Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews1 Comment on Review: ‘The Haunted Halls’ by Glenn Rolfe 
The Haunted Halls by Glenn Rolfe
Shadow Work Publishing (December 2016)
280 pages; $14.99 paperback; $2.99 e-book
Reviewed by Frank Michaels Errington
It’s been a while since I’ve read a good in-your-face horror novel. Don’t get me wrong, I read and enjoyed an abundance of excellent work in 2016, but when I compare them to The Haunted Halls, the latest from up-and-coming horror writer Glenn Rolfe, they’ve all been rather tame.Continue Reading
Upside Down: Inverted Tropes in Storytelling edited by Jaym Gates and Monica Valentinelli
Apex Book Company (December 2016)
$13.48 paperback; $4.99 ebook
Reviewed by Anton Cancre
Anthologies based on meta-fictive themes can be a bit of a sticky wicket. Sure, we get bored with the same old over and over again, and it is super cool when someone messes with our heads. At the same time, those “look how deft I am at subverting literature” stories are self important in the most boring way possible. Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews2 Comments on Review: ‘Behind Her Eyes’ by Sarah Pinborough 
Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough
Flatiron Books (January 2017)
320 pages; $18.18 hardback; $12.99 e-book
Reviewed by Frank Michaels Errington
There’s a quote from Benjamin Franklin at the beginning of Behind Her Eyes. It provides a clue, of sorts, as to the devilish nature of the story which follows.
Three can keep a secret if two are dead.
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews4 Comments on Review: ‘Zoopraxis’ by Richard Christian Matheson 
Zoopraxis by Richard Christian Matheson
Gauntlet Press
$275.00 lettered edition; $150.00 Limited Edition; $6o.oo Numered Edition
Reviewed by John Skipp
In the thirty years since Richard Christian Matheson burst upon the scene with his brilliant collection Scars and Other Distinguishing Marks, many things have changed. Up until his arrival, the short-short story was the purview of a miniscule handful of writers—Fredric Brown, Henry Slesar, and O. Henry leap most readily to mind—who’d mastered the art of telling a tight, twisted tale with a punch at the end in one thousand words or less, on a fairly regular basis.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews2 Comments on Review: ‘Relics’ by Tim Lebbon 
Relics by Tim Lebbon
Titan Books (March 21, 2017)
336 pages; $9.76 paperback; $9.99 e-book
Reviewed by Dave Simms
The first literary hit of the new year has been born. Tim Lebbon, no stranger to penning stories which shrug off the shackles of genre, has hit 2017 hard with the first of a breathtaking trilogy. Equal parts thriller, horror, and fantasy, Relics takes readers back to his best world creating in the apocalyptic Silence, Coldbrook, and The Nature of Balance, along with the more fantastic in Fallen and Echo City. Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Infernal Parade’ by Clive Barker 
Infernal Parade by Clive Barker
Subterranean Press (February 2017)
81 pages; $275.00 lettered edition; $60.00 limited edition; $3o.oo Trade Edition
Reviewed by Blu Gilliand
Infernal Parade is the second volume compiling stories created by Clive Barker to accompany figures created in conjunction with Todd McFarlane. The first, Tortured Souls, benefited because it began life as a novella that was broken up to go along with the packaging of the various figures. Infernal Parade is a series of character sketches meant to lend a little backstory to the figures, making it feel incomplete when pulled together in one volume.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Lilith’s Demons’ by Julie R. Enszer 
Lilith’s Demons by Julie R. Enszer
A Midsummer Night’s Press (December 2015)
64 pages, $14.95 paperback
Reviewed by Joshua Gage
For those who don’t know, The Alphabet of Ben Sirach is a medieval rabbinic text famous, amongst other things, for its reference to Lilith. Lilith is the woman that, according to Hebraic lore, God made before he made Eve; she was Adam’s first wife, but refused to submit to him sexually, so she flew off and became mother of demons. Julie R. Enszer builds on this mythos in her book, Lilith’s Demons.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews2 Comments on Review: ‘The Final Reconciliation’ by Todd Keisling 
The Final Reconciliation by Todd Keisling
Crystal Lake Publishing (February 2017)
106 pages; $3.99 e-book
Reviewed by Frank Michaels Errington
First, some background on The King in Yellow. Prior to season one of HBO’s True Detective series, many folks had never heard of Robert W. Chambers or his book of short stories by the same name. The book is named after a fictional play with the same title. The first half of the book features highly esteemed weird stories, and has been described by critics as a classic in the field of the supernatural. There are ten stories, the first four of which mention The King in Yellow, a forbidden play which induces despair or madness in those who read it.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Universal Harvester’ by John Darnielle 
Universal Harvester by John Darnielle
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (February 7, 2017)
224 pages; $15.00 hardcover; $11.99 e-book
Reviewed by Blu Gilliand
When you work at Cemetery Dance, you tend to make certain assumptions about the books publishers send to you for review. Sometimes, those assumptions are way off. John Darnielle’s Universal Harvester proved to be one of those instances….in the best possible way.
When I got the book (cleverly packaged in a plastic clamshell case like an old VHS tape, for reasons that would become clear when I read it) and scanned its press sheet, a few things jumped out at me: mentions of the “haunted, open landscape of middle-America;” “ominous and disturbing footage” spliced into a video store’s rental tapes; an investigation into “the origins of these unsettling scenes.” I took these tidbits and began to splice together my own version of the book.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Greetings from Moon Hill’ by Anthony J. Rapino 
Greetings from Moon Hill by Anthony J. Rapino
Precipice Books (October 2016)
300 pages; $3.99 e-book
Reviewed by Frank Michaels Errington
I wanted to love Greetings from Moon Hill and I can’t quite put a finger on what went wrong. Conceptually, it’s a great idea. A small town “tucked into the folds of the Pennsylvania countryside.” A place of “Unseen things that are all around us. Impossible flowers, witches, interdimensional beings, murder cover-ups” and more. These are all things I love, so what went wrong?Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews2 Comments on Review: ‘The Devil Crept In’ by Ania Ahlborn 
The Devil Crept In by Ania Ahlborn
Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster (February 7, 2017)
374 pages; $11.04 paperback; $11.99 e-book
Reviewed by Blu Gilliand
The Devil Crept In is the second people-go-into-the-woods-and-bad-things-happen book I’ve read this year (after Nick Cutter’s excellent Little Heaven), and the third in recent memory (including Paul Tremblay’s excellent Disappearance at Devil’s Rock). Ania Ahlborn’s latest novel stands shoulder-to-shoulder with those two—not just because of the premise, but because of the excellence of its execution. Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Too Soon Dead’ by Michael Kurland 
Too Soon Dead by Michael Kurland
Titan Books (November 2015)
320 pages; $12.95 paperback; ebook $7.99
Reviewed by Peter Tomas
Michael Kurland’s little misadventure, Too Soon Dead, is a wild goose chase of moderately restricted proportions. Columnist Alexander Brass and his small team, when approached by a rather large man with some very interesting pictures (whom also happens into quite a bind later) run from here to there, asking questions, being profound, finding corpses and making witty remarks. They discover all kinds of interesting things about individuals involved in government during their exploratory run, and in the end, uncover a conspiracy that could have very well led to a disaster.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Of Saints and Shadows’ by Christopher Golden 
Of Saints and Shadows by Christopher Golden
JournalStone (September 2016)
340 pages; $29.95 hardcover; $19.95 paperback; $7.95 e-book
Reviewed by Dave Simms
JournalStone has been a treasure trove of new authors and new stories which rarely disappoints. For years now, each release has drawn strong attention from readers of horror, dark fantasy, and other speculative fiction. This time, they made a smart decision to reprint Christopher Golden’s “Shadow Saga” series.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘Pinball Drugs Aliens Satan’ by Fiada Fey 
Pinball Drugs Aliens Satan by Fiada Fey
Furtive Labors (October 2015)
36 pages, $4.00 paperback
Reviewed by Joshua Gage
Fiada Fey (1980-2008) was a St. Paul-based novelist, short story writer and cut-up artist. His prose, while lacking in craft, shows a lot of passion for the bizarre horror genre. Pinball Drugs Aliens Satan is his posthumous collection.
Readers will immediately feel Fey’s desire as a writer. His collection of stories speaks to an author passionate about the tales he has to tell, and readers will be able to empathize with that urge. Fey clearly had a vision for his art, and used cut-up techniques to attempt to bring that vision to life. Pinball Drugs Aliens Satan speaks of notebooks filled with stories and story ideas, and as a posthumous collection, leaves the reader wishing that Fey had had the time and skill to carry them out. Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: ‘The Rib From Which I Remake the World’ by Ed Kurtz 
The Rib From Which I Remake the World by Ed Kurtz
ChiZine Publications (September 2016)
350 pages; $10.39 paperback; $7.99 e-book
Reviewed by Frank Michaels Errington
The Rib From Which I Remake the World is one of those books which doesn’t fit neatly into any category. Is it noir? Horror? Psychological Thriller? Occult? The list could go on, but truthfully, what Ed Kurtz’s latest is, is a helluva read.Continue Reading
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