Occultation and Other Stories [Hardcover]

Laird Barron (Author), Michael Shea (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 11, 2010

Laird Barron has emerged as one of the strongest voices in modern horror and dark fantasy fiction, building on the eldritch tradition pioneered by writers such as H. P. Lovecraft, Peter Straub, and Thomas Ligotti. His stories have garnered critical acclaim and been reprinted in numerous year's best anthologies and nominated for multiple awards, including the Crawford, International Horror Guild, Shirley Jackson, Theodore Sturgeon, and World Fantasy Awards. His debut collection, The Imago Sequence and Other Stories, was the inaugural winner of the Shirley Jackson Award.

He returns with his second collection, Occultation. Pitting ordinary men and women against a carnivorous, chaotic cosmos, Occultation's eight tales of terror (two never before published) include the Theodore Sturgeon and Shirley Jackson Award-nominated story "The Forest" and Shirley Jackson Award nominee "The Lagerstatte." Featuring an introduction by Michael Shea, Occultation brings more of the spine-chillingly sublime cosmic horror Laird Barron's fans have come to expect.

Contents:

Introduction by Michael Shea
The Forest
Occultation
The Lagerstatte
Mysterium Tremendum (original to this collection)
Catch Hell
Strappado
The Broadsword
--30-- (original to this collection)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Writing with a poet's eye for detail and a folklorist's understanding of mythos, Barron lives up to his reputation for elegant, subtle, and nightmare-inducing tales with a Lovecraftian edge in his second short story collection (after 2007's The Imago Sequence and Other Stories), which includes six reprints and three original stories. In The Lagerstätte, a woman who cannot come to terms with her husband's loss clings to an occult artifact said to reunite lovers whom death has separated. A guerrilla art exhibit turns murderous in the taut and bloody Strappado. A mysterious guidebook leads four men on a terrifying camping trip in Mysterium Tremendum. Heartbreaking, hilarious, sophisticated, and gory, these stories will thrill, trouble, and haunt Barron's fans and have newcomers scrambling to search for his other work. (June)
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From Booklist

*Starred Review* Most of, maybe all, the nine stories in Barron's second book belong to his bold and artful variation, launched in The Imago Sequence and Other Stories (2007), of H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos, according to which hideous aliens are emerging from within the earth to wipe out humanity. One says “maybe all” because Barron's tight focus on a single protagonist or two intimately related ones makes us unsure that we're getting all the info we need to figure out just what's going on. That is, Barron puts us in a predicament like those of the protagonists, who hardly believe what they must notice—or die. “The Lagerstätte” may be what it seems, an unusually harrowing record of a woman descending into suicidal madness after her husband and son perish in a plane crash, but then she does hear voices, like the much more overtly threatened macho gay friends in “Mysterium Tremendum,” memory-haunted retiree in “The Broadsword,” ex-lover wildlife researchers in “--30--,” and young marrieds investigating the house inherited from his occultist father in “Six Six Six.” Unfortunately, voices aren't all that the woman in “Occultation” hears. In every tale, everything heard and unheard, seen and unseen becomes creepier and creepier. The protagonists try to escape by drinking, drugging, fighting, fucking, even fleeing. Yet it's doubtful any of their gorgeously scary stories has much of a sequel. --Ray Olson

Product Details

• Hardcover: 245 pages
• Publisher: Night Shade Books; 1st edition (May 11, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1597801925
• ISBN-13: 978-1597801928
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 1.2 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #750,913 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born and raised in Alaska, I did time in the wilderness. I raced in several Iditarods. Later, I got the hell out and migrated to Washington State where I devoted myself to American Combato and reading guys like Parker, Ellroy, and McCarthy. At night I wrote tales that smash up noir, crime and horror.

I currently reside in Upstate New York and am writing a novel about the evil that men do.

(photo courtesy JD Busch)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Literary horror that captivates while scaring you to death June 9, 2010

By Michael Grover

Format:Hardcover

After reading Jody Rose's exhaustive critique of Laird Barron's OCCULTATION, I'm not sure what more I can add that's of value, but I'll certainly give it a shot, because the more people there are singing this fellow's praises, the better. Before I get to the book itself, let me just say that Laird Barron is, without a doubt, one of the best horror writers to come along in a very, very long time. Actually, calling him a "horror writer" doesn't even come close to doing the man justice, although I think it's safe to say that the majority of his output falls into that category, and I doubt he himself would take issue with the tag. Don't get me wrong: I'm not one of those people who feel that the horror genre is somehow unworthy of respect and must be apologized for. In reality, horror fiction constitutes the vast majority of what I read, and it always has; it's simply what appeals to me more than anything else. Think of that, and of me, what you will, but what it ultimately means is that I'm pretty familiar with the genre, and the sheer quality of Barron's work easily outstrips nearly everything else I've encountered in at least the past two decades, if not longer. Despite my horror fiction addiction, I've read enough of what qualifies as literature to know unequivocally that Laird Barron writes literary horror; if anyone still thinks that literature and horror are mutually exclusive, please direct them to this book as a definitive refutation of their sheer wrong-headedness.

As you're undoubtedly aware, OCCULTATION is Barron's second collection of short fiction, the first being the excellent THE IMAGO SEQUENCE. If I had to choose between the two (and having to do so would be a horror story unto itself), I'd have to say that OCCULTATION has a very slight edge over IMAGO, and I'll tell you why.... I found the stories in this book to be incrementally more accessible than those in IMAGO. By "accessible," I do not mean that the characters in these stories suffer fates any less soul-shatteringly grim than their counterparts in Imago. My goodness, no. What I mean is that more of the stories in OCCULTATION seemed, at least to me, to be easier to digest on the first go-round than those in IMAGO. IMAGO, on the whole, struck me as being somewhat analogous to a David Lynch film. At the end, you might ask yourself "What the hell just happened?" but you're profoundly unsettled nonetheless. Perhaps I'm just becoming accustomed to Barron's style, but I found the stories in OCCULTATION to be a bit less cryptic while still fully retaining their ability to unnerve and disturb the reader on multiple levels, and I really mean that. This is not fiction that resorts to cheap shock tactics. While some of the stories contained herein are gruesome, Barron never, ever resorts to dumping buckets of offal at your feet merely to provoke disgust. In Barron's stories, violence can happen to the body, but more often than not, it happens to the soul, or to a character's very humanity. There's sex here, too (or, as Barron sometimes calls it, "gratuitous rumpy-pumpy"), but it's always skillfully and realistically woven into the plot. No, there's much, much more going on here than in most horror fiction. Thanks to Barron's beguilingly fluid prose, these stories insinuate themselves into your brain and remain there long after you've closed the cover of the book. In particular, I've had a hard time shaking some of the imagery found in the stories "Mysterium Tremendum" and "--30--."

Barron certainly knows how to do more than scare, though. I found two of the stories in this book that dealt with loss, "The Forest" and "The Lagerstätte," to be profoundly moving, which is something that's quite rare in the genre, and as Jody Rose mentioned, there's a thrillingly brutal brawl in "Mysterium." There's some richly subtle humor to be found as well, especially in regard to Pershing Dennard, the romantically beleaguered and frequently stewed main character of "The Broadsword." Enjoy the levity while you can, because Barron eventually wipes the smile right off your face. If you love horror like I do, though, you know that's a good thing; in fact, it's the whole point. I can't recommend OCCULTATION highly enough. Read more ›

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Terrifying, Yet So Profoundly Beautiful May 3, 2010

By Matthew Jaffe

Format:Hardcover

When it comes to conveying degrees of both dread, and wonder, few writers working in the field today are as capable as Laird Barron. Each opportunity I have to indulge and enter Laird's world is a trip of the most unsettling of experiences; an experience I value more than most. This might sound a little exaggerated, but it's not far from the truth. Laird's writing is of such a terrifying caliber that it is capable of shaking the very foundation of what we, the fortunate readers, believe to be true. Like the master fantasists of the past, Laird lifts the veils of reality and exposes us to the cosmic realms of chaos beyond. It is a reality that is terrifying, yet so incredibly beautiful at the same time. It is a world of colors and sensations that are alien, but more importantly, also human. The stories contained within "The Occultation", and "The Imago Sequence", scare the hell out of me, but they remind me of why I love this stuff so much: fear is such a basic human emotion, and in this day and age, where the human race is constantly forsaking what it means to be alive, the writing of Laird Barron reminds me of what is means to be human.

24 of 28 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Magnificent! May 14, 2010

By W. H. Pugmire

Format:Hardcover

My introduction to Laird Barron came quite by accident, when I was attending Norwescon and decided to listen to some of the authors' readings. I walked into the reading room and saw Laird for the first time, and listened to him read. I was instantly fascinated and affected by the power of the prose that I listened to, and I made a point to remember this young man's name and attend any panels that he was participating in. My next recollection was meeting him at World Horror Convention in San Francisco. I had just bought the new FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION in which he had a story. He had brought me the issue of F&SF in which his story, "The Imago Sequence," was first published. I read the story during the convention and honey I flipped! This guy was brilliant!

That brilliance is evident on every page of this amazing second collection, OCCULTATION AND OTHER STORIES, beautifully published by those rad youngsters at Night Shade Books. The front cover is especially wonderful and is the first published book cover of Matthew Jaffe, whose art will be showcased in a forthcoming hardcover edition of Arthur Machen to be published by Centipede Press.

I have read the majority of this book before, when the stories had their initial publication or were reprinted in Year's Best anthologies, and in one case as a file sent me by Laird. To read them in book form is so delicious, and to reread them a second time is instructive, because they have not lost any of their evocative power, a power that is conjured from richness of imagination, powerful prose, and pure genius. Laird Barron is, quite simply, one of the most powerful new writers in the horror genre, as his solid reputation attests.... In a very short time, he has been hailed as a major new talent in the field, and this second collection will strengthen that estimation.

I had just finished reading "The Broadsword" in its appearance in S. T. Joshi's wonderful anthology, BLACK WINGS--NEW TALES OF LOVECRAFTIAN HORROR, and found it one of the finest "haunted house" tales I have ever read. The "haunted" motif is a powerful and recurring one in this collection, perhaps best expressed in what is, to me, the finest tale in the book, "Mysterium Tremendum." This was my second reading of the tale, but it caught me, absolutely, this second reading, and it scared me half to death. Know this: Laird Barron will creep you out! His horror fiction is everything that excellent weird fiction must be to be effective, and first and foremost that is fiction that spooks you, that conjures forth such a sense of fear that you are too freaked out to get out of bed to turn out the light. The haunted house motif, so beautifully expressed in "The Broadsword," is also superbly manifested in the book's final story, "Six Six Six," in which a couple have inherited an old family manse. The story is told in a simple style, and it is extremely effective. Laird has the ability to create characters that become very real. I did not care for the man and woman in "--30--", but I came to care absolutely about their horrifying and brutal fate.

I am indebted to Jody Rose for Jody's really amazing review of this book, which if you haven't read I urge you to do so now. It was, I confess, utterly amazing to have the narrator of one of the stories bear a name similar to my own; and the love that Laird has expressed in that tale is returned tenfold. Being friends with an author, in the view of some, taints reviews one may write of their buddy's book. This is nonsense, in my eyes. I praise Laird not because he is such a wonderful friend and brother in the genre of weird fiction, but because he is fantastic as a writer.

I am so looking forward to reading Laird Barron's first novel, THE CRONING, forthcoming from Night Shade Books. Read more ›

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Original and exceptional horror July 28, 2010

By Juha K.

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Laird Barron got me interested in horror fiction again after a long period falling out with the genre. A glowing review of his previous collection, The Imago Sequence, prompted me to seek out a copy and I was not disappointed. Barron is most often compared to H.P. Lovecraft, and not without reason - they share the same feverish imagination and a love for unimaginable cosmic horrors. However, where Lovecraft's writing was sometimes clumsy and betrayed his limited knowledge of how people actually work, Laird Barron has neither of these weaknesses.

In Barron's stories, there is no refuge in daylight or the company of others. Terror enters protagonists' lives either through a chance encounter with evil forces or as the result of past wrongdoing. Darkness starts to seep in, taking over their everyday lives until they are devoured or forever haunted by what they have seen. Struggling against this fate proves fruitless time after time.

In The Imago Sequence, these protagonists were mostly hard men in violent professions: Soldiers, Pinkerton agents, security experts. Occultation features a more varied cast, including a mother mourning the loss of her husband and child, a Hollywood cinematographer, and (in two stories) gay men - most of whom are just as ready for a fight as the previous collection's tough guys, mind you.

Otherwise Occultation treads much the same ground as The Imago Sequence, which is both its strength and its weakness. Barron's writing is skilled and often poetically beautiful: His sentences get stuck in your head. The characters are three-dimensional, although few of them are likable enough for their fate to create much of an emotional impact.

At the end of the collection I found myself wanting for a little more variety.... Even though the stories explore very different people and settings, the same patterns keep rising to the surface. Barron has been building his sinister universe with great skill, but I hope he will use his talent to explore new ground in the future. I was also very disappointed with the closing story Six Six Six, which just seemed out of place with its silly devil-worship elements.

For these reasons I feel that Occultation doesn't quite merit five stars. Having said that, I would still warmly recommend it to anyone interested in seeing what horror fiction can do these days. Read more ›