YOU CAN CATCH A GOOD HUMAN WITH A BAD HAMBURGER Proverbs For Monsters is an omnibus of the best writing to date by one the most offbeat and humorous writers working in the horror genre today, Michael A. Arnzen. Hand picked by the author, these are the stories "flash fictions," and poems most cherished by readers, most enjoyed at live performances, most celebrated by editor of year's best collections, and most recommended for literary awards from across his career. AN INFANT VAMPIRE BITES HARDEST In Proverbs For Monsters you'll get advice for growing your own maneating plant. You'll ride the movies at Exorcystland - the scariest amusement park ever created. You'll attend a bizarre grade school for assassins. You'll meet a dentist with a very disturbing collection of baby teeth. You'll encounter strange children - from the boy who carries his heart in a metal case attached to his chest to the girl who is completely encased in the carapace of her own giant scab. You'll ride a deseased elephant and witness the death of the last vampire and learn more than you ever wanted to know about a perpetual embalming machine. You'll wince and laugh and wince again. FORTUNE FAVORS THE CLEAVER Whether you're never read Michael Arnzen before or are already a fan of his gleefully twisted imagination, you're in for a very dark treat with this generous collection of thirty stories and thirty poems, many of them impossible-to-find or never seen before. Proverbs for Monsters offers the most delightful and disturbing retrospective of this acclaimed author's career. Winner of Three Bram Stoker Awards and the International Horror Guild Award "[Arnzen's] ingenuity of plot and startling resolutions rival the work of any horror author publishing short fiction...As time passes it will become increasingly obvious that Michael A. Arnzen is a strong and important voice in horror fiction." -- Cemetery Dance "...one of the most inventive and outrageous talents in the horror genre." -- Karl Edward Wagner, fmr. editor of The Year's Best Horror Stories "Mike Arnzen is the finest zombie poet who ever lived, then died and came back." -- John Skipp, author of The Long Last Call
Michael Arnzen (http://gorelets.com) is an award-winning author of horror and dark suspense fiction, a poet, and an English professor. His trophy case includes four Bram Stoker Awards and an International Horror Guild Award for his often funny, always disturbing stories. The best of these appear in the Bram Stoker Award-winning career-length retrospective, Proverbs for Monsters, which Dread Central called "a guided tour of insanity and the macabre, with a few moments of touching grace combined with repulsive terror...[which] serves to document the evolution of a great writer."
Arnzen holds a PhD in English from the University of Oregon (where he researched his non-fiction book, The Popular Uncanny) and he is presently a Professor at Seton Hill University, where he teaches horror and suspense fiction in the country's only graduate program in Writing Popular Fiction (http://fiction.setonhill.edu).
Arnzen resides near Pittsburgh, PA, with his wife of many years, Renate, and a brood of deranged cats.
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"In a little over a decade, Michael A. Arnzen has achieved what few writers manage in a lifetime. He has become the master of a brand of literature that is uniquely his own, and I do not doubt that his approach to horror will soon (if it has not already) be referred to as 'Arnzenian.' When you begin an Arnzen story, you embark on a journey where the old maps do not apply. Soon you find yourself deep in new territory, barreling through landscapes more fascinating and twisted than any previously encountered. Be assured, you will be amazed, startled, amused, and creeped out along the way, but whatever the road has in store, you will not be able to stop reading until the story ends. Horrifying, captivating, ironic -- Arnzenian! -- the works of Michael A. Arnzen are in a class all their own. Fasten your seat belts and enjoy the ride!" -- Lawrence C. Connolly, author of Veins
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