Whitstable by Stephen Volk

WHITSTABLE by Stephen Volk

 

A Spectral Press: Spectral Visions III publication

Publication date: May 26^th 2013

 

A review by Geoff Nelder

I have not reviewed a novella quite like this. The protagonist is a real person. Yes, I’ve reviewed fictional biographies but they’ve been of people in the distant past – eg The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory, not of someone I could have met and who, via the film media, we all have an intimate connection. It is kind of a fan fiction then, but far superior to most.

Peter Cushing was born on May 26^th 1913. Exactly a century later this novella will be released as a homage to the legendary actor, who lived with his wife in Whitstable.

 

Stephen Volk clearly researched Cushing’s life in great detail but this is not a biography. It is fiction and yet, as a film goer and Doctor Who watcher, I fell under the spell of Volk’s narrative and can say my disbelief was suspended in its reading. A reader should be forgiven if he or she believed this story was based on a real event.

 

The story is set in Whitstable in Kent in 1971 shortly after Peter Cushing’s wife died. He’s fraught with grief, feeling more like an old man than the young fifty-seven-year-old he really is. Morbidly insular he leaves his house to keep away from prying visitors but encounters a young boy who thinks the actor is Doctor Van Helsing, Cushing’s vampire hunting character in the Hammer films. The boy seeks help to vanquish his mother’s boyfriend, who is a vampire, or some other form of evil.

 

Although the story is woven around the boy’s concerns, transferred to Cushing, who takes on the vampire-hunt challenge for real as a welcome distraction from his grief, we experience much more than the plot. Between the bread of the main story is whole-fruit cinema jam, enough to make any horror fan salivate. Volk makes Cushing relate everything to something filmed by him or his contemporaries in a smorgasbord of cinema delight. Accordingly, the action in the novella reads as if a camera follows Cushing. For example he sees a boy about ten years old standing at an inquisitive distance, head tilted to one side with slats of cloud behind him and a substantial book under his arm.’ And in his conversation we have the boy picking at flaking paint on a signpost.

Resonance for me exist in little asides. Cushing is deluged with unopened manuscripts teetering in piles in his house. I had a literary agent in Stirling who vanished. When one of her clients persuaded the police to force her door there were heaps of unopened manuscripts, mostly in brown paper parcels tied with string, all the way up her stairs. She’s still missing but that’s another story.

There are aspects of the narrative that don’t ring quite true for me as a teacher and recipient of childspeak for decades. I don’t think a ten-year-old boy would make such long speeches so coherently from such an inarticulate family background and use words like ‘determined’, ‘crumbled’; although as a horror film enthusiast he might well say ‘vanquished’.  Would an English junior schoolboy say ‘Movies’? Perhaps he would as he is surrounded by movie books and films, but it jarred a little. Not so much jarred as shocked when I found Volk had named the boy as Carl Drinkwater. Grief, I taught him at a school in Chester!

Volk certainly grabs other characteristics of children. ‘“No,” the boy said, sounding supremely affronted, as if he was dealing with an idiot.’ Haha my grandson does that to me and he’s only four. As do my granddaughters though by then I’m thinking it’s more about me.

A fascinating dialogue occurs between Cushing and Carl’s mother. She accuses horror films of being a bad influence on children. Interestingly this debate is in my family too. Batman’s activities create nightmares in my grandson. (though it could be a scam by him to have extra hugs in bed with mum). Cushing’s response, which I rather like, is that he doesn’t make horror films so much as enable an experience of fantasy , an escapism from the humdrum but one in which Good prevails over Evil.

Whitstable offers us insights into the acting profession. Love such quotes that I assume are either legitimate, or should be, such as the one from Olivier to Cushing: “Be sincere, dear boy, always be sincere—and when you’ve faked that, you’ve cracked it.” Note the ironic humour, and there are other lighter moments in what otherwise could have been too gloomy in its poignancy particularly the unwritten point that Cushing’s heavy smoking was probably a factor in his wife’s fatal emphysema. I admit to amusing myself, as Cushing does, in this clip:

“You’re Christopher Lee aren’t you?”

He corrected her with consummate politeness, tugging on his white cotton glove.

“No, I’m the other one.”

“Vincent Price?”

He kept his smile to himself. “That’s right.”

I also like his conversations with his deceased wife – consoling and urging him to have faith in himself. And as a reflection of his view that fantasy represents his work more than horror, he says: “Concentration camp: that’s true horror.” I say the same to my wife when she says something a tad awkward is a nightmare. No, a giant slimey monster eating you from your toes up is a nightmare!

There’s so much more in this novella, which has the depth and characterization of a novel. As a story it really finishes before the end, but aficionados of Cushing’s films, including Stephen Volk, and I, clearly didn’t want to stop.

The Afterword by Mark Morris is homage in action, a declaration of love and appreciation of the genre as portrayed by Peter Cushing and of the man himself.

—

A Spectral Press: Spectral Visions III publication

Publication date: May 26^th 2013

Available in Ltd Hardback and unlimited Paperback

Retail: £17.50 (UK) / 24€ (EU) / $30.00 USA / $30.00 RoW

Available from the publishers: Spectral Press, 5 Serjeants Green, Neath Hill, Milton Keynes, Bucks, MK14 6HA, United Kingdom.

Pre-orders:  http://spectralpress.wordpress.com/2013/01/31/whitstable-news-and-pre-orders/

Web: http://spectralpress.wordpress.com  | Email: spectralpress@gmail.com 

 

Nelder News:

Sales of How to Win Short Story Competitions are steady. Get yours here.

Exit, Pursued by a Bee is at http://geoffnelder.com/exitbee.htm Several readers have pointed out recently that a principle notion in that book is being proved true. Ie that the universe might be chaotic but that the Earth is in a kind of bubble of stability. In Exit that stability is shaken when alien artifacts leave. Just shows that fiction might not be so unbelievable after all.

ARIA: Left Luggage continues to sell copies to wise readers. Links are

Kindle – Amazon.com  http://www.amazon.com/ARIA-Left-Luggage-ebook/dp/B008RADGYC/

Paperback Amazon.com http://www.amazon.com/ARIA-Left-Luggage-Volume-1/dp/1905091958/

Kindle – UK – http://www.amazon.co.uk/ARIA-Left-Luggage-ebook/dp/B008RADGYC/

Paperback UK  http://www.amazon.co.uk/ARIA-Left-Luggage-Geoff-Nelder/dp/1905091958/

Publisher’s website with more details and formats. http://www.ll-publications.com/leftluggage.html

Buy it quick before you run out of memory!

You tube video trailer  http://youtu.be/oh0AAXIe8VU

Join me on twitter at http://twitter.com/geoffnelder

Blood Fugue by Joseph D’Lacey

Blood Fugue by Joseph D’Lacey

Published by Proxima Books

November 2012

ISBN 978-1907773372

A rural American community is content in its ignorance of malevolent forces in nearby woods kept in check by Jimmy Kerrigan. But he’s overwhelmed, misunderstood, and beguiled to the point where the town might be lost. The key is a giant intriguing tree and its erotic, mythical secrets. “Joseph D’Lacey rocks!” – Stephen King.

Reviewed by Geoff Nelder

Fugue is a wonderful word to use in a title. Fugue for a Darkening Island by Christopher Priest for example. However, it isn’t just in the title in Blood Fugue, but as a premise. Fugue in the non-musical sense relates to a loss or change in identity, Jimmy Kerrigan isn’t human in the normal  sense, and yet he is one of the good guys. So was his father, also Fugue, or was until he transformed into another stage. The novel reaches into our souls and either takes or plants emotions of fear and a kind of holistic unMother Nature from the woods into our veins vicariously through the characters in Blood Fugue.

Most of the action, reaction, fear and hope occurs in the forest. It reminds me so much of the Mythago Wood series by Robert Holdstock, but the horror in D’Lacey’s novel digs deeper, and the writing more subtle and literary. I have a fascination with forests ever since I bivouacked in snowbound Cranham Woods, Gloucestershire, as a young boy scout for my woodland badge. Hence I wandered through the woods in Blood Fugue with knowing familiarity, and that was my mistake. Now I cannot visit my favourite local forest, Delamere, without a primed flame-thrower. Whereas before, the gnarled boughs, pine aromas, whirling acer seeds were a source of admiration and delight, they now represent danger, evil. From being a well-balanced individual, I am now Dendrophobic. Thanks.

Even Jimmy Kerrigan, our lone wannabe saviour, is surprised to learn that in his woods is a giant tree. At first intrigued, he becomes afraid. Fearful for the safety of the exploring family he is compelled to rescue and also for the townspeople of Hobson’s Valley. What is it about giant trees? That one of Jimmy’s is a Cthulhu meets Sherwood – terrifying. I encountered a giant tree in Kill Bill Wood this summer. Ah, no, Kit Bill Wood, you know – near Over Kellet near Carnforth. A great Ash tree has marked a boundary there for centuries and lives on to watch over transgressors. I hugged it, because I had yet to read Blood Fugue.

D’Lacey is a master of fine character detail. Shopkeeper Randall had spatulate fingers – where the ends are wider – murderers’ fingers. It made me look carefully at mine. To show readers the setting of Jimmy’s place the reader is treated to what he imagines his visitors see and think. An expert example of vicarious Show – rare to see it done so well. Blood Fugue could be criticised for being too incredible but to me disbelief is suspended for a moment enough for it to all be true!

If you enjoy eroticism in the woods, being terrified in an arboretum, and want a horror story, beautifully written yet will shake you to the core, then read Blood Fugue by Joseph D’Lacey.

My shorts on Ether Books

I found my horror gangster story is in the top 10 at Ether Books – to be read on mobiles and handhelds. download the Ether App and find Doppelgangster – http://bit.ly/bpvC84 but only if you have a mobile phone, iPad or similar that can read it. Interesting idea.

Besides Doppelgangster – a short story about a gangster who finds his double is in town messing up his life, there are other stories of mine on Ether Books such as:

Goliath – he was a misunderstood, maltreated child; In Absentia – a man thinks he has amnesia but is a little girl’s imaginary friend. Ether are still deciding on accepting Don’t Bite My Finger – a Zen Buddhist story.

Dead for the Money by Peg Herring

Dead for the Money – A Dead Detective Mystery (Book Two) by Peg Herring

ISBN: 9780957152700

For Kindle ASIN: B007RSLPC0

LL-Publications 2012

231 pages

The premise in this detective novel continues from that original concept in the first: a few people, who had died and on a kind of idyllic cruise ship in limbo, can ask for a mystery surrounding their demise to be investigated. Seamus is the clever one who, although dead, goes back to the living, his spirit jumping from living body to body in order to hear and see what they do and put the clues together. Like in the first novel, Seamus, unwillingly, takes a female partner. Mildred is keen to demonstrate her investigative prowess and although she is naïve and makes blunders, Seamus is impressed at her observational skills he lacks. For example when they interview the deceased Dunbar, she spots he persistently tilts his head to one side indicating that in his living existence he was partially deaf even though now in limbo no one has an affliction.

Think Ellery Queen meets Casper, except that the friendly ghosts here are invisible and silent – for the most part. So when a man falls over a cliff edge, the obvious suspect has to be exonerated.

There are beautiful descriptive phrases thought and uttered in a way only possible by the dead in this unusual novel. Consider this as Mildred looks at the ocean over the limbo cruise ship’s rail. ‘…colours beyond what had been seen, sounds unlike any other, scents and feelings that were stimulating and calming at once, and even a taste in the air… a person’s favourite but better.’ Sensory overload, but better.

Something else we can’t have in terrestrial detective novels is the way Seamus, inside the head of a witness, finds his own moods altering in response to that of the host. For example when he is in the teenager, Brodie, he finds himself being moody and irritable; when he jumps to the policeman, Rainer, he becomes negative; then he leaps into Scarlett and at once picks up on her vivacity. Actually, Peg Herring calls her attitude ‘spirited’. I asked my wife if she thought that a pun or completely unintentional. She opted for a pun. (she’d read the book in between her university science work. She likes detective stories but can’t stand science fiction, nor unscientific fantasy tales – such as I write. In spite of her literary prejudices, she enjoyed Dead for the Money, and that speaks volumes for its entertainment value.)

There’s living human emotions and observations in this book too. A line I appreciated is where a widow, Callie, needed to switch men as, in turn they got wise of being used as an ATM.

Returning to the prose, Herring has a knack for evocative phrasing and she, like me, prefers to use real geographical places for her real world. Mackinac Island has an olde-worlde charm on the USA-Canadian border. ‘Brodie… pictured moonlit walks along the road that circled the island, the scent of lilacs, the sound of ferry horns, a trip to Arch Rock or a carriage ride through the tiny, crowded town.’

Partly because of those phrases, and the mystery-solving, Peg Herring’s Dead Detective novels are reminiscent of Joyce C Oates books, such as The Falls, which is also set on the Canadian – USA border and that one also starts with a fall. In this novel there is promise of a fall at the end too as a young woman, being chased, climbs a narrow cable up a suspension bridge. More suspense than is good for readers of a delicate constitution – be warned!

Anyone who loves detective mysteries and wonders what it might be like to be dead but not yet passed on, will find Dead for the Money an escapade they cannot put down.

Available from LL-Publications as an ebook and paperback. Click here.

Snake Eyes by Joseph D’Lacey

The award-winning writer of that jaw-dropping horror book, Meat, has released two novellas in one book – ebook. Grab it today!

Snake Eyes by Joseph D’Lacey

Ebook and paperback

 

File Size: 552 KB

Print Length: 139 pages

Publisher: Crossroad Press & Bad Moon Books Digital Edition edition (April 12, 2012)

Sold by: Amazon Digital Services

Language: English

ASIN: B007TW8N60

ISBN-13: 978-0-9837799-7-1

If there is a New Wave science-horror-fiction sub-genre then Snake-Eyes would be its cutting edge. The reader is treated to a smorgasbord of hallucinatory ideas with a logical surprisingly sane spine. Joseph D’Lacey can write grisly horror as demonstrated in the acclaimed Meat novel but the tone, while horrific and nightmarish is more subtle. Robert Johnson is a family man, trying to be successful at his accountancy career, or is that his narcotics enforcer job, but then where has his family gone? Not to worry, they exist – in a fashion. Starting with giant spiders the arachnid theme travels either just behind or in front of Johnson through the tiers of his existence. Keeping with the spiders, this story is a web of ideas that will pull you along, screaming, puzzled but with an eventual resolution.

D’Lacey writes horror with a literary pen. I wish I’d thought of ‘a parting of minds’. He also is a master of sensory Show, using senses of smell and touch to excellent effect. Good to note too that his characters react to those sensory experiences.

Spoiler warning: I’ve read many generation ship stories, but none quite like this one. From Harry Harrison’s Captive Universe, Brian Aldis’ Non-Stop and many others are enjoyable takes on the theme and often you wonder how a contemporary writer can find a new angle. This story has. And for those collectors of zombie tales, this isn’t one. There are former humans that become animated known as revenants, but they learn to run after Johnson and we all know that zombies can’t run.

There’s a shorter bonus story bundled with Snake Eyes – A Trespasser in Long Lofting that explores what happens when a well-endowed demon crashlands in your neighbourhood. A tale of tremendous and lascivious fun.

The Respectable Face of Tyranny by Gary Fry

A review by Geoff Nelder of

The Respectable Face of Tyranny by Gary Fry

Spectral Visions Volume 1

Published by Spectral Press April 2012  website here

Suppose you are a recently divorced man with a typical teen daughter to bring up and protect. Stress enough for most ordinary people. Then add acute financial problems resulting in having to live in a caravan on a cliff top and you need fortitude. Into this mix your caravan is in the enigmatic landscape of Whitby, North Yorkshire, and you have more imagination than Roald Dahl seeing what might be hallucinations on the beach where the dinosaurs lived, and you too would wonder what life is all about.

Gary Fry has crafted a cunning tale here. No quotidian (his word of the month I think, and I like it) ghost or horror story but a recipe for madness, and yet a grasp for sanity as Josh sees symbols of his financial woes in the Jurassic landscape. This story, like others, by sheer coincidence – in the Spectral Press unique collection – have a personal resonance for me. I too have fossil hunted on Saltwick Bay, wondered about the disintegrating concrete boat from a World warring era, and smelt the metallic tang of pebbles but also the pungent nose-pinching odours of seaweed. I am a keen admirer of fiction that uses real geography and it is cleverly used here.

Praise be to the ammonite god that Whitby Abbey is used and yet no mention of Dracula is called for. Yeay – a first, surely. No vampire is needed to make this story stand out as a literary gem. A dwelling on life’s struggles in the static dwelling on the cliff – where strange electric flocks might be the children of the creatures of that coastline’s geological strata.

Who isn’t beset by financial problems in this global recession? If they lost you your marriage, home, and gave you new problems, how your mind would contort to find solutions. Yet, only in Gary Fry’s imagination has these elements combined – the ancient and the modern, past souls and contemporary life.

Thank you to Gary’s publisher, too for allowing font size changes to great effect. For example – On the beach    ‘… heard the sound return to him several times, on each

occasion quieter, quieter, quieter’

This is reminiscent of Walter Miller’s A Canticle For Leibowitz p83 where Brother Francis timidly speaks in a tiny font to the Lord Abbot, then when asked to speak up, blurts out in capitals. Hah. That was in 1960, and generally it’s been discouraged since and can look childish, but masterfully done here.

A theme in the story is on tattoos. Teenage Sally wants one, of course, and dad doesn’t want her too, of course. Cliché so far, but it develops in an undercurrent way, and I love the way she teased him. Also the tattooed man in Whitby Fair so reminded me of Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man, as does – in a good, ironic way – Gary Fry’s publisher himself: Simon Marshall-Jones. You are in this story, just as delectable.

This story isn’t to missed by those readers of the noir side to contemporary life, tainted by ghastly visions, supported by love. Cleverly done.

Sparrowhawk by Paul Finch

Sparrowhawk by Paul Finch

Reviewed by Geoff Nelder

Pendragon Press 2010

Reviewed the Kindle version via Brentwood Press 2011

ASIN: B006FORSP0

The paradox of conflicts between what you see and know.

 

Once freed from a vile debtor’s prison Captain Sparrowhawk of the 16^th Light Dragoons had to pay for his freedom with a strange guarding mission. Four aspects of Paul Finch’s novella drew me in: authenticity of geography and history; the exquisite writing style; personal coincidences; and most of all the grim storyline fascination of apparitional ghouls from the past, and the satisfaction of finally solving the puzzle.

1843 was an interesting time in England for social contrasts and political awakening. Add this to one of the coldest winters on record and we have terrific conflict and tension. As a climatologist I know about that winter, so I was mightily impressed by the research Finch did to make the narrative real. Same with other details. He refers to toppers. My granddad was nicknamed Topper because he regularly wore one at the weekends and as a joke in the pub even though he had risen no further than master plasterer as an artisan. Later in the story, our hero was battling suicidal odds in Afghanistan (so topical). My other granddad was wounded there during the third Anglo-Afghan war in the 1920s. How did Finch know my family connections so well – hah.

Sparrowhawk is paid and instructed by the enigmatic and beautiful Mss Evangeline, who knows an uncomfortable amount of information about him. She is the key to the puzzle in this story and turns the lock iteratively with each chapter. Clever.

Also smart is the writing. Just listen to this description of Angus. ‘Here, an attendant was waiting, a big, raw-boned fellow with thick, red whispers and braces over his linen undershirt. The tattoos on his brawny arms indicated a military background. When he spoke, it was with a Highlands accent.’ You are there with Sparrowhawk. Not only is there superb Show (as writers and editors urge on their writers) but the language is of the 1840s. We have costermongers –street sellers, ‘haranguing the public from their barrows, selling everything from eel soup to pigs’ trotters, from lemonade to kitchen grease, from frogs, lizards and snails to rare and exotic birds, most of which would be sparrows and finches done up with colourful paint.’ Finch’s research is beautifully revealed in words such as that lovely harridan and breveted, right down to knowing popular tunes of the day as constables would whistle In Dulci Jubilo on their beat. Trust Finch to be aware, unlike Hollywood directors that you don’t fire guns from the same place twice. I think Paul Finch must have been in the SAS, and have a time machine.

Sparrowhawk questions the veracity of what he experiences, but his brought-to-life father denies him a right to question it and to face the existing reality. Interesting philosophical stance, but it is whimsical and the probable hallucination vanishes, yet stays as a torment.

Some readers may feel that some of the narrative detail is infodump eg about the Peterloo massacre of 1819 but it is well done, and relevant to the plot. It is forgiven when a man-lion creature is described inside the terror, as having eyes that are ‘pits of molten gold’ – I wish I’d written that.

This novella is unmissable for any aficionado of ghost, horror, and historical fiction.  

Link to Amazon.co.uk Kindle

 

update on Don’t Bite My Finger

The Monk Punk fantasy anthology with my Zen story ‘Don’t bite my finger’ is now available on Kindle at http://www.amazon.com/Monk-Punk-ebook/dp/B004Z1UZ82/
and on Nook at http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Monk-Punk/AJ-French/e/2940012608338

The Dead Detective Agency by Peg Herring

What a splendid book title!

The Dead Detective Agency by Peg Herring

Reviewed by Geoff Nelder

Published by LL-Publications April 2011

ISBN: 978-1905091706

A vibrant easy-going twenty-five-year-old woman, Tori, with not a single enemy in this world, is shot dead in her apartment for no apparent reason. The apparent lack of motive narks her so much she refuses to go to Heaven. Instead, she finds herself in a kind of Paradise cruise ship among others in limbo. She is being coached to accept her lot but when she learns there is an elite able to cross back she argues with the high and mighty and wins.

As a consequence we have a unique novel, in both senses of the word, where there are not only two detectives trying to solve a puzzling murder, but one of them is dead. In fact Tori is with her mentor dead detective, Seamus. The two demised sleuths can only exist back on their former world by inhabiting the living, sometimes the same one. They can jump between people but only in extreme circumstances may they make their presence felt. Readers are used to following a story through the eyes of a protagonist. However, in this tale, they are engaging the action through the eyes of a ‘ghost’ through their inhabited live person! And yet you don’t get lost. The narrative is an easy read belying the complexity of the issues.

There are light moments. For example when alive Tori tried to match-make two of her colleagues. Carmon lacks confidence and though she is enamoured with Abe, needed a shove. That came from Tori, finally, after she died. Brilliant.

There is sadness here too. Tori’s death was a tragic error, as her investigation uncovers. So much life for her that she really anticipated living, cruelly robbed. At least she is assured of an even better after-life.

Because the two dead detectives can switch hosts if in sufficient close proximity, and with the story style carrying a kind of hard-boiled gumshoe feel, this novel could rightly be called Sam Spade meets Quantum Leap. The action in the book is contemporary even though the feel is of an earlier era. The cover art, by Helen E.H. Madden, reinforces the 30s style beautifully with the depiction of Tori – her wistfulness as a limbo cruiseship passenger.

I remain a pecuniary ignoramus about how an investment bank works but in one respect I am at least up to conversationalist level. Thanks to Peg Herring, I am now informed on ‘selling away’, the underhand practise of cheating both the firm and client to the profit of a swindler. It is this practice that ultimately led to Tori’s death, and that of others in this action novel. In an interesting way this is Financial Swindling for Dummies. Thanks!

On another level I felt Tori and Seamus could have treated the reader to a more exciting time in their voyeuristic travelling inside other people. I ask myself: would I resist the temptation to learn more about women by being inside the head of one – seeing through her eyes and experiencing all her senses? No, I’d go all the way and I feel a lack of the sexual frisson and intellectual gender differences that could have been explored.

Even so, there is much novelty here to commend to the reader. Seamus, as an experienced dead detective, leaps from a man to a rat, then to a dog. Wow. Cross-species sensory travelling and Herring doesn’t disappoint. Now I know why some dogs bark all the time – they are possessed!

A line I’m sure many of us on Earth can relate to is when the policeman ‘used his remote as a weapon against commercials’. I wish I’d written that.

Overall, in spite of Earthly tragedies, we have the joyful theme that all good people make it to ‘Heaven’, whatever that is. This limbo novel has much to recommend it.  See purchasing details here.

These Trespasses – book review

These Trespasses by Kenneth W. Cain 

 Paperback: 206 pages

Publisher: Post Mortem Press (February 10, 2011)

ISBN-13: 978-0615444147

Kindle: ASIN B004MDLTYC

Reviewed by Geoff Nelder

 This novel is a cross-genre science fiction / horror though leaning more to the latter. Unlike most dystopian apocalyptic stories in which the whole planet suffers, the action here is limited to a rural area of Illinois. We are, thankfully, not bombarded with presidential speeches, and global infodumps, but experience a strange phenomenon through the eyes of a handful of people, who could be your neighbours. In fact those people feel so real, the reader can forgive aspects of the plot that would otherwise stretch credulity to breaking point.

 Although, Martin, the lead character, has doubts about why the army lay waste the towns in his State, and is troubled to the point of trauma over the transmogrification of his brother, he is extraordinarily solid. He’s the kind of man people are drawn to in a crisis, and they are. Even though he had to shoot his own brother, and witness toe-curling horrors caused by both alien-changed-human creatures, and the army, he has an instinct to make the right decisions for his little group of survivors. All the more puzzling then why he leaves a paper trail: a kind of diary and instructions, on their escape route. Yes, other survivors, such as Sheila, who yearns to be Martin’s woman – love at first sight, though desperation to be loved is the attractive force – needed to find directional clues. But then so could the soldiers and I don’t buy the explanation that none of them read anything.* There are other plot puzzles, but I don’t mind. They are not too inconsistent with the bizarre situation the characters are in, and even normal life is rather baffling, at least to me.

 My favourite character is an ornery brute of a man, Ike. Many readers find themselves being attracted to an evil character, but those ogres are usually intelligent (think of Hannibal Lecter, and Lex Luthor); antagonists whose wit matches even out-performs the protagonist. Not Ike. He is dumber than an Illinois hog; his specialities being cussing, lewdness and misunderstanding. Yet every time a chapter came along told through Ike’s point of view, my pleasure zone buzzed. It’s rare to be so entertained while reading a horror story. Following poor Ike’s intellectually-challenged interpretations of the bizarre happenings first hand is a treat. His sections are well-written too:

‘Ike felt the smile… then he was able to find enough air in his lungs to get out the next words. “Fuck you and yer Goddamned hive.” … Ike smiled and it sent a surge of pain into his head. He let the smile subside, but it was too late. Everything began to swim in pain. His world spun out of control and Ike began to feel a pull to the darkness. With that feeling Ike passed out.’

Hive? Yes, the aliens have built at least one and their human captives occupy it. Weird and yet it works, mainly because of what I said at the beginning. I would go so far as to say that in spite of several typos, and head-hopping point-of-view flips, These Trespasses is a master class in characterization.  An easy read, horror readers of all types will find scenes to salivate over in this page turner.

* Footnote. US combatants are issued with memory sticks containing novels. I only knew this after my publisher’s inbox bulged with emails from US soldiers in the Middle East asking for the sequel to his book, The Ardly Effect that had been made freely available.

buy Kindle  paperback