August 2 - "Strawberry Spring"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“Strawberry Spring”
by Stephen King
Night Shift (1979)

* * * (Good) Horror

Hidden in the fog, a killer haunts the campus of the New Sharon Teacher’s College during the strawberry spring of 1968.

King does a better job with the setting and the mood of the story here than he does with developing the characters. Which is unusual. That’s not to say that he foregoes setting and mood in his greater works – in fact they are a large part of many of his stories – but they are usually combined with interesting, realistic characters. Here the narrator does little more than recollect fragments of that time when Springheel Jack stalked the campus, killing coeds in the fog. The twist at the end of the story is of little surprise, and by the end, it doesn’t appear to be much more than your average slasher/horror story.

[This story was read on August 2. The review was not posted until later due to laziness on my part.]

July 19 - "The Man Who Loved Flowers"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“The Man Who Loved Flowers”
by Stephen King
Night Shift (1979)

* * * (Good) Horror

A young man with a secret peacefully walks the streets of New York City before purchasing a bundle of flowers and setting off in search of his girl, Norma.

Sometimes all it takes is a single small moment, a clue hidden into the narrative so that the twist ending doesn’t come out of nowhere, to spoil a story. I’m not saying that I enjoyed the story less by recognizing this story beat, but the tale did become predictable from that point forward. But I was a bit disappointed here because the story started off so differently that any other King story I’d read. It was a story about a man in love and things were grand and I didn’t know where it was going to lead me. Once I knew there was a hammer killer on the loose, it was apparent who he was and what he was going to do and how the story would end. It was a fine story with an apt ending, but my excitement vanished long before that point.

June 26 - "Abraham's Boys"

“Abraham’s Boys”
by Joe Hill
20th Century Ghosts (2007)

* * * * * (Excellent) Horror

After caught snooping in their father’s study, Max and Rudy are taken to the basement to practice the skills their father feels must be passed to his children.

Hill does a great job of introducing us to these characters before adding the extra layer of vampires and legacy. Add to this the fact the story doesn’t involve any actual vampires and calls into question the sanity of the boys’ father – what if there never were any vampires? – the tale is tremendously engaging and entertaining. This is a great story of fathers and sons, of brothers, and how a little horror – real or imagined or feared – can bring things crashing down.

June 14 - "Gray Matter"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“Gray Matter”
by Stephen King
Night Shift (1979)

* * * * (Great) Horror

A group of old duffers leave the comfort of the local bar during a winter storm to take a case of beer to Richie Grenadine. Richie’s son, Timmy, had come to the bar for the beer, scared to return to a father that had transformed into something gray and monstrous.

I love the scary stories. The kind of stories that give you actual chills. The chance that a bad can of beer could turn a person into a dead cat-eating, gelatinous monster is enough to keep a person from drinking. King does a great job building the tension so that when the group finally reaches their destination, characters and reader are afraid to walk down that dark, smelly – eerie – hallway. And there’s even an Easter egg of a side tale about a man encountering a giant spider in the sewers.

May 31 - "The Night Flier"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“The Night Flier”
by Stephen King
Nightmares & Dreamscapes (1993)

* * * * (Great) Horror

Tabloid report Richard Dees follows the story of a serial killer preying on the people that run small airports along the East coast. His nose for the “blood and guts” story leads him to an encounter with the Night Flier he will never forget.

This is the type of horror story I enjoy. It’s the building tension and suspense – the mystery – that draw me into stories. I don’t mind the carnage –the blood and guts – but only if they fit the story, if they are the right element for the moment. As "The Night Flier" progresses, each section gives you another piece to the puzzle, with the past and present coming together at the end. There’s a spectacular bit of plane-crashing action before Dees finally meets up with the Night Flier. It’s a confrontation King excels at writing, leaving both the character and the reader in awe of the monster King has gleefully created.

May 23 - "The November Game"

“The November Game”
by F. Paul Wilson
Aftershock and Others (2009)

* * * * (Great) Horror

Mich continues work on his escape from prison, all the while becoming increasingly distressed by the pieces of his dead daughter the guards keep slipping into his meals.

Who hasn’t participated in that Halloween activity of passing around “body parts” in the dark that gave rise to Ray Bradbury’s short story, “The October Game”? Apparently the story had such in impact on a young Wilson that he felt the need – to our enjoyment – to continue the tale. The quick building of tension, and the too-obviously apparent monster in the hole, make the story feel a little rushed and predictable. However, the horror remained. And in horror stories, the hardest part is retaining that feeling of dread, of terror. It is what makes the story work and gives it its bite.

[The story was read on May 23rd, but the review was late in being posted. I knew I should have posted the review before settling down in the Chair of Unintended Sleep.]

May 17 - "The Boogeyman"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“The Boogeyman”
by Stephen King
Night Shift (1979)

* * * * (Great) Horror

Lester Billings discusses his guilt over the death of his three young children with a shrink. He didn’t kill the children – not exactly – he just didn’t protect them from the Boogeyman.

Speaking as a person who still jumps at sounds and bumps in the night, a story written about the Boogeyman terrorizing a family hits me where I still feel some fear. King does a great job of justifying, in character, why Lester would continue to leave his children alone in the dark, easy prey for the Boogeyman even he is convinced exists. After the first child’s death, you as reader wonder why he doesn’t learn and protect the other children. His upbringing – and then fear – are offered as explanation, not excuses, and they fit the character and thus end the questions we readers were asking. My only complaint is the ending. The story could have gone a few different ways, but took the easy route: the Scooby Doo ending. A monster in a mask is weak.

April 18 - "Dreams"

“Dreams”
by F. Paul Wilson
Aftershock and Others (2009)

* * * * * (Excellent) Horror

The recurring nightmare of being trapped in the monstrous body of a manly beast leads Eva discover a startling truth.

Knowing the truth that the narrator searches for regarding her life gives us, the reader, an understanding that only further adds to the ironic twist of this tale. The idea of living your dreams as if they were the “real” world has always fascinated me. This story does a great job of exploring that very idea while also mixing in the Frankenstein mythos. Everything about this short tale succeeds. The horror here is the possibility that that great lumbering monster could have evolved out of the dream-fulfillment fantasies of an unsuspecting, murdered farm girl.

March 22 - "Graveyard Shift"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“Graveyard Shift”
by Stephen King
Night Shift (1979)

* * (Okay) Horror

Hall and a handful of other men volunteer to clean the long-abandoned, rat-infested basement of the mill during the Fourth of July shut down. No one expected to find the old wooden door leading down to a forgotten sub-basement, and the evils lurking beneath the mill.

If you did not already dislike rats before reading this story, I imagine you’d look upon them now in a new, disgusted light. In this tale King spends too much time on the atmosphere and setting, ignoring the story. I never had a feel for the character of Hall, something unusual in a story penned by King, and that lack of connection kept me coolly aloof as a reader. While it is a creepy tale, and you can easily imagine the glassy-blind black eyes staring out at you from the shadows of the room, you reach the end and can do little but shrug your indifferent shoulders. Horrific, yes; entertaining, not so much.

March 20 - "The Long Dead Day"

“The Long Dead Day”
by Joe R. Lansdale
The Shadows, Kith and Kin (2007)

* * * (Good) Horror

A man’s daughter says a dog bit her, but the wound is not that of a dog’s bite; it is the bite of something else, something far more deadly.

This quick tale could very easily fit in the world of The Walking Dead, or any other zombie-splattered landscape. There is nothing shockingly new here, but that which is written is pure Lansdale in style. The story is visceral, it is graphic, and it is easily imaginable – not that many would want to imagine living in a world where you would be faced to make the choices this man makes. Similarities to other works aside, this is recognizable Lansdale, and it is good, bloody horror.

January 18 - "Autopsy Room Four"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“Autopsy Room Four”
by Stephen King
Everything’s Eventual (2002)

* * * (Good) Horror

Howard Cottrell awoke to find his body unresponsive, even his eyelids failed to perform their simple act. He was paralyzed and rolling toward room four. Unsure whether he was alive or dead, Howard struggled to get the attention of the coroner before the act of an autopsy answered the question – with finality –for him.

King does a great job building suspense and tension throughout the story. You begin to wonder how you’d feel and think if you were aware and on the slab. Knowing King’s stories don’t often flinch at the horror or unhappy endings, the intensity of the tale stays jacked up all the way through to the resolution. There is an afternote to the story that I feel diminishes the overall impact of the ending. It feels tacked on, and doesn’t add anything but an unneeded explanation for the cause of paralysis. Still, successful tales – horror stories in particular – are those that examine common fears and questions, and with these King is master.

January 12 - "The Sanctuary"

“The Sanctuary”
by Bentley Little
The Collection (2002)

* * (Okay) Horror

Cal came home from school to find that his mother had sinned again, given in to The Rage. Torn between turning his mother in to the authorities, or something much worse, Cal notices that familiar glint in his mother’s eye.

A fan of Little’s novels, I purchased the collection on whim to read the story, “The Washingtonians,” because of the Masters of Horror episode based on the tale. Both turned out to be adequate, but not near as good as the other stories I’d read of his. The same is true of “The Sanctuary.” There’s nothing overtly wrong with the story, and it contains enough creepiness to succeed in its genre, but there’s nothing special or newly unique. Originally published in 1989, it appears to be one of the earliest stories in the collection, and his strength as a horror writer has only grown. It does win a couple of points for examining – rather harshly, but maybe accurately? – the home life of certain religious extremists. (I’m sure that’s an unfair generalization, but jeez, those people creep me out.)

The Trouble with Horror

After reading my third story of this nature in less than a week, and struggling to classify it as simply Horror, I find myself changing my genre categories already.

It was “Willa” that brought me to rethink my Horror category, and “The Wedding Present” that forced me to edit my previous posts and correct such an error in classification. Stories such as these are more apt to be categorized as Supernatural than horror.

More on this troubling genre of horror to come…

January 1 - "Brand New Horror"

“Best New Horror”
by Joe Hill
20th Century Ghosts (2007)

* * (Okay) Horror

The editor of Best New Horror, a short story anthology, comes across the story of Buttonboy that rekindles his excitement for work - his love of stories and horror - but has difficulty tracking down its elusive author. Stories this scary come from somewhere – from someone. But is that really a someone you want to meet?

I don’t know that I would have chosen as leading story in the collection, or even included such a superlative such as “best” in the title, a story that was only okay, but ultimately unsatisfying. The snippets of the story-in-the-story, “Buttonboy: A Love Story,” were examples of all I don’t enjoy in horror – mindless torture/porn. The surprise, shock ending was obvious from the outset. I don’t know if I’ve just seen too many horror movies (a problem shared by the main character of the story, and his reason for loss of love of the job and his end of the story revelations), but this story fell flat on its own, trying-to-be-clever face.

That said, there was a description of a boy’s soul leaving through his pin-punctured eyes, sounding like breath over an empty Coke bottle, that I thought was pretty perfect.