Allen Ashley (ed.) – Creeping Crawlers

Allen Ashley (ed.) – Creeping Crawlers  (Shadow Publishing, Aug. 2015)

Cover: Steve Upham

David Birch – Spinnentier
Gary Budgen – Scarab
Adrian Cole – Running with the Tide
Storm Constantine – In the Earth
Andrew Darlington – Chemical Glide
Pauline E. Dungate – Mariposas Del Noche
Dennis Etchison – Wet Season
Edmund Glasby – Foreign Bodies
John Grant – Little Helpers
Terry Grimwood – Survivors
Andrew Hook – Us!
Mark Howard Jones – For the Love of Insects
Alan Knott – Dissolute Evolution
Robin Lupton – Guano Dong Baby
Ralph Robert Moore – You Dry Your Tears If They Don’t Work
Richard Mosses – The Tarantata
Marion Pitman – Woodworm
David Rix – A Taste for Canal Burgers
David Turnbull – The Sweet Meat and the Beet

Blurb:
What is this lingering fear of insects, arachnids, arthropods, crustaceans and those that slither… is it a hangover from the survival battles in the savannah or does it go deeper and further back than that in our evolutionary heritage? Unchallenged, the locusts, the maggots, the worms, the flies, the aphids and the termites may consume and destroy all that we have and hold dear. Creeping, slithering, crawling horror, science fiction & fantasy stories by nineteen of today’s top authors.

Joel Lane & Tom Johnstone (eds.) – Horror Uncut

Joel Lane & Tom Johnstone (eds.) – Horror Uncut  (Grey Friar Press, Sept. 2014)

Cover illustration: Neil Williams

Tom Johnsone – Foreword

Joel Lane – A Cry for Help
Simon Bestwick – The Battering Stone
Priya Sharma – The Ballad of Boomtown
John Llewellyn Probert – The Lucky Ones
Stephen Hampton – The Sun Trap
Gary McMahon – Only Bleeding
Anna Taborska – The Lemmy / Trump Test
John Howard – Falling into Stone
Laura Lauro – Ptichka
Stephen Bacon – The Devil’s Only Friend
David Williams – The Procedure
Rosanne Rabinowitz – Pieces of Ourselves
John Forth – A Simple Matter of Space
David Turnbell – The Privilege Card
Alison Littlewood – The Ghost at the Feast
Andrew Hook – The Opaque District
Thana Niveau – No History of Violence

Tom Johnstone – Afterword

Blurb
‘We’ve all heard rumour: that the austerity measures will be over by Christmas. That there will be a Christmas…’ ” But now the prime minister, in the opulent surroundings of a banqueting hall, has publicly called for permanent austerity.

The Con Dem Coalition government’s policies have brought real life horror stories: cancer patients bullied by the DWP, bereaved parents forced out of homes by the bedroom tax, pregnant migrants endangered by avoiding medical help in fear of hospital bills.

Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse, Gray Friar Press presents macabre tales from the frontline of aus-terror-ty. We asked fine writers of horror to bring dark visions of a society blighted by poverty, debt and privatisation, exploring what ghosts, private madness and afterlife such a world might bring.

The anthology counters a culture encouraging ordinary people to scapegoat benefit claimants and migrant workers, show-casing fiction that examines the real roots of a crisis that causes hardship for many and lining the pockets of few.

Here you will encounter the…
…terrible price exacted for treatment in a private hospital…
…ancient curse on an abandoned housing development…
…torture gang of wealthy thugs who hunt the poor…
…suicidal apparitions encountered by a healthcare P.R. man…

Such acclaimed talents as Alison Littlewood, John Llewellyn Probert, Rosanne Rabinowitz, Gary McMahon, Anna Taborska, Joel Lane, Simon Bestwick, Andrew Hook, and Priya Sharma invoke a world where you queue to join the queues, personal space is strictly rationed, and sadistic game-shows control the population.

 

Allyson Bird & Joel Lane – Never Again

Allyson Bird & Joel Lane (eds.) – Never Again (Gray Friar Press, September 2010)

cover by Daniele Serra

Nina Allen – Feet of Clay
R.J. Krijnen-Kemp – Volk
Lisa Tuttle – In the Arcade
John Howard – A Flowering Wound
Tony Richards – Sense
Alison Littlewood – In On The Tide
R.B. Russell – Decision
Mat Joiner – South of Autumn
Rosanne Rabinowitz – Survivor’s Guilt
Rhys Hughes – Rediffusion
Simon Kurt Unsworth – A Place For Feeding
Joe R. Lansdale – The Night They Missed the Horror Show
Kaaron Warren – Ghost Jail
Steve Duffy – The Torturer
Gary McMahon – Methods of Confinement
Rob Shearman – Damned If You Don’t
Carole Johnstone – Machine
Stephen Volk – After the Ape
David Sutton – Zulu’s War
Thana Niveau – Death of Dreams
Andrew Hook – Beyond Each Blue Horizon
Ramsey Campbell – The Depths
Simon Bestwick – Malachi

From Press Release:

Never Again is an attempt to voice the collective revulsion of writers in the weird fiction genre against political attitudes that stifle compassion and deny our collective human inheritance. The imagination is crucial to an understanding both of human diversity and of common ground. Weird fiction is often stigmatised as a reactionary and ignorant genre – we know better. The anthology will be published by Gray Friar Press in September 2010, and edited by Allyson Bird and Joel Lane.

It will be a mixture of original stories and reprints from Ramsey Campbell, Lisa Tuttle and Joe R. Lansdale amongst others. Never Again is a non-profit initiative aimed at promoting awareness of these issues among readers and writers of weird fiction. The editors, authors/artist and publisher will receive no fees for this work. Any profits made from sales will be donated to anti-racist or human rights organizations, e.g. The Sophie Lancaster Foundation.

PREORDERS NOW BEING TAKEN

UK, £10 + £2 P&P
USA, $18 + $6 P&P (airmail)

Gray Friar Press

Gary Fry – Poe’s Progeny

Gary Fry (ed.) – Poe’s Progeny (Gray Friars Press, Sept. 2005)

Michael Marshall Smith – Introduction

Mike O’Driscoll – The Hurting House
Mark Morris – The Places They Hide
Antony Mann – Save The Snutch
Melvin Cartagena – Bottom Feeders
Tim Lebbon – A Ripple In The Veil
Steve Savile – Idiot Hearts
Joel Lane – A Night On Fire
Greg Beatty – Dr Jackman’s Lens
Chico Kidd – Unfinished Business
Conrad Williams – Once Seen
Jon Hartless – Earth, Water, Oil
Nicholas Royle – Sitting Tenant
Kathy Sedia – Making Ivy
Dominick Cancilla – The Cubicle Wall
Stephen Volk – The Good Unknown
Gary Fry – The Strange Case Of Jack Myride And Company
Andrew Hook – The Pregnant Sky
Gene Stewart – Evidence
Rhys Hughes – The Jam Of Hypnos
Gary McMahon – While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Adam L. G. Nevill – Where Angels Come In
John L. Probert – The Volkendorf Exhibition
Allen Ashley – Turbulent Times
Richard Gavin – The Pale Lover
Kevin L. Donihe – Living Room Zombies
Neil Ayres – The Scent Of Nostalgia
Robert Swartwood – Goodbye
Simon Clark – One Man Show
Donald R. Burleson – Papa Loaty
Ramsey Campbell – Just Behind You

Blurb:

Too often contemporary horror fiction denies, forgets or is even unaware of its roots in classic dark literature. The man legitimately called the father of the genre, Edgar Allan Poe, thrust terror into the soul of humanity, while his illegitimate descendants located it in the cosmos, across nations, in science, through history, in nature, in the city — in short, wherever people come together and invariably attempt to dull their imaginations. But experience is always too cruel.

These themes are of course relevant today.

This book aims to show how the ideas and techniques of the greats might be utilised to explore the modern world. Here you’ll find neither pastiche nor period prose, rather thoroughly contemporary visions whose aging, tell-tale heart still beats with dismaying memory of the past and irrepressible fear for the future…

30 original stories from some of the finest practitioners in the field, including a brand new tale from modern master Ramsey Campbell.

Gary Fry – Bernie Herrmann’s Manic Sextet

Gary Fry (ed.) – Bernie Herrmann’s Manic Sextet (Gray Friars, Dec. 2005)

Mike O’Driscoll – Introduction

Paul Finch – Hobhook
Donald Pulker – Forced Perspective
Andrew Hook – Live From The Hippodrome
Gary McMahon – Like A Stone
Adam L. G. Nevill – The Other Occupant
Rhys Hughes – The Hydrothermal Reich
Simon Strantzas – Fading Light

Blurb

Edgar Allan Poe suggested that the short story was the ideal vehicle for the dark tale, yet some of the finest ever written — to take just two examples, Algernon Blackwood’s ‘The Willows’ and H. P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Colour Out Of Space’ — are far longer. The novella, or novelette, is an enduringly popular form in the field of imaginative literature, yet few books celebrate it exclusively.

This collection seeks to show how the longer short story, or the very short novel, is ideally suited to the demands of creating an atmosphere, telling an involving tale, and developing compelling characters. The authors here are all masters of their craft: they know how to combine economy with broad visions of fear.

Let their chill melody seduce you; discordant imagery awaits; infectious rhythms will drive you wild with dread.

Six outstanding pieces from some of today’s bleakest prodigies. Let the music commence…