Best of
Bizarro-Fiction

2018

Neverday


Carlton Mellick III - 2018
    Described as one of the top 40 science-fiction writers under the age of 40 by The Guardian and "one of the most original novelists working today" by extreme horror legend Edward Lee. In his 57th book, Neverday, Mellick has created a dystopian horror tribute to time loop stories in the tradition of Groundhog Day, Edge of Tomorrow and Happy Death Day.Karl Lybeck has been repeating the same day over and over again, in a constant loop, for what feels like a thousand years. He's been stuck in this endless cycle for so long that he doesn't remember what his life was like before time stopped moving forward. He doesn't remember his parents' faces or what he used to do for a living. He doesn't remember which president is currently in office or what city he lives in. The only reason he remembers his own name is because it's printed on his Oregon State driver's license.He thought he was the only person trapped in this eternal hell until a woman named January appears in his backyard one morning, fleeing armed pursuers who claim to be with the police. She doesn't know why today is exactly the same as yesterday. She doesn't realize she's trapped in the same loop that Karl's been stuck within for so many centuries.But it turns out that Karl and January aren't alone. In fact, the majority of the population has been repeating the same day just as they have been. While Karl was hiding isolated in his suburban home, he didn't realize that a new world was being built just outside of his door. Society has adapted to repeating the same day over and over again. New laws have been implemented. A new memory-based currency has been put into place.Karl and January find themselves in a therapy group with other people who are having a difficult time dealing with their situation--from hospital patients with illnesses that will never be cured to parents who will never see their children grow up. But there's something not quite right about those in charge of the new repeating government. They don't understand why going into the neverday--that time period that only exists if you stay awake all night to avoid repetition--is considered the worst possible crime that anyone can commit.With the help of others who share their suspicions that something is not quite right with their situation, Karl and January explore the neverday in search of answers. But what they discover could destroy the very fabric of their new society forever.

Post-Apocalypticon (The Apocalypticon Trilogy Book 2)


Clayton Smith - 2018
    His madcap last-hurrah road trip from Chicago to Disney World ended in disaster; he lost his best friend, and he’s spent the three years since weighed down by ghosts and haunted by tragedy. He’s found a shred of purpose back on Horace’s train, riding the rails and teaching new Red Caps how to protect the dwindling freight. When the train is beset by bandits who steal a particularly precious piece of cargo, Ben heads out into the high desert of the Colorado-Utah borderlands on a post-apocalyptic mission to get back what he’s lost. He’s not alone, though...he has the memory of Patrick Deen to guide him at every turn—for better or for worse. With a desert full of snakes and cults and messengers and cliff-dwellers and all manner of after-doomsday weirdness ahead of him, plus a sinister blonde woman thundering dangerously along his trail, hunting him for reasons he can’t possibly fathom, Ben is going to need all the guidance he can get. But when he learns the real reason for the train robbery—and of the mysterious doctor who controls the bandits and performs gruesome experiments on M-Day survivors in his remote lab, protected by an army of dusters—well...this might be one adventure he can’t machete his way out of. It’s a hilarious, harrowing, and heart-breaking sequel that confirms: the apocalypse is hard...but a world post-Apocalpyticon may be more than Ben can handle.

He Digs A Hole


Danger Slater - 2018
    Get married. Buy a house. Cut off your hands and replace them with gardening tools. Dig a hole. Can you hear the worms calling? Keep digging.

Nightmares in Ecstasy


Brendan Vidito - 2018
    Within its pages, the line between eroticism and terror, desire and death, is blurred. Damaged souls hurtle, as if in a dream, toward mutilation, transformation and fates worse than death. It is literary hardcore fiction for fans of David Cronenberg, Junji Ito, and Clive Barker.

The Boy with the Chainsaw Heart


Carlton Mellick III - 2018
    

Fortune Box


Madeleine Swann - 2018
    All they know is that each package is the best thing that’s ever happened to them…or the worst.In one box is a packet of seeds that allows you to grow your perfect date. In another there’s a cupcake that causes anyone who eats it to grow eyeballs all over their skin. There’s also a parcel with a mousetrap that turns all your enemies tiny. Or you could receive your autobiography, which when signed, makes your every thought famous. Or maybe even a key to a secret door that leads to another dimension where all your unfinished and abandoned projects exist. But with each package received comes both fortune and misfortune that will surely result in unexpected consequences.Like a season of episodes from The Twilight Zone or Friday the 13th The Series, comes a collection of dark and humorous stories from the premier British female author of bizarro fiction.

The Writhing Skies


Betty Rocksteady - 2018
    Outside, phosphorescent creatures infiltrate her every orifice. They want to know everything, especially the things she would rather forget.Featuring 20 black and white illustrations.

Winnie


Katy Michelle Quinn - 2018
    Winnie is Colt’s one and only, Colt is Winnie’s true love. Winnie is Colt’s rifle. There is nothing Winnie wants more than to please Colt and since a rifle is everything the young cowboy’s ever wanted, she certainly does that. But one day Winnie finds that she is not a rifle but in fact a woman. Can Winnie keep the sparks between them ignited, even if she isn’t the gun of his dreams? What happens if she can’t?

The Very Ineffective Haunted House


Jeff Burk - 2018
    

Zombie Punks Fuck Off


Sam Richard - 2018
    And zombie stories are even deader. ZOMBIE PUNKS FUCK OFF is here to show that is bullshit. This antho is loaded with 14 stories of gnawing teeth, shredded entrails, rotting masses, punk as fuck fury, post-punk weirdness, and beautiful decay. Within these pages are a touring Christian Punk band run afoul of a horde of living dead, a group of zombie-infected anarcho-punks staging a revolution in London, Hank William's far-distant great-grandson struggling against the restraints of universal fame, and guitars that gently eat.

Gods of the Dark Web


Lucas Mangum - 2018
     The internet is a scary place. Beneath Facebook and Twitter is another world. One in which anything can be obtained—for a price. A community of black markets, depraved pornography, and death. This is the dark web. Leon was just curious, he heard the stories of the secrets and forbidden fetishes that the dark web offered. He was an activist, protesting against war and hate. But after a protest became violent, he felt he needed protection. Being a teenager with no way to buy a gun legally, he had no choice but to turn to the dark web. This rash decision sends Leon spiraling down into a dark side of humanity that most don’t know, or even want to know, exists. A world of murder, torture, and cannibalism. But behind all that there is something worse, something stalking him and intent on ruining every aspect of his life. Now Leon is fighting for his life and reputation as he is being hunted by vile and arcane forces. They are… Gods of the Dark Web

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Saying Goodbye


Ben Arzate - 2018
    Arzate’s stories are stark, depressing, thought-provoking, and hilarious.” - Brian Whitney (Author of Raping the Gods.) A house with cancer, a killer soda, an unusual church, strange TV shows, the true story of the creation of the Universe. All this and more is contained in this debut collection of stories from the amazing mind of Ben Arzate.

Failure As a Way of Life


Andersen Prunty - 2018
    He also has a mystery rash. When Ryan’s best friend, Gus, convinces him they need to contaminate the source of the artisanal bottled water facility where they work, Ryan goes along with it because, hey, what else is he going to do? This proves to be another bad choice in an increasingly lengthening list of bad choices in Ryan’s life. It changes everything, leaving both Ryan and Gus transformed. Thus begins Ryan’s oddly comic stumbling through his dark night of the soul in a book best described as “self-help for the helpless.”