- Hardcover
- Publisher: San Val (Aug 2003)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1417721979
- ISBN-13: 978-1417721979
- Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Product Description
Product Description
Three editors, three countries… Gathering the Bones brings together, in one volume, the very best new horror writing from the US, the UK and Australia.
This landmark anthology not only sets a new benchmark for the best in horror writing – it will keep you reading with the light on, long after midnight.
Each editor solicited a third of this volume's contents in his own country of residence – Ramsey Cambell in Great Britain, Jack Dann in Australia, and Dennis Etchison in the United States.
The collection presents the familiar and the experimental, the traditional and the avant-garde, the quiet and the vividly shocking, in a field whose boundaries are no longer rigidly defined and where literary values coexist with the leading edge of popular culture.
--This text refers to the Paperback edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I bought this lengthy collection with high expectations. Thirty five modern horror stories are herein collected, the theme being that they stem from the three editors' home countries - the UK, USA and Australia. The authors range from established professionals to new arrivals on the publishing scene; consequently the volume partially sets out to showcase new talent, always an admirable ambition.They're brought together beneath a suitably spooky cover - actually some human skulls tucked away in a display case. As with many such compilations, however, the results are highly uneven. Perhaps a dozen or so of these tales are absolutely first rate (the best is probably the genuinely disturbing 'Bedfordshire' by Peter Crowther) and some of the more interesting are undoubtedly those written by women, who generally approach horror from a more thoughtful and consequently more frightening angle. A further dozen are worthwhile and a final group is frankly pretty forgettable.
In my opinion this volume would have benefited from a little more judicious editing; whittling it down to around twenty stories and cutting out the obvious deadwood would have done much to improve it. As it is, there are definite high spots but this particular ghost train is a bumpy ride.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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6 reviews
7 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Horror Dead and Buried
15 Aug 2005
Format:Paperback
This book's back cover proclaims that "horror may never be the same." Well if this predominantly mediocre collection is any indication, that statement is unfortunately accurate. Perhaps modern writers, trapped with the rest of us in our media-saturated society, have lost the ability to be truly scary. Personally I've never read anything more frightening than ol' Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Lovecraft; and even Stephen King, Clive Barker, or Dean Koontz, when each was in his prime, could deliver serious thrills and chills. But this collection, of what currently passes for "horror," proves that it may be time to nail the coffin shut on this genre for good.
Granted, of the 34 short stories here, there's a smattering of winners. Robert Devereaux offers a quite disconcerting look at our society's obsession with beauty, while Michael Marshall Smith, Stephen Dedman, and Adam L.G. Nevill show an affinity for inherent human evil that's healthily influenced by the classics. Still-dependable Ray Bradbury even supplies a whimsically dreadful update on the Grim Reaper. There are a few other stories here that can keep the reader perfectly interested even if they're not particularly scary, with well-drawn themes and characters.
But otherwise, the majority of selections here illustrate, embarrassingly, everything that's wrong with current "horror" writing (plus the editing of collections such as this). I'll make an example of Lisa Tuttle. Her story features a woman who is suspicious of her boyfriend's secrecy, so she goes through his stuff, learns he's a murderer, and that's pretty much the end. Oh the horror! Aaron Sterns and Chris Lawson/Simon Brown deliver stories that frightfully showcase human cruelty or struggle, only to have stock undead creatures or supernatural processes pop up in the final paragraphs, as unsatisfying explanations for man's inhumanity. These so-called surprises are actually far more predictable than they are scary. Several other tales are so genre-deficient that you wonder why they're even in a "horror" collection, those by Melanie Tem and Fruma Klass being prime examples. This collection is a failure in so many respects that it's almost scary. But not in a good way. [~doomsdayer520~]
Granted, of the 34 short stories here, there's a smattering of winners. Robert Devereaux offers a quite disconcerting look at our society's obsession with beauty, while Michael Marshall Smith, Stephen Dedman, and Adam L.G. Nevill show an affinity for inherent human evil that's healthily influenced by the classics. Still-dependable Ray Bradbury even supplies a whimsically dreadful update on the Grim Reaper. There are a few other stories here that can keep the reader perfectly interested even if they're not particularly scary, with well-drawn themes and characters.
But otherwise, the majority of selections here illustrate, embarrassingly, everything that's wrong with current "horror" writing (plus the editing of collections such as this). I'll make an example of Lisa Tuttle. Her story features a woman who is suspicious of her boyfriend's secrecy, so she goes through his stuff, learns he's a murderer, and that's pretty much the end. Oh the horror! Aaron Sterns and Chris Lawson/Simon Brown deliver stories that frightfully showcase human cruelty or struggle, only to have stock undead creatures or supernatural processes pop up in the final paragraphs, as unsatisfying explanations for man's inhumanity. These so-called surprises are actually far more predictable than they are scary. Several other tales are so genre-deficient that you wonder why they're even in a "horror" collection, those by Melanie Tem and Fruma Klass being prime examples. This collection is a failure in so many respects that it's almost scary. But not in a good way. [~doomsdayer520~]
Nagy's "Hanged Man of Oz" story in Gathering The Bones
26 Nov 2002
Format:Hardcover
This particular story in "Gathering The Bones" has made it impossible for me to watch The Wizard of Oz without looking for the fabled "hanged man."
I'd heard of this urban legend many times before, but Nagy's well-drawn characters and compelling, mindbending narrative has brought the cinematic oddity to life. I'll never be able to watch that movie again without feeling just a bit creeped out.
I'd heard of this urban legend many times before, but Nagy's well-drawn characters and compelling, mindbending narrative has brought the cinematic oddity to life. I'll never be able to watch that movie again without feeling just a bit creeped out.
6 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Contemporary horror
19 Nov 2003
Format:Paperback
The two stories I most enjoyed in this book, convince me that I am not a fan of contemporary horror. Tiger Moth by Graham Joyce, and the Big Green Grin, by Gahan Wilson, are more in tune with the fantasy genre.
Most of the other stories are well written, but they didn't scare me, or make me break out in a cold sweat. In my opinion, several are simply depressing, (Picking up Courtney, Sounds Like, Bedfordshire) and that is not what I look for in any story. Terry Dowling's "The Bone Ship" reminded me of Roald Dahl's story The 'Landlady', except I didn't care for the protagonist. I didn't finish Lil' Miss Ultrasound because the subject matter didn't interest me. I thought Stephen Dedman's story was interesting, but in the end seemed to be a fairly predictable tale of revenge. I lost interest in Andrew Brown's story half way through, I thought it was too long. Perhaps it is OK to use said bookisms/adverbs in dialogue, if Simon Brown's story is a guide. No man's land, finished suddenly, I thought there might be more to it, the ending didn't impress me at all.
Overall, this is a better anthology than "Dreaming Down Under", but if these tales are representative of where contemporary horror is headed, then it is not my cup of tea.
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