That said...
The Grimscribe Puppets, edited by Joe S. Pulver, a writer of worth if ever there was one, collects 22 stories inspired by the work of Thomas Ligotti. This one goes to the top of my Amazon Wish List. I mean, look at the TOC.
Livia Llewellyn “Furnace”
Daniel Mills “The Lord Came at Twilight”
Michael Cisco “The Secrets of the Universe”
Kaaron Warren “The Human Moth”
Joel Lane “Basement Angels”
Darrell Schweitzer “No Signal”
Robin Spriggs “THE XENAMBULIST: A Fable in Four Acts”
Nicole Cushing “The Company Town”
Cody Goodfellow “The Man Who Escaped This Story”
Michael Kelly “Pieces of Blackness”
Eddie M. Angerhuber “The Blue Star”
Jon Padgett “20 SIMPLE STEPS TO VENTRILOQUISM”
Robert M. Price “The Holiness of Desolation”
Michael Griffin “Diamond Dust”
Richard Gavin “After the Final”
Scott Nicolay “Eyes Exchange Bank”
Simon Strantzas “BY INVISIBLE HANDS”
Paul Tremblay “Where We Will All Be”
Allyson Bird “Gailestis”
Jeffrey Thomas “The Prosthesis”
John Langan “Into the Darkness, Fearlessly”
Gemma Files “OUBLIETTE”
Yeah, worthy writers all. I need this one. I've always enjoyed Ligotti's unique work and mindset in the horror realm. Heck, the title story of my first collection, The Dark Is Light Enough For Me, actually utilizes a main character somewhat based on this Ligotti mindset, so this anthology has my interest, no doubt.
Kate Jonez, who runs the excellent publishing house, Omnium Gatherum, with worthy releases by, among others, Ennis Drake and S.P. Miskowski, has just released her debut novel via Evil Jester Press, Candy House. Here's the blurb: "In Kate Jonez's debut novel, CANDY HOUSE, a brilliant young scientist moves back home with his parents because his explosive temper has ruined his career. His neighbors, a family of witches, imps and demons, are charged with keeping science under control. They must, by using their debauched and twisted magic, stop Roland before he fulfills his destiny and makes a deadly discovery that will change the nature of humanity forever." Sounds like fun, eh? The Look Inside sample is most tasty, so I will be picking this up for the Kindle this week.
I picked up Nicole Cushing's Children of No One recently for my Kindle--further inspiration to use the damn thing--and it looks more than worthy, right up my dark literary alley, actually. Here's the blurb: "Sadism, nihilism, poverty, wealth, screams, whimpers, sanity and madness collide in Nowhere, Indiana. For Thomas Krieg, Nowhere is a miles-long, pitch-black underground maze in which he's imprisoned dozens of boys for the past ten years—all in the name of art. For two brothers, Nowhere is the only place they clearly remember living. A world unto itself, in which they must stay alert to stay alive. A world from which the only escape is death. But for an English occultist known only as Mr. No One, Nowhere is much more...and much less: the perfect place in which to perform a ritual to unleash the grandest of eldritch deities, the God of Nothingness, the Great Dark Mouth."
Sounds like total warped fun to me.
What? You want instant gratification? Well, you can get the latter two titles for your Kindle in the blink of an eye...or read this, Laird Barron's first professional short story sale, reprinted at Nightmare Magazine: "Shiva, Open Your Eye." Kind of a wicked piece from one of our best, most worthy writers of the Dark Stuff.
Don't forget, one of my most recent published stories, "This Darkness," appears in the recently released anthology, For The Night Is Dark. A worthy endeavor, indeed, I'm in good company. As I check the page, there's also a couple of cool reviews--excellent!
So, there's a few things, check em out, as I expect to do.
:-)
Here's an, ahem, eye-catching image from O__u_R_sick. Not exactly what I had in mind when I titled this blog post, but...um...
O.o
