|
Post by fritzmaitland on Aug 16, 2020 13:36:14 GMT
Hello all. Apologies for going AWOL and then just turning up in a desperate attempt to flog some old tat I'm involved in. A shame England's Screaming doesn't seem to have gone down here as well as it has elsewhere.It has sent ripples out here there and everywhere. not least with Darrell Buxton, who decided to reactivate the Third BHF Book Of Horror Stories, a project that had lain dormant since about 2006, and was to be a collection of short stories using characters from British Horror Films. In an incredible burst of activity, he's got this together in an amazingly short space of time (considering he was moving house at the time) and it should be available soon, for £9.99 with proceeds going to the NHS. If anyone should be interested, I'll put up a link when it's available. Stories are -
8. Cold Snap – Richard Freeman 15. The Cold Hunger of Dead Wastelands – Paul Newman 21. Night of the Raven – Tom Lee Rutter 27. There’s No Businessss Like Showbusinessss – Neil Pike 32. Polish – Darrell Buxton 40. An American Premonition in Lindos – Ian Taylor 58. Fattening Frogs for Snakes – Ken Shinn 63. The Connoisseur – W.R. McKay 78. Death’s Head – Fritz Maitland 81. The Half-Deads – The Third Chronicle of Pain – James Stanger 96. Special Weapons Division – Tony Earnshaw 107. Last Departure from Hobbs End – Daniel McGachey 119. Mister Fixit – Darrell Buxton 123. It Could Have Been So Different… – Eric McNaughton 126. A Modest Proposal – Ken Shinn 131. Mr Hillsings’ Dinner – Wayne Mook 137. Good for the Soul – Darrell Buxton 142. The Naked Ape: A Tale from the Monster Club – Ken Shinn 146. Blood Ties – Paul Newman 158. The Beast Must Live…! – Martin Dallard 169. Cruelty Free – Jolyon Yates 173. The First Horror Movie – Darrell Buxton 179. Pillage of the Damned – Samantha Crosby 189. Nuggets – Jez Conolly 199. Raw – Tony Earnshaw 202. OfficeTech Intra-Personal Relationships Course – October 30th 11 p.m. – Franklin Marsh 207. Painting With Light – Darrell Buxton 214. Eden: The Paradise That Never Was – Martin Dallard 225. Taking it Seriously – Ian Taylor 228. Incident Report: The Halley Incident – Ken Shinn 236. The Shop – Nadia Mook 240. Death and Loneliness – Jason D. Brawn 253. Dog Star – Neil Pike 261. A Hungarian Vampire in London – Ian Millsted 267. Minister of the Sinister – Ian Taylor
|
|
|
Post by fritzmaitland on Aug 16, 2020 14:05:51 GMT
It has a great Paul Mudie cover, but I'm darned if I can figure out how to put it up here!
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Aug 16, 2020 15:47:14 GMT
Paul Mudie Well done Herr Maitland. Same goes for Auld Marshie, Darrell, Daniel, Mudie, and all the other contributors. Please post link when you have one!
|
|
|
Post by fritzmaitland on Aug 16, 2020 21:53:13 GMT
Cheers Dem. I'll never get the hang of this technology.
|
|
|
Post by fritzmaitland on Aug 17, 2020 5:52:50 GMT
The was a PDF download of some of the stories, so to give a bit of the flavour of the book -
Cold Snap – Richard Freeman - an aging man who suffered a childhood trauma goes back to where it happened to exorcise his fears, but finds something huge waiting for him..
The Cold Hunger of Dead Wastelands – Paul Newman - Mr Newman appeared in at least one of the Black Books. A passionate environmentalist, one of his favourite films is The Living Dead At The Manchester Morgue. I found this very bleak and grim, which he took as a compliment.
Night of the Raven – Tom Lee Rutter - Tom's actually a film maker. Although the title sounds a bit Edgar Allan, this concerns former DJ Mike Raven, and centres around the making of his fourth and final horror film, the self-financed folly Disciple Of Death. There's a guest appearance by the Witchcraft Museum at Boscastle. Excellent.
There’s No Businessss Like Showbusinessss – Neil Pike - a spoof involving cover star the black mamba from Venom, who was so tough he had no qualms about venturing up Oliver Reed's trouser leg.
The Connoisseur – W.R. McKay - Wendell is an American who takes his writing and his British Horror seriously. A lovely, old-fashioned (in a good way) prequel/back story/(groan) origin story of a hunchback called Grost, who would later take up with Captain Kronos.
The Half-Deads – The Third Chronicle of Pain – James Stanger - the controversial Mr Stanger who caused a few ripples in Black Book 7. I haven't read this one but believe it involves Andrew Parkinson's films I Zombie : The Chronicles Of Pain and Dead Creatures.
Mister Fixit – Darrell Buxton - although this wasn't in the preview, I vaguely remember it from the first attempt. Originally subtitled Not J*mmy S*v*lle it's about a kind of horror Tommy Walsh/Handy Andy who's the go to guy for villains who need special equipment, such as Dr Storm requiring decapitation blades fixed to his Roller, or Anton Phibes needing a special frog mask or unicorn catapult.
A Modest Proposal – Ken Shinn - Stratton-Villiers (fresh from England's Screaming) hosts a gathering of rather unusual restauranteurs to suggest to them how they might serve not only their specialities of the house (Mr Sbirro is one of them) but also the country they are based in. Fans of Jonathan Swift will recognise the title (and the subject matter)
The First Horror Movie – Darrell Buxton - a kind of reply to The Last Horror Movie. A film scholar is delighted to receive ten canisters of film from the house of one of Britain's pioneers of the cinema. As he starts watching them he's rather disgusted by the content, but amazed by the primitive special effects. As he watches more reels of film, he starts to suspect those aren't special effects...
Pillage of the Damned – Samantha Crosby - Chris Miller,(probably better known by his pseudonym Rat Scabies) is trying to rehearse with his band The Damned, but finds his new girlfrend's children (two incredibly neat, clean, polite, intelligent, blonde moptops, presumably from a relationship she had near Midwich) rather disturbing. I loved this one.
Taking it Seriously – Ian Taylor - can't say too much about this except that it was very, very impressive.
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Aug 17, 2020 16:48:27 GMT
Thanks FM. Am looking forward to this one. Darrell Buxton's blog posts re The Third BHF Book Of Horror Stories on Pass the Marmalade
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Aug 28, 2020 16:27:03 GMT
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Sept 10, 2020 20:26:35 GMT
Darrell Buxton [ed.] - 3rd BHF Book of Horror (BHF, Sept. 2020) Paul Mudie Blurb: It is time to keep your appointment...with Fear! A notorious serial murderer survives to perpetuate his deadly deeds... Monstrous childhood memories resurface to plague a troubled soul... A newly opened cinema may he inhabited by the spectre of a vintage movie star - or possibly something worse... Violent teenage gang members encounter an even more terrifying threat in the woods...
Vampires, zombies, ghouls, monsters, and all-too-human psychos step out of the screen and secrete themselves between the covers of our latest creepy collection – more than 30 terror tales to frighten even the hardiest horror hounds! These petrifying pages contain spine-chilling stories galore, each one a sinister spin on characters or situations from classic and cult British horror movies. Haunted by Hammer? Agitated by Amicus? Tormented by Tigon? Then step this way - you sound like our perfect victim, erm, reader ....Richard Freeman – Cold Snap: Russell, seventy-two, is haunted by a childhood tragedy which saw several friends fall through the ice of the not-as-frozen-as-they thought River Wear, on Christmas morning, 1948. Now he returns home to Durham to spend the annual festivities with estranged sister and her husband. Russell has since learned that every year an inordinate number of people vanish in the Wear, their bodies never recovered. What becomes of them? Paul Newman – The Cold Hunger of Dead Wastelands: Some months into the Zombie Apocalypse and the food supply has dwindled alarmingly. He who was Detective Calhoun is among the shambling heaps of rot and maggot, tortured by an insatiable appetite. Tom Lee Rutter – Night of the Raven: Bath, 1972. Real drama on the Disciple of Death shoot as small cast and crew woefully underestimate the lengths Mike Raven is prepared to go to - or thinks he is - to achieve stardom. True to form, saturnine Mike can't quite deliver when it matters most. Neil Pike – There’s No Businessss Like Showbusinessss: Superb reptile lead spills inside dirt on the making of Venom. Shocking revelations! What a terrific start!
|
|
|
Post by cauldronbrewer on Sept 10, 2020 22:16:57 GMT
Neil Pike – There’s No Businessss Like Showbusinessss: Superb reptile lead spills inside dirt on the making of Venom. Shocking revelations! Ok, this title cracked me up.
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Sept 11, 2020 18:55:43 GMT
Darrell Buxton – Polish: Normanton, Derby, 1967. Nineteen-year-old Elsie Broadhurst takes work as a cleaner at Michael Klinger's swish new Superama cinema on Colyear Street, whose opening night attracts all the greats, the peerless Jess Conrad and Annette Andre prominent among them. Much to her surprise, Elsie loves her work - until, mopping the ladies toilet, she is confronted by the cackling ghost of Britain's 'King of the Grand Guignol' (© Andy Boot) ...
Ian Taylor – An American Premonition in Lindos: Jack Goodman persuades David Kessler to forget hitching around Britain in the rain, and instead spend the summer vacation touring Greece, thereby trading their American Werewolf ... misadventures for an experience more akin to Final Destination with extra's. A very busy plot.
|
|
|
Post by fritzmaitland on Sept 11, 2020 20:32:51 GMT
Wahey! Glad you picked this up and seem to be enjoying it, Dem. Just read Polish meself. Took me a while to work out who the ghost was. Looking forward to your take on Pillage Of The Damned and Last Departure From Hobbs End. And the good Mr Buxton's Good For The Soul would be equally at home in the Phwoar! section - apart from the ending...
|
|
|
Post by jepersonoatcake on Sept 11, 2020 21:19:40 GMT
Just a quick confirmation that I am in fact the cove called Ken Shinn, and I hope that you enjoy my contributions to this one as well. It's one of the most enjoyable writing projects with which I've ever been involved!
|
|
|
Post by dem bones on Sept 12, 2020 9:39:31 GMT
Just read Polish meself. Took me a while to work out who the ghost was. Same here. I didn't guess the ghost right up until he delivered his ghastly catch-phrase. Cold Snap, Polish and the memoirs of Oliver Reed's feisty trouser snake (©Fritz Maitland) are personal favourites to date, though have enjoyed all, including: Ken Shinn – Fattening Frogs for Snakes: Psychomania revisited. Insanely convoluted - albeit brilliant - scheme of Shadwell the butler to trick rubbish motorcycle outlaw Tom Latham to self-destruction in the secret room ... W.R. McKay – The Connoisseur : Youthful solo adventure of the future Professor Heronymus Grost, staunchest ally of Captain Kronos. Grost, then serving as an apothecary's apprentice in the hamlet of Fiederthul, had just been sold to the saturnine Herr Helmreich, as his regulation hunchbacked assistant. It is the briefest engagement. Grost doesn't do evil and takes violent exception to Helmreich's molestation of Charlotte, the parson's dreamstuff daughter. A struggle ensues; Grost rather fortuitously triumphs, leaves the hamlet with soiled stake and a purpose in life.
|
|
|
Post by fritzmaitland on Sept 12, 2020 11:49:09 GMT
Are you reading this in order? 😮😮😮😮
|
|
|
Post by The Lurker In The Shadows on Sept 12, 2020 14:39:33 GMT
Are you reading this in order? 😮😮😮😮 Is that unusual? I know I read anthologies and collections in order. Apart from it being a good way to ensure I don't accidentally lose track of what I have read and haven't, I figure that the order stories are presented in often - though not always - has had a bit of thought put into it... though that may be more of a thing with single author collections than anthologies.
|
|