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A review by sscalavera
High Strange Horror: Weird Tales of Paranoia and the Damned by Charles Martin, Michael Bryant, Toni Nicolino
5.0
Full disclosure: I'm in this, and you can buy it here.
I hadn't actually read this before getting my contributor's copy, so I had no idea if it was any good (though, as one of the authors between the covers, I was hoping that it was); thankfully, this is a wonderful collection with a whole spectrum of stories to choose from. Some, like Mer Whinery's The Projectionist, are ugly little parables that explore the darkest parts of the soul, whereas other stories - The Pirate-Ghost of Hole 19 by Doctor Gaines, for example - keep a pulpier, lighter tone while still preserving a fierce intelligence and an ability to entertain.
The writers here where their influences on their sleeves, but it's to their credit - weird genre fiction has a firm place in the world now, and by holding fast to genre conventions, the authors in this collection find room to surprise the reader with twists and turns you don't always expect.
I hadn't actually read this before getting my contributor's copy, so I had no idea if it was any good (though, as one of the authors between the covers, I was hoping that it was); thankfully, this is a wonderful collection with a whole spectrum of stories to choose from. Some, like Mer Whinery's The Projectionist, are ugly little parables that explore the darkest parts of the soul, whereas other stories - The Pirate-Ghost of Hole 19 by Doctor Gaines, for example - keep a pulpier, lighter tone while still preserving a fierce intelligence and an ability to entertain.
The writers here where their influences on their sleeves, but it's to their credit - weird genre fiction has a firm place in the world now, and by holding fast to genre conventions, the authors in this collection find room to surprise the reader with twists and turns you don't always expect.