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Post by weirdmonger on Nov 13, 2021 18:04:33 GMT
I've been lurking on this site for years, and figured this is as good a place to jump in as any. "Petey" is my favorite simply because it actually scared me* -- PETEY by T.E.D. Klein “First the effect, then the cause — as if his mind held so many unexplored levels, mystery upon mystery, that he never knew the things it contained…” Arrival, Story of Your Life…? The first half — topped, tailed and intermitted by italicised inscrutability of illness and suicide of as yet unknown person(s) — builds from an engagingly theatrical social comedy of a house-warming party of a sizeable number of American middle-aged couples whom I, from Britain, would today call Republican voters (even Trumpists?), the house being very large, rambling and miles-from-anywhere, also like a stately home. Accretively, though, we learn of its decor and furnishings and items of fine art (more recondite than fine) and gradually we learn of the darkly strange backstory of the house and its owner. Tapestries of the grotesque and arabesque. And people drifting off from the main group. Readers, let’s keep together. *** “Nothing about an extra trump, a spare, a bonus, a joker…” Things at the party later take the turn of archetypes and rituals, e.g. tarot cards or astrology, as the guests explore the books that came with the House, its cluttered Attic, the host spending most of his time on the toilet, and another guest sleeping and having a nightmare. It appears that the house was purchased relatively cheaply by means of a trick or Trumpery of dodgy capitalism, pretending there was a high road coming through the house when, in fact, it wasn’t. As to the ‘Petey’ undercurrents, is this a version of ‘piety’, and indeed there is a ‘DIETY’, not ‘deity’, on one page. Or is it a reference to ‘pets’? Or things like Klein’s ‘children of the kingdom’ now pickled in jars? Or is this word Petey a garbling of Party as a prediction of this very house-warming? Hints, half-hints, and an eerie sense of a scarecrow outside, things haunting this text with more weird and wonderful glitches that one can imagine literally coming out of the text itself. I wonder what that grey shape arriving at the end turns out to be? “He turned over several minor trumps,…”
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Nov 13, 2021 18:06:10 GMT
I've been lurking on this site for years, and figured this is as good a place to jump in as any. "Petey" is my favorite simply because it actually scared me* -- had me looking over my shoulder more than once as I read it. Even to this day when I drive lonely country roads at night, I get a chill if that story crosses my mind. "Black Man With a Horn" is the best-written, I think, and really it's a toss-up between this one and "Petey." All four of these novellas are gems, though, and the least of them is a classic and would be a standout in any anthology. Like all of you, I mourn Klein's absence from the scene. He may not have written much, but what he has written secures his place as one of the greatest horror authors in the English language. Welcome to the Vault! I added my vote for "Black Man with a Horn," though I would've voted for "The Events at Poroth Farm" if Klein had included in it in Dark Gods.
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Post by dem bones on Nov 13, 2021 18:08:14 GMT
[Speaking of which, I'd like to start a thread on stories that actually scared you -- not necessarily the best, mind. In my case, these stories range over more than one century and the authors are of more than one nationality, so where would be a good place to start such a thread?] Hi Enoch Maybe the Favourite Short Stories - Your DIY anthos section would be a good a place as any? Thank you for registering. Hope you have fun here.
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Nov 13, 2021 18:12:04 GMT
[Speaking of which, I'd like to start a thread on stories that actually scared you -- not necessarily the best, mind. In my case, these stories range over more than one century and the authors are of more than one nationality, so where would be a good place to start such a thread?] Hi Enoch Maybe the Favourite Short Stories - Your DIY anthos section would be a good a place as any? Sounds like a great idea for a thread. There's also a bit of discussion on that question starting here.
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enoch
Devils Coach Horse
Posts: 116
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Post by enoch on Nov 14, 2021 1:05:50 GMT
Thanks, dem bones and cauldronbrewer. I will avail myself of both of those threads -- the stories that scared me will go under "Slimy Fans," as there's already a discussion on that topic underway there, and my personal anthology will be under the other one, as such an anthology would consist of my favorite stories, many of which I don't find personally frightening, just admirable examples of their kind.
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Post by humgoo on Jun 14, 2022 5:27:15 GMT
Klein's longer tales are all superb, Dark Gods is one of the all time great collections. I's love to see it re-issued with Poroth Farm added to the contents (it would be almost criminal IMHO to NOT add this tale to its natural home). I would love to see someone reprint an edition of Dark Gods that includes The Events at Poroth Farm. If any publisher does reprint Klein's novellas, they should consider adding "The Events at Poroth Farm" if possible (probably my favorite of his stories). No "Poroth Farm", but it's comforting to see the book reprinted at all in our super woke times. Thanks PS Publishing! There's an "Author's Note" prefacing the new edition:
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Post by andydecker on Jun 14, 2022 8:36:47 GMT
PS also did The Ceremonies, even as an Ebook.
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Post by helrunar on Jul 14, 2022 19:25:37 GMT
I just finished reading "The Events at Poroth Farm" in this Cthulhu Mythos Megapack thing I have on my electronic reader. Excellent work, and I definitely need to read more of Klein's tales. "Poroth" isn't at all a Mythos story--unless I completely misunderstand what people mean by Cthulhu Mythos, at this stage of the game. It's very creepy and also quite clever in how the protagonist's narrative counterpoints his sometimes bland account of what's happening with his comments upon various authors and phases of the Gothic tradition in literature, including Lovecraft.
One of the things I loved about the story was how so much went unexplained, so one could simply make up one's own version of just what had occurred, and why.
H.
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Post by humgoo on Jul 15, 2022 14:23:04 GMT
Excellent work, and I definitely need to read more of Klein's tales. Only four more to go! You certainly can't accuse the guy of being Fanthorpe-ish productive! "Petey" features an intriguing deck of Tarot cards, which sounds just up your street!
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Post by helrunar on Jul 15, 2022 14:40:02 GMT
Yes, it does! He only wrote five horror tales?
H.
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Jul 15, 2022 14:47:39 GMT
He only wrote five horror tales? He is still alive. He could still write another one if he felt like it.
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Post by humgoo on Jul 15, 2022 15:37:00 GMT
He could still write another one if he felt like it. According to a 2008 interview (collected in Providence After Dark, of which I only have the e-book edition), he doesn't even read horror fiction any more! Like everyone else, he also mentions Aickman's dental problems somewhere:
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Post by andydecker on Jul 15, 2022 19:23:37 GMT
Yes, it does! He only wrote five horror tales? H. Yes. As said above it has been reprinted by PS Publishing but only as a trade paperback. Events got developed into the novel The Ceremonies. I myself always thought the supposed connection to the Mythos rather stretching. Black Man with a Horn is an honest Mythos story.
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Post by Dr Strange on Jul 15, 2022 20:24:07 GMT
He only wrote five horror tales? As well as the novel The Ceremonies (1984), which is an extended version of "The Events at Poroth Farm", isfdb.org lists the following short stories - "The Events at Poroth Farm" (1972) - in The Year's Best Horror Stories No.3 ed. Richard Davis (1973) "Renaissance Man" (1974) - in Space 2 ed. Richard Davis (this seems to be SF rather than horror) "S.F." (1975) - in The Year's Best Horror Stories: Series III ed. Richard Davis (1975) "Magic Carpet" (1976) - in Spectre 4 ed. Richard Davis (1977) "Petey" (1979) - in the Dark Gods collection (1985) "Black Man With A Horn" (1980) - in the Dark Gods collection (1985) "Children of the Kingdom" (1980) - in the Dark Gods collection (1985) "Nadelman's God" (1985) - in the Dark Gods collection (1985) "Well-Connected" (1987) - in Weird Tales, Spring 1988 "Camera Shy" (1988) - in 100 Vicious Little Vampire Stories ed. Stefan Dziemianowicz, Martin H. Greenberg & Robert Weinberg (1995) "They Don't Write 'em Like This Anymore" (1989) - in Pulp Magazine #1 (March 1989) "Ladder" (1990) - in The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror 4 ed. Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling (1991) "One Size Eats All" (1993) - in Best New Horror 5 ed.Stephen Jones & Ramsey Campbell (1994) "Curtains For Nat Crumley" (1996) - in The Ultimate Haunted House ed. Nancy A Collins & Gahan Wilson "Growing Things" (1999) - in The Mammoth Book of New Horror 11 ed. Stephen Jones (2000) "Imagining Things" (2007) - in 666: The Number of the Beast
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Post by helrunar on Jul 15, 2022 21:19:06 GMT
Thanks, Dr Strange! I looked up Dark Gods on an annoyingly ubiquitous online retail site, and the book seems to be available for around $22.
I'm definitely a down-sitting rather than upstanding middle-aged (or, let's face it, getting on to elderly) white guy since I find the endless proliferation of re-enactments, videogames and documentaries endlessly rehashing the Civil War and WW II to be a crashing bore. But, de gustibus, etc. I wonder if T.E.D.'s dramatic change of life had to do with a marriage. I had a friend decades ago who loved reading and conversing about books. While I was living abroad, he met and married a veterinarian whose interests largely revolving around "birding." Subsequently whenever we met the care of domestic pets and various excursions in search of sightings of the yellow-bellied sapsucker became his chief topics of conversation, and there were numerous awkward silences. It was kind of sad because he became very boring to be around at that point.
cheers, Hel
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