Dark bleatings, my curious, book-devouring tribe. I’ve never written a list or article like this one before, and thought it would be fun! I usually go ahead and write individual book reviews, but each of these has something a bit unique going on, so I thought I’d introduce you to them this way instead. For you today, I have assembled a selection of slightly weird and out-of-the-box horrors, ahem…
ROADS LESS TRAVELLED showcases authors whose work is exceptional, yet who are not necessarily recognized outside of the genres within which they write. This volume includes previously unpublished fiction from GARY COUZENS and RALPH ROBERT MOORE, as well as interviews and bibliographies that enhance the fiction content and provide a background to the person behind the story.
What makes it “a bit unique”?
Well, the stories themselves! Also, the fact that they’re both followed by interviews with the respective authors, which is a lovely touch and not often found like this. Gary’s story is a gentle will-they-won’t-they sci-fi mystery that had me thinking throughout. It explores relationships and time, but not in a leaving-letters-in-the-mailbox kind of way. Ralph’s story features a looks-obsessed doctor who accidentally goes a bit… mangly… but on quite an unexpected patient. They were both enjoyable stories for completely different reasons.
A washed-up thirty-year-old actor and reluctant cryptid investigator, Tyler is used to playing the Scully to his best friend Josh’s Mulder on their stupidly popular YouTube channel. But when Tyler receives previously unseen footage of the B movie bombshell mother who abandoned him eighteen years ago—footage linked to an isolated island in the Canadian wilderness—the mystery is one conspiracy he’s determined to investigate. The fact that following the scent gives Tyler an excuse to run away from the “straight” Josh, whom he drunkenly made out with, is just the cherry on the shit sundae.
What makes it “a bit unique”?
Everything. It’s contemporary, for a start, and not just in a “it’s set today” way. Tyler is hilarious, easy to get behind, and a joy to be in the head of because his general tone is so amusing, regardless of the situation. It’s a really fun story that sort of (but not quite, because it doesn’t feel childish) reminds me of Scooby Doo (or Supernatural, now that I’m actually thinking about it).
For Lee Harris and his cohorts, it was meant to be a simple holdup; the kind of robbery they’d done many times before. Go in, scare a few people, and get away with the money. A piece of cake, with nobody being harmed. But when the job goes bad and a man winds up dead, they soon find themselves on the run with the Rozzers hot on their tail.
With little choice but to lie low for a while, Lee soon fetches up at a safe house far from prying eyes. But the small cottage tucked away in the back of beyond soon proves anything but a sanctuary. For Lee, it is the beginning of five days and five nights of dreadful terror that will test his sanity and drag him to the heart of the cottage’s dark and violent past.
Who are the people in the woods watching him? Why is the cottage the foci of a malignant, unearthly force? And what lurks in the cellar, beneath the earth, and under the roots?
Lee will discover a record of secret sin stretching back to a point in history when childish rumours or vengeful allegations could mean a painful death and eternal purgatory
THE DESIRE FOR REVENGE WILL SPAN CENTURIES.
What makes it “a bit unique”?
The protagonist, Lee, and his loyalties and priorities. This dude is introduced to us as a criminal. Granted – not the most heinous of the bunch, but still. We don’t trust him. At all. However, it quickly becomes apparent that it’s impossible to guess where the story might go, because his decisions are extremely unpredictable and surprising.
“I’ve wanted you for such a long time… Since it all began to fall apart. I don’t care about any of it. My life. Them out there. Only you. I only ever think about you now.”
An obscure horror film called The Black Remote; a demon hungering for lost souls beneath a dilapidated church; a lovesick vampire slayer; sinister cults and scheming cultists; troubled families and weird and terrifying pilgrimages to the roadside chapels and battlefields of France.
You will find these things and more in NIGHT IN OUR VEINS – a short story collection written by dark fantasy and horror author Paul Edwards.
What makes it “a bit unique”?
It’s weird… like, REALLY peculiar. It’s light on the horror, but trust me that several of these stories have a horror edge that sort of cuts like a knife when it crops up. I never knew where the author was taking me. I’d describe this as a collection of oddities, like one of those “Cabinet of Curiosities” sort of things.
After the tragic death of their father and surviving a life-threatening eating disorder, 18-year-old Ellis moves with their mother to the small town of Black Stone, seeking a simpler life and some space to recover. But Black Stone feels off; it’s a disquieting place surrounded by towns with some of the highest death rates in the country. It doesn’t help that everyone says Ellis’s new house is haunted — everyone including Quinn, a local girl who has quickly captured Ellis’s attention. And Ellis has started to believe what people are saying: they see pulsing veins in their bedroom walls and specters in dark corners of the cellar. Together, Ellis and Quinn dig deep into Black Stone’s past and soon discover that their town, and Ellis’s house in particular, is the battleground in a decades-long spectral war, one that will claim their family — and the town — if it’s allowed to continue.
Withered is queer psychological horror, a compelling tale of heartache, loss, and revenge that tackles important issues of mental health in the way that only horror can: by delving deep into them, cracking them open, and exposing their gruesome entrails.
What makes it “a bit unique”?
Excellent queer representation (it pains me that there’s still not enough rep in horror fiction that this should be stated). Genuinely creepy scenes. I’m hardly ever actually scared or spooked when I read, so thank you, Withered. And a teen protagonist that is actually confident – don’t get me wrong, we all have our hang-ups, but the strength of this character is refreshing.
I hope there’s been something here that tickles your interest!
Bleeeeeat!
Happy Goat Horror 
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