happened.

John Foxworth is mightily relieved that Lisa can't make it. If Lynn can't find a replacement, he can cancel their dinner date with the People Today hacks at the Edgewood. John recently acquired unwanted fame as the mystery hero who intervened when a crazed fan pulled a gun on chart-topping rock chanteuse Veronica. Although John immediately fled the scene, the paparazzi tracked him down with ease. A phone call to a thrilled if slightly narked Lynn - her husband saves a megastar's life and doesn't think to tell her? - and People Today have their exclusive interview in the bag. But Lynn is determined that nothing is going to stand in the way of HER big night out. She imposes on Denise Anderson to cancel whatever she's doing and please, please, please help her out of a bind! Denise, who'd been planning to invite her boyfriend over - she'd even rented Watchers, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and *cough* Night Show for the night - is a girl who can't say no. Of course, I'd be delighted, Mrs. Foxworth!

Hero he may be, but John is a LAYMON hero, in other words, he has a PERVY VOYEURISTIC NATURE. As they drive toward their destination, Lynn takes him to task over his reticence to embrace this fantastic opportunity.

`It'd be perfect for you. The invisible man. The ultimate in anonymity.'
`Why didn't I think of that?'
He had thought of that. Often. He was sure he'd never told Lynn, though. It was his pet fantasy, being invisible, and he'd always kept it to himself. Not exactly something you share, your desire to vanish from sight ........ As a teenager, his favorite daydream had involved sneaking invisible into the girls' shower room after gym class. He hadn't given up that daydream. But now his fantasies more often involved young women, not teenagers. Watching them undress and bathe
Invisible, he could do other things, too: eavesdrop, steal anything he might want, wreck havoc on his enemies, even commit murder. Not that he would. He had no desire at all to do any of those things, and rarely gave them a thought. His fantasies included very little beyond spying on women in the shower.
But that was enough to prevent him from ever breathing of his secret desire to Lynn or to anyone else.
She would consider him a latent peeping-Tom, a sicko for wanting to do that. For desiring invisibility to avoid the attention of creeps, she would figure him for a paranoid coward.
She's already got that part figured, John thought as he pulled away from a stop light and realized he was only a block from the Edgewood.

Just as they step inside the restaurant, a blast of thunder. The black rain come down and with it, the violent vignettes ....

*****

Get Your Big Dick Here: Vault's Laymon Love-in

Dreadful Tales
Out Are The Lights
The Woods Are Dark
Dark Mountain
Beware
The Cellar/ Beast House/ The Midnight Tours
Friday Night At The Beast House
Night Show
Red gym shorts chronicles
Funland
Fiends
The Glory Bus
Resurrection Dreams
The Lake
In The Dark
Vault MK I includes 'Flesh' and 'All Hallows Eve'

[dem bones]

"There's a lot to be said for anonymity. John Lennon would probably still be alive today if he'd been a TV repairman." - Jim Foxworth

First time around, I didn't think of One Rainy Night as one of Laymon's finer works, but it's been dead good so far to the point where I'm even considering a rematch with All Hallows Eve.

Chet Baxter and girlfriend Christie are queueing outside the local cinema for the seven o'clock showing of Out Are The Lights when the heavens open. Recruiting a pregnant woman, they lead a charge on the foyer to get at staff and customers within. Over at the police station, the desk sergeant throws a fit, shoots dead a female colleague, and opens fire on fellow officer Trev Hudson and his interviewees Lisa Walters and he Ma, Francine. Trev has no option but to gun down his pal. Fun and games at the Edgewood, too, where everybody gets an eyeful of Cassy the head-waitress's bodice-busters when she's attacked by the drenched doorman, prelude to an invasion of the restaurant by a maniacal mob. John Foxworth, needless to say, throws himself into the thick of the fracas. With little Kara's blessing, Denise the babysitter invites boyfriend Tom around to share their popcorn. Bad move, unless you've a weapon handy. All over Bixby the wet attack the dry, the tar-like black rain processing ever-more violent zombies by the minute.

Trev the cop has a steady girlfriend, Maureen. She's a pizza delivery girl. Maureen has an order from Buddy, Doug, Lee and their groupies, Sheila and Cindi. The downpour holds off until Maureen's moped pulls into the drive. She picks up a rock and rings the bell ....

Thankful for small mercies, the effects of the killer rain are temporary; knock out a wet, scrub off the black goo, and by the time they regain consciousness, they're back to normal. Such is the case with Maureen. In return for her life, Maureen must agree to become Buddy's slave. To get the relationship off on the right foot, the odious creep rapes her in the bathtub. Before introducing Maureen to the gang, Buddy sorts her a slave costume of white t-shirt and (fanfare) red gym shorts ....

Pop culture references; plenty of C & W, including Glen Campbell's Witchita Lineman. Dean R. Koontz's Watchers. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre; Super Mario, etc. I also like the Steve Crisp cover painting, which would be equally at home up front of a Robert Bloch collection.

[dem bones]

Buddy, Doug and Lee pals get soaked. Exposure to the black rain doesn't make them any fouler than they are to begin with although their girlfriends might disagree had they still the capacity to do so (they've both been butchered). Maureen has escaped their clutches by dashing through the killer rain and straight into the cleansing water of Buddy's backyard swimming pool. She hides under the diving board with the red shorts as an umbrella.

Buddy and the boys head for Lisa's place intent on killing her before she can finger them for torching Maxwell. Of course, Lisa and her Ma are with Trev the cop (wearing an improvised waterproof suit of bin-liners and sticky tape), driving through Bixby in search of his Maureen. It's not looking too hopeful. O'Casey's pizza joint resembles an abattoir. Lisa mentions that Maxwell's grandfather is a powerful Witch-doctor. This killer rain would be just the kind of stunt he would pull to avenge the cold-blooded murder of a cherished family member .....

The swish restaurant is still under siege. I rather think Laymon fancied himself as the John Foxworth of the piece. Could be my addled brain playing tricks yet again, but didn't the "Who died and named you king shit?" sequence resurface in Midnight's Lair?

And still the pop culture references come. "He remembered a book he'd read a few years ago. Phantoms. The oven of an abandoned bakery had a severed head or two inside. He stepped away from the ovens."

"As if he'd offered a nice chunk of meat to a stray dog, and the damn thing had turned into Cujo."

"The commercial ended, and a Clint Eastwood movie came on. One of those old spaghetti westerns. Clint looked gritty and cool. squinting as he lit the stub of a thin cigar.

'Fistful Of Dollars', Tom said. 'It's a great one."

[erebus]

I recently re read Funland again for the first time since the very early 90s. I now realise why I left it so long for a revisit. It was very bad. Long drawn out 500 page novel with little or no action until the late 400 mark and by then you neither care or are interested. What this has to do with this thread you ask, well I'm going to tackle One Rainy Night again next. I recall it being one I put in the favourable bracket. But as for Funland, never again.

And for people who like ultra sad tit bits I remember buying this brand new, the old Headline paperback along with Koontz's Night Chills ( a good un ) And Voice of the Night. Ah the days when books had silver foil embossed titles and strong spines. Anyway.

[dem bones]

Have to disagree with you on this one, mr e. I think the anti-tramp to tramp progress detailed in Funland is among Laymon's finest achievements, along with The Celler (debut and best, but would be first to admit the shock of something new played a big part in my enthusiasm), Midnight's Lair (if you're gonna do formula, do it really really well), the more outrageous Dreadful Tales, and ... and really, the only one disappointed me on any kind of meaningful level was All Hallows Eve (have it creeping up the to-reread pile, so doubtless, will shortly be acclaiming it his masterpiece). One Rainy Night? Liked it so much better the second time around, but strikes me as a fan pleaser (nothing wrong with that). He has confidence in his strength's and he knows what his audience want and gives it them. With a definite, but casually underplayed anti-racist premise as a bonus. Yeah, the guy was certainly plenty special.

As an aside, I pay regular visits to the local libraries, and where once the 'horror' section was dominated by King/ Koontz/ Herbert/ Laymon, now - what's left of it - is King/ Koontz/ Herbert/ Kim Newman/ Kelly Armstrong - and a virgin (i.e. yet to be loaned after three years) copy of Shirley Jackson's Haunting Of Hill House. When i were a lad .... (you are so right, Craig. We are OLD).

[Jojo Lapin X]

Who is Kelly Armstrong? If you mean Kelley Armstrong, who is Kelley Armstrong? I hope my ignorance does not offend anybody.

King Koontz I know, of course. A giant ape, right?

[Dr Strange]

May 16, 2014 14:42:40 GMT Jojo Lapin X said:

Who is Kelly Armstrong? If you mean Kelley Armstrong, who is Kelley Armstrong?

Ummmm... is she Laurell K. Hamilton?

Actually, the last time I was in the local Waterstones the paranormal romance / urban fantasy section seemed to have shrunk considerably, and the "proper horror" section grown proportionately larger. Either that or I've developed some new sort of defence mechanism.

[ohthehorror]

Our library is a tiny little affair, and one that seems to see nothing wrong in shelving everything alphabetically by author. I'd be ok with that if it were shelved alphabetically by author within each genre, but no, no genres in sight. When I go into a library to find a horror novel to read, first and foremost, I need to be guided to the horror genre section and then they can alphabetise it. Anyway, don't know where that little rant came from but I originally came here to inflict my thoughts upon you all regarding the minor masterpiece that is One Rainy Night by Richard Laymon. 

Every now and then I come here simply to wander through the various forums and threads of yesteryear to see what I can add to my to-read list. A week or so ago I came across several very entertaining threads about Richard Laymon novels, one of which was all about Red Gym Shorts Girl and surely deserves an award of some kind if only for the thread title. The one that caught my eye though was this one. Partly because I like the title of this book, One Rainy Night is right from the outset a wonderfully simple title that makes you feel all horror-y and just begs to be read, and partly because it promises me that red gym shorts girl is going to remove them and place them on her head at some point, apparently in a bid to outsmart the rain. It works too, at least long enough for her to slip beneath the diving board. Every time I think of this bit I can't help but picture a beautiful young thing with a stern, don't-mess-with-me look on her face and one red gym shorts leg slipping down over one eye. I'm pretty sure every time I read this I'm not going to be able to keep a straight face. It's probably not the author's original intention but I mention it as an expression of love and respect on my part if that helps.

I'm not giving anything away to say that the black rain drives everyone that gets wet into a kind of voodoo inspired violence and lust-crazed frenzy. This is rich ground for Mr Laymon and he makes the most of this happy situation by ensuring there's a good dollop of rape which leads to a nice bit of slavery and of course the already mentioned red gym shorts on the head scene. There's also plenty of people eating other people alive, and dead(of course), but alive's better(of course), but let's not gloss over that rape section.

So, Buddy has our little Maureen at a distinct disadvantage what with her going black rain crazy while delivering his pizza and attempting to lump him with a rock. Buddy being the kind of guy he is gets her all cleaned up(and therefore normal again) and basically makes her agree to be his slave. Excellent, who among us hasn't dream't of blackmailing a pretty young girl into sex slavery? and just because we could, right? right? Am I right? This is one of the things I love about Richard Laymon. There's no half measures with him. Nothing is impossible, or indeed improbable if the swimming pool scene is anything to go by. I'm still chuckling at those gym shorts on the head. Maureen's quite a good slave I think. I'm wondering if a part of her didn't enjoy it a little. And I'll bet that's exactly what our Mr Laymon was thinking too. That makes us either both geniuses, or both just a little bit pervy. I know which I am.

I like Richard Laymon. It's been years since I did the Beast House books so I don't really remember too much about them but I remember devouring them one after another and really, really enjoying them. It was the same with this one. There's something just a little cozy about him. Cozy in the same way that a good scare on Halloween is cozy, you know? That kind of cozy. This makes only 5 of his novels I've read and I can't say I understand what his detractors have against him. I do think though that you have to go into a Richard Laymon knowing what it is you're getting. When I pick up one of his novels I know I'm getting a b-movie in print, and that's all good, because if I had been looking for anything more than that I would have put it back on the shelf and walked away.

And so, now all I need to do is figure out which one of the many i read next. Funhouse seems to be well thought of I notice. Maybe I'll give that one a try. I'll have to re-check the relevant thread though to see if I'm going to get my hit of red gym shorts girl.


Edit: I thought I recognized the one called The Woods Are Dark while scouring the Richard Laymon threads. So that actually makes 6 I've read, not 5. It was a good read too from what I remember.
 

[dem bones]

Feb 21, 2015 19:37:37 GMT ohthehorror said:

And so, now all I need to do is figure out which one of the many i read next. Funhouse seems to be well thought of I notice. Maybe I'll give that one a try. I'll have to re-check the relevant thread though to see if I'm going to get my hit of red gym shorts girl.
 

Trust me, you will. Terrific novel too (provided, that is, you like Laymon. If you don't, there's nothing in Funland will change your mind). It's not unlike a Baywatch season gone to Hell.

There was a time, and not so long ago, when Richard Laymon was the horror section in our local library - OK, there were were the obligatory Koontz and King titles for variations sake - but since it became an 'idea store' all of his books have vanished from the shelves. On the plus side the selection is far healthier these days - they even have two of the Robert Aickman reissues - but its sad to see him overlooked.

A highly respected literary research faculty attached to Mortbury University have since scientifically proved that, over Laymon's entire body of work, the red shorts girls had a significantly higher survival rate than the, far rarer, white and denim shorts girls, so ladies, if you're planning on appearing in one of his posthumously-published novels ....

[ohthehorror]

Dem said:

It's not unlike a Baywatch season gone to Hell.

Well that's more than enough to recommend it in itself.