To Beat a Dead Horse [Paperback]

William Campbell (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 26, 2004

Beating a dead horse is easy. It's dead. Hit it all you want, it won't hit back. Watch out for these stories, though. They bite and scratch and put you face to face with your darkest nightmares. Meet a reporter who knows too much about a sinister crime, a woman obsessed with a dead serial killer, a hitchhiker with a magical gift, a tooth-fairy who won't take no for an answer, a loner who gets his blow-up doll pregnant, and an abortion nurse who has a plan for those unwanted fetuses. From a basement turned into a torture chamber to a Nebraska highway you'd beg not to be stranded on, these twelve stories and five stage plays will lash out at your imagination and leave you whimpering for more.

Editorial Reviews

Review

An abyss of terror written in a plain, informative style, but the description of fear always remains with the reader. -- Charlie Vogel, author of To Find A Killer.

His storytelling is so vivid; you may even recall his singular imagery and startling characters in your most private experiences. -- Sally J. Walker, Founder of Nebraska Writers Workshop, Write-Now Seminars, author, poet, screenwriter.

One of those writers who is able to take their pain and turn it into great work. -- C. Dennis Moore, author of Camdigan and co-editor of Project M-zine.

Reminiscent of early Matheson and Bloch, with a dash of Bradbury... An honest awareness pulsing through... -- Kealan Patrick Burke, author of The Turtle Boy, The Hides, and Ravenous Ghosts.

Thrilling, delicious tales that prove hard to put down. Evocative and haunting prose. -- Don Nguyen, Artistic Director, Shelterbelt Theatre

About the Author

William Campbell has been telling stories for what must be his entire life. His earliest memory of storytelling comes from when he was four. Apparently trying to understand what it meant to be adopted, he told his parents he was born in Germany and had to cross the ocean to be with them. According to his story, the ship sank in a terrible storm. He finished the journey by holding onto a piece of debris until he washed ashore.

His parents' dropped-jaw reaction: "Where did Billy learn the word Germany?"

William has been creating make-believe ever since, from comic books in elementary school, claymation movies in jr. high, depressing, "woe, I must cut my wrists" poetry in college, and finally to fiction. He had some minor success in the early 90's, but had to take time off from writing to deal with family problems. He began writing again this century. His short stories have appeared in Project M-Zine, Aofie's Kiss, Alternate Realities, Short e-Stories, and Flashshot, to name a few.

He has recently turned his attention to writing stage plays. His plays have appeared at the Shelterbelt Theatre in Omaha, the Heartland Theatre in Normal, Illinois, the University of Idaho Repository Theatre, and Playwright's Showcase in Denver.

Whether it’s short stories or stage plays, his writing is always a product of his popcorn culture and short attention span. He blames his love for horror and things that go bump in the night on a Norman Bridwell children's book. How to Care for Your Monster taught him that you can have a monster as a pet. Maybe William took the book too seriously.

Born in Oklahoma, he has also lived in Texas, Wyoming and Iowa. He currently lives in Omaha with his wife, children, a parrot and a Great Dane that he constantly tells to get off the couch. When not writing or reprimanding his dog, he works as a speech-language pathologist.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 148 pages
• Publisher: Fine Tooth Press L.L.C. (October 26, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0975338862
• ISBN-13: 978-0975338865
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,735,927 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Altogether creepy and twisted but with heart, January 9, 2005

By 

Charlie West "Charlie" (Topeka, KS) - See all my reviews

This review is from: To Beat a Dead Horse (Paperback)

This book creeped me out something fierce. It's not the type of horror that smacks you in the face. It's the sort that simmers and brews and when you finally get around to the climax it's way too late for pleasant dreams or happy endings. This isn't a comfortable book. It's not a collection of stories that you can read before bed. I tried. Then I lay there for hours thinking about what I'd read. Too much of the horror in Campbell's stories is culled directly from reality, familiar reality. No one is safe in a William Campbell story, not even the reader.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Measured Doses of Hell, January 17, 2005

By 

Craig Wolf (Oklahoma City) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: To Beat a Dead Horse (Paperback)

First, in the interest of disclosure, I provided a blurb for Mr. Campbell's book. This review, then, is something of an expansion of that blurb.

Bill Campbell writes about troubling things: execution, abortion, family dysfunction. He is not afraid to take a stance on these issues, or to let that stance come through in his stories, but he seldom demands that you see things the way he does. He just wants you to give 'em some thought.

Standout stories in this collection are "Don't Cheat The Tooth Fairy" "Abortion Is Life" and "Fantasy Night", but it's unlikely that any of them will leave you disappointed. In addition, Campbell has included the stage versions of several stories, and it's interesting to note the changes that were wrought in tranforming the original material.

Fans of Stephen King, Richard Matheson, or F. Paul Wilson will enjoy this very much, I think. And I think we will hear much more from the talented Mr. Campbell

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars To Beat a Dead Horse, by William Campbell, November 17, 2004

By 

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

This review is from: To Beat a Dead Horse (Paperback)

William Campbell writes like a man unhappy with life. After reading his introduction--a bad marriage, a messy divorce, custody battle--it's no surprise. But he's one of those writers who is able to take their pain and turn it into great work. His collection, "Beat a Dead Horse" is just a glimpse at that talent.

"My mind is a tongue constantly poking at a sore tooth," he says. "If you're paying attention, you'll notice I'm . . . mixing metaphors to drive home a point, beating a dead horse . . . I haven't stopped beating dead horses entirely. This collection has a fair share of them. Some of the stories in here have been told again and again, yet I have stubbornly tried to breath new life into them."

He manages this breath of new life by putting his own life story into this collection. From the divorced father in "Don't Cheat the Tooth Fairy" and "An Hour Before Dying" to the Nebraska highways he knows so well in "Letting Go" and "What's Wrong with This Picture?" almost every story in here gives us another glimpse of William Campbell the man. For me, that's what great fiction should do, tell not only the story from the author, but the story OF the author as well. While I'm sure the surface has barely been scratched, I still came away from "Beat a Dead Horse" feeling like Campbell and I were old friends, because he writes his short fiction with such intense and harsh honesty, you read it thinking, "Yep, I been there, man. I know what you're saying."

But before you go thinking you're headed for a book of "Oh woe is me, my life is so horrible" stories, don't worry. Those are just a few of the offerings. With any luck the rest of the stories--"His Living Monument", "Special Delivery" and "Abortion is Life" especially--are just stories. If not . . . well, then, I know William Campbell a little better than I need to.

While "Beat a Dead Horse" contains 12 stories--along with stage adaptations of 5 of those stories--it's a very quick read. I had it done in a day. Instead of wasting time on the unimportant details, Campbell gets to the point, tells his story, and keeps our attention focused where it needs to be, on the page.

"He stepped forward, viewing the wreckage. His skin tingled as he walked through the maze of still rain. He stared at the twisted and mangled body in the car, the lacerated face. His hairs stood on end, his flesh covered with goose bumps, and his knees became pudding. He could no longer hold himself up. He felt queasy, unable to breathe. The face he saw was his own. Ben fell to his knees and gagged. Squeezing his fist, he clutched the watch in his hand." (from "An Hour Before Dying")

I love that paragraph. It's very descriptive, but doesn't get bogged down. Every word is important. And it's indicative of the collection as a whole.

Now you're probably wondering about those stage adaptations I mentioned. Campbell says in his introduction that he's recently been getting interested in writing for the stage. With that in mind, he's adapted some of his prose and a few of those are included in the book. It's interesting to note how he managed to deal with the limitations of exposition on stage without resorting to long boring recitations from characters on their personal histories. I'm not a theatre expert, but as a reader I thought he handled it really well, even if some of the best parts were missing--the trippy section of the last story "Abortion is Life", for instance. There's a whole middle section that was cut for the stage. It makes sense given the limits of stage production, but it's still missing. And the adaptations help in setting this collection apart from all the others out there.

Campbell took a long time off from writing to deal with his life--the life he then lets us into through his fiction--but when he came back to it, he did so with great energy and years of bottled up talent and drive. "Beat a Dead Horse" is a great collection. Now I remember why it was I took 3 of his stories for the magazine I co-edit.