Michael Marshall Smith - What You Make It

[dem]

Michael Marshall Smith - What You Make It (HarperCollins, 2000)

Introduction:

More Tomorrow Dark Terrors
Everybody Goes Best New Horror #10
Hell Hath Enlarged Herself Dark Terrors #2
A Place to Stay Dark Terrors #4, The Mammoth Book of Vampires; New Edition
Later The Mammoth Book of Zombies
The Man Who Drew Cats Dark Voices #2
The Fracture Dark Voices #6
Save As..., Mammoth Book of Best New Horror #9
More Bitter Than Death Dark Voices #5
Diet Hell
The Owner
Foreign Bodies Lethal Kisses
Sorted
The Dark Land Darklands
When God Lived In Kentish Town
Always Darklands # 2
What You Make It
The Truth Game

More Tomorrow: A freelance computer technician recognises a girl at the office he's currently working at as the original from a series of photographs uploaded to alt.binaries.pictures.erotica. It's clear that she's a reluctant model and, when he enlarges the file he notices that she's been hit about the face. While seriously sick posters demand more of the same, our man sets off on a mission to save Jeanette from brutal boyfriend Ayers before he can do her permanent damage.

On the old board, Adrian wrote of this one:

Smith is a remarkable writer and I do think that More Tomorrow is his masterpiece. .... More Tomorrow has to be one of the most horrifying modern horror stories that I've ever read. I turned each page with increasing dread and the final line is an absolute killer. I remember reading Ed Bryant's review of Dark Terrors in Locus and he said that Smith's story was worth the price of admission alone.

It blew me away when I first read it and I haven't had the courage to read it since.

The Man Who Drew Cats: One day old Tom just blew into Kingstown, stepped into The Hogshead Bar and the locals - unusually for them - took to him straight away. A quiet and private man, he makes his living from the extraordinary paintings he tosses off for tourists and sometimes when the mood takes him, he chalks his more complex designs on the pavement. But when he befriends little Billy and his mom and learns that her nogoodnik drunken husband regularly beats the s**t out of them both, he draws something really terrifying.

Sorted: What with all that diving and off the ball mayhem - to say nothing of 'roasting', 'bungs' and coke-binging, those Premiership footballers get away with murder! Or they do if they're Gavin Mate, anyhow. His only regret is that his sister had to die along with his parents. Because he'd still like to give her one.

Later: Sadness. Rachel is knocked down and killed as she steps into the road en route to a party. He can't bear life without her. One trip to the cemetery with a shovel later ...

More Tomorrow .... ?

[Johnlprobert]

This is a fabulous collection although I think there's a more recent, more comprehensive version available from a US small press?

Anyway - MORE TOMORROW is superb - one of those stories where I can still remember complete sentences from. I also love SAVE AS, HELL HATH ENLARGED HERSELF & THE DARK LAND, but they're all winners

[dem]

It's one off those books where I had to abandon note-taking because I just wanted to get on with the stories. Recently reread his To Receive Is Better in The Mammoth Book Of Frankenstein and that's another stormer.

Our friends at Pantechnicon interview MMS in their first issue which you can download here. You might as well cop the other four issues while you're about it!

[carolinec]

admin said:

Our friends at Pantechnicon interview MMS in their first issue which you can download here. You might as well cop the other four issues while you're about it!

Thanks for the plug, Dem (may I call you that?). I feel I must point out that our Janitor isn't receiving any special favours from me for saying nice things about Panties ... er, sorry, Pantechnicon.


I must admit, I haven't read much MMS, but what I have read I've thoroughly enjoyed. I've read most of the stories in the Postscripts #10 MMS special, along with the poignant true story about the tramp who used to visit him and his wife, all of which were most enjoyable. "What You Make It" is one of those books on my "must-get" list.

[Shrink Proof]

As a new kid on the block I've been working through the Vault's threads & came on this one. FWIW, this book is terrific. Every story here is high quality but if you do nothing else with your life, read "The Dark Land", which is as near as writing gets to the actual experience of having a nightmare from which you just can't wake up. A real head melter.

Essential.