End Of Year Round Up: 2014

[dem bones]

Anthologies

New

Joel Lane & Tom Johnstone - Horror Uncut! *
Stephen Jones - Psycho Mania!
Stephen Jones - Zombie Apocalypse 3 - Endgame *
Paul Finch (ed.) - Terror Tales Of Wales
Paul Finch (ed.) - Terror Tales Of Yorkshire
Vault Advent Calendar #5

*: Not quite finished either of these yet, but they've delivered so far.


Old but new to me

Mary Danby's Nightmares trilogy
26th Pan Book Of Horror Stories. Clarence Paget
Robert Weinberg, Stefan Dziemianowicz, and Martin H. Greenberg (ed.) - 100 Wild Little Weird Tales

Revisited

Hugh Lamb (ed) - Stories In The Dark.
Charles Black - Third Black Book Of Horror
August Derleth - The Night Side.
Hugh Lamb - Cold Fear

Novels

Martin Jenson - The Village Of Fear
Roland Topor - The Tenant
Greg Kihn - The Horror Show.
Agatha Christie - Ten Little Niggers
Bernard Taylor - Evil intent
Cyril Donson - Draco The Dragon Man.
David A. Riley - The Return.
Sarah Pinborough - Mayhem.
Harry Adams Knight - The Fungus.
Robin Evans - Croak

Dishonorable Mentions

Laurence James - The Road.
Derek Hyde-Chambers - The Orgy Of Bubastis
Peter Tremayne - Angelus!
Peter Tremayne - The Morgow Rises
David Holman & Larry Price - Fleshbait
Richard Laymon - Dark Mountain
Richard Laymon - One Rainy Night
Agatha Christie - The Pale Horse
Richard Salem - New Blood.
J. C. Conaway - Quarrel With The Moon
Jeff Rice - The Night Stalker
Robert Westbrook - Insomnia.
Caroline Graham - Murder At Madingley Grange
Mark Morris - Zombie Apocalypse! Horror Hospital.
Jeremy Brent - Plastic Man
Drew Lamark - The Medusa Horror
David Anne - The Folly
David Bischoff - The Blob
John Russo - Limb To Limb
Guy N. Smith - The Black Fedora.
Phil Smith - The Saxonbury Printout

Really dishonourable mention

Mark Noble - Bloodbath At The House Of Death

Novelisation/ tie-in

Paul Monette - Nosferatu, The Vampyre.

Chic lit!

William Codpiece Thwackery - Fifty Shades Of Mr. Darcy.

Novella (also most surreal "too much information" reading experience of 2014)

The Secret Of Elena's Tomb 'Count' Von Cosel's account of his doomed love affair (pre and post-mortem) with a young woman who, when she still had a choice, seemed determined to the hell get away from the creep.

Collections

Craig Herbertson - The Heaven Maker & Other Gruesome Tales.
L. A. Lewis - Tales Of The Grotesque

Various shorts

See Best worst of 2014 as they happen(ed) or we'll be here all day

Non-Fiction

Peter Haining - The Classic Era of American Pulp Magazines
Eric Godtland & Dian Hanson - True Crime Detective Magazines
Adam Clayson - Death Discs: An Account Of Fatality In The Popular Song
Dorian Lynskey - 33 Revolutions A Minute: A History of Protest Songs
Martin Lacey - El Tel Was A Space Alien.
Kevin S. Eden - Wire ... Everybody Loves A History

Magazines

Justin Marriott (ed.) - Paperback Fanatic 28. Paperback Fanatics 29 & 30
Scream Factory (issues #13, 14 & 16. Thanks, Justin!)
Men Of Violence #3
Sleazy Reader #1

****

Part 2: The rest to follow ......

[andydecker]

I borrow your template, if you don't mind, Dem.

I guess 2014 was the year I bought not more then one or two new standalone horror novel in print and only a few as an Ebook. I still bought out of print and a couple of print-anthologies like Best New Horror, but either nobody advertised the books or I didn't catch them. I still havn't had the time or the interest to check Mr. Jones overview in BNH, but it is kind of sad to watch how this once proud field to sink into oblivion.

On the other had I bought much more anthologies or collections then I used to. A lot. And it was the year of the Ebook. I bought some I already have in print just to re-ead it without fear of damaging the old paperbacks or because the print is easier to read.

And a sad RIP to the cover-art. The stuff most put on their Ebooks is godawful and ugly.

Anthologies

New

Stephen Jones - Zombie Apocalypse 3 - Endgame *
Stephen Jones - Best New Horror *

S.T. Joshi - Black Wings II (Ebook)

Paul Sammons - The Dark Rites of Cthulhu (Ebook)

John Shirley - World War Cthulhu (Ebbok)

Tim Dedopulos - Cthulhu Lives (Ebook)

Mark Howard Jones - Cthulhu Cymreag* (Ebook)

Tim Curran- In the Court of the Yellow King* (Ebook)

Johnny Mains- Best British Horror*

June Lockhart - Tales of Jack the Ripper* (Ebook)

Old but new to me:

Laid Barron - A Season in Carcosa

Ellen Dalow - Lovecraft Unbound* 

Novels

Graham McNeill - Arkham Horror 2* (Ebook)

Graham McNeill - Arkahm Horror 3* (Ebook)
David A. Riley - The Return. (Ebook)

Morris- Zombie Apocalypse- Horror Hospital*

Revisited:

Michael McDowell - Blackwater (Ebook)

Michael McDowell - The Elementals (Ebook)

Errol Lecale - Tigerman of Terraphur#

Errol Lecale - Castledoom

Dishonorable Mentions

Michael Shea - The Color out of Time (Ebook)
John Blackburn - Broken Boy (Ebook)

McNaughton - Worse Things waiting (Ebook)

Ericson - Master of the Temple*

Peter Saxon - The Darkest Night

Novelisation/ tie-in

Tim Greaves - Vampyres


Collections

Laid Barron - The Imgo Sequence * (Ebook)
Reggie Oliver - The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler (Ebook)

Gray - My Touch brings Death*

McNaughton- Throne of Bones (Ebook)


Non-Fiction

The Art of Ed McGinnis

Kelly- Gunshots in Another Room - The Forgotten Life of Dan J. Marlowe
Clark - The Sleepwalkers

Saul - the Indian Mutinity 1857*

Hibbert - The Great Mutinity*

Cooper - The Queen's Agent - Francis Walsingham at the Court of Elisabeth I.*


Magazines

Justin Marriott (ed.) - Paperback Fanatic 28. Paperback Fanatics 29 & 30
Men Of Violence #3

Movies

The Whisperer in Darkness

And toomuch german editions of Giallos and all things italian to mention.

Comics

This year was the first I bought no monthly comic, not even digital. Too blah and too expensive. Only exception was as usual 2000Ad which I have a suscription for.

Still I bought some reprints like the Vampirella Archives and trade editions of BPRD. Also some of the Conan reprints with storys I missed the first time.

I also sampled a few digital comics when there was a bargain sale. Stuff like Crossed or a few classics because I like this guided view thing.

TV

Also too much. Highlights were:

Ripper Street

Masters of Sex

Hannibal

Boardwalk Empire

Dishonorable Mentions:

Endeavour

Midsomer Murders

Poirot

Foyle's War

Lewis

*Still not read or not finished

[dem bones]

Ah, thank you for rescuing this one from oblivion, Andreas! Very interested in your e-book recommendations as I continue to stoically resist the kindle experience. It was only a few days ago I found out there was such a thing as 'Cthulhu Cymreag' but isn't the editor Mark Howard Jones? So how far are you into 'Zombie Apocalypse - Endplay'?

As threatened, Part 2.

Film soundtrack

Type O Negative - Nosferatu

Non-fiction: Skooldays!

Geoffrey Willans & Ronald Searle - Back In The Jugg Agane.

TV

The Lost Honour Of Christopher Jefferies: Jason Watkins excels as a retired schoolteacher, locally regarded as something of an eccentric, who is arrested on suspicion of murdering a female tenant. The ensuing media witch-hunt cost him dear. Little consolation to him that the police eventually got the right man.

Detectorists. A beautifully understated drama series centred around the terrifying world of obsessive amateur archaeologists armed with metal detectors.

Brian Pern - A Life In Rock. The Plasticine addicted Thotch frontman and inventor of world music rehearses his thirty-years-shelved Day Of The Triffids Rock Opera narrated by Sir Roger Moore, and records an all-star Christmas charity single in aid of bipolar polar bears. Simon Day as Brian Pern, but its Michael Foyle's War Kitchen as his gloriously foul-mouthed manager steals it.

The Missing. Scuppered by crushingly lame last episode but it was one almighty trip getting there.

General Highs

Experiencing the Dultras first-hand in exciting 2-2 draw with Wealdstone at Grosvenor Vale one beautiful spring afternoon. Beards, girls, colourful banners and chants, though, sadly, no voodoo stick on this occasion.

Book-hunting with pulphack in W.End and Spitalfields.

Sitting in Byron Park, Wealdstone at 9. am on Boxing Day in freezing cold and feeling strangely at peace as my past flashed before me.

The kindness of those dear authors and artists who continue to donate work to an obscure advent calendar and do so with great good humour and no shortage of charm.

Downs

The backdrop to the above.

Those We Have Loved

Michel Parry
Archie Roy
Sam 'Peff' Peffer
Kirby McCauley
JT Edson
Peter Underwood

Joanna Dunham
Eli Wallach
Lauren Bacall
Robin Williams
Richard Attenborough
Rik Mayall
Sir Donald Sinden
Richard Kiel
Billie Whitelaw
Alexandra Bastedo
Bob Hoskins
James Garner

Tommy Ramone
Jeff 'Nash The Slash' Plewman
Lynsey de Paul
Alvin Stardust
Jimmy Ruffin
Joe Cocker
Jack Bruce
Ian McLagen

Eusebio da Silva Ferreira
Phillip Hughes
James Alexander Gordon
David Coleman
Alfredo Di Stefano
Sir Tom Finney
Bert Trautmann
Brian Greenhoff
Mick McManus

Bob Crow
'Lovejoys'
Hereford United F.C.

[andydecker]

Jan 18, 2015 16:00:01 GMT dem bones said:

Ah, thank you for rescuing this one from oblivion, Andreas! Very interested in your e-book recommendations as I continue to stoically resist the kindle experience. It was only a few days ago I found out there was such a thing as 'Cthulhu Cymreag' but isn't the editor Mark Howard Jones? So how far are you into 'Zombie Apocalypse - Endplay'?

Of course it is Mr. Jones. I edited it.

I read the line-up of Endplay, and not more, as I am still at the begining of No.2.  I am hoplessly behind on a lot of these books. But if you don't by them at the time of publishing you often can hunt them later. Especially if you are abroad. So I buy and they gather dust.

Frankly I bought so many Ebooks also because they used to be so cheap. For instance the "Cthulhu Cymreag" Ebook still cost a third of the print version. But I guess this will change this year due to the new tax laws for digital products. For me an Ebook still is and will be a glorified computer file, and the idea to pay as much for digital as for a real book is ridiculous. For instance the Warhammer guys charge about the same for their digital edition as for the paperback, so thank you but no.

I always have my Kindle in the pocket and can read everywhere, waiting for the bus or waiting for the waiter. As much as I dislike the format, the non-paper-books and that it has the potential to destroy the Profession of the paid writer, it has its advantages to always  carry a bibliothek in your pocket.

 

[dem bones]

Jan 18, 2015 14:14:34 GMT andydecker said:

I still havn't had the time or the interest to check Mr. Jones overview in BNH, but it is kind of sad to watch how this once proud field to sink into oblivion .... And a sad RIP to the cover-art. The stuff most put on their Ebooks is godawful and ugly.

I'm not at all sure that it has "sunk into oblivion." For me the past seven or so years represent a quiet golden age, it's just that the sad demise of the mass market paperback dictates that, where once we could find so much great stuff just by dropping by the local newsagent or tube station, now more than ever we have to keep abreast of the small presses.

Cover art. There's no denying the 'scene' could use a contemporary John Newton Howitt/ Frank Bernier/ Margaret Brundage/ Peff [insert names of your personal favourites here] but - to name but four - Joe Roberts, Neil Williams, Paul 'Moody' Mudie, and Steven Upham sure have their moments, even if they are painting digitally as opposed to the colour pastels on canvas approach many of us (?) prefer. It still requires an incredible amount of skill, dedication and imagination.

[cauldronbrewer]

It was a somewhat slow and strange reading year for me. Here are my picks from among my hazy recollections of the novels and collections I read in 2014:

NOVELS
Charles G. Finney--The Circus of Dr. Lao
Franklin Gregory--The White Wolf
Michael McDowell--The Elementals
Michael McDowell--Blackwater
Michael McDowell--The Amulet
Jack Vance--The Planet of Adventure series
Jack Vance--Showboat World
Jack Vance--Space Opera

COLLECTIONS
H. D. Everett--The Crimson Blind and Other Ghost Stories
Ernest Favenc--Ghost Stories and Mysteries
Margery Lawrence--Number Seven Queer Street
L. A. Lewis--Tales of the Grotesque
Robert Westall--Antique Dust

CHILDREN'S/YOUNG ADULT NOVELS
Joan Aiken--The Wolves of Willoughby Chase
Chris Priestley--Through Dead Eyes
Robert Westall--Ghost Abbey
Robert Westall--The Watch House
Robert Westall--The Wheatstone Pond

CHILDREN'S/YOUNG ADULT COLLECTIONS
Robert Westall--The Call and Other Stories
Robert Westall--The Stones of Muncaster Cathedral

[cauldronbrewer]

I spent a lot of time last year reading graphic novels and watching animated TV programs, so here are my picks for those categories:

GRAPHIC NOVELS
Emily Carroll--Through the Woods (especially recommended for horror fans; perhaps the best horror graphic novel I've ever read)
Scott Chantler--The Three Thieves, Volumes 1-5
Mike Maihack--Cleopatra in Space: Target Practice
Luke Pearson--The Hilda series
Jo Rioux--The Golden Twine
Moro Rogers--The City in the Desert, Volumes 1-2
Richard Sala--In a Glass Grotesquely
Thomas Siddell--Gunnerkrigg Court, Volumes 1-4
Fabien Vehlmann and Kerascoët--Beautiful Darkness
Andi Watson--The Glister series

ANIMATED TELEVISION SERIES
Adventure Time
FLCL
Gravity Falls
The Legend of Korra
My Life As a Teenage Robot
Over the Garden Wall
Samurai Champloo
Samurai Jack
Spice and Wolf
Teen Titans

WEB ORIGINAL SERIES
Bravest Warriors
The Guild

[dem bones]

Thanks for that, Mr. Brewer. Graphic novels, ebooks, childrens' ghost stories, animated TV series' - viva diversity! By the looks of it, the libraries around here stock as many graphic novels as horror novels (i'm not complaining: at least they have horror sections, which, I gather, is often no longer the case elsewhere), so on your recommendation will definitely try order Emily Carroll's Through the Woods. You have also reminded me to add Charles G. Finney's The Circus Of Dr. Lao to ridiculously lengthy rematch schedule. (I have it in the rather eclectic Ray Bradbury anthology of the same name)

Ray Bradbury (ed.) - The Circus Of Dr. Lao & Other Improbable Stories (Bantam, 1956)

Ray Bradbury - Introduction

Charles G. Finney - The Circus of Dr. Lao
Nigel Kneale - The Pond
E. B. White - The Hour of Letdown
Roald Dahl -The Wish
Shirley Jackson - The Summer People
Nathaniel Hawthorne - Earth’s Holocaust
Loren Eiseley - Busby’s Petrified Woman
Oliver La Farge - The Resting Place
Henry Kuttner - Threshold
James H. Schmitz - Greenface
John S. Sharnik - The Limits of Walter Horton
Robert M. Coates - The Man Who Vanished
Charles finney's the circus of dr. lao has been hailed by critics as a masterpiece of fantasy. The SATURDAY REVIEW called it "a remarkable excursion into the fantastic" and warns that it may "occasionally horrify or disgust you ... It isn't a book for babes."

"A licentious, irreverent, insolent, amusing book . a satirical comment on our so-called civilization."- NEW YORK HERALD TRIBUNE

With this famous novelette setting the mood, the celebrated science-fiction author Ray Bradbury has selected eleven other imaginative stories by first-rate writers such as E. B. White, Roald Dahl and Shirley Jackson to make a rich, exciting collection. Here the reader will get a taste of the off-beat, the unusual - the flavor of unknown worlds, and the excitement of our own world seen in new dimensions.

LOOK FOR THE BANTAM ROOSTER - YOUR ASSURANCE OF QUALITY!

[Dr Strange]

Dunno, but it didn't seem to be a particularly memorable one for me (though there is more than one explanation for that). Here is what did stand out -

NEW NOVELS: No One Gets Out Alive by Adam Nevill; The Wolf In Winter by John Connolly.

OLD ONES REVISITED: Naomi's Room and The Matrix both by Jonathan Aycliffe; Superstition by David Ambrose (thanks for the reminder, JoJo).

COLLECTION: Best British Horror 2014 ed. Johnny Mains.

FILMS: The Borderlands; Prisoners.

TV: Penny Dreadful; True Detective.

MUSIC: In Tongues by Roadkill Ghost Choir; A Monstrous Psychedelic Bubble by Syd Arthur. (I am enjoying the "psychedelic renaissance".)

[Deleted]

Cheers Dr Strange!!!!

[Craig Herbertson]

In keeping with my status as a hermit with no contemporary social skills I seem to have done nothing and read very little, none of it apparently horror. It was a shocker of a year for losing wonderful people to the grim reaper. That was the big downside and the true horror of this year.

Novels

Three Kingdoms: Luo Guanzhong
Outlaws of the Marsh: Shui Hu Zhuan - like Robin Hood for the Chinese.
Journey to the West: Xī Yóu Jì - Equally brilliant. If you remember Monkey and Water Margin they were based on the two above

Anthology

None

Various shorts

Revisited Bradbury - The Lake, The Crowd and The Emissary. Defy anyone to write better stories. Still pissed off about them trashing his house. What is with these people.
Jack Vance - Green magic. A story everyone interested in the Occult should read for its novel and entertaining perspective - but not horror

TV

Got into watching the first episodes of red Dwarf. Remembered the excitement at the time. Still stands up as really top class stuff.

Films

Disappointing two Hobbit sequels.
9/10 for Interstellar by Nolan. Man has a planet sized brain.
Tourist trap: Thanks to the Vault. Everyone knew about this except me

Non Fiction

A Japanese Mirror: Buruma - wonderful insights. The single paragraph about Japanese businessmens' idea of a striptease would be worth the 2 quid I spent at Camden market
Japan's Imperial Conspiracy: David Bergamini - Wonderful insights into the Emperor's role in frightening the life out of the West
Romance of the Sword: Sir Richard Burton. Renaissance man. More talent that a room full of professors

Those We Have Loved

Life - too short with a terrible ending. At best we can be grateful for the wonderful things they gave us.


Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

[Jojo Lapin X]

I have to admit I did not read a lot of horror last year, and I essentially never read horror novels, but Jonathan Aycliffe's NAOMI'S ROOM was a major revelation. What a nasty, uninhibited book! What was he thinking? Highly recommended.