My first taste of Zelenjy's fiction was his 2009 collection, EXPERIMENTS AT 3 BILLION A.M. and I found it nothing short of incredible. Now he's back with another mammoth collection of 34 tales (only 15 having been previously published). This whopper took me quite a while to get through, but if I didn't have so much on my plate I'd easily have finished in a few sittings.
Opening tale 'The Fire We Deserve' pretty much sets the tone for the book. Zelenyj's literary prose is infectious and is as dark as it is beautiful. I can't remember the end of the world being written so ... attractive before. 'Or the Loneliness of Another Million Years' is another apocalyptic tale about a man convinced he's the last person alive, until he meets a young boy who tells him of a mysterious "door" that's supposed to open at a specific time. Great stuff.
In 'God-Eater,' we meet Barbara and Howard's most unusual baby, who causes their friends to commit suicide before heading out into the world. One of the shorter pieces here but also one of the most intense. 'Elopers to Sirius' tells the tale of a suicide cult and those who come after them, while in 'Motherlight Go to Sleep,' a farmer uses his guitar to summon animals and some things more mysterious in arguably the best piece of the collection.
The book closes with the title story 'Songs for the Lost,' a futuristic Western dealing with a father and son seeking paradise. They meet a strange race and several other travelers on their quest, my favorite being Harry Dalmar, who narrowly escapes execution to find he isn't nearly as bad a man as he might have thought. This one reads like a "mini-epic" and is a great way to conclude the collection.
Most of Zelenyj's tales straddle genres, but regardless if he's touching horror, scifi, fantasy, or blending them all, he keeps readers guessing and going back to make sure they're following the right path. And the paths in SONGS FOR THE LOST are not only dark, but full of surprises, especially in 'Love Me, Too, Black Flower' and 'Song of the Dream Cats.' 34 tales and (remarkably) not a dull one in the lot.
Here's another impressive collection from an author who not nearly enough people are reading, and the book itself is a real treat for book lovers thanks to David Rix's artwork and the unusual page designs. Don't miss this.
-Nick Cato
Up to about the fourth or fifth book I’ve read so far by this author, gradually working my way through the many methods with which he seems determined to have fun destroying the world. So many possibilities! And even then, so many surprises!
SEA SICK is a great example of the surprises, and, probably my favorite yet. It starts off with a troubled cop – loner, anger issues, alcohol, hopelessness, bitterness, depression – boarding a cruise ship. Not because it’s his idea, but because his higher-ups have decided an enforced holiday might help turn him around, bring him back. If not, he’s likely to get fired.
Needless to say, Jack is not your usual carefree vacationer. He’s an island of outsider even in the throngs of passengers, viewing it all through his disgruntled lens. The obnoxious youths. The noisy children. The inappropriately smoochy old people. The crew. He doesn’t expect to spend much time enjoying the luxurious shipboard amenities. Mostly, he figures, he’ll hang out in his cabin and read and drink.
It doesn’t help that, despite the posted cautionary notices and hand sanitizer dispensers, there seems to be a nasty bug going around. Jack notices lots of people already coming down with it, before crashing for an extended nap (and I mean extended; I’ve been on cruises and one slight twinge to my suspension of disbelief was that anybody could get away with sleeping undisturbed for that long … where were the stewards coming in to do turn-down and maid service? what about mandatory lifeboat drills?)
When he wakes, he explores some of the other decks, settles in for a while by the pool, chats with a girl, gets into it a bit with her boyfriend, visits some bars, takes in a show, and dies a violent, gory death at the end of the second chapter.
Surprise! But wait! There’s more!
See, what you expect to be an ordinary outbreak scenario with infected psycho-crazies who even come back from the dead to attack and bite and kill … well, it is, but … that’s just the beginning. Or, not even the beginning, not even the main story but the backdrop around which the main story unfolds in ever-deepening layers and ever-widening spirals of weird.
I don’t want to give too many spoilers, so, I’ll just say I enjoyed this one very much. Which doesn’t mean it didn’t have a few issues; some of the plot points felt a little forced and now and then it fell into that obnoxious trope where a character with answers to important questions plays the “no time for that now” dramatic suspense card.
Neat read, though. Kept me interested and guessing right up to the end.
-Christine Morgan
Originally released as a limited edition hardcover as part of Dynatox's "Cannibalsploitation" series, Faun's CANNIBAL ISLAND is now in a second edition trade paperback and ready to be devoured (full pun intended) by the masses.
Remember those gory "third world cannibal" films like CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST and MAKE THEM DIE SLOWLY? Here's Faun's homage to them in novella form, although unlike the films that inspired it this tale is set in the 1920's. A 4-week long expedition aboard a British boat leads a colorful cast of characters (my favorite being the frisky, obnoxious Ms. Fairweather) to an isolated island where a meteor has crashed. But when they finally locate and begin to examine the huge crater, the island's malnourished natives have other plans for them.
CANNIBAL ISLAND is a quick, gross, and entertaining read fans of exploitation cinema (or pulp horror tales) will love. Read it on the beach this summer (or better yet, an isolated island) for maximum effect.
-Nick Cato
POKER!!! With zombies, yes, eight years after the outbreak, enclaves of survivors, privation and starvation, danger, the usual stuff you might expect … but this delightful post-zombpocalypse romp is only peripherally about that. It’s really all about the POKER!!!
Because, people are still going to have downtime amid their hardscrabble surviving. They’re going to need entertainment. There will still be games and gamblers. If cardsharps in the Old West could make a tidy living traveling from settlement to settlement, pitting their wits against the locals, hey, why not in the aftermath?
Chris Newman is more than a cardsharp. He’s a pro, a former World Series of Poker winner who’s faced the greats. What with most everyone else eaten, he figures he’s the best left alive. Just to play him is a feather in anybody’s cap; to beat him would be bragging rights for sure.
So, that’s how he gets by, roaming the desolation that once was California. With money meaningless, food and supplies and other useful items make the stakes. Then comes the day someone seeks Chris out with a message, an invitation for the biggest game of his life. In Vegas, the only city rumored to be a true safe haven.
You better believe he jumps at the chance. Walled off from zombies, the food’s plentiful, the power’s on, the water’s running. Of course, like most seeming utopias, there’s the dark secret undersides, but, who cares? Vegas, baby! Chris is glad enough to overlook the negatives … until he can’t, until he learns the real truth, until he remembers that vital adage about how the house always wins.
Now, me, I can’t play poker worth a damn. I enjoy watching it, though, and our household went through a serious televised Texas Hold ‘Em phase. The personalities, the jargon, the announcers, etc. I like to think I picked up a decent understanding along the way. And, from that, I quickly realized this author really does know his stuff. It all rings true, which is extra nice.
It’s also a tremendous hoot throughout, from start to finish. Or, from deal to river, if you rather. The zombies are handled in a deft way with some fun twists. The many-headed hydra of addiction in its various forms puts in several appearances and sneaks in some social commentary with the humor. Eminently readable, well-written, great fun!
-Christine Morgan
PREVIEW:
Harriet is on the verge of dementia. Her son Don and his wife Nikki bring her to an isolated retirement home in Pennsylvania (or upstate NY, depending on how you read the second chapter!), and she's not too happy about it. In fact she thinks it's part of her Adaughter-in-law's plan to get rid of her. And from the second they step inside Mercy House, Harriet complains the place smells like "Rotten Milk."
It doesn't take long for chaos to ensue: as the trio are given a tour of the place, Harriet and the rest of the elderly residents turn into sex and violence-crazed lunatics. An orgy and bloodbath of epic proportions kicks off and doesn't stop until the final page of the bleak epilogue. Cesare throws all kinds of kooky characters into the mix, including retired war vet Arnold Piper (who delivers some hilarious dialogue) and "Queen Bee," one of the first of the senior residents to be affected by what's called "The Healing."
While Cesare never tells us what's causing the change in the patients, they have gained much physical strength and are putting their improved mental awareness to sinister use: the seniors are creating their own in-house structure (including a mock version of church), but unfortunately for the small nursing staff, much of their activities include cannibalism, murder, and porn-film level rape and torture. This novel is basically what the 1973 film DON'T LOOK IN THE BASEMENT would be like if Richard Laymon had written the screenplay (and that will either scare you off or make you immediately order a copy).
MERCY HOUSE is a "survivor" type story, as Nikki (who happens to be African American and perhaps part of the reason for Harriet's anger), one of the doctors of the understaffed nursing home, and another man named Paulo attempt to get out of the maniac-infested home, that seems to have also become some kind of supernatural prison (it hasn't, but seems that way). The cannibalism may cause some to think the residents have become zombies, but that's not the case at all. I was frustrated for most of the novel, wishing the author would reveal what's causing the carnage, but by the end it works best that we don't fully know. To me it seems the "smell" or the essence of the place has somehow caused the elderly to accept their fate and simply snap, but whatever Cesare's intentions were, MERCY HOUSE is a title those into gory horror tales will savor from beginning to end.
-Nick Cato
Every time I go to an event where Eraserhead/Deadite has a table, I can count on walking away with at least half a dozen new books. At that rate, I still won’t catch up with the backlist of the amazingly prolific Carlton Mellick III, because he keeps writing them faster than seems humanly possible.
What seems humanly possible or not is a fitting segue for this one. You know how freaked out we all got about Furby, even before they added the computer stuff? Combine that with the child-within-us resonance of Toy Story or Small Soldiers or any of those cartoons where toys come to life … add the fears of Terminator-style AI as we keep making things smarter and more independent… mix in a hint of the whole furry fetish fandom/phenom, crank it to mind-shattering levels, and the result would be something like Cuddly Holocaust.
These are not your benign, loving, whimsical toys. These are toys that don’t just mad, they get even. And they don’t just get even … they wage total war. As in, rise up, rebel against their former human masters, attack, destroy, pretty much eradicate. Only, it’s even worse than that.
Julie was a little girl when it all started, a little girl whose daddy had just given her a new stuffed smart-toy panda bear. Mom isn’t wild about the idea, and she’s less wild when Poro the Panda turns out to be a foul-mouthed, wise-talking, lecherous jerk (the baby from Roger Rabbit springs to mind, as does Futurama’s Bender).
But Julie loves Poro, and the feeling seems mutual. Right up until, that is, the war erupts. Julie escapes home from what used to be her school, only to find her parents missing. When Poro offers to take her to them, but betrays her instead, Julie’s life becomes a crusade of infiltration and revenge.
How, you might wonder, would you infiltrate an army of giant mad killer stuffed animals? Well, by becoming one, or at least undergoing convincing enough deep-cover surgery to basically turn yourself into a panda-girl.
Then there’s purple bunny snipers, katana-wielding kangaroos, the actual fates of human prisoners, mayhem, carnage, gore, squick, and so much more! Decidedly unforgettable, likely to make you think twice about whatever next high-tech toy fad they roll out for the holidays. Much more Holocaust than Cuddly, to be sure!
-Christine Morgan
