This new anthology represents the most outstanding new short stories and novellas by both contemporary masters of horror and exciting newcomers. The award-winning series offers a chilling overview of this year in horror.
A gripping collection which offers for the first time a chronological overview of the popular contemporary sub-genre of body horror, from Edgar Allan Poe to Christopher Fowler, with contributions from leading horror writers, including Stephen King, George Langelaan and Neil Gaiman. The collection includes the stories behind seminal body horror movies, John Carpenter's The Thing, David Cronenberg's The Fly and Stuart Gordon's Re-Animator.
Bringing together the finest names in comic book horror, this volume features nearly 50 comics that caused a furor in the US and sparked legislation to crack down on explicit horror—from the 1940s to the 21st century. Includes names like Steve Niles, Pete Von Sholly, Michael Kaluta, Mike Ploog, Rudy Palais, Rand Holmes, Vincent Locke, Frank Brunner, and many more. Reproduced in black and white for this brand-new collection.
The year's best, and darkest, tales of terror, showcasing the most outstanding new short stories and novellas by both contemporary masters of the macabre and exciting newcomers. As ever, this acclaimed anthology also offers the most comprehensive annual overview of horror around the world in all its incarnations; a comprehensive necrology of famous names; and a list of indispensable contact addresses for the dedicated horror fan and writer alike. The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror remains the world's leading annual anthology dedicated solely to presenting the best in contemporary horror fiction.
Welcome to a landscape of ancient evil . . . with stories by masters of horror Arthur Machen, Algernon Blackwood, H. P. Lovecraft, M. R. James, Ramsey Campbell, Storm Constantine, Christopher Fowler, Alison Littlewood, Kim Newman, Reggie Oliver, Michael Marshall Smith, Karl Edward Wagner, and more! The darkness that endures beneath the earth . . . the disquiet that lingers in the woodland surrounding a forgotten path . . . those ancient traditions and practices that still cling to standing stone circles, earthworks, and abandoned buildings; elaborate rituals that invoke elder gods or nature deities; the restless spirits and legendary creatures that remain connected to a place or object, or exist in deep wells and lonely pools of water, waiting to ensnare the unwary traveler . . . These concepts have been the archetypes of horror fiction for decades, but in recent years they have been given a name: Folk Horror. This type of storytelling has existed for more than a century. Authors Arthur Machen, Algernon Blackwood, H. P. Lovecraft, and M. R. James all published fiction that had it roots in the notion of the supernatural being linked to objects or places “left behind.” All four writers are represented in this volume with powerful, and hopefully unfamiliar, examples of their work, along with newer exponents of the craft such as Ramsey Campbell, Storm Constantine, Christopher Fowler, Alison Littlewood, Kim Newman, Reggie Oliver, and many others. Illustrated with the atmospheric photography of Michael Marshall Smith, the stories in The Mammoth Book of Folk Horror tap into an aspect of folkloric tradition that has long been dormant, but never quite forgotten, while the depiction of these forces as being in some way “natural” in no way detracts from the sense of nameless dread and escalating horror that they inspire . . .
Here are 25 stories of science fiction that push the envelope, by the biggest names in an emerging new crop of high-tech futuristic SF - including Charles Stross, Robert Reed, Alastair Reynolds, Peter Hamilton and Neal Asher. High-tech SF has made a significant comeback in the last decade, as bestselling authors successfully blend the super-science of 'hard science fiction' with real characters in an understandable scenario. It is perhaps a reflection of how technologically controlled our world is that readers increasingly look for science fiction that considers the fates of mankind as a result of increasing scientific domination. This anthology brings together the most extreme examples of the new high-tech, far-future science fiction, pushing the limits way beyond normal boundaries. The stories include: "A Perpetual War Fought Within a Cosmic String", "A Weapon That Could Destroy the Universe", "A Machine That Detects Alternate Worlds and Creates a Choice of Christs", "An Immortal Dead Man Sent To The End of the Universe", "Murder in Virtual Reality", "A Spaceship So Large That There is An Entire Planetary System Within It", and "An Analytical Engine At The End of Time", and "Encountering the Untouchable."
Twenty-seven fantasy tales from Neil Gaiman to George R. R. Martin, plus many more, are collected in this anthology of speculative fiction. The renowned storytellers assembled here will challenge our concept of good and evil and provide us with new ways of seeing right and wrong: even angels can fall and demons will strive for redemption.
Pulp fiction has been looked down on as a guilty pleasure, but it offers the perfect form of entertainment: the very best storytelling filled with action, surprises, sound and fury. In short, all the exhiliration of a roller-coaster ride. The 1920s in America saw the proliferation of hundreds of dubiously named but thrillingly entertaining pulp magazines in America – Black Mask, Amazing, Astounding, Spicy Stories, Ace-High, Detective Magazine, Dare-Devil Aces. It was in these luridly-coloured publications, printed on the cheapest pulp paper, that the first gems began to appear. The one golden rule for writers of pulp fiction was to adhere to the art of storytelling. Each story had to have a beginning, an end, economically-etched characters, but plenty going on, both in terms of action and emotions. Pulp magazines were the TV of their day, plucking readers from drab lives and planting them firmly in thrilling make-believe, successors to the Victorian penny dreadfuls of writers such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Charles Dickens. These stories exemplify the best of crime and mystery pulp fiction – its zest, speed, rhythm, verve and commitment to straightforward storytelling – spanning seven decades of popular writing.
Gathers zombie stories by Clive Barker, Ramsey Campbell, Manly Wade Wellman, Edgar Allan Poe, Karl Edward Wagner, Brian Lumley, H.P. Lovecraft, and Robert Bloch
With "Nosferatu," or vampires, as a common theme, this collection of macabre stories gathers together the work of Harlan Ellison, Paul McAuley, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, Peter Tremayne, Steve Rasnic Tern, Clive Barker, Brian Lumley, Neil Gaiman, and Kim Newman, among others. Original.