First-person open world games are my favourites, and some entries in the Far Cry series are right up there alongside S.T.A.L.K.E.R. as amongst the best.

In a way, Far Cry 1 started it all — allowing you to approach missions any way you wanted, with few set paths. Far Cry 2 took this to a new level, opening up an enormous map of a (fictional) section of Africa, allowing the player a great deal of latitude in playing the game the way they wanted to. Far Cry 2 also took itself quite seriously and, despite it’s numerous bugs and annoyances, was a dark tale with strong messages on ethics in war. I think Far Cry 2 is still my favourite of the series.

Far Cry 3 was gorgeous to look at, and took the open world nature of FC2 to an entirely new level. Unfortunately, the POV character was lame and the story even worse. There were also constant attempts at humour, and I mean ‘attempts’, and a silliness to many of the characters that meant it lacked the gritty seriousness of FC2. There was no real moral, and the ethics questionable. I played it through though (twice!) because the scenery was so good, and I just loved the open nature of the missions. Ultimately, though, I was hoping for more with FC4.

Far Cry 4 started out well. The new setting (Himalayas instead of a tropical island or African savannah) is even more gorgeous than previous games, and the verticality of the mountains make a very different game. And the wildlife! Tigers, Bears, Rhinos, Elephants, Eagles, Honeybadgers (damn those honeybadgers!)… they’re all there and they’re all dangerous. Very exciting! But the story? The POV character’s motives for getting involved in all this are near non-existent. You’re just expected to become a bloodthirsty killer, mowing down natives in another near Third-World country, for the flimsiest of reasons (if there actually WAS a reason). And the ending was VERY anti-climactic. After pouring over 45 hours of my time into this thing, I expected some sort of pay-off at the end. Unfortunately, it just sort of fizzes out.

So, the verdict? It looks amazing and there have been many improvements — getting the wingsuit so early really opens up the world, and the single-seat ‘Buzzer’ helicopters were a great addition. I still loved just wandering the world, climbing mountains and traversing valleys, watching Eagles snatch pigs from the fields and bears fight with tigers. I loved stealthing into an enemy compound and taking guys out silently, without anyone ever knowing I was there… and if things turned to shit, I always had enough heavy weaponry to blast my way to victory. It was AMAZING!

But the story? It sucked so bad that it spoiled a lot of the experience. I’m glad I played it, but I probably won’t be going back to Kyrat. Hopefully, FC5 will return to the much more serious (and adult) style storyline of FC2.

Score: 7/10

Books of the Dead Press (http://www.booksofthedeadpress.com/)

E-book: ISBN 978-1-3117783-8-3

Suspended in Dusk is the latest anthology from Books of the Dead Press, and the first for Australian editor Simon Dewar. Featuring 19 tales from a mix of new and established authors, and an Introduction from Bram Stoker Award winning Jack Ketchum, Suspended in Dusk hits its mark more often than not.

It’s always nice to have a note or introduction from the editor at the beginning of an anthology; a place where they lay out their thoughts and goals, their targets. Simon Dewar does this quite well. He tells us that the stories are all about change, and the time between those changes, much as dusk is “the time between the light and the dark”. Some of these changes are metaphorical, while others take the theme more literally.

To the stories! I might not mention all of them, only the ones that really stood out for me. This isn’t to say there are any bad stories in the anthology; that certainly is not the case. Any reader of horror will find plenty here to enjoy, and those tales that weren’t quite for me might be exactly what another reader is looking for.

First up is “Shadows of the Lonely Dead” by Alan Baxter. A beautifully written and emotional tale about a hospice worker with a gift for easing the suffering of the elderly as they slip into death, and the greater ramifications that has on her life outside the hospice.

Anna Reith’s “Taming the Stars” takes us to the dark and gritty side of Paris, with a story of a drug deal that goes horribly (and gruesomely) wrong.

“At Dusk They Come” by Armand Rosamilia invites us to a small town at sundown for a well written take on the old tale of ‘doing deals’ with the nefarious.

Rayne Hall brings us “Burning”, a Southern Gothic flavoured tale with a conspicuous absence of the supernatural, but all the more horrifying for it. As in real life, “Burning” shows us that people — especially those isolated by the ignorance of their own world views — are much worse than any monsters we can imagine.

Chris Limb’s “Ministry of Outrage” reveals the truth behind corporate and governmental conspiracies in a tale that is all too scary for its plausibility.

S.G.Larner give us “Shades of Memory”, wherein religion reigns in post-apocalyptic Queensland and the locals of a small town, who want no part of it, have some ghostly superstitions of their own.

“Outside In”, a strange Quantumpunk-Noir by Brett Rex Bruton, is one of the most interesting pieces in the anthology. The story begins: “I swing my feet from beneath the warmth of the covers and down on the cold, hard copy of the opening paragraph.” I stared at that — “hard copy of the opening paragraph” — and wondered if it was some kind of strange typo, an editor comment inserted by accident. But no, it isn’t! It is slips like this, in the walls of reality between story and reader, that really made this story stand out for me. Very original.

“Would To God That We Were There” is the creepy science fiction story I’ve been trying to write for years. I even have 10yr old opening paragraphs that are near identical. I never knew where to take the idea, but it seems that Tom Dullemond did, and he does a wonderful job of it.

The anthology finishes on a high-note too, with Angela Slatter’s “The Way Of All Flesh”. I love a post-apocalyptic story that doesn’t focus on the actual apocalypse, but instead on the people who are trying to get on with their lives. “The Way Of All Flesh” accomplishes this brilliantly, subtly, and in the end, very disturbingly. It’s a fitting end to a collection of so many fine stories.

As I said earlier, I haven’t mentioned every story; only those that really shined for me. A few of the other stories just weren’t too my taste, or I found personally a little predictable. Be that as it may, there isn’t a badly written story here. In every case the prose is well constructed and, in a few stories, quite beautiful.

Overall, Suspended In Dusk is a very good collection. I think there’s something for everyone’s taste — vampires, werewolves, ghosts, zombies and plenty of nefarious humans — and I’m sure others will find things in certain stories that I didn’t. And the mix of authors, old and new, means you’re certain to be introduced to someone you’ve never heard of before: which I think is the most exciting part about reading any horror anthology.

Home and Hearth

Spectral Press (http://spectralpress.wordpress.com)

This review will be short, because ‘Home and Hearth’ is short. That’s not to say the length in any way diminishes its strength or impact. Instead, the growing sense of dread seems concentrated, distilled to achieve maximum effect.

‘Home and Hearth’, by Angela Slatter, is the 11th title in Spectral Press’s Chapbook series. It concerns a family. A mother and her child and the absent father who has abandonded them. Caroline is a newly-single mum. Her teenage son, Simon, has returned home after being found innocent of a horrible crime, and like all parents Caroline feels a strong need to protect him. It is a base instinct; the knowledge that we’d do anything for our children, no matter what. That our love for them is unconditional. But what happens when that instinct is questioned? When the evidence mounts that our child may no longer be who we think they are?

‘Home and Hearth’ is a story that preys on readers through their empathy. Simon is as distant as any teenager can be, but Caroline’s love and fear are both realistically (and somewhat heartbreakingly) rendered right up until the confrontational end. And, if you’re a parent, that ending will probably hit you hardest of all.

Well paced and beautifully written, Angela Slatter has created a small and unsettling masterpiece with ‘Home and Hearth’. Highly recommended.

Inside these covers are 17 stories of unusual creatures, myths and legends, in dark, urban fantasy settings.

Bloodstones is being touted by Ticonderoga Publications as the first volume in an annual anthology of dark fantasy. We haven’t had one of those in Australia for a while, and I’d love for something like it to succeed. I know Ticonderoga have the chops to achieve such a feat, and Amanda Pillar is an accomplished editor.

The focus of Bloodstones is on non-traditional dark urban fantasy, which is to say: no vampires, no werewolves, no zombies. Authors were encouraged to submit tales of more unusual creatures from myth, to delve into cultures and legends that have not been repeated ad nauseum over the years.

Before I even get to the stories, and how they might (or might not) fit this brief, I was sort of held up by the cover. It seems unrelated to the anthology’s theme and that didn’t work to entice me into the book’s pages as a good cover should. Mainly, I would have liked to have seen a cover more immediately indicative of the anthology’s contents.

But, don’t judge a book by its cover! It’s the words inside that count. So read I did, and the stories are indeed an exploration into the unknown. Diverse are the monsters, and quite a few of them I’d never heard of before and hope I never have to meet in the future. There are also plenty of familiar but less utilised creatures from myth on display too. The trick is in how the stories use this grab-bag of monstrosities to tell an effective tale, and in that aspect Bloodstones is something of an uneven success.

The anthology kicks of strongly with ‘The Bull in Winter’ by Dirk Flinthart, a tale of old gods, myths and legends struggling to find relevance in a modern world where film, tv and viral YouTube videos are the vectors for the creation of new myths and monsters. Well written and full of great ideas, ‘The Bull in Winter’ really dragged me in, kept me reading and left me eager to delve deeper into Bloodstones.

Nicole Murphy’s ‘Eurydale’ continues the theme of monsters of legend adapting to the modernity of suburbia. Clash of the Titans meets Desperate Housewives is how I’d describe ‘Eurydale’, and I mean that in a good way because the story works on many more levels than that, even touching on the the issue of immigrants trying to maintain their cultures in a new world.

‘A Small Bad Thing’ by Penelope Love introduces us to the Malaysian Toyol, a malevolent child-like goblin created by black magicians to steal money and jewellery, the small things. Delving deep into how the ‘small things’ can also affect a relationship, Penelope Love leaves us no doubt by the end as to who the real monsters are.

Jenny Blackford’s ‘A Moveable Feast’ is delicious with description, combining the dark and fertile imagination of children with the myth of the Faerie Queen. Pete Kempshall tackles the issue of misusing government welfare (specifically the ‘Baby Bonus’) in dark and gruesome ways in ‘Dead Inside’, and ‘Smoke Gets In Your Eyes’ by MLD Curelas brings us a banshee battling the waning power of belief.

‘Sanaa’s Army’ by Joanne Anderton is a powerful tale of art and decay, and how things new and beautiful (and sometimes dangerous) can be created from death. Richard Harland’s ‘A Mother’s Love’ brings the dark-side of Santiera from Cuba to the Western Suburbs of Sydney, and Christine Morgan reawakens ancient Egypt into the modern day in ‘Ferreau’s Curse’.

Thoraiya Dyer’s prose in ‘Surviving Film’ is, as usual, both beautiful and unsettling. Her merging of cinematic history and ancient myth is short, but also possibly the most fully realised and complete of the stories in the anthology. Like Flinthart’s ‘The Bull in Winter’, it stands high above the other tales in the collection.

That’s not to say other stories mentioned, or those yet to come, aren’t good. Indeed, ‘And the Dead Shall Be Raised’ by Kat Otis is ripe with new and unnerving ideas, imagining tours of the world’s most famous cemetery as conducted by the dead themselves… but don’t stray off the path and don’t stay after dark. Karen Maric weaves a bittersweet tale of love and loss set amongst the clash of old in new in the fast moving world of modern China in ‘Embracing the Invisible’, and Dan Rabart’s ‘The Bone Plate’ is a dark, modern-take on the ancient myth of deriving power from those you slay.

In ‘Cephalopoda Obsessia’ Alan Baxter shows us — with about 1/50th the words it took China Mieville — why we should definitely still fear the awakening of the Kraken. Both Erin Underwood’s ‘The Foam Born’ and Vivian Cathe’s ‘Skin’ stay with Baxter’s nautical theme, but in very different and effective ways: ‘The Foam Born’ updates the myth of Aphrodite’s birth into something much more sinister, and ‘Skin’ re-examines the myth of the Selkie from a new and disturbing perspective.

Stephanie Gunn’s ‘The Skin of the World’ takes us deeper yet, away from the suburbs and those who’d ply their coastal fringes, peeling away the layers to reveal a darker world beneath. ‘The Skin of the World’ was, for me, a perfect end to Bloodstones. Like the places revealed, the story has a depth had that me wanting more, feeling there was more going on in this world than a single story could reveal. Very pleasing then to read in the author’s introduction, that ‘The Skin of the World’ is only a small part of a much larger series of stories and novels, of which I’m certainly keen to read more.

As I said, overall I found Bloodstones to be something of an uneven collection. There certainly aren’t any bad stories, just a few that I felt didn’t quite meet the brief, as outlined in the blurb and in Seanan McGuire’s Introduction. Some stories worked for me more than others, and a lot of that just comes down to personal preference. Others readers are sure to get different mileage, and on the strength of just a few stories alone (Dirk Flinthart’s, Thoraiya Dyer’s and Stephanie Gunn’s especially) I would certainly recommend Bloodstones for readers looking for more in their horror fiction than just sparkly vampires and overripe zombies.

There’s a quote attributed to Harlan Ellison about writing which goes: “The trick isn’t becoming a writer. The trick is staying a writer.” If this is taken as true, then Martin Livings has certainly mastered the trick. For twenty years Livings has been publishing horror fiction fairly consistently, and of a quality high enough to have received multiple nominations (and a couple of wins) of nearly every major Australian speculative-fiction award there is. He has published a novel, novellas, and novelettes, but it is in the short story form that Livings is most prolific, and possibly, at his best.

Living With The Dead is Martin Livings’s first published collection of short stories. Brought to us by Dark Prints Press, the book (in its physical form) is a striking and hefty trade paperback with a marvellously evocative monochromatic cover illustration by Vincent Chong. Inside are twenty three stories; a reprint story for each of Mr Livings’s published twenty years, plus three brand new stories. That might seem like a lot of stories for a single-author collection, but this isn’t just a ‘greatest hits’ compilation. Living With the Dead is more a retrospective collection of Livings’ writing career to date. While not presented in publication order, the decision to include so many stories does mean a more variable collection overall. But, considering the high quality of the stories throughout, this matters little, and the inclusion of so many tales does give an interesting (and more complete) overview of Livings’s progression as writer.

Being as there are so many stories, I’ll limit myself to commenting on those I found exceptional and name dropping those that I found merely good. As you’ll see, even that will still cover a great portion of the collection.

Lollo is the lead-story, and as it is a story about an evil clown doll, it is sure to creep out a large portion of the horror reading genre. I’ve never really been bothered by that particular fear — I think clowns much maligned, in fact — but Lollo was written well enough to keep me hooked. Maybe it’s the 80s slasher film feel to the story that lifts it above the typical evil-clown tale? Sort of like a Tarantino mash-up of 80s horror. Whatever it is, Lollo is a great lead in to the collection and certainly sets the tone.

You Ain’t Heard Nothin’ Yet is the first original tale to the collection, and one that tickled both my ‘what if’ and ‘film history’ buttons. The premise? What would a snuff film from the era of Silent Film be like? In typical Livings style, he holds back from the obvious tack of hack-and-slash gore until the last excruciating moment. I’m glad that, after a rough publication history, this story has seen print. It’s a really good one.

Running is a story originally written for Agog Press’s giant monster anthology ‘Daikaiju’. It takes the absurd ‘sport’ of Running With the Bulls and makes it even more absurd. And yet, at the same time, Running is a touching story of how the forces of nature (such as hurricane Katrina) can affect and change our lives. It is often this mix of the absurd with the touching that makes Livings’ work so memorable.

Piggies is a story I missed when it was first published, and a good thing too or I probably would never have written my own The Final Degustation of Doctor Ernest Blenheim. The ideas are so similar, that Piggies acts almost as a prequel. What lifts Piggies far above my own story, is Livings’ ability (like that of his story’s protagonist) to cut things right back to the bone. Piggies is short and sharp and all the more disturbing for it.

In Nomine Patris (see, I’m listing near every story here!) is another short tale. Incest, abortion, cannibalism, religion and all handled sensitively in only 3 1/2 pages. Where many authors would pad out a idea like this, Livings leaves you with only the barest of bones. It is restraint like this that makes Livings well worth reading.

Hooked is possibly the most twisted tale in the book. Not for the gore or surreal twists of Livings’ other works, but for the way it takes our childhood dreams and turns them into something much more horrible and (probably) much more realistic. Here J.M.Barrie’s Peter Pan is given the Livings treatment, with all our favourite characters descending into crime, prostitution and drug addiction. A cautionary tale maybe, for those who find it too hard to give up their childhoods?

Living With the Dead, the title story, is one of the older tales in the collection. Despite the spectre of HIV/AIDS Hysteria having long faded from our media-ruled consciousnesses, it would be too simple to change this tale of social cleansing to a more modern disease or even life-choices and other perceived ‘differences’ (such as sexuality or religion) and for it to still have relevance. Keeping this in mind, Living With the Dead loses none of its impact almost 20 years past its original publication.

Birthday Suit is another story original to the collection, and my favourite of the lot. Others must have thought so too, because Birthday Suit was recently short-listed for just about every Australian spec-fic award and won the Australian Shadow Award for best Horror Short Story. The tale has the feel of Ray Bradbury about it, of normal lives lived and the bittersweet experiences that can bring. I won’t even go into the premise of Birthday Suit, because I want you to discover it for youself. It is so good an idea I can’t believe nobody thought of this before. But, then again, I’m glad it is Martin Livings who was the writer who did think of it as he certainly does the concept justice. Birthday Suit is so wonderful and beautiful and sad, that (even though I’d read it before) it really topped off the collection for me.

A few other stories deserve mention. Down Town, Smiley, Into the Valley and The Last Gig of Jimmy Rucker (written with Talie Helene) are all wonderful too. This isn’t too say that any of the stories in this collection are bad or not worth reading. Some are indeed more mature, more assured, than others but all were deserving of their initial publication and it is a treat to read them all collected here.

Overall, Living With the Dead is a great collection of tales, although a little uneven at times. It shows Martin Livings to be an author who enjoys tugging on his readers’ heartstrings just as much as he enjoys severing them. Twenty years is a long time to have been publishing short stories but, on the strength of Living With the Dead, I’m hoping that in twenty years I’ll be waxing lyrical about Martin Livings’ second retrospective collection.

Blurb: In a place where no stars appear in the night sky, a group of strangers whose ancestries reach back to an earlier apocalyptic disaster are brought together to track down a resurrected corpse that might hold the key to the End of the World. Described by science fiction legend Jack Dann as “one of the strangest and most interesting visions to come out of the modern horror/fantasy genres,” acclaimed author Robert Hood’s Fragments of a Broken Land: Valarl Undead is an epic tale of greed, dying magic, strange monsters, and a motley group of heroes, with a strange and breathless climax you won’t easily forget.

When I think of Fantasy as a genre, I don’t often get the modern Epic Fantasy image of Dwarves and Orcs and Elves questing through majestic forests in my mind. I’ve always been more drawn to the works of Clark Ashton Smith, Fritz Leiber, William Hope Hodgson, Robert E Howard, Jack Vance, M. John Harrison and Michael Moorcock. Their fantasies were always so much more ‘otherworldly’ than the faux-Europes and other earth-analogues of modern Epic Fantasy. Their worlds were far-distant not only in ‘place’ from our own, but often also far-distant in ‘time’. Long past or far, far in the future, they were as foreign and exotic to the reader as if they really had just stepped into another country and culture.

Fragments of a Broken Land: Valarl Undead, the debut adult-novel¹ from Robert Hood, has this Otherworldliness in spades. The ‘world’ of Tharenweyr is as strange and exotic a place as has ever existed in fantasy fiction. Indeed, it is not even a world but a solid firmament (or a ‘seed-like emanation’ as Hood puts it on his website) that exists separate from space and time as we know it. It has no sun or moon or stars. Not even the infinite void of space to stare into. Instead, Tharenweyr is locked within its firmament, a mysterious wave of energy that washes from the ‘Worldly Gods’ of the north to the ‘Dark Gods’ of the south and creating the semblance night and day.

The novel begins with Remis, a young and newly graduated spellbinder interested in starting her own magical artifacts business, who is being pressured (threatened, intimidated) into working for a powerful Merchant House. She’s also having horrible nightmares in which she finds herself trapped inside the body of a hideous corpse-like being. And then there’s Tashnark, the bastard son of a commercial slaver. He’s having dreams that he is the powerful warrior Bellaroth, questing across some strange otherworld that exists on the shoulders of a vast cosmic monster.

It is the chance meeting of Remis and Tashnark – their respective dreams unknown to each other – that sets the course of lifting Fragments of a Broken Land.. out of individual nightmares and into a fantasy who’s cosmic scope rivals anything by Lovecraft or William Hope Hodgson. Gods battling Gods. Ancient artifacts and the prophesised return of catalysmic events that will wipe Tharenweyr out of existence. And, as always, Gods using normal people as their pawns.

In the hands of Robert Hood Fragments of a Broken Land… becomes so much more than just a Fantasy or Sword & Sorcery adventure though. The philosophical and spiritual underpinnings Hood has evoked for the world and its people almost demand a denser tale. In this sense, Hood certainly delivers. At times Fragments of a Broken Land… can be a hard read. You need to concentrate a bit. Divest some of your attention in the book. But believe me, the effort is worth it; Fragments of a Broken Land… will have your brain spinning in Gnostically-induced circles.

One thing that really did stand out for me is Tharenweyr’s main city of Ko’erpel-Na. The characters of Fragments of a Broken Land… all have a wonderful depth — their sense of humour, of justice, the way they try and interpret their world and the way they react to it — but the city is just as much a character too. It reminded me of Fritz Leiber’s Lankhmar or M. John Harrison’s Viriconium. It’s dirty, it’s crowded and full of disease and poverty, but there is also a feel to Ko’erpel-Na that speaks of age and so many lives lived within its walls. The impression I got of the city and its people was quite vivid, quite ‘real’. It seems a place just begging for a million more tales to be told.

Overall, Fragments of a Broken Land: Valarl Undead is a brilliant fantasy novel of the type we seldom get to read these days. Dense and exotic and full of ideas. It’s also full of sword & sorcery action too, and the type of cosmic horror that leaves you paranoid about your own reality. Really, what more could you ask for in a book?

Don’t believe me? Want to check it out for yourself? Mr Hood has three other Tharenweyr ‘Fragment’ stories to read for free on his website [http://fragmentsnovel.undeadbackbrain.com/]. Definitely worth checking out as a teaser and to get a feel for the world before tackling the very worthy Fragments of a Broken Land: Valarl Undead.

Oh, and the cover by Bob Eggleton? It is brilliant!

Footnote:
1. Robert Hood is the author of 5 previous Young Adult Novels, 15 Children’s books, published 3 collections of his own work, and edited a further 5 anthologies.

Blurb: For three centuries, as the Black Death rampaged through Europe and the Reformation tore the Church apart, tens of thousands were arrested as witches and subjected to torture and execution, including being burned alive. This graphic novel examines the background; the witch hunters’ methods; who profited; the brave few who protested; and how the Enlightenment gradually replaced fear and superstition with reason and science. Famed witch hunters Heinrich Kramer, architect of the infamous Malleus Maleficarum, and Matthew Hopkins, England’s notorious “Witchfinder General”, are covered as are the Salem Witch Trials and the last executions in Europe.

Way back when I had just started High School I discovered, in the library, graphic novel versions of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Othello and Romeo and Juliet. There were also graphic novels of the life of Genghis Khan and Alexander the Great. They were brilliant. They not only introduced me to wealth of historical figures and to Shakespeare’s genius but they cut through all the hard work of the original texts. They presented art and history in a visual way that made the past exciting and interesting. It is something that stuck with me. It is something that helped pave the way for my own journey to becoming a writer and illustrator.

What has ‘Witch Hunts – A Graphic History of the Burning Times‘ to do with this?

Well, I think they’re much the same. On opening ‘Witch Hunts…‘ for the first time, I was struck with a wave of nostalgia. Like I was that little kid in the school library, just now pulling down one more book after all these years. Within a couple of pages —  or maybe it was only a couple of panels — I was hooked.

‘Witch Hunts – A Graphic History of the Burning Times‘ begins with a brief introduction, an overview that sets the direction and tone of the work. There’s a bit of time-jumping in the chronology of this section, but bear with it. ‘Witch Hunts…‘ very soon settles into a detailed chronological telling of ‘The Burning Times’ (roughly 14th to 18th centuries) and beyond to the horrors still perpetrated around the world today.

A couple of things struck me about ‘Witch Hunts…’. Firstly, the obvious knowledge of the authors is there in every word. It was sort of amazing to me, as I read, to see how much history they’d encapsulated within such short bites. To distil all that information down to just a few words shows a real depth and understanding of the subject matter. Also, I felt I learnt more, retained more, and enjoyed it more than I ever have any history text-book. HWA President Rocky Wood and Bram Stoker Award winning author Lisa Morton really have to be congratulated on achieving such a feat.

Secondly, the artwork by Queensland author/illustrator Greg Chapman is spot on for the work. The style is not that of the modern ‘comic’ — all mood, bold blacks filling 80% of a panel — but much more what I remember from those old Illustrated Classics in the library — less chiaroscuro, more detail, more character. Again, as with the authors, the research that must have gone into each and everyone of Chapman’s illustrations is mind boggling. To be honest, I’m no expert on any of this stuff, but every page looks authentic. The clothing, the hairstyles, all the little objects in the background. They mesh perfectly with the narrative, really drawing you into the stories that Wood and Morton are telling.

The overall narrative is one we’re all familiar with through the culture of horror-literature and -cinema: that despicable period of inhumanity that began with the Spanish Inquisition and spread as Witch Hunts and Witch Trials throughout Europe and the New World. But Wood, Morton and Chapman take us beyond that; back to the religious and biblical origins of ‘Witchcraft’ as an evil and as a sin in the introduction, then later beyond the 18th Century. They also delve deeper. They offer up an onslaught of historical events and incidents. Grotesque images by Chapman. Individual things that happened to individual people, and these people had names. Sure, I’d sort of read and seen TV docos on the sort of things that the Catholic Church did in the 15th Century, or what occurred in Salem. But never before has this history been shown to me on such a personal level. As I said, these people had names, and now I know some of them. That has to bring anyone closer to history, doesn’t it? Gets you right in there, and you begin to really understand what these people went through. Isn’t that what learning history is all about?

That’s where ‘Witch Hunts – A Graphic History of the Burning Times‘ really worked for me. It showed me stories of real people. All the horror and the torment they went through and all the madness of the people who’d condemned them. It certainly is graphic — Chapman’s illustrations are often more uncompromisingly gruesome than the text — but it serves to show a truth about our past that we should not shy from. In light of some of the religious and political events happening around the world today, remembering that truth seems, to me, an especially important thing.

Ultimately, ‘Witch Hunts – A Graphic History of the Burning Times‘ is informative in a way few non-fiction works are, and it’s great-looking too! Definitely a worthwhile addition to any horror reader’s or writer’s library.

Well, I just watched the teaser trailer and, ummm, well, just wow. Such a short clip;so much in there. It tells you; this is something you are familiar with, we’ve all been here before. Very quickly you realise though; same story, same setting, but this isn’t the cheap and cheesy gore of the original EVIL DEAD. This is, well … there were a couple of moments when I flinched, or felt a very strong urge to turn away. This is EVIL DEAD the ‘realistic’ version, I guess.

Frankly, it looked amazing. Totally disturbing, with the sort of imagery that tends to stick in your mind for years. And, you know, it looks so good that I don’t even know if I’ll actually be able to watch it (woos that I am).

Anyway, needless to say, this very short teaser trailer with so much packed in NOT SAFE FOR WORK. NOT SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN. DO NOT SHOW IT TO YOUR GRANDMA!

Terra Magazine, Issue #1

Terra Magazine, from Sydney-based Black House Comics, is a throw-back. A return to comics of a different era. Without political or social agenda, they were made to entertain; to shock and to thrill and to make you laugh. In many ways, Terra Magazine reminds me of that. Of EC Comics and early 2000AD.

In Terra Magazine‘s first issue, editor Jason Franks has assembled a varied collection of artists and writers. And an even more varied collection of genres. The almost Frazetta-like cover by Jason Paulos, the first thing that will catch your eye on the news-stands, is a brilliant evocation not only of the first story (see below), but also of the pulpish nature of the entire comic/magazine.

From the opening “Gourmand Go in ‘Memorial Soup’“, written by Franks with artwork by Harry Purnell, we are thrust immediately into deep space. This is exactly the sort of tale I remember reading in old 2000ADs; a ship crewed with human mercenaries, stuck drifting due to a busted Fission Drive, their distress signal picked up by the biggest, ugliest, meanest looking cockroach-lobster aliens in the galaxy. But you just know there is going to be a twist. While not exactly unpredictable, the story is fun. The writing is clear and concise and the artwork crisp and quirky.

Next up, we’re off to feudal Japan for “Kensuke“. Written again by Franks, but with artwork by Tom Bonin, this story couldn’t be more different than the opener. What struck me most was the total change, not only of genre, but of the feel of the artwork. While Purnell’s art for “Gourmand Go…” consisted of crisp line-work and lettering, Bonin’s approach in “Kensuke” is much rougher, sketchier, offering up a style more in line with the setting. And the story? Samurai warriors. Martial arts monks. Court intrigue. Concubines. Ninjas. Need I say more?

It is these shifts in genre and style that make Terra Magazine so much fun. The very next story, “The Catamorph“, with a script by Chris Sequeira and art by Jan Scherpenhuizen, places us firmly back in EC Comics ‘Tales from the Crypt‘ territory. Two cops respond to a break and enter alarm from the posh-end of town only to encounter a — quite animated — Ancient Egyptian mummy, and so much more besides. The script and artwork are sort of timeless in this supernatural-noir tale. It could be the 60s, or the 70s, or any decade onwards. I tend to favour a late 80s setting – wait until you see the push button phone in the Police Office! Apart from these initial panels though, there isn’t much in the way of visual clues to tell us exactly ‘when’ we are… and I see this as a good thing leading forward for “The Catamorph“. As I said: timeless.

“Shadowmancy: Episode 1, The Key in the Wall“, with a script by Jason Franks and art by Nicholas Hunter, continues on in a similar mode. The artwork is more modern, with sharp Manga-inspired lines, but the story is still straight out of something I would have read as a kid in the 70s and 80s. For me, a new and refreshing take on that nostalgia seems to be what Terra Magazine is all about. In “Shadowmancy…“, young Quay decides the follow his mysterious and often absent father, only to find himself the centre of a battle between powerful sorcerers at a secret academy. The panels in this segment are really well composed. The script is sparse and increasingly intriguing. Once begun, I just had to keep going through to the end … and this is where I was reminded of what might be Terra Magazine‘s single downfall.

The story sequences are just too darn short!

Of those reviewed so far, only “Gourmand Go…” has anything resembling a self-contained story. I’m hoping for more stories set on that deep space kitchen, but if not, that’s okay. Everything else, though? Yep! To Be Continued…

It might not be so bad if the stories weren’t all so good. So much fun. Maybe then, I wouldn’t have to worry about the wait between issues. But, tri-annual? I have to wait one third of a year before I get to see if Imperial Guard Kenuke gets away? Or whether detectives Vic and Doyle get any closer to discovering the Mummy’s secret? That’s quite a torturous wait for a reader, especially when the story crumbs are so small (but oh so tasty). “Shadowmancy...” was, to me, the most interesting story in terms of future development, but just for one more page, or another two pages, or three! I definitely feel it could have given more.

“Gun Smoke Bud“, with a script by Jason Franks and art by Yuriko Sekine, is in a style I’m not overly familiar with. I’m guessing it’s manga inspired. The story is simple enough — Two Tokyo detectives investigate a Yakuza massacre at a shopping mall, their only witness? A young stoner — but it doesn’t give us much indication of where it might be heading in the future. And after the crisply stylised lines of “Shadowmancy“, the artwork didn’t do that much for me.

The final panelled story is Ben Michael Byrne’s “Prototype“. Written and illustrated by Byrne, “Protoype” is another short, self-contained, 2000AD style sci-fi story. Nothing serious, just good fun with the usual gruesome twist at the end. The darker, blockier artwork really suits the piece and it is quite different from anything else in the magazine. I can see this continuing with a new short, and comically-nasty, story each issue.

Which brings us to the final story, “Tusk” by Jason Fischer, which isn’t a comic at all. Still in keeping with the serialised nature of the magazine, “Tusk” plumbs the Golden Age of genre fiction with something that could have come right out of an early 70s issue of Analog. “Tusk” is straight prose — with a few Rhys James illustrations sprinkled throughout — of the sort that Mr Fischer has become well known for: tight, well written, original and more than a little bit gonzo. “Tusk” is The Planet of the Pachyderms with a healthy dash of Robert E Howard thrown in. A post-apocalyptic world run by a civilisation of war-like elephants. Talking warrior elephants, no less. Who enslave humans. And they wear ‘swords’ on their tusks! Count me in! Not only are the battle scenes tremendous, but there are hints of a much deeper story developing here. I very much look forward to reading more of “Tusk” in future issues.

So, that’s that. My non-comicaknowledable take on what I think is a really excellent debut. Terra Magazine is a great blend of exactly the sort of comics and tales that got me reading as a kid — a wonderful retro revival that, despite its obvious influences, still offers something new and refreshing for readers of both comics and of genre fiction. It should be available on your local newsagent and comic store now, or you can visit www.terramagazine.com.au Let’s hope Black House can keep the issues coming!