Book picks similar to
Beneath the Surface (Revised & Expanded) by Simon Strantzas
horror
short-stories
weird-fiction
collections
The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories
Jeff VanderMeerWilliam Gibson - 2010
Together these stories form The Weird, and its practitioners include some of the greatest names in twentieth and twenty-first century literature.Exotic and esoteric, The Weird plunges you into dark domains and brings you face to face with surreal monstrosities. You won't find any elves or wizards here... but you will find the biggest, boldest, and downright most peculiar stories from the last hundred years bound together in the biggest Weird collection ever assembled. The Weird features 110 stories by an all-star cast, from literary legends to international bestsellers to Booker Prize winners: including William Gibson, George R. R. Martin, Stephen King, Angela Carter, Kelly Link, Franz Kafka, China Miéville, Clive Barker, Haruki Murakami, M. R. James, Neil Gaiman, Mervyn Peake, and Michael Chabon.
Saffron and Brimstone: Strange Stories
Elizabeth Hand - 2006
This new collection (an expansion of the limited-release Bibliomancy, which won the World Fantasy Award in 2005) showcases a wildly inventive author at the height of her powers. Included in this collection are "The Least Trumps," in which a lonely women reaches out to the world through symbols, tattooing, and the Tarot, and "Pavane for a Prince of the Air," where neo-pagan rituals bring a recently departed soul to something very different than eternal rest. Written in the author's characteristic poetic prose and rich with the details of traumatic lives that are luminously transformed, Saffron and Brimstone is a worthy addition to an outstanding career.* Elizabeth Hand's work has been selected as a Washington Post Notable Book and a New York Times Notable Book, and she has been awarded a Nebula Award and two World Fantasy Awards.
McSweeney's Enchanted Chamber of Astonishing Stories
Michael ChabonJason Roberts - 2004
Brite - The Devil of Delery StreetChina Mieville- Reports of Certain Events in LondonJoyce Carol Oates - The Fabled Light-house at Vi–a del MarPeter Straub - Mr. Aickman’s Air Rifle
Year's Best Weird Fiction; Volume 2
Kathe KojaCat Hellisen - 2015
Contributing authors include Julio Cortazar, Jean Muno, Karen Joy Fowler, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Nick Mamatas, Carmen Maria Machado, Nathan Ballingrud, and more. No longer the purview of esoteric readers, weird fiction is enjoying wide popularity. Chiefly derived from early 20th-century pulp fiction, its remit includes ghost stories, the strange and macabre, the supernatural, fantasy, myth, philosophical ontology, ambiguity, and a healthy helping of the outre. At its best, weird fiction is an intersecting of themes and ideas that explore and subvert the Laws of Nature. It is not confined to one genre, but is the most diverse and welcoming of all genres.
Demiurge: The Complete Cthulhu Mythos Tales of Michael Shea
Michael Shea - 2017
P. Lovecraft—an entire universe of gods and monsters that hundreds of writers have imitated. But Shea has done a lot more than merely mimic Lovecraft’s prose or add a new god or “forbidden book” to the Mythos. In his Mythos tales, Shea has infused his own unique vision and perspective. The much-reprinted “Fat Face” takes us into the seedy underworld of prostitutes and drug dealers in San Francisco, while other tales such as “Dagoniad,” “Copping Squid,” and “Tsathoggua” vividly meld Lovecraftian cosmic horror with the contemporary world of California, with its swimming pools and beachcombers. Shea was also fascinated with Lovecraft’s novel of Antarctic horror, At the Mountains of Madness, and his stories “Under the Shelf” and “Beneath the Beardmore” take us to that frozen land of death and terror. The title story, “Demiurge,” is a previously unpublished novella that draws upon Lovecraft’s tales of psychic possession in its chilling portrayal of a nameless monster who may be the harbinger of the overthrow of the entire human race. Michael Shea (1946–2014) was the award-winning author of The Color out of Time, the Nifft the Lean series of fantasy novels, and the classic tales “Polyphemus” and “The Autopsy.” This volume of his complete Cthulhu Mythos tales has been assembled by S. T. Joshi, a leading authority on Lovecraft and the Mythos. This volume features wraparound cover artwork and five interior illustrations by renowned artist Aeron Alfrey (MADHOUSE).
Black Wings: Tales of Lovecraftian Horror
S.T. JoshiRamsey Campbell - 2010
Kiernan, Brian Stableford, Ramsey Campbell, Michael Shea, Darrell Schweitzer, Donald R. Burleson, and David J. Schow delve deep into the psyche, expanding on concepts H.P. Lovecraft created and taking them in new directions. The result is stories that are wholly original, some even featuring Lovecraft himself as a character. Black Wings editor S.T. Joshi is the recognized authority on all things Lovecraftian, and is famous for his restorations of Lovecraft's original works. He has assembled a star-studded line-up in a book that is essential for every horror library. Including: Pickman's Other Model - Caitlín R. Kiernan Desert Dreams - Donald R. Burleson Engravings - Joseph S. Pulver, Sr. Copping Squid - Michael Shea Passing Spirits - Sam Gafford The Broadsword - Laird Barron Usurped - William Browning Spencer Denker's Book - Davd J. Schow Inhabitants of Wraithwood - W.H Pugmire The Dome - Mollie L. Burleson Rotterdam - Nicholas Royle Tempting Providence - Jonathan Thomas Howling in the Dark - Darrell Schweitzer The Truth About Pickman - Brian Stableford Tunnells - Philip Haldeman The Correspondence of Cameron Thaddeus Nash - Annotated by Ramsey Campbell Violence, Child of Trust - Michael Cisco Lesser Demons - Norman Partridge An Eldritch Matter - Adam Niswander Substitutions - Michael Marshall Smith Susie - Jason Van Hollander
Deathbird Stories
Harlan Ellison - 1975
The collection contains some of Ellison's best stories from earlier collections and is judged by some to be his most consistently high quality collection of short fiction. The theme of the collection can be loosely defined as God, or Gods. Sometimes they're dead or dying, some of them are as brand-new as today's technology. Unlike some of Ellison's collections, the introductory notes to each story can be as short as a phrase and rarely run more than a sentence or two. One story took a Locus Poll Award, the two final ones both garnered Hugo Awards and Locus Poll awards, and the final one also received a Jupiter Award from the Instructors of Science Fiction in Higher Education (discontinued in 1979). When the collection was published in Britain, it won the 1979 British Science Fiction Award for Short Fiction.His stories will rivet you to the floor and change your heartbeat...as unforgettable a chamber of horror, fantasy and reality as you'll ever experience.-Gallery "Brutally and flamboyantly shocking, frequently brilliant, and always irresistibly mesmerizing."-Richmond Times-Dispatch
New Tales of the Yellow Sign
Robin D. Laws - 2012
A slim, sinister text called The King in Yellow drove those who read it to madness. Despite suppression by anxious authorities, it spread through global culture, and history itself, like a virus. Now the contagion bears hideous fruit.New Tales of the Yellow Sign expands the classic horror mythos of weird tales pioneer and Lovecraft precursor Robert W. Chambers into new vistas of unease and imagination. Over the course of eight troubling stories, writer and visionary game designer Robin D. Laws lures you into diseased timelines, impossible pasts, and the all-too-terrifying present.Sterilize your suicide chamber, harken to the remorseless clicking of your black box, and whistle for the monstrous creature that lives in your basement. The pallid mask awaits.
Behold the Void
Philip Fracassi - 2017
It's the kind of place where the wrong people get hurt; hazard is everywhere and it doesn't play favorites. The complacent won't find refuge here on the threshold of the void. Nobody is safe and nothing is sacred. Enjoy the ride."– from the introduction by Laird Barron***BEHOLD THE VOID is nine stories of terror that huddle in the dark space between cosmic horror and the modern weird, between old-school hard-edged horror of the 1980's and the stylistic prose of today's literary giants.***
Praise for Behold the Void:
SHORT STORY COLLECTION OF THE YEAR – This Is Horror “Fracassi…builds his horrific tales slowly and carefully…his powers of description are formidable; and he’s especially skillful at creating, and sustaining, suspense.” – The New York Times“…think vintage King at his best.” – Rue Morgue Magazine (“Dante’s Pick”) “…recalls the work of writers such as McCammon, King, and Bradbury.” – John Langan, LOCUS Magazine“With carefully drawn characters, vividly constructed situations, and deft description, Behold the Void offers the perfect blend of honest-to-goodness human nastiness and true supernatural creepiness. This is horror fiction at its best.” – Brian Evenson, author of A Collapse of Horses“Everything here is damned near perfect… a first-rate collection.” Black Static“Philip Fracassi is the next big horror writer to blow your mind. If you’re a fan of the horror genre at all, then this guy is a must-read.” – Lit Reactor“These stories are scary, yes, but more than that, they’re haunting– they get inside you and they don’t go away.” – Ben Loory, author of Tales of Falling and Flying“Fracassi’s Behold the Void is the perfect read for horror fans who expect authors to raise the bar and redefine what horror fiction means.” – Ronald Malfi, author of Bone White“Fracassi is quickly building a reputation as a superior storyteller of incredible talent…. an author we must surely now hail as a leading light in the dark field of horror fiction.” – This Is Horror
The Innsmouth Cycle: The Taint of the Deep Ones
Robert M. PriceDave Carson - 1997
/ My journey to your depths begins tonight / To serve immortal till the stars turn right."These lines from a poem by Ann K. Schwader are the coda for this fine collection of tales about H.P. Lovecraft's Innsmouth--that decadent, smugly rotting New England town where half-human creatures with forbidding batrachian faces follow the arcane practices of the Esoteric Order of Dagon. In his erudite and witty introduction, Robert M. Price calls Innsmouth "the most effective, most evocative ... example of Lovecraft's full-blown alien civilizations." The Innsmouth Cycle includes 13 stories and 3 poems, including the three tales by Lord Dunsany, Robert W. Chambers, and Irvin S. Cobb that inspired Lovecraft's "The Shadow over Innsmouth." This collection is planned as the first of a pair, the second half of which will be Tales of Innsmouth, containing (according to Price) all new works of "fishy fiction."A fun detail: this book is "respectfully dedicated to Ben Chapman, the Creature from the Black Lagoon." --Fiona Webster
Alone With the Horrors: The Great Short Fiction, 1961-1991
Ramsey Campbell - 1993
He has won four World Fantasy Awards, ten British Fantasy Awards, three Bram Stoker Awards, and the Horror Writers' Association's Lifetime Achievement Award. Three decades into his career, Campbell paused to review his body of short fiction and selected the stories that were, to his mind, the very best of his works. Alone With the Horrors collects nearly forty tales from the first thirty years of Campbell's writing. Included here are "In the Bag," which won the British Fantasy Award, and two World Fantasy Award-winning stories, "The Chimney" and the classic "Mackintosh Willy." Campbell crowns the book with a length preface which traces his early publication history, discusses his youthful correspondence with August Derleth, illuminates the influence of H.P. Lovecraft on his early work, and gives an account of the creation of each story and the author's personal assessment of the works' flaws and virtues.In its first publication, a decade ago, Alone With the Horrors won both the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. For this new edition, Campbell has added one of his very first published stories, a Lovecraftian classic, "The Tower from Yuggoth." From this early, Cthulhian tale, to later works that showcase Campbell's growing mastery of mood and character, Alone With the Horrors provides readers with a close look at a powerful writer's development of his craft.
Mysteries of the Worm
Robert Bloch - 1981
To know them will be to know him. And thus we have decided to release a new and expanded third edition of Robert Bloch’s Mysteries of the Worm. This collection contains four more Mythos tales–”The Opener of the Way”, “The Eyes of the Mummy”, “Black Bargain”, and “Philtre Tip”–not included in the first two editions.
The Dunwich Cycle: Where the Old Gods Wait
Robert M. Price - 1995
Lovecraft -- The Shuttered Room / August w. Derleth -- The Round Tower / Robert M. Price -- The Devil's Hop Yard / Richard A. Lupoff -- The Road to Dunwich / Ben Indick -- The Tree-House / W.H. Pugmire and Robert M. Price -- You Can't Take It With You / C.J. Henderson -- Wilbur Whateley Waiting / Robert M. Price.
New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird
Paula GuranLaird Barron - 2011
Lovecraft has inspired writers of supernatural fiction, artists, musicians, filmmakers, and gamers. His themes of cosmic indifference, the utter insignificance of humankind, minds invaded by the alien, and the horrors of history—written with a pervasive atmosphere of unexplainable dread—remain not only viable motifs, but are more relevant than ever as we explore the mysteries of a universe in which our planet is infinitesimal and climatic change is overwhelming it. In the early twenty-first century the best supernatural writers no longer imitate Lovecraft, but they are profoundly influenced by the genre and the mythos he created. New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird presents some of the best of this new Lovecraftian fiction—bizarre, subtle, atmospheric, metaphysical, psychological, filled with strange creatures and stranger characters—eldritch, unsettling, evocative, and darkly appealing.
The Witch-Cult in Western Massachusetts
Matthew M. Bartlett - 2015
Bartlett, author of Gateways to Abomination, is back with The Witch-Cult in Western Massachusetts. A cross between Roberto Bolaño’s Nazi Literature in the Americas and Gardinel’s Real Estate by Orrin Grey and M.S. Corley, this slender volume consists of 13 bite-sized fictional biographies, each accompanied by a chilling illustration by the masterful Alex Fienemann. Meet Stanley Malanson, who had a curious rapport with felines. Meet Abrecan Geist, who endeavored to take revenge on a capricious God. Meet Minerva LaBrie, who abandoned Wicca in favor of a dark and blasphemous alternative. Meet Jebediah Blackstye, who crossed a line with his beloved familiar, a toad with revolting powers. These are but four of the practitioners of black magic who have made their homes in the cities and towns of Western Massachusetts. Read of sumptuous feasts gone to rot, of a corrupted priest who dared unleash his venomous platitudes over the common airwaves, of a powerful sorcerer born at the intersection of Blood and Stone. Open your hearts to the Witch-Cult in Western Massachusetts.