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Showing posts from November, 2018

Ancient Horror History REPUBLISHED: A guest review of Do Not Disturb The Dream by Paula Trachtman

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Capricorn Literary continues to republish some old school "Paperbacks from Hell" and as the end of year gets closer, I've enlisted some help of friend's to get through reviewing some of the books I've been sent for review. Chris Mayek says of DNTD: "It's nothing original - a family a four moves into a seemingly nice home with a haunting past - in this case, following Amityville exactly, with a gruesome murder happening there decades prior. It progressively ends up affecting each family member differently. You've read this before, likely several different examples of it. Disturb Not The Dream is unfortunately one of the more boring versions of the haunted house trope book. It's written well enough, similar to any other early 80s horror author, but it is bogged down by over explanations of non-horror scenarios in it's too-long length. There was a funny scene in the beginning - The older sister teasing her slightly younger, nerdy brother se...

Practitioners by Matt Hayward & Patrick Lacey REVIEWED

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Practitioners. I'd been extremely excited to read this one since it had been announced. Patrick Lacey and Matt Hayward are two of my favorite authors putting out books today, both of which put out novels last year that made my "best of 2017" list. Those novels, We Came Back and What Do Monsters Fear, are both highly recommended and if you haven't read those, you're missing out. Stop missing out and go buy a copy of each. Ten of each, give em out as Christmas gifts. Anyway, I learned that this would be coming out by Bloodshot Books, who for my money, are putting out some of the best horror fiction on the market today. Not only does Pete Kahle, the man behind Bloodshot (and author in his own rite), have a great eye for exciting new talent, but he makes sure each book the press outs out looks fantastic. Books you can judge by their cover, for sure. By all accounts of those involved in this one, looked like it was going to be a winning recipe of great horror readin...

Kill Creek By Scott Thomas REVIEWED.

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I'm a bit late to the party, but Kill Creek was one of the most buzzed about new Horror novels of 2017, published by one of the most buzzed about new publishers with a specialty in Horror, InkShares. InkShares is a relatively new force in the publishing world, that has me fairly excited with last year's A God In The Shed and now this, both of which have been optioned for TV. One of the most exciting parts about InkShares for me, is their visibility, as they're actually making it to the shelves of brick and mortar bookstores, a feat not many genre titles, especially by new authors, are able to manage these days. For that alone, I'll give them my money, as a token of appreciation and in hopes it'll keep them there. But is this book any good? I'll be honest. A 400+ page book billed as a 'slow burn haunted house story' doesn't exactly get my reader senses jumping for joy. There's a billion of them and they generally aren't for me. It's ...