Over the last few months, debates have arisen (once again) about the use of Trigger Warnings for literature. I got involved then and I find myself once again wading into the conversation because, over on social media, a newspaper article has started being shared around on the very such topic and an acquaintance not only shared it but said how ridiculous it is that a book would need a trigger warning. 

I tried to engage in conversation with him, to explain why it is important for books to have trigger warnings but he didn’t want to know. He was close-minded and ended the conversation with “then they shouldn’t read horror”. Before that useful tip, he even said that if books need Trigger Warnings then so does pornography. After all, what if a homophobe clicked on some porn and was treated to a close-up video of a penis. At both comments, I rolled my eyes so damn hard that I actually saw my brain. And what a magnificent specimen it was too.

Before I explain Trigger Warnings (and why they’re needed) let’s take a look at his answers. First, pornography. With pornography there are multiple categories to choose from. You can type in what you want to see and you can find it easily. It’s very rare that an unwanted surprise will invade your chosen show. There is even the choice of softcore and hardcore to choose from so, again, you really can tailor what you expose yourself to (no pun intended). For the more “extreme” categories, there are even websites dedicated to such “likes” (for example, shit-eating) and you won’t find such content on the bigger, more mainstream sites.

 I explained this to my “friend” and he dismissed it. 

I turned to his other comment about how people shouldn’t read horror if they don’t like it. Keep in mind, by this point of the conversation I had explained the different types of horror you can (to him) get but we will get to that in a minute. Now, from his argument, if people dislike certain aspects of horror then they should not read horror. Well, okay. That means if you dislike gross-out comedy because it offends you, you should avoid all comedy, right? After all it is easy to pick up such content given it is kept next to the more generic content (such as slapstick, or even romantic comedies). So, with how he views trigger warnings, if you don’t like a certain sub-genre then you should just avoid that entire genre to save yourself from accidentally stumbling on something you don’t like. A stupid outlook if ever I heard one but, then, engaging with this individual on social media was very much like talking to a brick wall. They were right, everyone else was wrong. At this point I walked away because life is short and I felt myself ageing every time he opened his mouth. 

So, why do I believe Trigger Warnings are essential? Simple: The world is a cruel place and some people have lived lives which would break some of us. They have experienced a kind of pain and trauma that we could not possibly begin to imagine and the last thing they want is to accidentally stumble across such themes in the books they choose to read. You see, not all blurbs explain about (for example) graphic rape scenes, animal cruelty, child abuse, miscarriages and so on and so forth. In fact a lot of the time such topics can simply be a sub-plot which takes the reader by surprise. 

Even if you have no empathy for people who have suffered these things in real life, consider it from a business point of view: If they hate your book, they will leave a negative review, they will tell their friends to avoid it, you will lose a reader for life. If you show compassion and give them fair warning then - oh well - there’s nothing else you can do if they chose to read it and still review it negatively but, then, it’s them who look ridiculous. They’ll leave a bad review, someone will read it and the first thing they’ll wonder is, Why did they read the book given the warnings? 

Another tip for business? Treat someone’s triggers with respect. Only the other week there was a reader on Twitter looking for more extreme horror. My name was mentioned by a good friend and the reader commented they were worried about stumbling on material which triggered them. I saw the post, I reached out and I said that they can contact me at any time, about any of my books, if they want to know if it is safe to read. I don’t want to add to their trauma. I want them to read my work and enjoy it. My reply was re-tweeted a number of times. One comment came back with the tweet: Great first impression with the author who tried to help me as oppose mock my triggers. Because, yes, in some cases authors have been mocking people who have certain triggers. These authors are simply known as “assholes”.

Now we need to take pause for a moment so I can explain that not all horror books need trigger warnings. There are lots of sub-genres of horror but for the sake of this piece, I’m going to ignore them all and break “horror” down to mainstream horror and underground horror. Stephen King would be considered mainstream, as would Dean Koontz. Whilst I write in multi-genres with some books aimed more towards a mainstream audience, I got my big break in writing with extreme horror and splatter-punk. Both of these sub-genres I would put in the underground horror camp. The difference between the two of them? Simple:

In Stephen King’s book “Pet Sematary” the cat gets run over. The family is sad, they bury it. Obviously this is a rather simplistic view towards that particular part of the book and I’m certainly not making light of King’s work, or abilities as a wordsmith. But if you take that section of the book and re-write it as though writing an extreme horror story then we would know the colour of the guts, how far they stretched down the road and we’d no doubt hear the cat’s last “meow”, probably have its eyes rolling around and fixing on the owner just as they get to the mangled body. 

Biography
​
Born in 1980, MATT SHAW is the award winning published author of over 200 stories. His work has been translated into Japanese, Korean, German and French - as well as being adapted into graphic novels.

In 2018, Matt Shaw directed and produced his first feature film, MONSTER (available on Amazon) and, in 2019, he went on to produce and direct his second feature, NEXT DOOR.

* * * *. *
LINKS:
www.patreon.com/TheMattShaw

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/NYJCF6q?fbclid=IwAR0Mhj85waWYR-wQ6wQMmcSJySNbnoI1YfAiZ46HdLp6z5zff3_9TENZNwo

facebook.com/mattshawpublications

13 Minutes of Horror is a 60-second film challenge for women horror filmmakers, inclusive of BIWOC, LGBTQ+ women, disabled women, and non-binary creators. The Festival's inaugural 2021 theme is Folklore. Together with creators and partners, 13 Minutes is looking to redefine the horror industry and women’s roles within it.

Watch our 2021 Official Selections on Shudder from August 13 - September 13, 2021.​

Nyx Horror Collective is a community of diverse women creators who develop, celebrate, and elevate original, women-led horror content for film, TV, and new media.

What began as a simple 60-second film challenge in January 2021 blossomed quickly into the little festival that could. Garnering top notch judges from the horror genre and securing Shudder as its official streaming platform, Nyx Horror is proving itself to be a creative force of nature.

One of the missions at Nyx Horror and with 13 Minutes is to give women horror filmmakers of all identities and backgrounds greater exposure and more opportunities through strategic partnerships with established industry professionals. With that in mind, the Festival has garnered support from production companies and film incubators that include Blood Oath (Starry Eyes, Satanic Panic) and Squid Farm Productions (Shudder Original Shook), as well as from development executives at Blumhouse [Get Out, The Invisible Man (2020)].

“I cannot wait for audiences to see the creativity and talent. These filmmakers packed so much story and scares into one minute,” said Lisa Kröger, Festival Co-Producer.

“Our drive to keep generating incredible opportunities for this festival really speaks to our tenacity and passion, as individuals and as a team, to dispel the myth of ‘no women, LGBTQIA+ or people of color working in the genre.’ We’re right here; you can’t say you don’t know any. Not anymore.” – Mo Moshaty, Festival Co-Producer
​
“The messages that Nyx has received from women and non-binary filmmakers since launching 13 Minutes have been overwhelming in the most amazing way. This is why we do what we do—to share in the joy of so many talented creators is beyond rewarding.” – Kelly Krause, Festival Co-Producer

“We wanted to give these wonderful up-and-coming writers and directors the opportunity to have their work seen. The fact that Shudder is hosting us on their platform is a testament to their growing support of BIPOC and women-driven work and we’re eager for the world to see more of this kind of content.” - Melody Cooper, Festival Co-Producer


Nyx Horror Collective’s 13 Minutes of Horror Film Festival will air for 32 days on Shudder from August 13 – September 13, 2021.     ​

THE FIRST HORROR BOOK I REMEMBER READING 

I was twelve and already a veteran of horror movies, but my first book was Edgar Allan Poe’s Collected Tales and Poems. It was suggested to me for a book report. I took the suggestion and ran with it. I was so taken by it that it changed my life. My first story was The Tell-Tale Heart. I was never the same. I wasn’t scared. I was engrossed. The writing was revelatory; it was exuberant language. Poe’s best stories manage to stay on point, rarely engrossing in exhibitionist prose designed to make him appear smarter than his loathed peers. The Tell-Tale Heart is an example of that. So is The Masque of the Red Death and Berenice, an underrated gem.


THE FIRST HORROR FILM I REMEMBER WATCHING 

My brother loved horror movies that were really gross and sick. I just happened to love watching them, too. The first movie that made an impression on me was a VCR rental called The Gates of Hell. When the female lead saw Satan and she ended up puking her guts out through her mouth in response, it was the first time I saw someone’s insides out. The special effects on the gore was great. It looked like sausage links dipped in barbecue sauce, like the real thing. I couldn’t sleep for days.


THE GREATEST HORROR BOOK OF ALL TIME 

I can already hear people laughing at me after reading this one. I love Stephen King, and Clive Barker’s Books of Blood has got to have some consideration for this distinction, but my fave book of all time is still Poppy Z. Brite’s Wormwood. It’s a collection of stories, and it sang to me like gin and juice when I was still a college kid. Poppy described it as splatterpunk, but it didn’t feel like it. Wormwood is goth, poetic without striving to be. The stories have range; they’re not central on one topic. More importantly, they spoke to my loneliness like no horror fiction book ever has. I identified with how lonely and desperate these characters sometimes were, and how brutal (and gory) life is and was to them.


THE GREATEST HORROR FILM OF ALL TIME 

Stanley Kubrick changed aspects of Stephen King’s novel, The Shining, I believe. If I remember correctly, the novel had a supernatural element instead of Kubrick’s use of a more psychological one, and King was subsequently displeased with the film. However, it was the first horror film that made its mark on me, and years later, I still remember just how difficult it was for me to sleep at age eleven after watching it. I can still watch The Shining and know I’ll love seeing it. It’s that timeless.


THE GREATEST WRITER OF ALL TIME


Stephen King writes darn good stories; those stories are also highly literary. You can’t go wrong with him. And he’s also quite prolific. Easy pick.


THE BEST BOOK COVER OF ALL TIME


Too many good covers to choose from.


THE BEST FILM POSTER OF ALL TIME


Dawn of the Dead. Maybe Jaws


THE BEST BOOK / FILM I HAVE WRITTEN


Il Migliore Del Mondo & Other Stories. There will be more.


THE WORST BOOK / FILM I HAVE WRITTEN


I’m getting ready to rewrite/revise all of my self-published books and recompile into one collection. My career basically starts with Il Migliore Del Mondo & Other Stories. It’s a reboot.


THE MOST UNDERRATED FILM OF ALL TIME


The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. One of the most awesome black and white films ever. Enduring.


THE MOST UNDERRATED BOOK OF ALL TIME


I can’t say enough about Wormwood, but Poppy’s novel, Exquisite Corpse, was a ton of fun, too. I wish she’d unretire and consider writing about loud bands, New Orleans, alcohol, blood, sex, and violence again.


THE MOST UNDERRATED AUTHOR OF ALL TIME


Melanie Tem and/or Poppy Z. Brite come to mind.


THE BOOK / FILM THAT SACRED ME THE MOST


The b-movie, Driller Killer, was extra gory and violent. Just read the title. It looks like real heads and real brains coming out of the heads.


THE BOOK / FILM I AM WORKING ON NEXT


It’s called, The Last Stop, and it occurs in a rural town in Northern Virginia close to the mountains. The world-building is very detailed. Although the town is fictional, you can see things unfold because of the vivid portrayal and description. A feared contract killer has come to complete his last contract, and he happens to kill everyone in his path. The Feds are trying to piece it together before more people die, but he just keeps getting away. When they finally learn that everyone in town was stipulated to die in his contract, they try to learn just how he plans to do it. The supernatural and occult elements bring horror genre elements into this psychological thriller.

Artists want one thing: catharsis. The characters in the following eight stories will go to great lengths to find boundless inspiration, and the more complicated those means get, the bloodier. It starts with a man called Il Migliore del Mondo, the best in the world at painting portraits for the deity Santa Muerte, whom he is cursed to serve. The story is followed by Painter of Dead Girls, about an artist so inspired by sadism, he puts together a plan to showcase his paintings at the heels of a series of brutal murders. The collection ends with Morbid Destitution of Covenant, a quirky title for a chess match novelette, featuring an ensemble cast of law enforcers and clinicians, all intent on proving that one man in custody is the killer in a series of brutal killings. The stories included in this collection will keep you on the edge of your seat and guessing until the thrilling climax.​

In China, many people believe that the dead visit their loved ones, especially shortly after death. Sometimes when they do, they hurt the living. They don’t mean to. But dying is a big shock, and the minds of new ghosts are often cloudy and damaged. Even those new ghosts who retain their wits can accidentally hurt you.
In my family, for example, the ghost of my yeye [grandfather] would sometimes visit us. We could always tell who he had come to see because that person would get violently nauseous, and their stomach would hurt in a very particular way. This, my grandmother said, was a result of ghosts being made mostly of yin energy, while human beings were made mostly of yang energy.

Whenever we would suspect my grandfather might be visiting, we would do “the chopstick test” to make sure. This is where you stand three chopsticks up in a bowl of water, while calling out the name of a spirit that you suspect is in the room. If they are in the room, after you remove your hands from the chopsticks, they will remain standing. I saw this happen several times. It was very unsettling. The following story is even more so. —YIY



When I was three and a half, my yeye drank pesticide and killed himself. To understand why, you first have to know this: from the day I was born, Yeye loved me dearly. He fell in love with me, he said, as soon as he saw my tiny face. And on that very day, he asked my parents to move in so that he could watch me while they worked.

In China, it is common for one grandparent or another, or even an aunt or an uncle, to move in with new parents to help look after children. But my grandfather had a characteristic that worried my parents. He was addicted to liquor and drank it every day. A lot of it. Because of this, my father denied Yeye’s request.

Yeye’s feelings were hurt but not enough to quit drinking. Not at first. After all, my dad still let me stay with him and my grandmother during the Lunar New Year and Autumn Festival holidays. So for a while, he was able to have liquor and me both.

However, my parents eventually started to worry about this unsupervised time too. And my dad picked me up from these visits earlier and earlier.

When Yeye noticed that our time together was dwindling, he devised a strategy to avoid my father. As soon as he saw my father’s car, he would hoist me on his back and race up the mountainside behind his house to hide and play until my dad gave up looking for us.

But Yeye knew his trick would not last forever. After all, my dad could just refuse to drop me off. So finally Yeye did it. He went to my parents and solemnly promised not to drink liquor anymore.

At first, my parents didn’t believe him. But when he didn’t touch a drop for several weeks, they talked. Afterwards, my father called Yeye and told him that he could move in for a year and watch over me. And he could begin this new role on his birthday. That would be their present to him.

Yeye’s eyes filled with tears at the news. He was so full of excitement that it was very hard for him to wait until his birthday. Nevertheless, he managed to be patient until the day arrived.

But then the whole plan fell apart.

It happened like this:

My third uncle, who ran a bus business, was supposed to drive the couple of hours to my yeye’s village and then get him to our apartment in time for Yeye’s birthday celebration and first night as my caretaker.

That was the plan.

But my uncle started in a game of cards with friends early that morning and got lost in that. By the time he remembered Yeye, it was too late.

Today, of course, everyone would be constantly calling everybody else to check on everything.

But this all happened before there were cell phones. True, we were one of the few families with a landline. But we could only afford one. And my dad kept it in his office, which was located in another apartment in our building.

That’s why when it started getting so late that something was obviously wrong, my dad decided to walk to my uncle’s. He thought that maybe my uncle had misunderstood the plan and driven Yeye to his place to wait on us. Just before my dad got out of the building, the phone in his office began ringing—over and over—and would not stop. When he answered it, he heard my grandmother’s voice.

“Your father’s gone,” she said.

* * *
My yeye waited for my uncle a long time.

He waited until he became convinced that no one was coming and that my dad had changed his mind.

Sad to lose my dad’s trust again, and his chance to be with me, Yeye drank a glass of alcohol. Then another—all the while crying his heart out.

When the alcohol didn’t dull the pain, he drank a bottle of pesticide.

My grandmother watched him drink the pesticide—but she thought he was just drinking more alcohol. Even when she went out a little later to go shopping and came across him completely still on a sofa, she just thought he had fallen asleep. But then she came back home and tried to shake him awake.

* * *

The first seven days after Yeye died were filled with funeral preparations. My mom had to use up all her sick days from work to get everything done. My dad was very busy with the preparations too. So neither of them had time to look after me. That’s why on one of these days, they sent me to a daycare.

I seemed okay when my father dropped me off that morning. But when he came to pick me up later, he couldn’t wake me. Not completely. I’d mumble and stir but immediately drowse off again.

Worried, he asked the daycare attendant how long I had been sleeping.

“Most of the afternoon,” she said. “She was asleep during snack time and also when her grandfather visited.”

The attendant told my father that she was so concerned by my deep sleeping that she asked the daycare nurse to take a look at me. The nurse said that I was probably just catching a cold, and my body was fighting it.

The attendant’s words didn’t make my father feel better. Not only did he still find my deep sleeping strange, but the comment about my grandfather visiting unsettled him. Since his father was now dead, this grandfather had to be my mother’s dad. But neither my dad nor my mom had mentioned to anyone that they were going to drop me off at the daycare. So how did my mom’s father know I was there? And why had he even visited?

Confused, my dad asked the attendant what my grandfather looked like.

She gave him a long careful description that included the wearing of a unique black fedora.

My dad was so shocked he couldn’t breathe. She had described his dead father, my yeye, perfectly.

My dad rushed me home, and he and my mom tried everything to wake me.

Pushing pressure points.

Slapping my feet.

Pricking my middle fingertips with an acupuncture needle.

Nothing worked.

Suspecting my problem was related to the daycare visit by my yeye’s ghost, he and my mother carried me to a psychic.

The psychic confirmed their worst fears. “Yes,” she told them. “You’re correct. Your daughter’s problem is her grandfather. He’s attached himself to her. He loves her very much and doesn’t mean harm. Nevertheless, the attachment is draining your daughter’s strength.”

Frightened, my parents begged for the psychic’s help. She agreed but said that she couldn’t help until the next morning. That’s when the sun was powerful enough to give her the yang energy she needed to fight the ghost.

When morning came, the psychic set up a square table in our living room. She sat in front of it, meditating and chanting, while my father—per her directions—walked around our yard, holding a black umbrella and shouting my name. After they’d done a bit of this, the psychic took a chicken out of a wooden carrier, cut its head off, and used the bloody neck stump to paint magical symbols on a stack of yellow papers. These she pasted all over the walls. When she finished with the last one, I woke up.

The unhealthy bond between my yeye’s ghost and me was broken, the psychic explained. But I would still be vulnerable to ghostly influences for a long time. So the paper talismans should stay on our walls.

The talismans stayed up until I turned eight.

* * *

Some people question whether the psychic and her rituals really helped. Maybe I would have woken up anyway, they say.

Maybe.

But I’m convinced that they worked. This is because of what I remembered when I awoke.

After Yeye walked into the daycare that day, he led my spirit away from my sleeping body to a Western-style carnival. (It’s important to say here that all of this was very real and not like a dream. To this day, for example, I can still recall how things felt, tasted, and smelled at the carnival.)

The carnival surprised me. I had never seen it before in our town. And, at this time of my life, I had never even been to a carnival or encountered one on TV. This was 1993. Just like phones, televisions were still rare and so were Western-style carnivals.

Nevertheless, I had a really good time there.

I ate a big strawberry candy, rode on a Ferris wheel, then in a bumper car, and finally on a giant car-shaped ride that swung in the air.

But there was one bad thing. Or at least strange.

The weather.

Ever since Yeye and I left the daycare, the sky looked wrong. It was an odd, ashy gray—stained with purple. A very scary kind of color, as if a big storm was about to break.

It didn’t rain though. So we kept playing and eating delicious food.

But even carnival fun can last too long. And after what felt like two days passed, I was so exhausted that I could barely stand.

When I complained to Yeye, he hoisted me on his back and took a couple of steps forward.

Suddenly, we were no longer walking on the carnival grounds but on the mountain road next to his and my grandmother’s house. Trees lay to the sides of the road. Icicles hung from several. Yeye and I took turns snatching them off the branches and eating them like popsicles (people in the mountains did this all the time when I was a kid).

I had just about finished one of these tree-sicles when abruptly I found myself back at my parent’s place, fully awake, my opened eyes taking in my parents, the psychic, and the talismans all over our walls.

This is how I know the rituals really helped.

* * *

After I woke up that day, I rarely saw my yeye—just a dream every year or so. Three dreams were especially vivid. I think these might have been actual visits.

In one, Yeye was digging a hole in the ground—a deep one as tall as a person. When he looked up from his work and saw me, he handed me some candies.

“Why are you digging?” I asked him.

He told me the hole was part of a highway and that he was part of a work crew. He could have chosen other kinds of work, but the highway construction project was the closest to me. He intended to stay on it another twenty years. That way, he said, he could watch out for me.

The second dream occurred when I was grown up and just starting college in another city—far from where I and Yeye had once been so close.

In it, I was walking across a field when I suddenly came across Yeye sitting on a stone seat outside a yard with super high walls.

“What are you doing here outside the wall?” I said.

Yeye told me that someone had cut down the shade tree near his house and he was sitting under the wall to get some shade.

The next day I called my mom and told her about the dream. She said it was just a random dream and not to be so serious about it. But then a few days later, she called me back.

“Your dream meant something,” she said. It turned out that my fourth aunt’s husband had cut down the tree in front of Yeye’s grave.

The most recent dream happened in 2015. It was different from the others. While I could hear Yeye’s voice, I couldn’t see him. It was like we were standing in a large dark room.

“I have to leave you, little one,” he said. “It’s time for us to let each other go. You have to look out for yourself now. Don’t fight this. It is the right thing.”

I promised him I would do my best to let go. Since then I have not dreamed of him once.

My yeye really, truly, so deeply loved me. Even more than my dad. No matter his faults, he constantly showed me this.

If I wanted candy, he would buy a big box and then another big box.

If I wanted to eat watermelon, he would get one of those big, twenty-five-pound ones.

If I wanted clothes, he would buy me three outfits and let me switch from one to the other—all on the same day.

Sometimes, his generosity drove my dad crazy. He would yell at me for asking Yeye for so many things. At those times, Yeye would jokingly chase my dad out into the street and threaten to beat him with a stick for scolding me.

Once, a chicken that Yeye raised scratched me. The next thing I knew the chicken was cooked into a soup for me. He never raised any more chickens in his yard after that. My dad sometimes says that if Yeye were still alive, I would have turned out to be a spoiled, rotten girl. I’m not certain that is true.
​
Anyway, it’s approaching midnight now. I miss my yeye. That’s all I wanted to say.

In this collection, award-winning writers and translators Yi Izzy Yu and John Yu Branscum share paranormal and glitch in the matrix tales from across present-day China. Confided by eyewitnesses, these true stories uncannily echo Western encounters with chilling dimensions of reality and supernatural entities. At the same time, they thrillingly immerse the reader in everyday Chinese life and occult beliefs.

Zhiguai: Chinese True Tales of the Paranormal and Glitches in the Matrix includes such accounts as:
*The reincarnation of a teenager whose fate eerily mimics his predecessor’s
*A girl who dies in the womb but nevertheless continues to communicate with her twin
*Terrifying shifts into demonic parallel universes
*Walls desperately painted with blood to save a family from tragedy
*Huge populations that disappear into thin air
*The revenge-seeking ghosts of murdered cats
*Weird temporal shifts
*Occult murders
From the terrifying to the uncanny, this collection will not only change your understanding of China but of reality itself.

​Comic-books are a medium, not a genre; they can tell any story and suit any palate. You want horror? I've got bottles of the stuff. Welcome to 'Splashes of Darkness.' 

​WesterNoir gets its kick from that bottle of tequila tucked away yonder; the one the barman's been experimentin' with. Seems he's been keep the worms back from the usual batches and dropping 'em into it, month by month. Once in a while some damned fool demands a shot of it, neat, but your barman ain't the killin' kind. If you're takin' it, you're chasin' it with a little sugar. A body can only swallow so much stark reality. Best y'all sit down to drink this.
​
The clue’s in the title, but I’ll lay it out plain for you – WesterNoir is a magnificent mongrel. The creative team behind it have clearly spent some time sneaking around the genre graveyard, digging up the choicest bits and pieces for their grand project – a monster-hunting mash-up set in the wilds of the American West, portrayed with the *monochromatic starkness and darkness of the bitterest noir. Each issue is a tight little number, no more than 35 pages, but every one packs a punch.

​Say hello to Josiah Black. T’ain’t his real name of course, but it’ll do for now. He’s running from a long history of blood and sorrow. Trouble is, he spends so much time looking over his shoulder, he has no idea what he’s headed towards. When the woman with the dead eyes hires him to hunt down the fella who killed her family, he learns there are deadlier things than men abroad in those dusty frontier days. Ghouls, vampires, were-creatures – and who knows what else – hiding amongst ordinary people. Wolves in sheep’s clothing, stalking the innocent and devouring the vulnerable. It might be there’s no such thing as redemption, but if Black’s guns can take down a few of these monsters, save some folk that might have otherwise perished, well, at least he can begin to settle accounts.
​
AccentUK are an independent comics publisher who place a great deal of value on intelligent stories told from unusual perspectives. Take the time to imbibe a few and you’ll be as blown away as I was. It seems to me their book covers have done them little justice in the past, but the WesterNoir series bucks that trend with their bold headers and dramatic imagery. The books are eye-catching, exciting and intriguing artefacts that demand to be picked up. You can practically smell the pulp oozing from them; and little visual touches like creases, peels and scratches complete the illusion of battered books, long-treasured. These wear-marks may be fake, but the love poured into the tales is true enough. 

​Dave West writes with real style. Each volume tells a complete tale, expands the world and fills in touches of back-story too. The dialogue is peachy; constantly developing character and plot while showcasing a fine ear for accent. Old-fashioned American dialogue may be formal but it’s chock full of subtlety, and West writes with considerable fluency. His greatest success is in Black’s narrative voice running throughout the stories. The cynical voice-over has long been a staple of film noir, commenting upon both the action and the dialogue to undercut (or throw dramatic new light on) what is happening. It lends a certain tone to a story, and depth to a character that could otherwise appear callous or cold.

​Gary Crutchley does a similarly grand job bringing the world of WesterNoir to life with his astonishing inks. Facial features are expertly picked out, costume and scenery given recognisable characteristics and atmosphere without ever feeling overworked – which is a wonderful trick if you can manage it. This lush economy can be seen throughout the books in various forms, from both sides of the creative team and, for me, it defines the style of the book. 

​The general sparseness of background detail chimes with the Western sensibility (as do the occasionally ornate splashes of detail, when appropriate), while the bold shadows and harsh lines occasionally evoke the nightmare noir of [Sin City]. He makes use of a couple of watery grey shades to bring out the intermediate depth, but little more than that is required. Sepia tones might have been more appropriate for this world, and a different colour palette would have been nice for those times we look through Black’s special glasses, but I guess an indie budget only stretches so far. ​

​The layouts are used to control the narrative pace as much as its direction, and this is so finely gauged that you only realise the sheer variety of panel sizes, density and dimensions when you consciously look for it. These are people who know how to grab you and give you a great ride. There are certain images that you do kind of expect; shots and angles that form part of the visual vocabulary of Westerns and film noir. I was exceptionally pleased to see so many of them worked in without once jolting me out of the story.

WesterNoir may be a patchwork creature, but the needlework is very fine indeed. I urge you to seek it out.

* Note: This review was originally written for Geek Syndicate. At the time, WesterNoir only existed as 4 black and white issues, with more on the way. Since then, the creative team have revisited these issues to update them in full colour. They’ve also produced several more issues with many more to come. I’ll be returning to the world of WesterNoir in the not-too-distant future to see how the colouring adds to their creation and find out just what in tarnation has happened to our black-hatted hero in the meantime.