|
Post by dem bones on Dec 30, 2018 10:17:18 GMT
Time to give some thought to the annual round-up.
Favourite books, mags, stories you read in 2018 (as ever, it doesn't matter when they were published). Films, TV, blogs, events, etc. Personal highlights/ possibly lowlights. The usual.
|
|
|
Post by Shrink Proof on Dec 30, 2018 18:06:12 GMT
Here's one to kick off with; one of my faves from this year. "The Tower" by Marghanita Laski is a short story that I first encountered in 2018. It was broadcast on BBC Radio and can be heard by clicking on this link, but, appropriately enough, only up to and including New Years Day. A simple idea but really unsettling....
|
|
|
Post by andydecker on Dec 31, 2018 13:28:29 GMT
2018 must have been the first year I only bought one (!) new horror novel. Shaun Hutson's Chase. There surely must have been a few others published for the mass market, but I am not aware of them. And I don't buy new novels in the small press. Too expensive for just sampling a new voice which has a good chance for landing on the shelf after 30 pages because it doesn't grab me at all. But as usual got some old stuff. I did some research on old French horror novels for a project and got some Black Coat Press translations on Kindle of the Fleuve Noir novels. Writers like Maurice Limat and Andre Caroff. A fascinating field with hundreds of novels produced from the 50s to the 80s. Also bought a few other old books in print. But nothing compared to the past. Instead I often looked at the shelf and re-read old stuff or novels I bought and never read. One day I will finish Graham McNeills Arkham Trilogy Books I liked: Pan Book of Horror Stories 12 – they don't write fiction like that any longer. Les Daniels - Citizen Vampire – got a nice hardcover edition and re-read it. Still a great novel. Other novels: John Lawton – the first two books of his Inspector Troy series, Historical crime, from the Blitz onward, much better written then most of today's output. (Both novels were written in the 90s.) C.J.Sansom – the Matthew Shardlake series. Currently I am at book 3 Sovereign. Great historical crime novels in the times of Henry Tudor. It has been a long time since I managed to finish such doorstopper books, but these are fascinating. Non-Fiction: Rosemary Pardoe - Black PilgrimmageRoberto Curti – Italian Gothic Horror Films 1957 -1979J.H.Elliot – Europe Divided 1559-1598William Doyle – The Oxford History of the French RevolutionThe Paperback Fanatic line Movies (all watched on TV or DVD): I liked: The Lodgers, The Ritual, Veronica, Valerian, The Institute, Italian and european horrormovies: La rose ecorchee by Mulot; La vergine di Norimberga by Margheriti; Death walks on High Heels; Death walks at Midnight; Il castello dalle porte di fuoco by Merino, Lady Frankenstein (a terrific new restored edition) More or less okay: Guardians of the Galaxy 2, A cure for Wellness A waste of time: Justice League, Spider-Man: Homecoming, TV: Murdoch Mysteries (which I bought on DVD); Z-Nation, Elementary, The Expanse, Rick&Morty, still all going strong. Netflix Germany had some French crime mini-series like Le Chalet or La Foret which were okay. On the fence for Westworld (brilliant writing or pretentious and over-complicated?), The Alienist; The Frankenstein Chronicles. A special mention for The Big Band Theory and Midsummer Murders. Both should have been cancelled years ago. TBBT has become boring, unfunny, conservative, prude garbage, and Midsummer – judging as of series 19 – sadly is running on fumes and has lost everything which made it so much fun.
Blogs: A farewell to Tumblr, which got a frontal lobotomy. It will be missed.
|
|
|
Post by Dr Strange on Dec 31, 2018 14:40:59 GMT
Anthologies: New Fears 2; The Valencourt Book of Horror Stories, Volume 3.
Novel: The Woman In The Woods by John Connolly. As long as he keeps writing the Charlie Parker books, I will keep reading them (and putting them on these lists).
Films: Ghost Stories; The Endless; The Lodgers.
TV: The Strain.
Music albums: ATW - All Them Witches; Tell Me How You Really Feel - Courtney Barnett; Hope Downs - Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever; B-sides and Rarities - The Flying Eyes.
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Dec 31, 2018 19:18:04 GMT
Antholgies Stefan Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg, Martin H. Greenberg (eds.) - Horrors: 365 Scary Stories Peter Haining - The Mummy Peter Haining - Tune In For Fear Peter Haining - Classics of the Supernatural Andrew Smith - Lost In A Pyramid Al Sarrantonio & Martin H. Greenberg (eds.) - 100 Hair-Raising Little Horror Stories
Single author collections Sydney J. Bounds - Seance Of Terror Charles Black - A Taste Of The Macabre James Wade - Such Things May Be R. Chetwynd-Hayes - Tales From The Shadows
Short stories. Twenty I liked. Cornell Woolrich - I'm Dangerous Tonight Charles Black - The Con Martin Mundt - Fashion Victim Anna Taborska - The Park Dan McGachey - The Longman Elsa Wallace - The Chalk Pit. Elsa Wallace - The Suppell Stone Paul StJohn Mackintosh - My Dancing Days Are Over John Llewellyn Probert - Post Mortem Eva M. Henry - The Curse Of Vasaratas Mark Nicholls - Unfinished Business Michael Chislett - The Whistle Thing Richard T. Chizmar - Monsters Kathy Chwedyk - Dead Women's Things Capt. George Warburton Lewis - The Return of Paul Slavsky Julian Kilman - The Golden Caverns Alexander Woollcott - The Vanishing Lady Hugh Estrell Wright - On The Embankment Sydney J. Bounds - Strange Portrait R. Chetwynd-Hayes - The Rational Explanation.
'Novelisation' Nigel Taylor - Mystery Tour
Novels Lael Littke - Prom Dress P. B. Yuill - The Bornless Keeper Bernard Taylor - The Comeback Michael Falconer Anderson - The Woodsman Guy N. Smith - Thirst Frank Crisp - The Night Callers Dishonourable mentions: Judi Miller - Save The Last Dance For Me Michael Avallone - Partridge Family #2: The Haunted Hall
Non-fiction The Fantastical Art of Jim Pitts: Rolling back the years. Rosemary Pardoe - The Black Pilgrimage & Other Explorations: Essays On Supernatural Fiction Adrian Tempany - And The Sun Shines Now: How Hillsborough and the Premier League Changed Britain
Mags/ zines/ Comics Paperback Fanatic #39 & #40, Pulp Horror #7, Ghosts & Scholars #34, G&SMRJN #33, Men of Violence #10, Hot Lead #1 & 2, Sleazy Reader #6, Energy Realms #1, Shiver & Shake annual 1983, All Hallows #41, 1st UK Paperback & Pulp Bookfair Official Souvenir Booklet, Paperback Pulp & Comic Collector #7.
Websites Archive Org., Luminist archive, SFF audio, Fanac, ISFDB
Personal highs Paperback & Pulp Fair, Oct. 26th: Vault Advent Calendar: Visit to Comix, Books, DVD's in Westbourne: Finally getting to read the March 1923 issue of Weird Tales - as half-cocked, bizarre, brilliant, awful as I'd hoped it would be. Haunted benches: Mummies: Eliza Pyke: Elliott O'Donnell on parks: the ongoing 'Fashion victims' thread: The Monster of Glamis. Urban Myths in supernatural & Horror lit: Visit to Hurlingham Books, Putney Bridge.
RIP M.E.S & Pete Shelley.
|
|
|
Post by cromagnonman on Jan 1, 2019 10:54:57 GMT
There hasn't been all that much for me to reflect upon this time around. Tv watching has largely contracted around catching reruns of The Sweeney and Quincy on ITV4: (am I the only one surprised to discover that Richard Christian Matheson once worked as a story editor on the Klugman show?)
Cinema going was restricted to one solitary excursion to see Avengers: Infinity War which I pretty much despised. I did get to see Justice League, finally, on dvd and was a little surprised to have the opposite reaction to it to everyone else. I liked it. Granted its deeply flawed, the villain is rubbish and some of the effects are creeky, but at least it has superheroes doing super heroic things and actually looking as if they're enjoying doing them. That's what I go to watch superhero movies to see, not spend two and a half hours slogging through the troubled id of a super-villain all for the purpose of the most absurd attempt at a cliffhanger imaginable.
The abiding sadness was provided by the passing both of Steve Ditko and Stan Lee in the same calendar year. The word legend scarcely does justice to either of them. But at least they now have all of eternity to debate the issue of who really created Spiderman.
No disrespect to the authors of any of the books I've read but the chief literary pleasures of the year were provided by the old UK weeklies like Valiant, Lion, Hotspur et al which I've been getting back into in a big way. The great thing about following strips like Adam Eterno, Janus Stark, the Black Sapper, Kelly's Eye and the like 40-50 years after the event comes from the reassurance that they aren't now going to be spoiled by the dictats and demands of changing attitudes and social agendas the way in which the American comics of my youth have been.
One highlight of the year was provided by my visit to the Hurlingham Books warehouse. A gob-smacking experience. The place stands like a cross between Arthur Daley's lock-up and the Congressional library, with maybe a bit of the Raiders storehouse thrown in for good measure. A place which has to be experienced to be disbelieved.
But, as always, the chief joy of the year came from the Bloomsbury pulp fairs and in reaffirming friendships with the likes of HP, Severance, Anna, Johnny and, of course, the legendary Vault Keeper himself, the immortal Dem. Chaps, its never less than a privilege and a pleasure, and one I look forward to continuing in 2019.
Happy New Year to everyone in the Vault.
|
|
|
Post by ripper on Jan 1, 2019 11:16:02 GMT
Looking back over the year, I was surprised at how few books I had purchased. Unless I have forgotten any, which is entirely possible, the only print books have been The Woodsmen by Michael Falconer Anderson and Mountain of Skulls by Leo Kessler. I have actually purchased more Kindle books, probably for the first time. I purchased 3 volumes of the Wimbourne Book of Victorian Ghost Stories (3, 7 and 8) and a Black Heath title, The Ghost Hunters. I have enjoyed all of them, particularly the Wimbournes as I am a big fan of ghost stories from the Victorian/Edwardian eras. Film-wise, I haven't seen anything at all at the cinema as I just don't go there anymore. I recently subscribed to Amazon Prime and there seem to be a large number of horror/supernatural films included in the subscription. Quality of those I have no idea, but I will be viewing many over the coming year, so hopefully I shall have more to report this time next year.
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Jan 1, 2019 19:08:42 GMT
Thank you for the kind words, Crom. The October Fair was probably the one I've enjoyed most since it shifted to the excellent new venue. The books really are secondary to the reunions! Got talking to a sometime Spitalfields Market trader before Christmas. Turns out he has a table at the regular Ephemera Fair. He told me they look forward to the Paperback & Pulp Fairs for the big spike in attendance and the cracking atmosphere.
Best of 2018: Part II (it's all coming back to me now)
Novels Bari Wood - The Tribe Stephen Laws - The Wyrm Honourable dishonourable mentions Mark Sonders - Blight (quite possibly the most anticlimactic ending of all time) Guy N. Smith - The Camp (GNS-on-autopilot - on autopilot).
Collections J. Ramsey Campbell - Ghostly Tales R. Chetwynd-Hayes - The House of Dracula Shaun Jeffrey - Voyeurs of Death
Anthologies Michel Parry Superheroes John Carnell - Weird Shadows From Beyond Dishonourable mention Esther M. Friesner - Fangs For The Mammories
Non-fiction Philip Harbottle - Vultures Of The Void: The Legacy E. F. Bleiler (ed) - Science Fiction Writers Cliiford Morsley - News From The English Countryside 1750-1850. (Wild and weird items from the day's regional presses).
Short Stories Some others that stuck include:
Adam Roberts - Tollund Steve Rasnic Tem - Shadows In the Grass Seabury Quinn - Restless Souls Obadiah Kemph - It Takes Two For Terror Louisa Baldwin - The Weird Of The Walfords Seabury Quinn - Body and Soul Charles Birkin - Dark Menace James Wade - The Silence of Erika Zann Bassett Morgan - The Wolf Woman Brian Mooney - The Witch of Nuide Keith Roberts - Timothy Robert Presslie - Dial 'O' for Operator Ruth Rendell - Loopy Lindsay Stewart - Strictly For The Birds Karl E. Wagner- The Portrait of Jonathan Collins D. H. Lawrence - The Rocking-Horse Winner E. C. Tubb - Mirror Of The Night Alonzo Deen Cole - The Werewolf Eden Phillpotts - The Terror From The Sea Diane Hoh - Dedicated to the One I Love Howard R. Marsh - The Foot Fetish E. F. Benson - The China Bowl Lawrence Schimel - Someday My Prints Will Come Lisa Morton - The Proof in the Picture
and, how quickly we forget!, R. T. M. Scott - Nimba, the Cave Girl
|
|
|
Post by Shrink Proof on Jan 2, 2019 20:02:37 GMT
My favourite of 2018 was "Tenebrous Tales" by Christopher Richard Barker. A huge recommendation from me for this one. Menacing ghost stories that are to be savoured...
And the consistently best place of 2018 was the Vault of Evil. Best wishes for the New Year to all who sail in her and huge thanks to Dem for understated yet masterful behind the scenes jiggery-pokery. Here's hoping that 2019 comes up with the goods...
|
|
|
Post by cauldronbrewer on Jan 3, 2019 2:18:55 GMT
I didn't read as much horror in 2018 as in previous years, but there were a few highlights...
NOVEL: The Ballad of Black Tom (Victor LaValle).
NOVEL, YOUNG ADULT: Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (Ransom Riggs).
NOVEL, MIDDLE GRADE: Spirit Hunters (Ellen Oh).
COLLECTION: A tie between The Sound of His Horn and Other Stories (Sarban) and Lost Ghosts: The Complete Weird Stories of Mary E. Wilkins Freeman (edited by S. T. Joshi).
ANTHOLOGY: Children of Lovecraft (edited by Ellen Datlow).
GRAPHIC NOVEL: Sandman, Volumes 1-4 (Neil Gaiman and various artists).
GRAPHIC NOVEL, YOUNG ADULT: Scarlett Hart: Monster Hunter (Marcus Sedgwick).
FILM: A Quiet Place, with a special award for The House with a Clock in Its Walls for entertaining my older kid and giving my younger one nightmares for a week.
TELEVISION: A tie between Requiem and The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
ALBUM: Prequelle (Ghost).
|
|
|
Post by jamesdoig on Jan 3, 2019 3:52:11 GMT
Crikey, I can't remember much from this last year - all a bit of a blur:
Novel: The Ritual, Banquet For the Damned, Swan Song, Drood, A Song of Shadows
Collection: White Road, Of Kings and Things, Nocturnes II
Movie: The Ritual, Ghost Stories, Quiet Place, Annihilation, Bird Box, Bandersnatch, Hereditary, Lodgers, Devil's Doorway, A Dark Song
TV: Sharp Objects, The Bridge, Marcella, Deutschland 86, Altered Carbon, Dark, The Alienist, Westworld, The Kettering Incident
Non Fiction: Black Pilgrimage, John Le Carré The Biography, Lo!
Art Books: Ultraterranium, The Art of Denis McLoughlin
Mags: G&S, PF, Etchings & Odysseys, Cinefantastique, World of Horror, Bizarrism, Biblio-Curiosa
I'm sure there's a lot of other stuff...
|
|
|
Post by andydecker on Jan 3, 2019 20:10:23 GMT
TV: Sharp Objects, I'm sure there's a lot of other stuff... Did you like it? I tried hard to like it, but after a while I thought it ridiculous and missed the last one. Or two? Can't remember. Maybe I shouldn't have read the spoilers beforehand which told the ending, but after the tedious third hour of the protagonist aimlessly driving around drunk after dark - in reality only 20 minutes in all eps, I guess - I had the impulse to fast forward - which unfortunatly was nor possible - or throwing a bottle of Bud light at the screen like the rest of the dumb as wood kids did. Where is Michael McDowell when you need him?He did this Southern Gothics so much better.
And you finished Swan Song. Never managed to do that.
|
|
|
Post by helrunar on Jan 3, 2019 21:51:01 GMT
Thanks, Shrink Proof, for mentioning Tenebrous Tales. I had never heard of the book, nor of author Christopher Barker. I found this interesting review of the book from 2010: nullimmortalis.wordpress.com/2010/10/31/tenebrous-tales-by-christopher-barker/It seems as if the book is now available only in an electronic edition. It might make for an interesting follow-up for me to Elizabeth Walter. Evidently, Christopher Barker used to be on the Vault, possibly in the pre-Pro Board days, and was described as "controversial." I don't do best and worst lists. Perhaps I am simply too fickle or my idea of taste doesn't run along the lines of quantification. For instance, I love the novels of Simon Raven, but am well aware that many readers would find Raven's writing appalling and "triggering." A lot of folks find Clark Ashton Smith, H. P. Lovecraft, and Sax Rohmer boring or simply "bad writers." On the reverse of the medal, I've found most of the Robert E. Howard that has crossed my desk over the years barely readable at best. Taste is so subjective. I appreciate this forum because I so often find notices here of work that would otherwise never get remotely near my admittedly quite narrowly attuned radar. Two books I read last year, but failed to discuss here. Bride of Darkness by Margery Lawrence (published circa 1967), one of her last novels, was a fun read for me, yet another yarn about a modern day suburban Witch getting up to mischief in Sixties London. It was rather reminiscent of Brian Clemens' script for his 1970s Thriller series, "Spell of Evil" (which had Diane Cilento in a big, shiny, black, rather frighteningly lacquered wig as the Witch wife). Janet Caird, an author I'd never heard of, published Perturbing spirit in 1966. I was led to this one by a very strong blurb from Anthony Boucher, published in the back of another Sixties paperback I read earlier on in the year. Boucher described this novel as "charming, witty, satiric, and disturbingly eerie." I thought the odd epilogue-ending was the eeriest moment in the book. The Scots Border village local color was one of the strongest elements in the novel. I thought about writing a separate entry about it on one of the author boards but never got around to it. Not really scary enough to warrant bringing to the attention of Vault readers, but I did enjoy it. cheers, Helrunar
|
|
|
Post by jamesdoig on Jan 4, 2019 4:53:38 GMT
Did you like it? I tried hard to like it, but after a while I thought it ridiculous and missed the last one. [/div] And you finished Swan Song. Never managed to do that.
[/quote] Yeah, I finished it, and the end was a bit over the top - in fact the whole thing was a bit over the top. I agree about Michael McDowell - nobody does Southern Gothic better, except maybe Joe Lansdale, eg The Bottoms. I finished Swan Song after stop and starting for a few years - it was okay, a sort of 2nd tier The Stand.
|
|
|
Post by ropardoe on Jan 4, 2019 9:20:35 GMT
Some very enjoyable reading this year, when I sat down and thought about it.
Novels:
The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert
Hall of Mirrors by Christopher Fowler (Bryant & May series)
Lies Sleeping by Ben Aaronovitch (Rivers of London series)
Collections:
The Uncertainty of All Earthly Things by Mark Valentine
By No Mortal Hand by Dan McGachey
Help the Witch by Tom Cox
Non-Fiction:
21st Century Yokel by Tom Cox (includes an excellent chapter on the strangeness of East Anglia, with lots on M.R. James)
Bookworm: A Memoir of Childhood Reading by Lucy Mangan
Harvest Hymns (two vols): Twisted Roots and Sweet Fruits, ed. Jim Peters, Richard Hing, Grey Malkin and Andy Paciorek (essays and reviews on folk horror in music)
"Ghostly Studies, Dr Grace and the Diodati Society" by Dan McGachey (brilliantly researched!)
|
|