Darkness, My Old Friend

[OSJ]

Hey all: 

My editor was just here for a visit and I re-upped on copies of my short story collection, which has (thus far) garnered nothing but rave reviews on both sides of the Atlantic (apparently, I have quite the following in the UK). Anyway, I have a box of the trade edition (retail $34.95 + shipping, from me a mere thirty bucks postpaid) and I have two copies of the slipcased, signed Deluxe Edition(retail $125 + shipping, from me, a hundred bucks postpaid). Looks like the book will possibly sell out before the end of the year so don't be shy, hit me up on PayPal at [email protected] and get your good self a personalized copy before they're all gone! 

[J.T.]

Darkness, My Old Friend

A Review by JT

As is the custom of people of previous generations, I tend to espouse the virtues of my childhood zeitgeist.  These places tend to be magical realms when times were either better or worse, depending on the point we were trying to make at the time and the audience we arguing with.  

When I began to turn the pages of my good friend John Pelan's horror anthology, Darkness, My Old Friend, I found myself spirited away back in time to the late 1970's.  EC (Entertainment Comics) used to be the standard bearer of illustrated pulp horror fiction.  Stories from magazines like Tales From the Crypt, The Vault of Horror, and Eerie had fueled kid's nightmares and infuriated parents since the 1940's, but now EC found its gates under siege from companies like DC, Marvel and Charleton

For every issue of Superman or Blue Beetle, you could find The Witching Hour, Werewolf By Night, or Ghost Manor.  It was indeed a better time.

The dank and horrific tales to astonish are all shared inside a nondescript yet ominous, pub called The Smoking Leg and like any good horror writer worth his salt, John gives us no explanation as to how this establishment got such a peculiar name.  The best part of world building is that you don't really owe an explanation of your personal mythology to anyone.  

I can't really point to a particular story that I enjoyed over another, however one thing I can say is that I really do thank God that John remembers the traditional roles of the monster in pulp fiction.  He reminds us that the chthonic elder gods of Lovecraft were not so much destroyers of mankind as they were stop signs along the highway leading to those things that humans really shouldn't be meddling with and if you got eaten along the way, it was your own damned fault.

John also brings us tales where the monster is the enforcer of natural law or in this case, unnatural law .  Whether they be the cold hands of the dark things lurking in the corners of a shadowy room or grisly tentacles from the deep, we can count on the monster to administer terrible and satisfying poetic justice to the evil people that foolishly believe that status or wealth gives them carte blanc to engage in whatever cruel act suits them. 

The monster gave a voice to the voiceless and gave power to the powerless.  It avenged the lost and punished the wicked.  

As much as I loved those old pulp horror comic classics, I am a grown-up now so I am very appreciative of John adding a rather nasty edge to his prose.  A mean and vicious spirit is sometimes essential when you are telling cautionary tales to an adult audience. There are times when it is best to keep the horror behind the veil, and there are other times the reader needs to know in horrible detail what the price of understanding or malfeasance truly is.

I am looking forward to heating more tales from The Smoking Leg.  it is not lost on me that the pleasure I receive from reading such stories is build on human anguish and supernatural terror, but I would not have it any other way.

[Contentious C]

Given the, ahem, timing of this review (and it's not like I was posting again as of 2016), my question is, are any of these still sitting around in a box in New Mexico?

[J.T.]

2 minutes ago, Contentious C said:

Given the, ahem, timing of this review.

The fault is mine.  I have been sitting on that project for a while now and it was long overdue.

[Contentious C]

Oh, I know; I've seen John whack you for that in quite a few other threads and, jerk that I am, couldn't avoid some mild trolling.

[J.T.]

7 minutes ago, Contentious C said:

Oh, I know; I've seen John whack you for that in quite a few other threads and, jerk that I am, couldn't avoid some mild trolling.

You would only be trolling if it weren't true.