BEYOND THE VEIL New Horror Short Stories edited by Mark Morris Publisher : FLAME TREE PRESS; New edition (26 Oct. 2021) Language : English Paperback : 320 pages ISBN-10 : 1787584623 ISBN-13 : 978-1787584624 Reviewed by Mario Guslandi Here’s a new massive horror anthology edited by Mark Morris, who seems to be following the steps of famous genre editors such as Ellen Datlow, Paula Guran and Stephen Jones. The stories included in this loosely themed anthology explore, in different ways, what lurks behind everyday reality and what happens after death. As in any book of this type the quality of the contributions is a bit uneven, but on average most stories are good and some downright excellent. My task, as a reviewer of such a hefty volume, is to point out the tales that I feel are the best, hence especially worth to be mentioned. “ The God Bag” by Christopher Golden is truly an outstanding tale with a distinct supernatural taste, investigating the terrible secrets of the human soul, our selfishness,our hunger for life, even at the expense of our loved ones. Other great stories are the deeply disquieting “ Caker’s Man” by Matthew Holness, about a nasty, dangerous man whose cakes are indigestible and whose malign influence persists after his death, and ”A Mystery for Julie Chu” by Stephen Gallagher, a splendid, dark tale revolving around an old, bizarre radio set found in a second-hand market, with the uncanny property of catching the voices of the dead. In the quite unusual “ The Dark Bit” by Toby Litt, a married couple is affected by a strange “disease” continuosly spreading every time they move through a dark area of their house, while in the well told “ For All the Dead” by Angeline B Adams & Remco van Straten we learn about the sad fate of fishermen lost at sea and their desire to get back home alive or dead. “Provenance Pond” by Josh Malerman is yet another offbeat tale depicting a young girl’s imaginary friend living in a pond by her house, and “ The Girl in the Pool” by Bracken MacLeod describes how a projected burglary in an empty villa gets sour when one of the thieves discovers a dead girl in the pool and things start to get weird... Other contributors to the book are: Priya Sharma, Dan Coxon, Aliya Whitely, Jeremy Dyson, Lisa L Hannett, Karter Mycroft, Lisa Tuttle,Peter Harness, Lynda E Rucker, John Everson, Nathan Ballingrud, Frank J Oreto, Gemma Files. Happy shivers! Beyond the Veil Paperback |
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