Jack Ketchum--Ladies' Night

[ripper]

Ladies' Night by Jack Ketchum (Gauntlet, 2000)

It is a hot summer's day in New York City. A tanker jack-knifes, spilling its load and killing the driver. The police are puzzled as there is no trace of the tanker in records and it should not have been in that part of the city. People notice a sweet, cherry-like odour in the air, which appears to be coming from the tanker's load.
Tom and Susan, a late 30s couple are attending a party on the roof of their apartment building. Everything is going normally when a young woman with a glazed expression suddenly lifts up her dress and begins to pleasure herself in front of everyone. Apartment block security guards bundle her away and the incident is passed off as drug related. Tom and Susan leave the party with their friend, Elizabeth, and return to their apartments. Soon, Tom and Susan are engaged in another of their frequent arguments, while their son, Andy, listens from his bedroom. Tom storms out and heads for his favourite bar.
In her apartment, Elizabeth is tired, having only flown into New York several hours earlier.
Susan starts to feel strange, her head pounding. Meanwhile, Tom is trying to pick up a girl in his friend's bar. Owner Bailey is nervous. There is a strange atmosphere in the bar, a tension he can't put his finger on, and the women in the place have a curious look about them. He is about to close up the bar, scared that something is about to happen when three of his waitresses emerge giggling from the kitchen. One is carrying a large covered plate. It is obviously heavy and she almost slips. A customer rushes to help her and the cover falls off revealing the severed head of the cook...

In his introduction, Ketchum says that Ladies' Night was his second novel but it was rejected by his publisher at the time as being too shocking and brutally violent. It was also over 400 pages long and it sat unpublished for many years. Eventually, Ketchum and a friend pruned the book, cutting out over half the text and it found publication. I think I can understand the initial reluctance to publish the book. From that scene in the bar with the severed head, the pace is relentless and the action becomes very brutal at times as Tom struggles to get back home to Andy, fearful that Susan will succumb to the same homicidal rage that seems to have gripped every woman in the city. As well as Tom, the plot also cuts to Tom's apartment and to that of Elizabeth, who is unaffected as she wasn't in the city when the tanker crashed. There are also vingettes of other characters, which will be familiar to anyone who has read any 80s horror fiction. The body count is very high as women slaughter men in the streets, in their homes and workplaces. It all builds up to a tense, bloody and exciting climax as Tom approaches his apartment, unsure of what he will discover.

I thought this was a terrific read with a breakneck pace and non-stop action, much of it pretty graphic. It has a Night of the Living Dead vibe about it, but also, I would say, echoes of The Fog, as the women often exhibit crazed sexual behaviour. Ketchum doesn't mind killing off major characters and the ending is suitably poignant, as well as apocalyptic, since how can a city recover from such a catastrophe. I read this one in two sittings and I would thoroughly recommend it to anyone who enjoys pulse-pounding violent action-orientated horror.

[dem bones]

I really need to check out this guy. He's often mentioned in the same breath as Richard Laymon which can only be a good thing, and Ladies' Night sounds deliciously lurid from your review.

[Jojo Lapin X]

I read something by Ketchum a long time ago and found it depressing. I suspect he is actually the antithesis of the cheerful Laymon.

[ripper]

The only other Ketchum I have read is his first novel, 'Off Season'. It was censored by the publisher due to its violence but is now available in its unexpurgated form. I haven't read enough of Laymon to make a comparison but Ketchum is deadly serious in his writing. I mean there is no camp as was sometimes the case with 80s pulp horror. There is a tendency towards downbeat endings, or at least from what I have read of him. I wouldn't perhaps go quite as far as saying his novels are mean-spirited, but they are played deadly straight, and there is a kind of grimy feel to the plots. He wrote a sequel to 'Off Season' called 'Offspring' but I am still to get a copy of that one.

[Jojo Lapin X]

He is the author of THE GIRL NEXT DOOR, about the sustained torture, rape, and eventual murder of a young girl by an entire family. Based on a true story. Not the kind of thing I would read for entertainment, to be honest. There is a kind of modern horror fiction that seems to mistake pathos for horror.

[ripper]

Just looking at Ketchum's novels and came upon that reference to 'The Girl next Door' being based on an actual case as Jo-Jo just posted about. Haven't read it and that kind of thing doesn't really appeal to me. There's a novel called 'Red' about an old man getting revenge on a group of rich kids who slaughter his dog, which I might try at some time.

By the way, 'Off Season' features a group of inbred cannibals hiding in caves and killing and eating locals and travelers--echoes of Sawney Beane?

[dem bones]

Thanks for the crash course, gents. Will see if I can spot Off Season or Ladies' Night in the library (don't much fancy the sound of The Girl Next Door). I'm guessing they'll be filed with the crime fiction (as are Paul Finch's 'Heck' novels)?

[ohthehorror]

I once read one of Edward Lee's novels, called The Bighead which sounds to me like it might very well be the twin brother of Jack Ketchum. I remember at the time trying to decide which of the two author's I'd like to try. Looking back at my goodreads review, it seems I enjoyed that type of horror at time, but I couldn't imagine putting a Jack ketchum or Edward Lee ahead of less in-your-face horror these days. I think some authors may be trying to compete for the prize of 'most disgusting, gory violence', while forgetting the attraction of a good old eerie atmosphere.

 

[ripper]

'The Big Head' by Edward Lee is very extreme, but I thought that some of the violence was rather cartoony, and it also could be read as a very black comedy, particularly the parts featuring the two moonshine-running hillbillies. Ketchum, or what I have read of his work, writes straight, extreme horror, and I don't think it could be interpreted as being in any way a black comedy. Of course, the two books of his that I have read were written quite a while ago, so his style could have mellowed now, in a way that seems to happen to many horror writers.

[Dr Strange]

I think my only experience of Ketchum is the film based on his book "The Woman", which is very nasty. "Red" was also made into a film (with Brian Cox and Tom Sizemore), but I haven't seen it. Both of these had the same director, who goes by the name Lucky McKee.

[ripper]

Apparently, 'The Woman' is the third installment of his cannibals series, being a sequel to 'The Offspring'. So far, I have only read the first volume, 'Off Season'.

[mrhappy]

I just heard that Dallas Mayr (who wrote under the pseudonym Jack Ketchum) passed away this morning.

Sad news.