Dark Arts
The Horror Writers Association Presents: Dark Arts Cover artwork by Jill Bauman About the Book: In this anthology, award-winning editor John Pelan invites his colleagues in the Horror Writers Association to contribute their darkest thoughts on the creative processes. Step into the gallery and view twenty-two of the most disturbing visions that can be conjured by these dark artistes... Stay as long as you dare.... "Artists of various stripes give the uncanny shape and dangerous substance
in this pleasing horror anthology from Pelan (Lost on the Darkside).
Steve Rasnic Tem leads off with "The Disease Artist," a Kafkaesque
account of a performance artist in an antiseptic future who simulates disease
symptoms to reacquaint people with their mortality. Matt Cardin and Mark McLaughlin
close the book with "Nightmares, Imported and Domestic," a cleverly
inverted story about an artist whose dreams of an alternate life in a depressingly
bleak and ordinary world begin to overwhelm his waking hours. These two fine
tales serve as bookends for 20 stories that tend to feature gruesome works of
art that prove to have a basis in real life or artists whose dark visions expose
the grim reality of existence, notably Brian Hodge's "With Acknowledgments
to Sun Tzu" and Lucy Taylor's "I Hear You Quietly Singing." Other
contributors include Gerard Houarner, Tim Lebbon, Jeff VanderMeer and David
Niall Wilson." Table of Contents: Born is Seattle in 1957, John Pelan was inspired to become a writer at age thirteen when he discovered that Arkham House had published a book submitted by Ramsey Campbell at age sixteen. Not as precocious as Mr. Campbell, it was another two decades before he would begin writing seriously. Prior to launching his writing career he worked as a sales trainer, mixologist, steel-worker, and antiquarian bookseller. In 1986 he founded Axolotl Press and published several well-received volumes by authors such as Tim Powers, Charles de Lint, Michael Shea, and James P. Blaylock. He is the editor of several popular anthologies, including the Bram Stoker Award winning The Darker Side. His novella, The Colour out of Darkness, is available from Cemetery Dance Publications, with a second novella, Breaking the Lines, in the works. A major collection of his ghostly fiction Darkness, My Old Friend is forthcoming from Ash-Tree Press. As a researcher and historian of the horror genre John has edited over two-dozen single author collections including collections by Russell Kirk and Violet Hunt for Ash-Tree Press. He is currently working on assembling collections by Richard B. Gamon, Uel Key, and Daniel F. Galouye for publication by Darkside Press and Midnight House. John lives with his wife Kathy (and their six cats) in Seattle where they have just celebrated their twenty-fourth wedding anniversary. Published in two states:
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