Bastards of Alchemy [Paperback]

Tom Piccirilli (Author), Gerard Houarner (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 2002

Bastards of Alchemy brings together two of today's most respected and prolific writers of dark and disturbing horror. Tom Piccirilli offers up "Alchemy" a tale of a fun night at the beach gone horribly wrong when dead bodies start washing up on shore. While Gerard Houarner delivers a brutally dark story of a man born to clean up the atrocities of the powers that be while a new order seeks to gain control and create a new kind of chaos. This book is offered in a 300 copy signed and numbered chapbook. #4 in the Necro chapbook line.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Tom Piccirilli is the author of ten novels, including A Lower Deep, Grave Men, The Night Class, Hexes, The Deceased, The Dead Past, Sorrow’s Crown, and Shards. He’s sold over 100 stories to the anthologies such as Museum Of Horrors, Dark Arts, The Darker Side, Bad News, October Dreams, Be Very Afraid, Hot Blood: Stranger By Night, Hot Blood: Fear The Fever, Hot Blood: Crimes Of Passion, Noirotica 3, Star Colonies, Future Crimes, The Conspiracy Files, White House Horrors, Terminal Frights, Cat Crimes Through Time, Felonious Felines, Best Of The American West II, Desperadoes, Guns Of The West, Boot Hill, and the magazines Cemetery Dance, Gothic.net, Fantastic, The Third Alternative, Deathrealm, CrimeWave, Terminal Fright, Lore, Talebones, and Hardboiled, among many others. He’s also the recipient of the first Bram Stoker Award given in the category of Outstanding Achievement in Poetry, for his collection A Student Of Hell. Tom lives in Estes Park, Colorado.

Gerard Houarner is the kind of person who wandered away from the village at a tender age, spent too much time in the wilderness, and these days returns only on ceremonial occasions or to scare the little children. His latest mass market novel, Road to Hell, will be released from Leisure in early 2003. His latest collection, Visions Through A Shattered Lens, will be out shortly from Delirium. He serves as Fiction Editor for Space and Time Magazine.

Product Details

• Paperback: 40 pages
• Publisher: Necro Pubns; 1 edition (August 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1889186309
• ISBN-13: 978-1889186306
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,245,530 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bastard of Alchemy, by Piccirilli & Houarner, February 1, 2003

By 

C. (St. Joseph, Macau) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bastards of Alchemy (Paperback)

Fourth in the Necro Publications chapbook line, "Bastards of Alchemy" is a collection of two short stories from a couple of wonderful horror writers, Tom Piccirilli and Gerard Houarner. This is not the gross-out fest of the first Necro chapbook "Partners in Chyme," nor are the stories linked by theme as in the "Skins of Youth" chapbook. Instead, we're treated this time to something simple--well, simple in that there's no overriding theme to carry the stories along, no connecting bond between stories other than them appearing in the same book--two horror stories written by two authors. Nothing more than that.

Tom Piccirilli's "Alchemy" is, quite possible, the best short story I've ever read. A story about suppressed emotions and hidden rage, all finally coming to the surface in what can only be described as a horrible example of early-adult one-upmanship, this is what I hope to see horror fiction become very soon--literary horror. This isn't the spooky stories of your youth, nor one of the bloody, anger-fueled gore-fests of the late 80s and 90s. This is a piece of literary fiction--it just happens to be a horror story.

Brilliant. I've noticed a move lately in some horror fiction toward a more literary approach, horror as a serious method of communication. No longer do you need to read the "mainstream" novels or the serious poets to find the real voice of a generation, because a lot of horror writers seem to BE that voice, and Tom Piccirilli is definitely one of the ones at the forefront.

Gerard Houarner's "The Bastard" is a different breed altogether. While it could probably also be considered literary horror, Gerard Houarner has never written like everyone else. I don't know WHAT'S going on in his mind when he sits down, but it's certainly far removed from what most of us horror writers are thinking about. I knew that 3 years ago when I reviewed his "Road to Hell." And later when I read one of his stories in the first (and only) issue of "Midnight Hour" magazine. Whatever's going on in his head, it's nothing I'm familiar with.

Gerard Houarner is not writing easy fiction, this isn't stuff you sit down and pound out in an hour or so. It never has been, at least not from what I've read of him. All I can say for sure about Gerard Houarner's work is that secret organizations and magic seem to be important to him. Other than that, I'm lost as to how to figure out this man. But that's the way I like it, just so long as he keeps turning out work of this quality.

If Necro Publications keeps publishing work like this (along with the Ed Lee's Quest for Sex, Truth, and Reality chapbook), I'm going to begin thinking maybe Dave Barnett, Necro's owner and publisher, is growing up a little bit. I don't know if the world's ready for a mature Necro. But I hope we get to find out.