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Post by allthingshorror on Sept 8, 2008 7:34:39 GMT
STEPHEN KING : THE LAWNMOWER MAN MURRAY PICKLES: BOBBY BLUE EYES DAVID WILLIAMSON: THE TOO GOOD SAMARITAN DAVID WILLIAMSON: THE NOT SO GOOD SAMARITAN JACK WAINER: PRINCESS ALAN TEMPERLEY: REVENGE OF THE KITTIWAKE ROSEMARY TIMPERLEY: UNKNOWN TERRITORY ROSEMARY TIMPERLEY: LITTLE BOY HAUNTED CHRISTOPHER FOWLER: COOKING THE BOOKS NORMAN P. KAUFMAN: VIVISECTIONISTS JACK WAINER: TRUST ME GAME WILLIAM DAVIDSON: NO ROOM AT THE FLAT B. SESHADRI: THE CRY OF THE CHURAIL STEPHEN EDWARDS: THE SCENE OF THE CRIME JONATHAN CRUISE:...AND THE SEA SHALL GIVE UP ITS DEADAnd so we come to the...whimper......end of the series and as far as the latter books in the series go - this one isn't the worst - Alan Temperley is on restrained form with his Revenge of The Kittiwake, Jack Wainer hits with Trust Me game and nearly nails it with Princess. The lead tale - Lawnmower Man by Stephen King should never have been the first story in the series, that honour should have went to the Samaritan stories by David Williamson (William Davidson...who WAS this guy???). Out of the pair, The Not So Good Samaritan is by far the nastiest of 30 - and comes in for being one of the funniest of the series. Cursory nods go to Murray Pickles and Jonathan Cruise, but you can see why the series was finally given the bums rush. Sad end, but great cover art.
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Post by bushwick on Sept 8, 2008 8:33:26 GMT
What's the B.Seshadri story like Johnny? 'The River Bed' from 26 really sticks in my head, very cruel. Do you know anything about him/her? Seems a bit of an enigma/pseudonym.
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Post by allthingshorror on Sept 8, 2008 9:14:53 GMT
I'm not the biggest fan of The Cry of The Churail - it reads in part like an old folklore tale - but then it sometimes reads like it's being told in a guide book. And then it's dressed up with terrbile violence against a 12 year old girl by an angry bear. B. Seshadri is another one of those enigmas - good jobsworthy tales - not a clue on who the bugger is. I did find a person who went by the name who worked for some telecommunications company in deepest darkest India - sent off an email (always worth a go!) and am still waiting for a reply....
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Post by allthingshorror on Dec 14, 2008 19:56:09 GMT
Remember - a couple of posts up - I wondered who the hell David Williamson/William Davidson was? Here is an email I recieved a few hours ago: Subject: Pan 28 & 30
Message: Hi ,
I had 4 stories published in the above anthologies..The Sandman in Pan 28 and The Too Good Samaritan , The Not So Good Samaritan and No Room At The Flat (under the name of William Davidson..ok , so not very original , but you were only allowed to have 2 stories published under your own name !) The sad thing is , I don't have any copies of either book as I gave them all away ! Great pity they stopped the series I feel..I think they opened the door for a whole raft of horror writers .
Good luck with your project ,
Regards ,
David WilliamsonHe's got all his Paget letter etc - goes to show, if you build it, they will come......
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Post by erebus on Feb 7, 2009 20:20:36 GMT
Well in town today I found some hens teeth. A snakes toenail clipping and some goldfish boots. But my quest for this scarce book continues.
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Feb 7, 2009 21:58:05 GMT
If you have 130 dollars you can get one on abe books. Then postage. Makes me feel like a criminal for picking it up for a song over here...
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Post by dem bones on Nov 1, 2011 18:45:17 GMT
Grateful thanks to Johnny Mains who so generously sent me a Halloween bundle comprised of Lest You Should Suffer Nightmares: A Biography of Herbert Van Thal (a thing of beauty, this. Screaming Dreams have really pulled out all the stops), Van Thal's own The Mask & Other Stories from Noose & Gibbet, Bite Size Horror from Obverse and - is he mad? - a copy of PH30, first time i've seen one since those happy days when the local library had no aversion to tatty paperbacks. All jests aside, i am sincerely grateful for such a lovely gesture, Mr Mains! Stephen King - The Lawnmower Man: Harold Parkette doesn't live to regret turning to Pastoral Greenway & Outdoor Services to provide him with someone to cut his grass. The good old boy shows up on his doorstep has a very idiosyncratic way of going about his job. First he strips naked, then he lays down behind the mower and ... Very E.C.. The account of the grisly fate befell the Smiths' cat is funny-sick and, whatever you do, don't look in the birdbath! Rosemary Timperley - Unknown Territory: Our narrator is the only passenger aboard the number 13 bus. Either the driver doesn't know the route or a hijacker must have slipped aboard when she wasn't looking because this is not the way home! No spoiler necessary, but if you're thinking "cemetery!" you've already improved on the ending. All of two pages in length screams filler, but it's nicely written filler and would have been quite at home in one of Mary Danby's young adult ghost collections. Norman P. Kaufman - The Vivisectors: One day some enterprising soul will collect Norman's horror fiction and promote the resulting monstrosity as "read 'em and puke!" Here we find him developing a social conscience as he dabbles a slimy tentacle into sci-fi territory with a story set in the twenty-elevens, and if your hamster has been acting shifty of late, now is the time to be alarmed. The revolution has come. The animal kingdom, done with being tortured in labs, have turned on their supposed masters in a bloody and successful coup. Mr Cartwright is one of the unlucky survivors. Dog, aided and abetted by colleagues, Baboon, Cat, Rat and Rabbit, all of whom have experienced the cruelty of the research laboratory, have a good delve about his innards before performing delicate open heart surgery. If it's gratuitous references to venereal disease you're after, Mr. Kaufman will happily oblige! Jack Wainer - Trust Me Game: Despite a ten year age difference, Sam and his cousin Kate have remained inseparable since school-days when Kate, then fifteen, got the bullying teacher off his back (he was in the infants at the time). Problem is, Kate is so possessive she feels the need to protect Sam from his first fumble in the hay, his first love and just about anyone who ever said hello to him. Time to raise the stakes in their special game of mutual trust. David Williamson – The Too Good Samaritan: December 23rd and Cathy is alone in the office, taking the despairing calls of the lonely and suicidally depressed. So moved is Cathy by the plight of young Sarah, shut away in a gloomy mausoleum of a house since the loss of her parents and brother, that she agrees to pay a home visit when her shift ends at 7 a.m. The address Sarah gives is over on the dangerous side of town, but a friend in need is a friend indeed, and this one has psychopathic tendencies! David Williamson – The Not So Good Samaritan: An inversion of the previous story sees Arthur Benton, unemployed, call the helpline whenever he fancies an argument. Just his luck that Roger, the guy who takes his call, is another Samaritan prepared to go the extra mile if it means preventing a client from taking their own life. As with The Too Good Samaritan (which i preferred of the two), by the end of page one it's no longer a question of what will happen but how gory will it get.
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Post by dem bones on Nov 3, 2011 17:51:38 GMT
William Davidson – No Room At The Flat: Barry's taken the job in London, so it's bye-bye cosy house on the moors, hello poky flat in the capital for wife Sarah and the kids. But not Shep, the family's faithful pet Alsation. Despite the tears of his loved ones, Barry resolves to have the old fellow put down but relents at the last and lets him lose in the fields. Some weeks later, an emaciated, terrified wreck of a creature arrives in the big city ...
Rosemary Timperley – Little Boy Haunted: Little boy murders baby brother. Cat is blamed. Cat put down. Cat's ghost haunts boy.
Stephen Edwards – The Scene Of The Crime: The Estate Agent didn't see fit to inform the Chambers' that their house once played host to a notorious murder, elderly loner Herbert Carrington battered with a poker by deranged ex-serviceman Henry Burton. Now a dramatic reconstruction of the crime is a fixture of Sarah Chambers's nightmare and there's a dodgy old guy in the street looking up at her window ..
So far, so competent, nothing like the disappointment i found it way back when, but it badly needs a SPARK. And i just read it! to be continued again
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Post by dem bones on Nov 15, 2011 5:47:00 GMT
Jonathan Cruise - .... And The Sea Shall Give Up Its Dead: "Sunday is the anniversary of the day the Lady Fortune was lost. Something happens in Portheyron then, something that involves everyone born and bred here. But it's private, see. We don't share it with anyone. We can't. We can't!
Richard Porlock ended his days in the Blaketown Mental Hospital and, among his papers, this strange and terrible account of what he witnessed that night off the Cornish coast.
After the tragic death of his wife Helen, Porlock moves in with close friends in Portheyron and strikes up a friendship with his hosts' daughter, Alveth Trewin, a landscape painter of some promise. The friendship soon blossoms to romance, and when Porlock returns to London, Alveth follows, desperate to test herself in the big city galleries. Within a year of Helen's death, Porlock is set to remarry. Alveth agrees, but come February 29th she must spend the day alone with her people.
Porlock is aware of the date's significance. In 1832 a gang of wreckers lured the Lady Fortune onto the rocks and the people of Portheyron have laboured under a curse ever since. If the mad old sea dawg in the hotel bar is to believed, every anniversary the mouldering pirate crew rise from the sea to claim a bride in death ....
Christopher Fowler - Cooking The Books: Haldeman has hit on a foolproof plan to stave off impending bankruptcy - arrange a gas-leak at his 'thriving' restaurant on the Danta Monica Boulevard and grab himself a juicy cheque from the insurance company. If Jose and all the rest of his dopey staff have to perish in resulting inferno well, you can't make an omelette without cracking a few eggs. To put plenty distance between himself and the impending tragedy, Haldeman drives out to Palm Springs which is all but deserted on account of the annual insufferable heatwave. The place is so hot that gangs of Mexicans are employed to continuously tarmac the roads to keep 'em in one piece. Haldeman should have made a point of remembering that boiling tar is murder on the soles of ones feet, but ....
No big surprise that this pair surpass everything else to date. Chris Fowler's won't be rushed but the really horrible ending sure makes it worth sticking with. Jonathan Cruise provides a great trad horror story, pure and simple. Put me in mind a little of Robert Aickman's Ringing The Changes but i'd best not write that!
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Post by dem bones on Nov 25, 2011 11:11:13 GMT
Alan Temperley - Revenge Of The Kittiwake: Billy Govan escapes from Glasgow's Barlinnie Jail, a second home to him for most of his young life on account of his violent crimes. Primed by his erstwhile cell-mate, 'Sailor Mike', Billy, now operating as 'Nicol Brodie', hot foots it to the fishing port at Bridekirk and The Reaper's Arms where he lets it be known that he's a capable trawler man available for immediate employment. In truth he's already decided he'll be working for Captain Magnus Meiklewhite and his son Terry aboard The Kittiwake, it's just a matter of creating a vacancy. Exit the third crew member, randy Hughie McNish, in mysterious circumstances.
'Nicol Brodie' is duly taken on by Captain Meiklewhite and proves himself a willing hard-worker, and, for all his wild edges, not such a bad fellow to have around, though the Captain jokes that Brodie's a Jonah, all the close shaves he has aboard ship. Brodie doesn't care. His master-plan is coming together with more rapidity than he could have dreamed. Unbeknown to either man, he's been seeing Adrienne, the Captain's slow-witted, frizzy haired blancmange of a daughter. With her pregnancy confirmed, Brodie approaches her furious father reassuring the old boy that his heart is set on marrying Adrienne but he'll be wanting security now he's a family to think of. Maybe if the Meiklewhite's would give him a share in The Kittiwake?
The Captain reluctantly agrees and, in doing so, signs his own and son Terry's death warrants. In late November, The Kittiwake is caught in a force nine gail off the Irish coast, and Brodie takes full advantage of the situation. With both men dead - he had a terrific tussle with Terry, caught up in the nets and dragged for ten miles under the sea - Brodie radio's for help. His broken shoulder and dislocated knee - self-inflicted in a dive from atop the wheelhouse - add plausibility to the tragic tale he tells the rescue party, and he's hailed locally as a hero who risked his life to save his shipmates.
Brodie and his wife move in with the Captain's fast-ailing widow at Rowan Lodge, the grandest house in the village and now, effectively, Rowan's in everything but deed, as is The Kittiwake. The young murderer has never been afraid of hard graft and, despite his injuries and the January snows, sets to making the proud old trawler seaworthy. It's while he's working underneath, scraping the barnacles and applying a coat of anti-mould, that there's a sudden lurch ....
It's sad he doesn't look back upon his work for the series with any fondness these days as Alan Temperley's contribution to the Pan Horror's was immense, and had his work been collected at the time he'd possibly be as highly regarded in the genre as David Case. The once-read, never forgotten Love On The Farm and Kowlongo Plaything are as extreme as any horror story published in the 'seventies, but he was equally adept at weird tales (The Boy With Golden Eyes, The Victorian Conservatory - a rare highlight of the desperately routine volume 20) and even good old fashioned traditional supernatural terror as in the case of this 48 pager.
Jack Wainer - Princess: Jamie, six, has a massive crush on his fifteen year old babysitter Natasha who, between reading him tales of heroic dragon-slayers rescuing damsels in distress, good-naturedly encourages his marriage proposals. Her fatal mistake is to bring boyfriend Bryn around one evening for a grapple on the sofa once Jamie's been packed off to bed. Heads will roll.
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Post by erebus on Feb 13, 2014 12:14:09 GMT
Somersaults in my house today, the holy grail arrived, and my quest is complete. Ive finally got number 30 and my set is complete. Not bad nick to, to be honest. If the missus asks whats the plan for ( gawd ! ) valentines day, I'm gonna tell her straight, sod you I'm off into a corner of the house to read this bugger. Chuffed as anything I am.
Think Dem has covered all the stories here. But I'll throw a review up if required .
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Post by dem bones on Feb 13, 2014 18:10:28 GMT
Please do, mr. e., and I hope you find the long hunt was worth it!
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Post by erebus on Feb 15, 2014 22:03:22 GMT
Well, I did indeed type up a fair old summary of each of the stories in the book. But like a total dipstick whilst hopping over to another open window I accidently pressed on the X icon mid post on the way back and deleted it all. What with that and me battling the dreaded man-flu I felt bloody suicidal I tell you.
Anyway enough of all that what is the big deal with this number 30 anyway ? Well Whimper is correct. The book is by no means a winner. Its not as poor as the dreaded number 28 or the pitiful 25th volume. But there are a lot more misses than hits. And also it is very restrained in its violence. I recall seeing the title THE VIVISECTIONISTS back in the day and thinking here we go, its a Kaufmann story and with a title like that its bound to be awash with claret. Its anything but, in fact the story is totally bizarre to a point where I thought that if anybody told me it was by Martin Wadell I would have believed them as its just as crazy as OLD FEET and BLOODTHIRSTY.
And yes Alan Temperly's REVENGE OF KITTIWAKE is also very subtle. Mind you I don't think he could ever top what he did in numbers 23 and 24. It is for me the best story in the book though. And he does have that knack of creating odious and nasty characters doesn't he. The demise of the protagonist here, although not gory , is very horrific.
A little thread I noticed within the book was Animals getting their own back. LITTLE BOY HAUNTED has the vengeful moggy. NO ROOM AT THE FLAT has a dog getting back at its owner. And THE VIVISECTIONISTS is about all animals getting even after being the subject of experiments down the years. A story this vegetarian got a certain degree of pleasure from.
With this book whilst reading all the tales you get to a point where you know exactly how its going to end. I tried to go a different approach whilst reading THE TOO GOOD SAMARITAN by thinking maybe perhaps the caller is a ghost, rather than the old lure the victim to me scenario, but nope I got that one wrong. But this and THE NOT SO GOOD SAMARITAN are perhaps the other two saving graces in the book. Along with PRINCESS which although basic and generic was good in an AGJ ROUGH sort of way.
Disapointed with COOKING THE BOOKS, It seems a horrific death was thought up, then a story was wrapped around them for me. CRY OF CHURAIL gives us an interesting set up of this creature/spirit/being that when it wails it brings upon death and suffering to the villagers. Ok , so a young 12 year old girl, due to be married ( What !! ) has her chops raked by a fed up grizzly. So the portent was correct, but the story just ends. Is that it. I want to know more about this Churail thing. Its like a poor version of THE BEAN-NIGHE a story that covers similar ground so cleverley.
Those of you who have seen the film The Fog or maybe even better its terrible remake will know the story of AND THE SEA SHALL GIVE UP ITS DEAD. Its basically that without the fog. But to be fair it is one of the stronger stories in the book. Which is more than could be said about BOBBY BLUE EYES, which was dire. A hairy fellow is cursed by an Indian Fakir. Lots of long winded stuff about him and his dog blah blah blah, and it takes up a number of pages it quite simply shouldn't have been allocated.
Rosemary Timperley always gives the obligatory ghost story ( this time the pussycat ) but UNKNOWN TERRITORY wasn't to bad for all its couple of pages and it delivers in those more than Bobby and his bloody blue eyes ever could.
TRUST ME GAME is a basic filler that is neither memorable or bad. And THE LAWNMOWER MAN is of course a good story, but along with the other King stuff should never darken a Pan.
In summary this is an average to below book. I expected that. Dissapointed in THE VIVSECTIONISTS as that was the one I was looking foward to. There are weaker volumes but this needed a bit of violence to boost it up the ranks. If the others are 18 certs this most certainly is a 15. And its a million miles away from the classic volume 9.
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Post by dem bones on Feb 16, 2014 15:58:04 GMT
Well, I did indeed type up a fair old summary of each of the stories in the book. But like a total dipstick whilst hopping over to another open window I accidently pressed on the X icon mid post on the way back and deleted it all. What with that and me battling the dreaded man-flu I felt bloody suicidal I tell you. we have most of us been there, mr. erebus, and the best way to avoid it is to save a copy in wordpad before you post. Anyway, thanks so much for taking a second crack at it after such calamity. Actually, I had quite a good time with most of #30, including The Vivisectors, and the Temperley, Collins and (very young) Chris Fowler's in particular. Would certainly rate it above Van Thal's #18 which, the odd story apart, screams of a series begging to be put out of its misery, though having said that, will probably declare it the zenith of macabre literature on next revisit. There really is no "big deal" about #30, save the inclusion of Lawnmower Man and the relatively small print run, making it attractive to King completests and the "Look at my books! Aren't they rare?" brigade (aka the people who take selfies posing before their "humble collection" or some such twaddle, who I discard). Either I didn't read Bobby Blue Eyes or it's as awful as you say and i developed a mental block about it. Well, am in a masochistic mood so will see if I can fit it in later.
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Post by charliegrenville on Jun 18, 2014 2:34:21 GMT
Well believe it or not, I haven't had to indulge in a long, expensive search for this one, as luckily, I still have the copy I bought the week it came out, in 1989, from the very same newsagents I did my paper round from. I had gotten the 29th and 28th from exactly the same place, and had no idea they would ever become rare.
I still haven't read them all, but the stories I do remember are actually rather good: as has been mentioned before, PRINCESS comes off tops, with TRUST ME GAME running a close second. Who was Jack Wainer and where is he now? I must also be the only person that actually likes VIVISECTIONISTS, despite its somewhat preachy tone, but then again I always had time for Norman P.
While it's thought of as a whimper rather than a bang with which to end the series, there is something rather final and fitting about the way it rounds off with Rosie Timperley's last two posthumous ghost stories- almost as if HER ghost had written them- Alan Temperley finally coming of age and replacing the sex and violence with something more subtle, and Jonathan Cruise delivering a suitably postscript-sounding bookend in AND THE SEA SHALL GIVE UP ITS DEAD, even if it is just a rewrite of John Carpenter's FOG script transfeered to Southern England.
I wonder if, once Paget delivered the news that this would be the last one, they all held a commemorative pissup?
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