Shaper of Worlds

He is Legend: An Anthology Celebrating Richard Matheson (2009), edited by Christopher Conlon with an Introduction by Ramsey Campbell, containing the following stories:

Throttle by Joe Hill and Stephen King
Recalled by F. Paul Wilson
I Am Legend, Too by Mick Garris
Two Shots from Fly's Photo Gallery by John Shirley
The Diary of Louise Carey by Thomas F. Monteleone
She Screech Like Me by Michael A. Arnzen
Everything of Beauty Taken from You in This Life Remains Forever by Gary A. Braunbeck
The Case of Peggy Ann Lister by John Maclay
Zachry Revisited by William F. Nolan
Comeback by Ed Gorman
An Island Unto Himself by Barry Hoffman
Venturi by Richard Christian Matheson
Quarry by Joe R. Lansdale
Return to Hell House by Nancy A. Collins
Cloud Rider by Whitley Strieber 

Award-winning, enjoyable anthology celebrating the late, great Richard Matheson, whose horror and suspense work in print, in movies, and on TV helped define horror and suspense for two generations of readers and viewers.  Duel; The Shrinking Man; Hell House; I Am Legend; What Dreams May Come; Stir of Echoes; Somewhere in Time; episodes of The Twilight Zone, including the William Shatner-on-a-plane "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" remade with John Lithgow in The Twilight Zone movie; adaptations of Poe for Roger Corman's film studio: these are just some of Matheson's contributions to pop culture. 

The stories include homages, sequels, revisionist takes, and riffs on Mathesonian ideas. "Cloud Rider" by Whitley Strieber is the wildest riff in the anthology, inspired as it is by Matheson's entire Collected Stories. The other stories are a bit more specific.

Standouts include Nancy Collins' novella-length prequel to Hell House, that inspired haunted-house story of the 1960's. Collins shows us the events that preceded those in Matheson's novel, to good effect. Mick Garris also offers a prequel in "I Am Legend, Too," and it also offers a revisionist take on the original Matheson novel's vampire-fighting protagonist from the POV of his vampiric next-door neighbour. "She Screech Like Me" by Michael A. Arnzen effectively extends Matheson's stunning debut story, "Born of Man and Woman," while "The Diary of Louise Carey" by Thomas F. Monteleone retells The Shrinking Man from the viewpoint of his increasingly beleaguered, non-shrinking wife.

The venerable William F. Nolan offers a short, brutal sequel to another Matheson horror story, while Joe Lansdale presents a sequel/sidequel to Matheson's "Prey" -- a.k.a. the Matheson story adapted for the TV movie Trilogy of Terror, in which Karen Black does battle with a tiny, violent, highly animated African fetish doll in her own apartment. And Stephen King and son Joe Hill (King) collaborate on a story for the first time, a riff on "Duel" that involves a motorcycle gang and a transport truck instead of the original's station-wagon-driving salesman and a monster of a truck.

Overall, this is a fittingly strong anthology to honour such a major figure in the modern history of fantasy. As Ramsey Campbell notes in his introduction, Matheson helped move horror out of Gothic castles and into suburban bedrooms and America's endless blacktop highways. And because Matheson worked in television and movies so much after 1960, his works reached much larger audiences than those generally afforded writers of prose. Recommended.

Last Whispers

Whispers VI: edited by Stuart David Schiff (1987) containing the following stories:

The Bones Wizard by Alan Ryan: Supernatural musical shenanigans. Extremely subtle to the point of attenuation, with little actual horror.

Leaks by Steve Rasnic Tem: Quintessential Tem: mysterious, disturbing, rooted in the real.

Everything to Live For by Charles L. Grant: Almost a Philip K. Dick science-fiction horror story both in execution and in its treatment of its themes.

Bogy by Al Sarrantonio: Poetic, Bradburyesque piece with the sort of nasty ending that Bradbury specialized in back in the 1940's.

The Fool by David Drake: Lengthy novella echoes the regional dialects and themes of Drake's friend, horror legend Manly Wade Wellman, but with its own peculiar spin on magic and justice. Really a good, convincingly regional piece, and quite different from much of Drake's other output.

Repossession by David Campton: Enjoyable ghost story with a couple of interesting concepts. Would probably work better if it developed the narrator more.

The Years the Music Died by F. Paul Wilson: Bleakly humourous conspiracy tale about Rock-and-Roll.

The Woman in Black by Dennis Etchison: Typically elusive Etchison tale of mysterious horrors in the suburbs turns into an almost surreal freak-out at the end. This is not an ending you will see coming. Disturbing.

My Name Is Dolly by William F. Nolan: Concise, ably narrated in the first-person by a child, straddles psychological and supernatural horror.

Toad, Singular by Juleen Brantingham: Well-written but intensely unpleasant story in what I generally find to be an unrewarding sub-sub-genre of horror: the tale of a sympathetic nebbish who's been brutalized by the normal world...and now gets further brutalized by the supernatural! It all feels awfully sadistic.

Sleeping Booty by Richard Wilson: Droll short-short: black comedy, not horror.

Privacy Rights by J. N. Williamson: Really disturbing bit involving rape and abortion. Verges on the exploitative, and the madness of the main character doesn't seem fully earned by the story.

One for the Horrors by David J. Schow: Great, nostalgic piece about old movies and lonely people. Not horror.

The Black Clay Boy by Lucius Shepard: Super-duper creepy tale of sex, death, magic, and what I'd describe as Hagar Shipley goes to Hell.

Where Did She Wander? by Manly Wade Wellman: The last John the Balladeer story by the then-recently-deceased Wellman. Lovely and somewhat mournful.

In all: highly recommended.

More Whispers in the Dark

Whispers IV: edited by Stuart David Schiff (1983) containing the following stories:

A Night on the Docks by Freff: One of the oddest vampire stories I can think of, with echoes of the classic tale "Call Him Demon" by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore

Into Whose Hands by Karl Edward Wagner: Terrific, moody piece that draws on Wagner's experiences as a psychiatrist working in public mental health facilities. Maybe Wagner's most subtle piece.

Out of Copyright by Ramsey Campbell: Droll bit of supernatural revenge by Campbell, working in a very literary version of his EC Comics revenge mode.

Elle Est Trois, (La Mort) by Tanith Lee: I think this is the prolific, multi-talented Lee's crowning achievement in short works. It's really an essential piece of dark fantasy/horror.

Come to the Party by Frances Garfield: Fun short from the writer also known as Mrs. Manly Wade Wellman.

The Warrior Who Did Not Know Fear by Gerald W. Page: Odd choice, as it's really a piece of a longer work of heroic dark fantasy, a piece without an ending. Still enjoyable.

Fair Trade by William F. Nolan: Another short exercise in the EC vengeance mode, with Nolan doing spot-on dialect for the first-person narrator.

I Never Could Say Goodbye by Charles L. Grant: Mysterious.

The Devil You Say! by Lawrence Treat: More humour than horror.

Diploma Time by Frank Belknap Long: Interesting ghost story from long-time writer Long, with one of his typically jarring moments in which he eschews transitions, though here it's intentional.

Tell Us About the Rats, Grandpa by Stephen Kleinhen: Minor bit of gross-out horror.

What Say the Frogs Now, Jenny? by Hugh B. Cave: Unpleasant insofar as the female victim of sexual harassment is somehow made out to be the antagonist of the piece. I don't think that was Cave's intent, but it's a really ugly, somewhat cliched story.

The Beholder by Richard Christian Matheson: Unusually supernatural story for the master of shocking short-short stories.

Creative Coverage, Inc. by Michael Shea: Bleak comedy about corporate malfeasance. Really, really, really bleak.

The Dancer in the Flames by David Drake: Evocative piece draws on Drake's time in Viet Nam, but uses a somewhat clumsy 'footnote' ending to fully explain what has happened.

The Reflex-Man in Whinnymuir Close by Russell Kirk : Lovely period piece/pastiche by the always elegant Kirk.

In all: recommended.

Fear in the 1980's

Fears: edited by Charles L. Grant (1983) containing:

Surrogate by Janet Fox; Coasting by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro; Spring-Fingered Jack by Susan Casper; Flash Point by Gardner Dozois; A Cold Day in the Mesozoic by Jack Dann; The Train by William F. Nolan; The Dripping by David Morrell; The Ragman by Leslie Alan Horvitz; Deathtracks by Dennis Etchison; Father Dear by Al Sarrantonio; As Old as Sin by Peter D. Pautz; Fish Night by Joe R. Lansdale; Remembering Melody by George R. R. Martin; The Pond by Pat Cadigan; The Beasts That Perish by Reginald Bretnor; Cassie, Waiting by Julie Stevens; and High Tide by Leanne Frahm.

Dandy anthology comprising both reprints and originals from the heyday of anthologized horror, and the heyday of horror great Charles L. Grant. There's something very Bradburyesque about many of these stories. Early, nastier Bradbury, that is, before the whimsy curdled, back when nostalgia worked alongside horror and the fantastic to conjure up that distinctive Bradbury glow that could suddenly be shot through with terror. Certainly the stories by Joe Lansdale, Jack Dann, Al Sarrantonio, and Pat Cadigan operate within the parameters of that Bradbury without slavishly imitating him stylistically or even thematically.

The anthology also gives us a mournful horror dandy from George R.R. Martin when he was a science fiction and horror writer, and not a best-selling epic fantasist. Reginald Bretnor's entry seems like it would make a dandy pitch for a TV show. Susan Casper gives us a prescient horror story about video games (prescient enough to anticipate a subplot on this season's Dexter, pretty good for 1983); Janet Fox leads with a prescient shocker about surrogate parenting. Dennis Etchison is represented here with one of his 1980's classics, and the anthology ends with a nice, Wyndhamesque bio-disaster piece by Leanne Frahm, an Australian writer I'm unfamiliar with. Recommended.

Edge of Night

Cutting Edge: edited by Dennis Etchison (1986) containing the following stories:

Blue Rose by Peter Straub; The Monster by Joe Haldeman; Lacunae by Karl Edward Wagner; "Pale, Trembling Youth" by W. H. Pugmire and Jessica Amanda Salmonson; Muzak for Torso Murders by Marc Laidlaw; Goodbye, Dark Love by Roberta Lannes; Out There by Charles L. Grant; Little Cruelties by Steve Rasnic Tem; The Man With the Hoe by George Clayton Johnson; They're Coming for You by Les Daniels; Vampire by Richard Christian Matheson; Lapses by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro; The Final Stone by William F. Nolan; Irrelativity by Nicholas Royle; The Hands by Ramsey Campbell; The Bell by Ray Russell; Lost Souls by Clive Barker; Reaper by Robert Bloch; The Transfer by Edward Bryant; and Pain by Whitley Strieber.

Solid original horror anthology from Etchison, a fine and unjustly neglected horror writer in his own right. There's violence, and sexual violence, here, but most of it seems justified by the context of the stories (though "Goodbye, Dark Love" seems a wee bit problematic). The writers basically comprise a who's who list of 1980's horror writers, along with some genre long-timers (Nolan, Johnson, and Bloch). Etchison's revealing introduction grants an insight into his career, and into his thoughts on the state of horror and other genres as of 1986. Recommended.

1979

Shadows 2: edited by Charles L. Grant (1979; this edition 1984) containing the following stories:

　

Saturday's Shadow by William F. Nolan
Night Visions by Jack Dann
The Spring by Manly Wade Wellman
Valentine by Janet Fox
Mackintosh Willy by Ramsey Campbell
Dragon Sunday by Ruth Berman
The White King's Dream by Elizabeth A. Lynn
The Chair by Alan Dean Foster and Jane Cozart
Clocks by Barry N. Malzberg and Bill Pronzini
Holly, Don't Tell by Juleen Brantingham
The Old Man's Will by Lee Wells
The Closing Off of Old Doors by Peter D. Pautz
Dead End by Richard Christian Matheson
Seasons of Belief by Michael Bishop
Petey by T. E. D. Klein

The late Charles L. Grant was both a talented writer and one of the four or five finest anthologists the horror genre has had. His original anthology series -- Shadows -- was a high point for horror short fiction in the late 1970's and early 1980's, sometimes reading more like a 'Best of' than anything else. Most stories in Shadows are contemporary in setting, as the mandate seemed to focus thereon, but beyond that, anything seemed to go.

There isn't a clunker in the bunch in Shadows 2. Moreover, there are at least two all-timers that appeared here for the first time: Ramsey Campbell's unnerving tale of childhood horror, "Mackintosh Willy", and T.E.D. Klein's "Petey," a novella about a house-warming party that plays enjoyably as both social satire and a Lovecraft-infused horror of suggestion and accumulation of detail. Entries by Michael Bishop and William F. Nolan are also excellent, and the whole anthology is well worth the read. Highly recommended.