Bumper Crop [Paperback]

Joe R. Lansdale (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2005

Joe R. Lansdale compiles and introduces 26 of his own favorite and most violent dark horror tales in this review of his work. "God of the Razor" introduces the dark god behind serial killers. A martial arts fight to the death between a reluctant champion and a sadistic alpha male is featured in "Master of Misery." Human sacrifice to ensure prosperity and as a coming-of-age ritual, are themes of "On a Dark October" and "Duck Hunt." In "The Fat Man," young boys learn the hard way that some mysteries should not be investigated. Many of the tales are truly weird, such as "Chompers," a story of false teeth with an appetite. All of the stories are individually introduced by Lansdale, who explains the humorous, weird, and sometimes sad genesis for each.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In his foreword to this chicken-fried and jalapeño-laced story collection, a follow-up to High Cotton (2000), Lansdale (The Bottoms) describes these 26 tales as graduates from the "twist and surprise and ain't that damn weird school." He's about right. Published between 1982 and 2003, the tales reflect the influences of the author's East Texas roots, the "California school of horror (Bradbury, Nolan, Matheson, etc.)" and T.E.D. Klein's editorship of Twilight Zone magazine during horror's '80s heyday. Among the best are the laugh-out-loud "Chompers," about some really hungry false teeth; the luridly cartoonish "Fat Man," featuring two way-too-curious boys; "Bestsellers Guaranteed," a story any would-be bestselling author can and should appreciate; and the Bradburyesque "In the Cold, Dark Time," about a future war that now no longer sounds so distant or impossible. Other memorable selections include "Cowboy," with its biting cultural commentary on the plight of the African-American cowboy; the grotesque "God of the Razor," with its nightmare vision of serial killers; "Billie Sue," with its wacky whizbang lovers; and "The Shaggy House," with its irresistible old farts. Lord of the neo-noir Southern Gothic, Lansdale reveals once again that while these stories might not be for the weak of stomach, they're perfect for everyone else trying to get through the pain of contemporary American life.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Lansdale, who routinely crosses genres and attracts both mainstream and cult fans, delivers a story collection heavy on fantasy. Bumper Crop contains 26 stories mixing fantasy with horror and laced with the author's signature macabre humor. (Not surprisingly, five of the stories were originally published in Rod Serling's Twilight Zone Magazine.) As Lansdale notes in his introductory material, many of these stories draw heavily from the Fredric Brown/Robert Bloch/Bradbury tradition. When he's on a roll with horror material, however, Lansdale pushes things a good bit further than any of those older writers. In the crisply written lead story, "God of the Razor," for example, a demonic object fills whoever touches it with a lust to murder. Perhaps the highlight of this collection is "Bestsellers Guaranteed," a dark little fantasy about a murderously competitive publishing industry. For Lansdale fans looking to gather some of the author's harder to find material.

Elliott Swanson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 199 pages
• Publisher: Golden Gryphon Press (May 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1930846339
• ISBN-13: 978-1930846333
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,349,814 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of over thirty novels and numerous short stories. His work has appeared in national anthologies, magazines, and collections, as well as numerous foreign publications. He has written for comics, television, film, newspapers, and Internet sites. His work has been collected in eighteen short-story collections, and he has edited or co-edited over a dozen anthologies. He has received the Edgar Award, eight Bram Stoker Awards, the Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the British Fantasy Award, the Grinzani Cavour Prize for Literature, the Herodotus Historical Fiction Award, the Inkpot Award for Contributions to Science Fiction and Fantasy, and many others. His novella Bubba Hotep was adapted to film by Don Coscarelli, starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis. His story "Incident On and Off a Mountain Road" was adapted to film for Showtime's "Masters of Horror." He is currently co-producing several films, among them The Bottoms, based on his Edgar Award-winning novel, with Bill Paxton and Brad Wyman, and The Drive-In, with Greg Nicotero. He is Writer In Residence at Stephen F. Austin State University, and is the founder of the martial arts system Shen Chuan: Martial Science and its affiliate, Shen Chuan Family System. He is a member of both the United States and International Martial Arts Halls of Fame. He lives in Nacogdoches, Texas with his wife, dog, and two cats.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Twisted Tales from the Mojo Storyteller, July 14, 2004

By 

CreepyT "CreepyTendencies" (Colorado, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Bumper Crop (Hardcover)

Joe R. Lansdale writes stories and novels that overlap into a vast array of genres. This short story collection of his is no different. "Bumper Crop" brings together an enthralling and eclectic medley of short five or six page tales stemming from the horror, crime, science fiction, and suspense categories. Though each story is very different from the next in terms of classification and style, they all share a common thread in that they are extremely dark, and not for the squeamish.

In his introduction to the book, Lansdale explains that the term "Bumper Crop" refers to when crops provide an added splurge or treat for the growing season. This book is indeed that, and should be seen as an accompaniment to Lansdale's previous short story collection, "High Cotton." The two combined serve as the culmination of what Lansdale refers to as his best work.

Some of my favorites in this volume include:

"God of the Razor" opens the book quite nicely. A man wanders into an old southern Gothic mansion with hopes of finding antiques. However, he finds that the mansion has not stood vacant all this time as he had thought. Furthermore, the man discovers that there may be more to serial killers than meets the eye.

"Chompers" describes a set of false teeth that have a mind all their own and a taste for blood and flesh.

"On a Dark October" is a monster tale and speaks of an annual tradition that takes place in a dark garage on Halloween night.

"Bar Talk" is what happens when an alien visits Earth and sits down for a conversation and a drink.

"The Companion" is a story Lansdale wrote with his children, and is meant to be a good old-fashioned spooky campfire story. A scarecrow made to serve as a companion to a farmer after his wife's death comes is more than a mere compilation of twigs and hay.

"Bestsellers Guaranteed" is perhaps my favorite story in this book, and one of the longest at about 14 pages. How far would one struggling author go to be guaranteed a best-selling book each year?

In addition to these incredible stories, Lansdale has written a short introduction for each of the 26 tales in this volume, indicating his thoughts on and inspiration for every story included, which is a very nice touch. Many of these tales were influenced by Bradbury, and many were written for the Twilight Zone magazine. All, however, are very good in their own unique way. Though these stories have found their way into print previously, it is wonderful to have them all in one complete volume. This collection (both "Bumper Crop" and "High Cotton" together) should not be missed by fans of dark fiction, and those who have a taste for the strange, the weird, and the amazing.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Joe Gets Weird, February 21, 2005

By 

Tim S. (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bumper Crop (Hardcover)

The stories contained in this collection are, in a word, weird. I love Lansdale's stuff and originally got into his work as a horror fan, enjoying "The Night They Missed The Horror Show" so much that I quickly snatched up all of his "horror" stuff. After reading the excellent short story collection "High Cotton" I moved on to "Bumper Crop" expecting more of the same.

While "Bumper Crop" has its fair share of horror tales, the stories are more along the lines of weird Twilight Zone-esque yarns, with the strangest twists and turns you'll ever read. There are also a few fantasy-type pieces, and some rather intensely violent pieces that play out only as Lansdale can do. Absolutely worth reading, but if you're more of horror fan, I recommend "High Cotton" as the quintesential Joe R. Lansdale short story collection.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The good old stuff, part 2, June 17, 2004

By 

Robert P. Beveridge "xterminal" (Lakewood, OH) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bumper Crop (Hardcover)

Joe R. Lansdale, Bumper Crop (Golden Gryphon Press, 2004)

For the majority of its all-too-short time on this mudball, I was a devoted reader of Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone magazine. I was lucky enough to stumble upon the first issue by chance on a newsstand, and after that I subscribed until the bitter end. Many of the authors I still revere today I first found in the pages of TZ, including Joyce Carol Oates ("The Rose Wall," reprinted in her collection Raven's Wing, was the strongest story in that first issue) and Dan Simmons (whose first published story, "The River Styx Runs Upstream," was the winner of TZ's first fiction contest). But through all those years, I didn't remember seeing Joe Lansdale's name a single time. So when I checked the pub credits page and saw TZ's name by a number of stories, I got to wondering. Then I read the preface, and Lansdale says these stories stick with you. I got to wondering more. Then I read "The Dump,"and the second I saw the name Otto, I bowed to Lansdale's superior firepower. Note, "The Dump" is a story I haven't read in over twenty years, and within the first few words, I remembered it. "Memorable" is an understatement.

Bumper Crop, the second (following High Cotton) volume in Lansdale's personally-selected "Best-Of" collections of his short fiction, is, in short, a whole lot of fun. The stories here, most of which are exceptionally short, run through the early part of his career like a vein of adamantite in a mountain of pure silver. It's all great stuff, but this is just that little bit more rare, more coveted, and harder. "Chompers," "The Fat Man," and, well, just about everything here will leave its mark on you. Two stories will be recognizable to those who have read The Nightrunners (Lansdale, during the seven years between the book's completion and its purchase, took pieces out of it and revised them into stories a number of times). One of them, "God of the Razor," is one of the strongest pieces here, and very highly recommended.

If the book has a weak point, it is "Master of Misery," the last story. It sounds too much like... something. But I can't for the life of me remember what. But, jeez, don't let that stop you. This is great stuff. ****