Giveaway Winner: The Children of Old Leech

The winner of this giveaway is Steven Zampini, from California.

Interview: Matthew M. Bartlett

I recently reviewed Gateways to Abomination, the debut "fiction collection" from author Matthew M. Bartlett. It is a book I quite highly recommend, and I now follow up with an interview with the author.

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AD: First I'd like to thank you for taking the time for this interview.

 

It’s my pleasure.

 

 

Gateways to Abomination is a culmination of a few years worth of stories. How did the project come about? How long has this collection been in the making?

 

A friend of mine had begun a humorous fictional Livejournal page about deranged politicians and odd local characters in a fictional town, and, inspired by that, but also being a fan of horror, I decided to start my own page, but with a real setting and a macabre bent. I thought the blog format would be a good venue for the ongoing story of a malevolent cabal – an occult group of revenants with a devilish leader – targeting the wounded souls of an art community through radio broadcasts.. I posted the first installment in March of 2005. I scoured the Internet and local antique stores for old, unsettling daguerreotypes and tintypes, and I took pictures of desolate locations around town, and I posted them, constructing little stories or vignettes around the pictures. I thought the stories unpublishable at the time, as I felt that they were inextricably tied to the pictures. As I went on, the stories got longer and more involved, the pictures fewer and farther between. Suddenly it occurred to me that I’d amassed enough to put together a collection. I started ordering and compiling and rewriting in early 2014.

 

 

 

What attracts you to weird fiction? What authors and works have impacted you over the years?

 

I’ve always been a fairly cheerful person but a person with an undercurrent of terror of mortality, a morbid bent. I don’t believe in any measure of consciousness after death, and nonexistence is a thought that utterly terrifies me. I’m not comforted either by the fact that I did not exist for an eternity before my birth: somehow that’s even worse to try to comprehend. I’m kind of a day-to-day optimist and a big-picture pessimist. As I've aged, I've become more and more dismayed by the thought that we are all walking horrorshows. We’re skeletons, filled with and encased in fat and gore, the whole mess barely held in by a few layers of dermis. We're so easily cut and sprung and burst - we're always a millisecond from encountering or becoming an unthinkable horror. And that doesn’t even cover the cancer and ills that can grow invisibly within us.

 

So I think weird fiction was a natural fit for me. My parents tell me that when I was four or five years old, and Sesame Street was on TV, whenever The Count appeared, I would stare at him and slowly, carefully back out of the room, my eyes never leaving him. At a Halloween cub scout meeting I was the only kid in costume – picture 12 cub scouts in uniform and one Dracula, complete with a cape and a widow’s peak drawn in with eyebrow pencil. I was obsessed with the Universal Studios monsters as a child, and was introduced to Stephen King’s work at the age of 13 or so.

 

It took me a long time to give Lovecraft a try; I’d somehow gathered that he was more a Science Fiction writer than anything, and that genre held no interest for me at the time. But when I’d learned a little more, in the process discovering that he made use of familiar New England settings, I picked up a book at random and was immediately captivated. Strangely, maybe, I found Thomas Ligotti separately, browsing in a Connecticut Borders store. They had a copy of “The Shadow at the Bottom of the World,” the one with a scarecrow on the cover. I opened the book to “The Last Feast of Harlequin” and I felt a rush of endorphins as I read the opening paragraphs. From there it was a quick jump to Robert Aickman. I fell in love with Aickman – his facility with the language is something I strive for every day…not to mention his uncanny ability to provoke unease. Ramsey Campbell, T.E.D. Klein, Robert Bloch, all great. I’ve also developed an obsession with Shirley Jackson.

 

I’ve only recently begun to dig into the works of the people currently working in Weird Fiction, and it’s like I’ve walked into a room of treasures: John Langan, Simon Strantzas, Laird Barron…I enjoy their work so much and I feel like I am learning a lot from them.

 

 

The stories in Gateways to Abomination are all connected, with one of the common threads being radio station WXXT 81.5 FM. Why precipitated the idea of the ominous radio station?

 

Radio can be such an intimate experience. When I started writing Weird Fiction, I was listening to shows by a radio monologist named Joe Frank. His work was by turns dark, surreal, deeply personal, blackly humorous, searching. His voice, heavily compressed, was usually recorded over a drone or repetitive electronic music. What if, I thought, the thing behind that voice was some sort of unhinged entity? What if this disconnected voice introduced the listener to terrifying sounds, weird mutterings, bizarre tales, tortured screams set to music? I could imagine driving, at night, under a spell, unable to spin the dial away. Radio, or experimental and local radio is, of course, quite possibly in its death throes. The metaphor of ghosts worked quite well in that context.

 

 

 

The stories you write take place in and around the area in which you reside. Do you find that the area lends itself well to weird fiction, or did you just take the place you knew and warp it to get the results you wanted?

 

Northampton, Massachusetts is seen largely as a college town, a touristy town, an art town. But under all the trappings, under the boutique signs and awnings, the main drag looks exactly as it did in the 1800s. History is still very much present, very visible if you have the eyes to see it. And the history of the town - of Western and Central Massachusetts as a whole - is very, very rich. Jonathan Edwards delivered his fiery speeches in Northampton. In the 1850s a dam burst and the Mill River flooded, devastating many area towns. Not far away, in the fifties, four towns were disincorporated and drowned to make way for the Quabbin Reservoir. In the '80s, Reagan was essentially responsible for shutting down mental asylums, including the Northampton State Hospital, whose inhabitants were essentially released into the streets. Western and Central Massachusetts have always attracted spiritual seekers and strange cults - the Brotherhood of the Spirit, later known as the Renaissance Community, about which there is a fascinating documentary out there...the Church of End Times in Uxbridge, more recently. It’s a beautiful area, and Northampton is a lovely town, to be sure, especially in Autumn...but it has dark undercurrents. I don't think I'd live here if it didn't.

 

I was born and raised in East Hartford, Connecticut; actually, and there are references to East Hartford locations and people throughout the book, though maybe only my family would pick up on them. In any event, in the midst of my putting stories together for the book, I received an email from a relative working on a family history. As it happens, ancestors of mine were among the first settlers in Northampton in the early 1600s. A more fanciful person might conclude that was what drew me here, that ancestral pull, rather than the fact that I just liked the place.

 

 

 

As I said in my review, I feel that Gateways to Abomination works more like an experimental novel or meta-narrative, instead of a collection of short fiction. The short stories and vignettes are all so intertwined that it reads to me like many parts of a singular, nightmarish whole, even if the book doesn't give readers the entire picture. Do you plan to revisit these areas in further fiction?

 

I do, very much so. I still have pieces from the last nine years that I left out of Gateways to Abomination and I’ve also written conclusions to some of the stories in the book that seem to end abruptly or to hint at a continuation. I’m writing new fiction as well. Some of my finished stories and my in-progress stories are of that world, while a few really couldn’t fit into the larger narrative. But I have an idea for a new framing narrative that could easily lead to a second volume, or to an expansion of the first. I’m excited about the work I’m doing now.

 

 

AD: Once again I would like to thank you for taking the time to talk to me today.

 

It was a lot of fun. Thank you.

Review Roundup: August

I'm finishing up the summer by posting another roundup of reviews. This time I review a collection, an anthology, and a book of non-fiction.

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Gateways to Abomination by Matthew M. Bartlett

I tend to avoid most self-published works, as the vast majority I have encountered tend to be self-published because no publisher in their right mind would even touch them. This book is one of the exceptions, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it re-released under a publisher's banner. Billing it as "collected short fiction" kind of sells the book short. This book is MUCH more than that. It reads like a post-modern novel. Very short stories and vignettes combine in an effective way to offer glimpses into an area infected by a sort of weird evil, using a phantom radio station to twist reality. Bartlett's book gets under the skin and digs deep. There is a mad genius at work here, the stories offering enough of a glimpse that a full picture nearly forms, yet not giving away the full game. This collection of nightmares, and disturbing radio broadcasts blends together so well that the book transcends the concept of a simple short fiction collection and becomes so much more. Sure, the book could use a tad bit of polish, no different from many small press books, but the quality of writing here hints at a promising future. I fully anticipate this book to be considered by many to be a modern cult classic, and I very much look forward to more from Mr. Bartlett. Highly recommended, there is something special at work here.

Fearful Symmetries edited by Ellen Datlow

Ellen Datlow is the modern queen of dark fiction. It simply cannot be disputed. Published by Canadian publisher ChiZine Publications (who already put out one stellar horror anthology earlier this year with Shadows & Tall Trees 2014 edited by Michael Kelly) Fearful Symmetries is a non-themed horror anthology consisting of twenty short stories by many of the genre's best. As with most Datlow anthologies, these stories run the gamut from pure horror to dark fantasy, and as such there is a bit of something here for all sorts of readers. In reading this anthology I found that most of my favorite stories came not from my usual favorite authors, but from authors of whom I was less familiar with: Helen Marshall, Robert Shearman, Siobhan Carroll, Carole Johnston, Catherine Macleod, Bruce McAllister and Pat Cadigan. Definitely one of the better anthologies of the year.

When the Stars Are Right by Scott R. Jones

Scott R. Jones has done something really special with this book. What sounds like a ridiculous premise, namely taking Lovecraft's fiction and using it as the basis of a spiritual path, actually comes together to create a fun reading experience. Taking a unique look at Lovecraft's deities (the reader of this may never view them quite the same again) and using his own personal experiences, Mr. Jones makes a case for living a life dedicated towards achieving the 'Black Gnosis,' a sort of tentacled Nirvana. The "R'lyehian" therefore lives a life constantly seeking knowledge and experience, in both dreams and waking life. It's clear that the author knows his Lovecraft in a way that perhaps no one else does. At times hilarious, at others deeply personal, this book is as much a love letter to the Gentleman of Providence as it is anything else, a cosmic thank-you note if you will. Some readers might not think this book sounds like their cup of tea, but anyone with an interest in Lovecraft should put this on their to-read list immediately. It's highly entertaining, and there's enough interesting concepts inside that all Lovecraft fans will find something to take away from it. Highly recommended.

Giveaway: The Children of Old Leech edited by Ross E. Lockhart and Justin Steele

It's been a busy end to the summer, and I've allowed myself to accumulate quite a pile of books for giveaway.  I will start with a hardcover copy of The Children of Old Leech, signed by myself and co-editor Ross E. Lockhart. Elsewhere on the blog you can find excerpts from every story, and my introduction and Ross's afterword in full. Rules below.

Entering is easy. Send an e-mail to contest(at)arkhamdigest.com with the subject line OLD LEECH. In the body of the e-mail include your snail mail address and why you want to read the book. Also let me know if you prefer me to simply sign it, or to personalize/inscribe it for you. I will do a random drawing Thursday, August 28th. This contest is only open to residents of the US and Canada, due to shipping costs. 

The Children of Old Leech: Afterword by Ross E. Lockhart

Today brings the final installment in our series of excerpts from The Children of Old Leech. We hope you’ve enjoyed these excerpts as much as we’ve enjoyed bringing them to you, and we sincerely hope that we’ve persuaded you to pick up a copy of The Children of Old Leech for yourself. And while this round is over, we will be back with more samples of Word Horde books, photos, reviews, and previews, so we would encourage you to stay tuned. So with the melancholic sense of a journey’s impending conclusion, but no regrets, we bring you a look behind the curtain with co-editor/publisher Ross E. Lockhart’s “Afterword.”

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One of my first gigs in this crazy business we call publishing was writing the flap copy for the hardcover edition of Laird Barron’s first collection, The Imago Sequence. As I recall, I got paid in books for this, which is fine because I’d likely have spent any monetary compensation on books anyhow.

The Imago Sequence blew me away. I was already fairly well versed in the weird tale, and in the typical tropes associated with Lovecraftian pastiche, but Barron’s approach did something unexpected with the form, fusing the strangeness of supernatural horror with the stark naturalism of Jack London (whose “To Build a Fire” Barron himself classifies as Cosmic Horror), daring to deliver something different, a high-stakes carnivorous cosmos populated with tough, rugged protagonists more accustomed to inhabiting hard-boiled tales of crime or espionage than Lovecraft’s prone-to-fainting academics. Through this (at the time) unlikely combination, Barron managed to, in the words Ezra Pound once pinched from a Chinese emperor’s bathtub, “make it new.”

One does not read a Laird Barron story so much as one experiences it in a visceral manner. A tale like “Shiva, Open Your Eye” strips away a reader’s reason, flaying him, leaving him floating in the primordial jelly, innocent of coherent thought. “Hallucigenia” is, quite literally, a kick in the head. The painstaking noirish layering to be found in “The Imago Sequence” culminates in a ghastly, shuddering reveal of staggering proportions. And it is that sense of culmination one finds echoing throughout Laird Barron’s work, binding the whole together into a Pacific Northwest Mythos reminiscent of, but cut from another cloth entirely from, Lovecraft’s witch-haunted New England.

A handful of one-off copywriting gigs led to greater opportunities, and soon, I found myself working full-time for the publisher of The Imago Sequence, which led to my meeting Laird in the flesh at the World Fantasy Convention in Saratoga, NY. I found we shared a kindred spirit… and a taste for rare spirits and supernatural tales. Upon my return, I worked on the trade paperback edition of The Imago Sequence, and on Laird’s next collection, Occultation, where I not only wrote the jacket copy, but laid out the book, coordinated the production team working on it, supervised copyedits, approved those edits with Laird, and corrected the book (as a nod to Robert Bloch, I suppose you could refer to me as “The Man Who Corrected Laird Barron.”).

Shortly after Occultation landed, my wife and I embarked on a road trip up the West Coast, a drive where the scenery—stark mountains, tall trees, steep costal drop-offs—constantly reminded me of one Laird Barron story or another. Our journey brought us to Olympia, where we met Laird for lunch, talked martial arts and American literature, and I snapped a few photographs of Laird playing with our little dog, Maddie.

Somewhere along the line, both The Imago Sequence and Occultation managed to win Laird his first and second Shirley Jackson Awards, and I began working with Laird as editor of his first novel, The Croning, which he sent to me in bits and pieces over the course of a tough year, building it like a wall, brick by brick and layer by layer. With The Croning, Laird metaphorically opened a vein and bled words onto the page, and while a casual reader might not spot the author’s open wounds, the emotional wallop delivered by the book more than assures you that those wounds are not only there, but that they are raw.

I published Laird’s novella “The Men from Porlock” in my first anthology, The Book of Cthulhu, and his “Hand of Glory” in my second, The Book of Cthulhu II. And over the course of 2012, I worked on Laird’s third collection, The Beautiful Thing that Awaits Us All, reading stories as Laird finished them and sent them along. One of my favorites in the collection, the wickedly sardonic “More Dark,” managed to get me in trouble when I read it on my phone during a baseball game, prompting my wife to elbow me as I laughed—then shivered—at a situation that rode the train from bad to weird to worse to a downright Barronic level of darkness. The Beautiful Thing that Awaits Us All was the final project I worked on for its publisher, which might bring us full circle, were it not for the fact that this circle, like the sigil marking Moderor de Caliginis, is an open—and hungry—curve.

In 2013, I started my own publishing company, Word Horde, launching the press with Tales of Jack the Ripper, an anthology that included Laird Barron’s tour-de-force “Termination Dust,” a fractured narrative not only providing the thrills and chills expected from Barron’s oeuvre, but marking a new venue for his brand of cosmicism, a strange, savage, and sanguine land that Laird knows quite well… Alaska.

Not long after the publication of Tales of Jack the Ripper, Justin Steele, who had reviewed The Book(s) of Cthulhu and Tales of Jack the Ripper at his weird fiction website, The Arkham Digest, approached me suggesting this anthology. I receive—and say no to—a lot of anthology pitches, many of which are suggested as possible co-editorial projects, but I found the idea of honoring Laird, an author whose work has influenced and intersected with much of my professional career, irresistible. I approached Laird, asking for permission to let other authors play in his sandbox, and to my delight, Laird said yes. For that, Justin and I owe Laird a lifetime of gratitude. We immediately set to building a roster of our favorite authors, authors who we felt shared Laird’s vision of a ravenous universe, and an understanding of that terrible, beautiful thing that awaits us all.

There are no accidents ’round here. The editors of, and the authors included in, this volume have been inspired and affected by Laird Barron’s carnivorous cosmos. We’ve all gazed at mysterious holes, wondering where they lead. We’ve all found ourselves in conversation with a stranger, staring at a scar and wondering if it is, instead, a seam. We’ve all heard the voices whispering in the night, praising Belphegor, and saying, “We, the Children of Old Leech, have always been here. And we love you.”

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The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron may be ordered directly from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold. Ask for The Children of Old Leech and other Word Horde titles at your favorite bookseller.

The Children of Old Leech Introduction: Of Whisky and Doppelgängers by Justin Steele

We told you there would be more this week. What follows is my introduction to The Children of Old Leech, “Of Whisky and Doppelgängers.” And stay tuned for more!

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If you value your health, sanity, and general sense of well-being, then you should stop reading this book right now. Close the cover, put it back on the shelf, and head on over to the non-fiction section. Pick up a book on fishing, or pottery, something safe. Anything but this book.

If you’re still reading you must be damaged goods, nothing to lose. Maybe you saw that I started with a warning and felt the need to prove me wrong, to prove that you like to live life on the edge, laugh in the face of danger, shit like that. Maybe the warning tugged at your curiosity, intrigued you enough to carry on. Just remember what happened to the cat.

I’m supposed to be writing an introduction. That’s what Ross wanted me to do anyway, but I owe some responsibility to my fellow man, and what we did with this here book, what we unleashed, well, it’s just wrong. I’m sitting here at my desk, a near empty glass of Lagavulin on the desk edge, the bottle in easy reach. Three feet from me, propped in the corner of the room, is a 12-gauge pump-loaded with double-aught buckshot. If that’s not enough I have two .45s and a recently sharpened hunting knife within reach, so no matter how it goes down, it won’t go down easy. But who am I kidding. THEY want me to write this. It’s part of the project. Until my part’s done I’m safe. At least I think so.

I should probably start from the beginning. Tell you how I first discovered this Lovecraft guy, and how reading his fiction kicked me off onto this whole “weird fiction” thing, but I’m sure you’ve heard that one time and time again so I’ll skip ahead a little bit. A few Cthulhu Mythos anthologies into my tentacle binge, I picked up Ellen Datlow’s Lovecraft Unbound, and was pleased to see an anthology striving to avoid falling into pastiche territory. It was during my late night readings that I discovered my first Laird Barron tale. “Catch Hell” did something to me that only a few special stories managed to do: upon finishing I reflected on the story for a minute or two, and then turned back to the first page and immediately reread it. After the second read I walked over to my computer and ordered The Imago Sequence and pre-ordered Occultation. There was no question that I had stumbled upon something special, something dangerous. Who was this Laird Barron guy? He looked like a pirate, or a grizzled Viking warrior. His writing was a blend of genres that I loved. One part pulp, one part noir, two parts pure cosmic terror, blended smooth and seasoned with a literary skill that few possessed. I had found weird fiction for the connoisseur. If I had only known what I was getting into.

Flash forward a few years later, and I’m sitting here in my dimly lit office space, gulping scotch and wondering how I ever let myself get drawn into this mess. The light from my lamp is reflecting off my tin poster of The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. I let Clint Eastwood’s stoic squint and Lee Van Cleef’s predatory glare serve as reminders that I have to be tough, finish this up. The wind is whipping at the window and I find myself eyeing the 12-gauge once every few seconds.

In September or so I had a conversation with Ross Lockhart, the other man responsible for what we’ve done here. We were both huge fans of Laird’s fiction, recognized its power. By the end of our talk, the wheels were in motion. We were so excited, completely oblivious as to what the actual significance of the anthology would be.

Finding the authors to take part actually proved to be the easy part. Laird’s work is highly respected, and offers authors much to work with. Ross and I wanted to find some of the best writers of weird fiction and offer them a chance to play in Laird’s playground. They could use the more literal elements of Laird’s growing “Pacific Northwest Mythos” or utilize his themes. Pastiche was not welcome. We wanted the authors to use their own unique talents and voices in order to do Laird justice, yet not by simple mimicry.

The thing is, Laird’s fiction is powerful, and not just in the literary sense. Some theorize that there exists some fiction that has the ability to bleed into reality. The words serve a higher function, act as a sort of formula. When these words are read they open a gate to somewhere else, allow them to come over. What Ross and I have done is complete the formula, see? Laird’s works were the base, the true source of the power. With these stories we amplified it, radio towers strengthening the signal.

Ross experienced it first. He’d be out walking his dog in sunny California, or out at his local bookstore when he would see him. Only it wasn’t actually him? Ross would catch a glimpse, just enough for him to realize he’d seen Laird. When he looked back he would see Laird standing there, at the mouth of an alley, or the end of a row of bookshelves. And it was definitely Laird, his mug isn’t the kind you mistake for someone else. Ross was perplexed, he told me later, because he was sure he was seeing Laird. He looked long enough for the imposter’s face to split into a black grin, and then with a wink the not-Laird would duck into the alley or step away from the aisle of books. Ross thought Laird must have been playing some kind of elaborate prank on him, until I pointed him to one of Laird’s blog posts. Apparently some of Laird’s friends have seen this doppelgänger before, but never more than once. I know this spooked Ross, and he hasn’t been the same since. I often ask him if it’s happened again, but whenever I bring it up he goes pale, changes the subject. If I push, he firmly denies anymore sightings, but I have my doubts.

I figured it out. Ross thinks we are just putting together a good group of stories, tries to justify his weird sightings with lack of sleep and too much reading for the project. But I know better, the dots are all there, easy to connect. Several of our authors have confided in me that during the writing process they were fraught with night terrors, and even a few cases of sleepwalking. One author turned in his story in a daze, and swore to me that he doesn’t have a single memory of writing it. One could chalk all this up to writer’s stress, working in overdrive to meet the deadline, but that doesn’t explain what happened with our foreword. A certain big-shot author sent us a foreword, before disappearing. Nobody has heard from him since. Ross and I debated on using the foreword regardless, only to find that it had somehow been erased from both of our computers. Strange coincidence considering we both reside on opposite sides of the country.

And then there’s me. Being woken up in the middle of the night by whispers from friends long departed. Easy enough to pass off as echoes from dreams, but that doesn’t explain why I would find the dog cowering under the bed whimpering. Or the black, sticky footprints left across my kitchen floor, cellar door ajar although I always check the latch before heading to bed.

If you’re still reading this you must now know that it’s too late for you, too. You’ve started to twist the handle, and the opening of the door is soon to follow. You’re going to meet the dwellers on the other side. The Children of Old Leech will soon be whispering in your ear, and they will whisper the same thing they whispered to me: “There are frightful things. We who crawl in the dark love you.”

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The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron may be ordered directly from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold. Ask for The Children of Old Leech and other Word Horde titles at your favorite bookseller.

The Children of Old Leech Excerpt: “Tenebrionidae” by Scott Nicolay and Jesse James Douthit-Nicolay

Co-author Jesse James Douthit-Nicolay & Missy.

Today brings our final excerpt from The Children of Old Leech, and features a collaboration between father and son, a tale of riding the rails, and secret societies, and gangs, and girls and dogs and far, far stranger things: “Tenebrionidae,” by Scott Nicolay and Jesse James Douthit-Nicolay. Next week, we’ll be back with a little bit more, sharing the book’s introduction and afterword, as well as a gallery of photos. Until then, lie back, listen to the clacking wheels, and enjoy the ride. It is, after all, going to be a dark ride.

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The whole room pulsed next and… altered, made no architectural sense. Missy barked and twitched her tail against the bucket and Dumont placed a hand on her back. He felt dizzy and fought the urge to puke. The doorway spun around him several times—round and round and round she goes, and where she stops—Ratch and Worm and Marlo stood. The two sidekicks drifted into place behind Marlo right away, assuming generic bully positions so fast Dumont was tempted to laugh. But Marlo had his K-Bar out beside his thigh and the other two each wore their general bulk as a weapon so no way was it time for wisecracks or laughter. The room no longer spun, only rocked a bit side to side in a seasick way as if whatever whirlwind torqued it had settled in overhead for now.

—Lookit the schwag bitch, Marlo sneered at him, spoke the words as a slow smoldering threat. His voice oscillated in tempo as if the distance between them were stretching and receding. Dumont felt another twinge of nausea and struggled to suppress it. Ratch and Worm sneered in their special fleshy ways but said nothing. Missy pressed closer against his thigh, hindquarters stiff with tension as she barked in bursts. He stroked her head to calm her.

—Are you sad because your girl ain’t here? Well you can go ahead an’ cry now ’cause she ain’t comin’. Little Miss Tigger. Turns out she don’t bounce too well.

Dumont didn’t much care to hear what he was hearing but he knew Marlo was s’posed to be big on head games. Didn’t mean any of it counted for a damn thing. If it did then he failed her just like he failed Hector, the kid younger than him at the foster home, what they’d done to him.

He could stand—he was taller than all but Worm—only that would likely take things physical quick, and they were three on one. Maybe they only came to threaten him, scare him into leaving town. They could threaten away. He’d been ready to leave anyway, only with Tigger. But what had they done to Tigger?

She told him about the Shadow Riders almost at the start, how she hooked up with Marlo till someone tipped her off he only wanted her for some kind of sacrifice. How she found it out Dumont didn’t know but the whole story confused him anyway. Tigger was holding some big pieces back, he could tell that easy. Made it all hard to follow but main thing was he could see she was scared. Way shit scared. Now she was missing maybe worse and the Shadow Riders were all up in his face.

He never dealt with Marlo or his crew himself before, only saw them from a distance and Tigger would whisper that’s them or sometimes their names. There were others, Crunch and Skurd, Arkansas Jason and Jimmy Whip, more whose names he could not recall. But Marlo was supposed to be their king or ruler or some shit like that, Ratch and Worm his left hand and right.

—Du-mont. That girl took something from me, Du-mont. Something she shouldn’a took. Did she give it to you, Du-mont? I think she did. Hey, we understand how these things can happen. It’s na-chur-al. Why don’t you just let us take a look in your pack Du-mont? We’ll take what’s ours and leave you with your mutt. No harm no foul, whadda you say?

Ratch stepped hands out toward Dumont’s pack. Although he seemed to move in slow motion Dumont didn’t try to block him, but he teetered sideways away from the Rider, his bucket seat tilting almost toppling.

Marlo started to say something like That’s it—and nod before he saw how Dumont slid himself several inches along the wall, bent to grab the bucket handle, then pushed up the wall all the way and with his sea legs at least half back beneath him swung the bottom of the bucket at Worm. Ratch was closest but Worm was the tallest so Dumont went for him first. The bucket with its half dozen rough crusted inches of lumpy concrete at the bottom took Worm full on the side of the head and he. Went. Down.

Missy lunged for Ratch and her teeth sank into his left calf above his boot so he cursed and stumbled back a step. Marlo jerked to his right, brought the K-Bar full up just as Dumont yanked back hard on the bucket only to feel the wire handle tear free from plastic. The battered orange cylinder tumbled away into the shadows and slammed loud against a wall somewhere off in the dark. Everyone looked surprised. Everyone except Worm, who lay staring at the dirt floor. Staring at it real close, like point blank close. Staring at his blood pouring on the dirt.

Dumont yelled to Missy and grabbed the guitar case, booked it for the exit. He felt a tug on his arm as if someone grabbed him and he yanked hard to get free. He heard Ratch pound after him several steps till Marlo shouted —Leave him, asshole! Get the pack! The pack!

Missy hit the doorless doorway ahead of him and staggered as she went. As he trucked through he felt himself swing up sideways on an incline a second, the whole room pitched over the major part of 90 degrees. His applicable senses all told him brace for the fall but he did not fall. Missy yelped ahead so he knew she felt the same still they both pressed on and came level again in three more steps. His stomach prepared to purge but he fought it down one last time, staggered forward anyway. Not now. Not here.

Marlo called from behind —Run sad punk. We’ll see you again. Run run run and we’ll all have some fun. Later on down the line.

Dumont ran. At least half a dozen blocks, Missy skittering always several feet ahead before Dumont felt the warm wetness on the fingers of his left hand and held it up to see first the blood dripping off them, then the red-streaked facing crescents of pink white muscle revealed in the deep slash across his forearm. He was leaving a trail but he didn’t stop to bandage himself till he reached the yard.

—

The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron may be ordered directly from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold. Ask for The Children of Old Leech and other Word Horde titles at your favorite bookseller.

The Children of Old Leech Excerpt: “Of a Thousand Cuts” by Cody Goodfellow

Photo courtey of Félix García

Our penultimate excerpt from The Children of Old Leech has arrived, and it’s a doozie. Cody Goodfellow takes us inside The Pageant, the secret, and bloody, gladiatorial matches held in occult locations throughout the world for the entertainment of a select few first glimpsed in Laird Barron’s The Light Is the Darkness, with the Samurai, and “Of a Thousand Cuts.” So prepare your mind by way of strange potions and stranger rituals, sit back, and hang on for a wild ride…

—

Only in the final, volatile moments of the ludus, when vows made by will are broken by flesh, does the Samurai forget himself and mar his hitherto flawless performance by trying to die.

Dragging his left leg, javelin jutting from butchered knee, hastily resected bowel waving like a gory pennant, yet the Samurai circles his remaining opponent with calculated poise, herding him downwind into the black, creamy smoke wafting from the pyre of his identical twin.

Frenzy and fatigue vie to take the Roman even before the Samurai can close with him. Plunging his broken katana into the smoldering corpse to goad his enemy, the Samurai presents his wakizashi like a gift and settles into a waiting pose.

The Roman has abandoned all technique. Draws a whickering, whooping breath into the broken basket of his ribs, roars hollow blood-flecked hate and charges through charnel smoke, gladius swinging in a blind woodsman’s coup de grace.

And then the moment that puts the lie to perfection, proclaims it the act not of a masterful athlete, but of a slumming, drunken god, or a troubled automaton. Samurai bows his head, arms out in supplication. Throws up an arm, not in defense, but to tear off his helmet. Impossible, of course…

The Roman’s chopping stroke shears an antler from the Samurai’s helmet and glances off his leather cuirass. Overextended, he tramples his opponent and lands among his brother’s blazing remains. Before any outside his inner cadre have noticed his deathwish, the Samurai recovers and hamstrings the Roman. Wakizashi eagerly swims up hyperextended calf muscle, flensing meat catbox-bitter with lactic acid from spiral-fractured bones.

The Roman turns, seemingly revived by blood loss. Brings the gladius down on the Samurai’s shoulder, splitting the torso down to the solar plexus. What little blood comes out at all is almost black.

The wakizashi quivers, sheathed to the hilt in the Roman’s kidney. Samurai’s hand touches but can’t grasp it. The Roman’s spade-shaped sword twisting in the burst balloon of his lung. With his other hand, Samurai draws the javelin from his knee. Nearly faints, but somehow he drives the long spike up through the corded muscles of the Roman’s neck, penetrates the ribbed vault of the hard palate and into the cavernous echo chamber of the gladiator’s brain.

It takes nearly another minute for the Roman’s body to get the message.

It takes the surgical team another seven minutes to separate the bodies and check vital signs to certify the winner. The Roman called Pollux, though stabbed in nine places and burned to the third or fourth degree over ninety percent of his body, almost survives the night.

Shot up with painkillers and adrenochrome, the Samurai lurches out of the arena using the Roman’s enormous gladius as a crutch, to the muted cheers of the small, select audience.

***

In the time after a battle is when it gets worst. He can almost remember who he is.

He knows he had a name.

Before this.

His name.

It was… something.

But in the Pageant…

Now… again and forever… he is the Samurai.

Rumors swirl about the champion few choose to fight, relegated to sideshow matches in pariah state circuses. All but destroyed in six of fifteen matches in nine years, but undefeated, and none have ever seen his face. Even in the pitch-black demimonde of the Pageant, the Samurai is a cipher, his identity insignificant next to the paradox of his survival. Students of the art point to the many awful injuries sustained; not even the Pageant’s surgeons could rebuild such terrible carnage. Indeed, from one match to the next, the Samurai gains or sheds weight and height. Lord Sun makes no promises regarding the identity of the Samurai. Only the masked helmet and the mated swords and the implacable, elegant butchery remain the same.

And yet, the obligatory devil’s advocates must insist, compare the perfect discipline, the rigor of technique maintained even unto dismemberment, the reflexive disdain for mere mortal injury, the true absence of fear of death or pain. No matter how many bodies he’s gone through, it could only be the same man.

—

The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron may be ordered directly from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold. Ask for The Children of Old Leech and other Word Horde titles at your favorite bookseller.

The Children of Old Leech Excerpt: “Ymir” by John Langan

In Norse mythology, Ymir was a being born from primordial frost and poison, who became ancestor to all jötnar, or giants. In the realm of weird fiction, John Langan is also a titan with a penchant for birthing ettins from his armpits and monsters from his feet. What follows is an excerpt from Langan’s story “Ymir,” from The Children of Old Leech.

—

III

The Eckhard Diamond Mine was a collection of Quonset huts set back from the rim of a titanic hole in the endless white. Barry leaned forward for a better view of it, whistling appreciatively. “Isn’t that something? How far across would you say that is?”

“A quarter-mile,” Marissa said.

“I expect you’re right.”

She stopped the Hummer at the front door of the metal shed closest to the pit. The light green paint that had coated the structure was visible only in scattered flakes and scabs. She left the motor running: the digital thermometer on the dash measured the outside temperature at forty below, and she didn’t want to risk the engine not starting. For the same reason, she was carrying the heavily oiled .38 revolver in a shoulder holster under her coat. She zipped and buttoned the coat, pulled on the ski mask and shooting mittens lying on the passenger’s seat, and tugged her hood up. She half-turned to the back seat. “You ready, Barry?”

He had encased his bulk in a coat made of a glossy black material that made her think of seal skin. The gloves on his large hands were of the same substance. He drew a ski mask in the gray and electric green of the Seattle Seahawks down over his broad, bland face. “Ready,” he said. “Let’s go look at my new investment.”

Marissa had expected their arrival to draw some kind of reception from whoever was inside the hut. The moment she stepped outside, however, into cold that shocked the air from her lungs, that she felt crystallizing the surfaces of her eyes, she understood why those inside and warm might prefer to reserve their greetings for her and Barry joining them. The cold seemed to take her out of herself; it was all she could do to keep track of Barry as he lumbered the fifteen feet to the hut’s entrance. Without bothering to knock, he wrenched the door open and squeezed through the frame. Marissa followed, giving the area surrounding this end of the building a quick once-over. She wasn’t expecting to see anything besides the Hummer with its schoolbus yellow paint, a steady cloud of exhaust tumbling from its tailpipe, the great hole in the earth in the background. Nor did she.

—

The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron may be ordered directly from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold. Ask for The Children of Old Leech and other Word Horde titles at your favorite bookseller.

The Children of Old Leech Excerpt: “Brushdogs” by Stephen Graham Jones

In today’s The Children of Old Leech excerpt, we’re going hunting with a taste of Stephen Graham Jones' “Brushdogs.”

—

Junior wasn’t even forty-five minutes into the trees when his son Denny called him on the walkie, to meet back at the truck. Denny was twelve, and Junior could tell he’d got spooked again.

He wasn’t going to get any less spooked if Junior called him on it, though.

So, instead of staking out a north-facing meadow like he’d been intending, waiting for the sun to glint off some elk horn, Junior tracked himself back, stepping in his own boot prints when he could. And it’s not that he didn’t understand: coming out an hour before dawn, walking blind into the blue-black cold, some of the drifts swallowing you up to the hip, it wasn’t the same as watching football on the couch.

The bear tracks they’d seen yesterday hadn’t helped either, he supposed.

Since then, Junior was pretty sure Denny wasn’t so much watching the trees for elk anymore, but for teeth.

He was right to be scared, too. Junior was pretty sure he had been, at that age. But at some point you have to just decide that if a bear’s going to eat you, a bear’s going to eat you, and then you go about your day.

One thing Junior knew for sure was that if he’d been in walkie contact with his dad, then there wouldn’t have been any meets at the truck.

Junior was doing better, though. It was one of his promises.

So he eased up to the truck, waiting for Denny to spot him in the mirror. When Denny didn’t, Junior knocked on the side window, and Denny led him fifteen minutes up a forgotten logging road to a thick patch of trees he’d probably stepped into for the windbreak, to pee.

“Whoah,” Junior said.

It was a massacre. The bear’s dining room. At least two winters of horse bones, some of them bleached white, some of them still stringy with black meat.

Junior had to admit it: this probably would have spooked him, twenty years ago.

Hell, it kind of did now.

—

The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron may be ordered directly from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold. Ask for The Children of Old Leech and other Word Horde titles at your favorite bookseller.