This is the first entry in the successful erotic horror series, now reprinted with better cover art. I've read three of these so far (out of order) and this is the best one.
Here's an idea of what you'll find:
In Graham Masterton's "Changeling," a traveling businessman falls for a mysterious, irresistible woman, and then finds out what life is like from her perspective. It has some interesting developments, but at times reads like a feminist tract on how hard it is to be a woman. Fortunately it gets back away from that and redeems itself in the end.
In Richard Matheson's "The Likeness of Julie," a college student finds himself fixated on one of his classmates, without knowing why. The infatuation turns darker when he's unable to shut out thoughts of all the things he'd like to do to her.
"The Thang" by Robert R. McCammon is about a man with a small personal problem. It wants to be funny but is simply grotesque and cartoonish. It's the only story in this collection that's actually bad.
A gardener and a housekeeper carry on an affair as they care for a hideously crippled old woman in "Ménage a Trois" by F. Paul Wilson. But their employer is not as helpless as she seems.
"Mr. Right" by Richard Christian Matheson portrays a session between a woman and her therapist. Like most short-shorts, it reads like an extended joke with a punch line, but the author plays nicely with the readers' preconceptions about doctor/patient roles. You'll want to kick yourself for being taken in by it, but you'll enjoy it all the same.
Lucid dreaming takes a deadly turn in Chet Williamson's "Blood Night."
The protagonist of Mick Garris' "Chocolate" finds himself inexplicably experiencing the desires, feelings and finally the actions of a woman he's never met before.
Ramsey Campbell's "Again" finds a man trying to help a lost old woman, and the horrors he encounters after he succeeds. This is easily the most frightening story in the book, which surprised me because I've always found Campbell's work very dull. Apparently there's an exception to everything. The quality of the stories here, as good as most of them already were, steps up a notch with this one.
A young woman arrives to spend some time with her aunt and meets her strange young companion in Lisa Tuttle's "Bug House." It's a chilling examination of predator/prey relationships.
A couple of thugs assault a helpless married couple in Theodore Sturgeon's "Vengeance Is." But which party is really the more dangerous?
A more subtle kind of revenge is at the heart of "The Unkindest Cut" by J. N. Williamson.
A man his haunted by the girl he mistreated twenty years ago in Michael Garrett's "Reunion."
In "Footsteps" by Harlan Ellison, a child of the night meets her match in a fast-talking Frenchman, and receives the shock of her eternal life.
A sorority girl is obsessed with a very foreign classmate in Mike Newton's "Pretty Is..."
Gary Brandner's "Aunt Edith" is a witch who would just love to put her niece's new boyfriend to the test.
Dennis Etchison once again proves himself to be one of the masters of quiet horror with "Daughter of the Golden West," as two best friends investigate another's disappearance and strange death.
"Meat Market" by John Skipp and Craig Spector gives the term literal meaning as we witness a violent courtship ritual.
Rex Miller's entry gives a radio DJ a chance to finally meet a special woman he's known only as "The Voice."
We discover the disturbing truth behind the fashion industry in Robert Bloch's "The Model."
A man balances two very dysfunctional relationships in Steve Rasnic Tem's "Carnal House," which blurs the line between being dead and being alive in both directions.
"They're Coming For You" by Les Daniels is another comedic tale, but unlike the McCammon entry, is actually funny. It begins when a man comes home to find his wife with another lover, and runs from there.
"Suzie Sucks" is the message scrawled on the wall in editor Jeff Gelb's story. Is it really just a tasteless practical joke?
In Ray Garton's "Punishments," a church organist strikes up a special relationship with the teenaged boy she sees there every week. This is both the most erotic and the most disturbing story here.
Finally, in David J. Schow's sad and frightening "Red Light," a model photographer learns that we cannot give of ourselves indefinitely. This story won a World Fantasy Award, and deserved it.
The best entries here are by Schow, Tem, Etchison and Tuttle, but most of the rest are worth reading as well. I think the best stories are the ones that have sex as a plot point (that is, after all, the theme) but don't focus on it constantly. It's not that I'm a prude by any means; I just find it keeps things from getting repetitive and predictable, and allows for a broader variety of content. I always start every anthology hoping to read just one priceless gem. There are many here.
