|
Post by dem bones on Feb 29, 2008 10:01:37 GMT
Guy N. Smith - Sabat 1: The Graveyard Vultures (Nel, May 1982) Blurb: Mark Sabat, ex-priest, SAS-trained killer, exorcist, is a man with a dreadful mission. Driven and haunted, he has to seek out and destroy his mortal enemy. An enemy who has chosen the Left Hand Path, who embodies the eternal principle of evil. An enemy who is his own brother. No pussyfooting around in this one. By p. 16 (of 160), Mark Sabat has finally located his brother, the most evil man the world has ever known, who goes by the name of Quentin. "An old man, so old that it was almost impossible to believe that he still lived, threadbare garments barely hiding the wasted frame beneath. Hairless, the skin like ancient parchment, the eyes receding into deep black cavities, nostril cavities that bubbled thick mucus in time with the wheezing lungs. A slit of a toothless mouth ..... Despite his condition, the maggot dripper very nearly pulps his brother with an axe after first performing a swift necromantic ritual and summoning three zombies from the the earth, albeit more for effect than anything: the walking dead trio are cowed and terrified, nor do they want their master to win and they spend the fight huddled in eternal misery. Mark eventually triumphs and splatter's Quentin's brains everywhere, but not before the latter has delivered a final, chilling warning: "You fool! I die and yet I shall live again. It is you who will moulder in this grave, Mark!". Much astral projection (having assumed the form of a raven) and amusing pentagram fun, and we're yet to pass the prologue.
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Mar 19, 2011 8:48:43 GMT
'Seventies black magic, cemetery desecration, necromancy, supremely anti-erotic sex scenes - The Graveyard Vultures ticks so many of the right boxes it's beyond comprehension that I struggled to get into it first time around. The little village church of St. Adrian's has fallen into disrepair. Bishop Wenner, having conveniently mislaid the proceeds of the restoration fund, appoints likeable old codger Rev. Storton as part-time curate, but at seventy-four years of age, he's hardly the most imposing figure. Under his stewardship the churchyard has become a favourite haunt of teenage vandals who have progressed from spraying a swear word across the church door to digging up the dead. Their leader, who goes by the unlikely name of Horace, is a dabbler in the black arts, specialist subject: necromancy! Tonight is the night of Sheila Dowson's initiation. To mark the occasion, Horace has his minions exhume the freshly dug grave of Sylvia Adams, a mere eighteen when the cancer got her and, better still, she died a virgin. But Sheila is only in it for the orgies, and if she didn't really mind when they dug up a mouldering skeleton or two, this business is altogether nastier. If Horace thinks she's going to lie on the altar next to a corpse he has another thing coming! Unfortunately for her, Horace isn't about to allow her any say in the matter. Bound, gagged and draped across the stone, she can only writhe in terror as a horrible stench heralds the arrival of 'the Master'. When her body is eventually recovered from the river, it's in such an awful condition that the police suspect she's been eaten alive by rats. Detective Inspector Plowden isn't buying it. "I'd say it was the goat those bastards mated that other corpse with that was responsible for this!" Mark Sabat arrives in the village and takes a room at The Dun Cow. While he's enjoying a swift drink at the bar, his eyes fall on a young woman in a low cut blouse, disinterestedly flashing her suspendered thigh at all comers. Sabat hears the landlord address her by name .... "Randa. That would be short for Miranda, Sabat concluded, and wished he didn't get erections so frequently."... and beats it upstairs to his room to pleasure himself before he goes mad. After a terse meeting with Bishop Venner - the two men despise each other on sight - Sabat calls on the altogether more amiable Rev. Storton who lends him his treasured Domesday Book. Mark learns that one of the graves emptied by the coven is that of William Gardiner, a powerful black magician who died in 1880. With the police keeping the cemetery under surveillance, there's little likelihood of the necromancers putting in an appearance, so Sabat takes the opportunity to astral project into randy 'Randa's room and see what she's up to. This being a GNS novel, there's no prizes for guessing what that is. After she and partner Royston have concluded a disappointingly routine session, they get to discussing Coven business. Sabat learns that what occurred in the cemetery during Sheila's initiation has so unhinged Horace that he's since been confined to a lunatic asylum, leaving Royston in command. Miranda wants to put all this necromancy lark behind her as it's no longer funny, but Royston reminds her of her solemn pledge to serve 'The Master' and offers Horace and Sheila as hideous examples of what will happen should she displease him. Royston has also fingered the stranger to the village as an enemy, and assures Miranda that he'll soon be taken care of. Sure enough, while Sabat is still eavesdropping on the astral, a phantom arsonist sets The Dun Cow ablaze .... Which brings us up to the p.50 mark. It seems Guy fell back on his stash of The Unexplained and New Witchcraft by way of researching this one. Best I don't go into detail about my suspected source material for the Sabat brothers' occult duel, but the grave-robbing at St. Adrians is clearly based on the notorious events at Clophill Church in March 1963!
|
|
|
Post by andydecker on Mar 19, 2011 15:04:48 GMT
'Seventies black magic, cemetery desecration, necromancy, supremely anti-erotic sex scenes - The Graveyard Vultures ticks so many of the right boxes it's beyond comprehension that i struggled to get into it first time around. Not to forget the Jeckyl/Hyde angle. Okay, it´s more a Hyde/Hyde angle, still. I love this series. It would make a terrific cable-tv-series
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Mar 22, 2011 21:26:36 GMT
Yeah, some of the later GNS's I've read seem a bit stodgy, but this is real never a dull moment stuff. Det Inspector Plowden is marvellous - thinking back, apoplectic but essentially bloody good police chiefs have always been something of a GNS speciality.
Just past the halfway point now and continuing where we left off, Mark Sabat returns to his body just in time to pull off a spectacular "with one bound he was free" escape by throwing himself through a window, only to be clobbered by a blazing oak beam once he's hit the ground. Mark awakes from his coma to find himself bandaged like a mummy and immediately discharges himself from the hospital. Rev. Storton provides him a room at the church while he gathers his strength for a multiple exorcism, first of the cemetery, then of the exhumed Black Magician's bones, wherever they are. We're getting to know Sabat better now and "intense" doesn't really cover it - Solomon Kane was a bundle of laughs by comparison - but I guess sharing ones soul with an evil dead brother must get unbearably claustrophobic, especially as Quentin is forever putting dirty ideas in his head to give him erections at inopportune moments (even on the astral for goodness sake!). Despite it all, Mark's successfully re-sanctifies the churchyard after his own fashion when, set upon by the mouldering dead, he summons Baron Cemeterre to assist in destroying the corpse army, essentially ridding the burial ground of one evil party by replacing it with another. But in his death lust he's forgotten that Baron Cemeterre never returns to his domain empty handed. Sabat returns to the church to find Rev Storton naked and terrified on the verge of a fatal stroke. That's another exorcism booked into his diary, though he'll have to wait until the poor bastard's been delivered to the morgue before he can perform his grisly Van Helsing routine.
Other than a brief appearance on the astral (resulting in yet another untimely protrusion in Sabat's trousers) there's been no word of what 'Randa is up to. Am sure she'll be back with us sooner rather than later.
|
|