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Post by piglingbland on Aug 9, 2012 10:11:41 GMT
David Sutton's Shadow Publishing is delighted to announce the forthcoming publication of Frightfully Cosy And Mild Stories For Nervous Types by Johnny Mains.
Not for the Squeamish! The collection contains twelve bizarre stories, five previously unpublished. From classic themes in his sequel to M. R. James’ A Warning to the Curious, to his wild take on traditional horror subject matter in the strange case of ‘The Were-Dwarf’, to the bleakly dark modern horror of ‘Cure’.This collection of extraordinary horror yarns will not disappoint genre fans who enjoy variety in the books they buy.
Shadow Publishing, September 2012, ISBN 978-0-9539032-5-2. Paperback 184 pages, £7.99
Introduction by Stephen Volk. Cover art by Richard Sampson.
CONTENTS:
The Song of the Syrinx, and Other Callings (Introduction) by Stephen Volk
Aldeburgh
Mrs. Claus and the Immaculate Conception
Cure
The Tip Run
Head Soup
Dead Forest Air
The Rookery
Prim Suspect
The Jacket
‘I Wish’
George V
The Were-Dwarf
Author’s Mumbles
From the twisted mind of British Fantasy Award winner Johnny Mains Comes 12 stories of death, betrayal, insanity and pregnancies...
GO TO: www.shadowpublishing.webeasysite.co.uk/.Attachments:
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Post by piglingbland on Aug 10, 2012 10:46:03 GMT
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Post by piglingbland on Aug 21, 2012 8:08:23 GMT
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Aug 21, 2012 11:00:08 GMT
Excellent stuff!
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Post by piglingbland on Aug 30, 2012 12:58:10 GMT
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Post by dem bones on Jan 4, 2014 16:04:45 GMT
Another of those books I've been collecting in instalments, so am very grateful to Messrs Sutton & Mains for fixing it for me to have a hard copy. Three of the twelve stories will be familiar from various Vault Advent Calendars, and I recognise others from The Screaming Book Of Horror, Terror Tales Of East Anglia and Bite-Size Horror, so quite a head start. Stephen Volk's introduction name-checks his own favourite Pan Horror stories (and covers), making for an interesting start.
Head Soup: Matthew Jolks, an unspeakably gushy horror fanzine editor, slimes up to the all-but forgotten Leopard Book Of Horror contributor, Peter Von Basel, a surprisingly sprightly eighty year old. Von Basel achieved unsought notoriety when a cannibal killer blamed his crimes on exposure to the story Head-Soup For The Hole. It ruined his author's career for years.
Delighted to have somebody fawn over him, Von Basel invites the lad to his home for dinner. As an additional bonus, Matthew is introduced to Maria Von Basel, whose exploits provide much of the inspiration for her husbands ghastly tales.
The Tip Run: Every Saturday morning, eight-year-old Steve and his dad go foraging at the Stour Valley municipal dump. It's amazing what others see fit to toss out as garbage, and who knows what exciting treasure you'll take away with you? Over by the gates, a grimy example of White Van Man has already found his!
"I Wish": W. W. Jacobs' The Monkey's Paw relocated to a crime-ridden Glasgow Tower Block. Andy returns from Afghanistan, the solitary survivor of an ambush. Cadging a couch for the night from his brother Morris, Andy shows he and wife Shiela the relic he obtained in a market which he swears saved his life. Sheila, sick of living among drug fiends and drunks, wishes for enough money to begin a new life elsewhere. The following morning a wall collapses ....
Aldeburgh: Joseph Payton, son of the late Percival, approaches M. R. James in the school yard at Eton with an extraordinary allegation. James murdered his father at Aldeburgh to obtain the supposedly mythical third crown of East Anglia, and then published a thinly veiled account of the deed - changing the treasure-hunter's name to 'Paxton' - as A Warning to the Curious. To support all this, Joseph produces a yellowed newspaper clipping and a damning photograph of the provost and his father in conversation at The White Lion. James, for his part, assures the troubled young man that, while he based the story on what his father had told him, even, distastefully, spicing up his death with a dash of violence, his is a work of supernatural fiction. Joseph is not to be placated, and, when James next returns to Aldeburgh, again makes a nuisance of himself - and this time he's in possession of a gun.
The pair finally separate at the Martello tower, Joseph to seek out the Anglo-Saxon crown his father had been so desperate to return to it's guardians, James to retrieve the copy of John Gawsworth's New Tales Of Terror By Eminent Authors he'd dropped further along the beach, even though, Richard Middleton and M. P. Shiel apart, the content is "utter tripe, obviously written by hacks who had no understanding of the finer points of the English language."
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Post by dem bones on Jan 6, 2014 6:15:30 GMT
The Were-Dwarf: The sad, sad story of Vinny Dazzle, a vertically challenged werewolf in East Anglia (and, occasionally, Scotland), will be familiar to those who lasted the distance with most recent Vault Advent Calendar. Returning from a gig in a Norfolk pub, Vinny, maestro of the mobile disco and the smallest adult male in the UK, is savaged by a werewolf. His subsequent romance with the nurse who tends him in hospital is tempered by an unwanted lust for human flesh whenever there is a full moon. Tiny he may be, but there's no shortage of blood and guts when the were-dwarf walks abroad. The Cure: A Scandinavian Medical Centre offers a 100% successful cure for cancer in women. While far from financially prohibitive, the real price may be higher than some would be prepared to pay once they're familiar with Charlotte's experience. Played straight and the better for it, imo. Prim Suspect:Return of Mrs Primrose Hildebrand, official nosey parker of Effingham-on-the-Stour, who first appeared in title story of Mr. Mains' first collection (via Fourth Black Book of Horror Stories). A convoluted plot sees Amie Hird, a sometime horror author with a guilty past, undergo a psychotic episode after exposure to Mrs Hildebrand's little black book, listing the various transgressions of each member of the community. Frank, a character in Amie's latest story, urges his creator to murder the twisted old bag. Several references to a 'Dr. Probe,' kindly dispenser of pills which should most certainly not be taken with alcohol.
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Post by dem bones on Jan 10, 2014 6:00:01 GMT
The Rookery: The loss of a daughter to Meningitis proved too devastating a blow for Roger and Lucy's marriage to survive. Citing her husband's escalating Whiskey habit, an embittered Lucy wins the custody battle over their son, and now Roger has access to his beloved Sean for only two days a fortnight. It isn't enough.
Roger is gamekeeper on the Leader Estate, and his duties, apart from the all-important release of pheasant during the shooting season, include the culling of the fox population with his rifle. Sean, now twelve, has already proved himself a capable marksman, and once again, Roger can only regret his limited time with the boy, but Lucy's spite shows no sign of burning itself out ant time this century . By now the reader anticipates tragedy, but which form will it take? Contains a scene of extreme turnip abuse, but otherwise another which (for this reader) benefits from its sense of solemnity, and among the finest of the Cosy Tales.
George V: Gentle ghost story centring around a falling out between obstinate father and obsessive son over a rare batch of George V halfpenny stamps, withdrawn from sale due to an imperfection. By way of reconciliation, a contrite - and very dead - father guides Elias to his treasure via an antique postcard.
The Jacket: When Charlotte McGarry refuses to hand over a bag of marbles to Effingham Elementary's school bully in residence, his predictable response is a campaign of toady-assisted brutality. Mrs. McGarry, appalled at Headmaster Monty James' customary indifference to the star pupil's behaviour, packs Charlotte off to stay with her doting Grandfather, Reginald. When Granddad learns of Charlotte's problems, he presents her with the strange jacket that saved his life during the Great War. Back at school, the jacket demonstrates that it has lost none of its deadly potency over the intervening years.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jan 10, 2014 19:28:46 GMT
I don't know if anyone's interested - but The Jacket was turned into a short film, and filmed on a budget of £40. Here's the link: vimeo.com/60318675 |
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Post by dem bones on Jan 15, 2014 17:34:27 GMT
Dead Forest Air: As we learned in Russell Braddon's superb The Inseparables, it is never a good idea to drop acid prior to visiting a Concentration Camp. Mark's sightseeing tour ends in tragedy when he falls in with three free-spirited German hipsters and decides to spend the night tripping by a mass grave in Belsen. Mrs. Claus and the Immaculate Conception: Ignatius Solo already has every reason to despise the festive season as his wife and kids perished in a house fire on Christmas Eve, so when his application for the post of Santa Claus #7 is curtly dismissed, it proves the last straw. Solo throws in his lot with the Kill Christmas campaign, who plan a kamikaze commando raid on the North Pole to wipe Santa Inc. off the face of the earth. They reckon without 900 year old Mrs. Claus, a jolly, seventeen stone psychopath who happens to be pregnant by - I think ? - a chicken. Whimsical with the odd flash of violence. If you can imagine R. Chetwynd-Hayes with Tourette's syndrome, it's .... it's not really like this .... but it is. For this reader, the stand-out stories are the downbeat ones - The Rookery, Cure, The Tip Run, and "I Wish" - though I can't help but have a soft spot for The Were Dwarf, and the sequel to A Warning To The Curious is good fun, too.
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Post by helrunar on Apr 18, 2020 2:25:03 GMT
I started reading the collection this evening. Stephen Volk's introduction was heartwarming.
"Aldeburgh" was a very nicely turned tale. I wasn't aware that the Provost had an aversion to Machen. No doubt well known to students of the James gang, but news to me.
"Mrs. Claus" wasn't what I expected to find in the book, but it certainly held my attention. I look forward to reading more.
I see that from Kev's helpful notes that the eponymous Mrs Primrose Hildebrand is a character in one of the tales... one less mystery of the Vault to untangle.
Thanks again to Mr Mains for so generously sharing the book with us!
cheers, H.
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Post by johnnymains on Apr 18, 2020 7:48:30 GMT
Cheers for reading - hope you enjoy the rest. Personal faves are Aldeburgh, The Rookery, Were-Dwarf and Cure.  |
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