From Publishers Weekly
This uneven second anthology in a series from the publisher of long-running horror magazine Cemetery Dance proves that what makes one reader shiver may make another only shrug. The book's best stories push the envelope of their themes or work effective variations on familiar horror story types. Douglas Clegg's "The Machinery of Night" is a creepy exploration of the deranged mind and the anomalies of physics and biology that might be possible if physical constants were as fluid and unpredictable as madness. Gary A. Braunbeck's "The Box Man" is a well-wrought Twilight Zone tale on the dark side of everyday experience. "Fine Until You Called," by Thomas Tessier, is a perfect black comedy in which a telephone solicitation for a medical charity leaves the unsympathetic protagonist irremediably self-conscious about his own mortality. These exemplary selections are overbalanced by routine efforts from the majority of contributors, most of which show that some mileage can still be gotten from the simple, quiet weird tale. A few stories are not likely to have life outside the volume, such as David Niall Wilson's "When Worlds Collide," a tribute to deceased horror emeritus Karl Edward Wagner. Kelly Laymon's "Living in the Cemetery, Dancing the Dance" is not a story, but a giddy account of working for the publisher, which more than any other selection suggests that this book is targeted largely at the core readership of Chizmar's magazine.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
