Enjoyable Horror Anthology
350609
An awesome anthology of Canadian horror. Definitely worth a read!
3619559
Normally when I read an anthology such as this, there is at least one story that I don't like.  However, this is not the case with "Collected Christmas Horror Shorts." Not a bad one in the bunch.
2740164
Most anthologies have a few strong stories, and some that are not so... engrossing.  This is was a surprisingly even collection of horror (ish) tales from an author I had not read before.  I particularly liked Bone Yard - not your average man and dog story.  My other favourites were Jacob's Gift (a little boy fears his brother has been buried alive) Sunburn (the grisly side of home health care) and Wrong Turn (sometimes you can right childhood wrongs).

The included excerpt from the author's novel Jimmy also looked like good reading.

All in all for 99 cents it is excellent value, particularly with Halloween around the corner.
2210448
As was the case with volume one of this series, I was fortunate enough to receive a pre-release copy so I could provide a review.  It is great to see an anthology of modern horror and suspense stories and I am extremely pleased to know there are looking to be more volumes coming.  I did enjoy the first volume of the series a bit more, but this collection is still a great thrill to read.  I had read all the authors in volume one of the series, but only previously read two of the authors in this volume.  Part of what I love about anthologies is getting exposed to authors I might not otherwise read, so I really looked forward to checking out these five stories.

The first story is "The Deep End" by Robert McCammon.  This was a great, creepy little story.  In the vein of classic Twilight Zone you are left wondering if the protagonist is a few sandwiches short of a picnic until the twist at the end.

"Interval" by Norman Prentiss is simply a solid read.  It takes the very real horror of modern times, an airline disaster, and approaches it from a new creepy angle.  The core story is evocative with very relatable characters.  As soon as you get sucked into the events of the tale, you get a little more horror for your money!

Next up is "If These Walls Could Talk" by Shawntelle Madison.  I knew where this story was going from early on, but it was still a fun ride to get there.  My main complaint is that I wish it was a bit longer as the characters didn't feel very fleshed out so I was not as invested in their fates as I might have been.  Despite this quibble it was an enjoyable, though brief journey.

"The Night Hider" by Graham Masterton was a fun, creepy journey.  Almost everyone has been given or purchased used furniture, typically with little thought to their past.  Masterton's tale will likely make you think twice about such history in the future.

"Whatever" by Richard Christian Matheson was a wild, somewhat experimental journey.  This story is actually a series of articles, notes, journal entries and other bits of information relating to a 70's Rock 'N Roll supergroup named Whatever.  Initially I found the story a bit hard to follow as the info was not in chronological order, but after a bit it all fell into place and I enjoyed the ride.  I didn't experience much horror or suspense in this tale, but ended up finding it one of the better stories of the collection despite this.

As with the first volume in this series I think you cannot go wrong picking this up.  It is a great set of stories for a budget price.  Each story can easily be consumed in a brief single sitting.  I continued to be excited for the upcoming volumes in this series.
4700329
Positives: Not a zombie in site! This anthology made a point to seek out different angles on horror. The classics are great, but there is a lot more out there and you will find it here. Oracle bones that bleed, sea monsters of old, piecing together the soul, soul collectors... this collection is challenging and bold in scope.

A few standouts:

A Monstrous Touch by Marty Young
Mutes by Rob Smales
Beware the Nuckelavee by David Price
The Dybbuk Wife by Lillian Cohen-Moore
The Oracle Bone by B.E. Scully
The Lake by Melissa Stevens
Man With A Canvas Bag by Gary A. Braunbeck

Negatives: Any anthology is never going to please everyone all the time. There were a few silly ones, a few that went too far out on a limb, and one that went so far out it never came back.

Summary: A solid collection and well worth adding to your Halloween haunt list!
239980
As some of the other reviewers have let on, some of the stories here might be considered a bit disturbing, which is not to say that they aren't good however they may have been trying too hard for the gore factor.  At least none of them were boring or not scary which is something you see more often than not in a horror anthology.  A good value for the price.
2371967
Manish has used the typical Indian horror stereotypes in his stories in a nice manner. The plot ranges from ghostly trees to dead people to ancient spirits to plain scary people, from haunted houses to haunted railway stations, from strange photographs to stranger amusement parks (which won't amuse. There is a nice quality to the stories which I couldn't really put my finger on but enjoyed nevertheless. Manish has even managed to inject some nice humor in the horror stories. Manish Sharma has been able to weave stories in a manner which hold your attention and grip you.

My personal favorite is Her Unkempt Promise where the short stories of an author begin to come true. My other favorite is 13, Church Street because it has the ghosts with the touch of humor when it is least expected.

12 stories spanning 70 off pages are a good two hours worth of nice reading. The author advises the reader to read the stories in the solitude of the night. Do it at your own risk (of gaining more pleasure out of the book).
3214464
What can I say? I'm a sucker for a good vampire story, and this anthology has some of the best I've read. Arranged in chronological order by the date they appeared, these stories date back to the very first, classic bloodsucker stories to be published in the early 19th century, up to late 20th century offerings from current authors.

The lore evolves as time goes by, with the monsters becoming something more than stylized leaches. Some of the characters are not really vampires in the sense that it's not the blood of their victims they require. It's fascinating to witness how different authors put their own spin on the legends, creating much deeper, and also more unsettling, motives and desires for these eternal outcasts.

If you're a horror fan with a penchant for the Undead, this collection is definitely for you.
1789631
I am not usually one who enjoys short stories, but this seemed right up my alley so I decided to give it a go. I am so happy that I did because it opened my eyes to some new authors and I thoroughly enjoyed most of the anthology. I am going to share a quick glance review with some blurbs about each of the stories:

- The Birds of Azalea Street by Nova Ren Suma was creepy in a real sort of way...3.5
- In the Forest Dark and Deep by Carrie Ryan was excellent. A retelling of sorts of Alice in Wonderland, it gave me chills and somehow made me sad. 5 stars
- Cat Winters delivers another fantastic historical ghostly tale in Emmeline. 5 stars
- Bardugo's story somehow makes celebrity rehab surprisingly creepy. 4 stars
- I liked the lore of the story by Megan Shepherd, the harbinger of Death is always a go in my book! 3.5 stars
- I still don't love Danielle Paige's writing...but she wrote about basically my favorite thing ever so I dig it. 4 stars
- April's story was probably my least favorite. Very "I Know What You Did Last Summer," and very dull. 2 stars
- The Maberry story was dull, and was too prequel like for my tastes. Zombies. Meh. 2 stars
- OMG the Jay Kristoff story was awesome. 5 stars
- Stefan Bachman's was interesting enough...3 stars
- The Girl Without a Face by Marie Lu actually creeped me out a bit which is a feat in itself! Vengeful ghost for the win! 5 stars
- A Girl Who Dreamed of Snow by McCormick Templeman was quite good, and almost fable-like. 4 stars
- Stitches by A.G. Howard is not for the squeamish, but it was fantastic. 5 stars
- I like the vengeance in Kendare's story. 4 stars

As you can see, I really enjoyed most of these short stories, which was a fantastic surprise for me! If you enjoy even a few of these authors, pick up this anthology and give it a go, it was the perfect creepy read that got me excited for more from these authors.
4307988
Overall Rating: 3.5 Stars

Horror short stories are my favorite form of literature, hands down. So when Jeani Rector offered me a copy of Shrieks and Shivers From The Horror Zine to review, there was zero possibility I was going to say no. With a few well-known names in the table of contents, and my love of discovering new horror talent, I really couldn't see a downside.

The book itself is fairly handsome, certainly one of the better covers from Post Mortem Press.

Let's start with the positive: The first actual story in the collection, TAPEWORM by Martin Rose, was quite good. For my tastes, this collection was about a 30% hit rate of stories that I really enjoyed, 20% that were okay, leaving a remainder that wasn't horrible. In fact, it's some sort of achievement that there really weren't any "terrible" stories here.

In addition to the aforementioned TAPEWORM, my favorites in this collection were penned by Joe McKinney, Bruce Memblatt, Elizabeth Massie, Tim Waggoner, Dean H. Wild, Lisa Morton, Garrett Rowlan and Eric J. Guignard. Honorable mention also goes to tales from Shaun Meeks, Ray Garton, Kristen Houghton, and Joseph Rubas.

The contributions from William F. Nolan and Tom Piccirilli, two writers I quite enjoy, were so slight as to barely qualify as actual stories, apparently included only to bolster the appearance of the roster.

Dropping stories from big names into an anthology such as this is one way to get attention, however it's a double-edge: you expect the stories from the big names to be GOOD, and keep your fingers crossed that at least a few of the stories from lesser-known authors hit the mark.

So now for the grumbles:

This anthology stumbles hard out of the gate, with one of the most cringe-worthy introductions to an anthology I've ever read, by the straight-shootin' Bentley Little: He hasn't read the stories, doesn't know the authors contributing to the volume. Goes on to say that Jeani contacted him out of the blue hoping to get a story from him for an earlier anthology she was doing, so he sent her something he had lying around, something he implied wasn't good enough to submit elsewhere.

Maybe this introduction would've worked better at the end of the book? Or maybe just drop it and let the stories fall or stand on their own?

I soldiered on.

The very first piece in the book wasn't a killer short story to draw me in, but rather a rambling non-fiction bit by John Russo that sounded exactly like someone had bought him a few drinks at a convention, set an audio recorder down on the bar while he rambled, and then transcribed it as "A WORD ABOUT ZOMBIES". Why? What on earth does this have to do with anything? It's a fiction anthology and I'm immediately subjected to John Russo rambling like Grandpa Simpson about zombie movies.

Removing these two bits by Little and Russo would've gotten the whole thing off to much more solid start, in my opinion.

Fortunately, things began to look up after that and before long a few decent stories washed that initial sour taste out of my mouth.

The final verdict?

All in all, a pretty decent collection that does what it's supposed to do: entertain and introduce new authors to a wider audience, and in that it succeeds. Check it out!

I know I will certainly be seeking out more from Bruce Memblatt, Dean H. Wild,  Garrett Rowlan, and Eric J. Guignard in the future, as well as digging more deeply into Elizabeth Massie, Tim Waggoner, and Lisa Morton's work to boot.
1549749
In my opinion, independent press anthologies are a wonderful read. They offer a wide range of authors, many of whom you may not be familiar with or have only seen in passing. Evil Jester Digest, Volume Two is one such collection. While there are prominent names in horror, including Tim Waggoner and Holly Newstein, there are a host of others just as good lurking in the pages here.

The stories here are not the standard slasher/ splatter horror fare. The gore is minimal and the suspense is intense. Waggoner opens the collection with a disturbing look at a man driven by the past, of which he cannot escape. The story is not only great horror, but also a reflection on the long-term impact of the high school bully and his cronies. Where do those scapegoat kids go and who do they become? Waggoner's answer will chill you to the bone. The stories include a wonderful post-World War II tale from Newstein and a painful look at abuse and justice from Gene O'Neill.  The authors here resisted the urge to slip into the clich and avoided the traditional serial killer gorefests. They instead looked into the dark, shadowy places in ourselves to find the horror that resides within us. Even the more traditional "monster" tales of zombies and vampires feel fresh and take on different, challenging perspectives.

This is a great collection for not only an introduction to established authors, but also for discovering some new, fresh talent out there. There's some real talent here and I'm looking forward to plunging into a few novels from this bunch! As with any anthology, it does come down to taste.  Zombie fans may be disappointed that there's not more brain-crunching, but the fans out there looking for more tension than guts will be pleased. Read this one with the lights on!
1086872
Transcendent by Rita Webb is a collection of eight short paranormal stories.  I enjoyed how diverse this collection was and it was easy to sit and read several stories in one day or just pick up the book while I was waiting for dinner to cook and read one story.

  The book opens with Seduction of a Siren where two teenage boys are stuck on an island after a boating accident and find that the only other person on the island is a disgusting looking siren.  One of the boys can see past the ugliness to the siren's inner beauty but the other cannot.

  In Feather, a Native American girl takes her spiritual journey into the wilderness only to find a secret about herself that she never thought possible.  The Pumpkin Thief is a creepy, yet sweet story.  Then in Ryan's Wish Ryan finally makes it back home after being missing for years...or does he?

  A fun collection of paranormal tales that has a little bit of everything sprinkled in from creepy to sweet to powerful.

I give this collection 3 out of 5 stars.
1903470
This is a very good collection of short horror stories. Swimming pools that are infested, plane crash relatives agony, these are good and creepy. Real world, with touches of horror. Not your average scare. You'll like these stories. Good to 'chew' through during a break

Brian J. Freeman and Richard Chizmar, of Cemetery Dance have picked some very good horror stories for us, looking forward the rest of the books in the series.
4257841
Queering Stokers Dracula was an easy read for me, mostly because I was already very familiar with all aspects and characters of the classic horror novel. The anthology offered up tales that toyed with the sexualities and sensitivities of the well-known characters like Van Helsing and Jonathan Harker, or invented queer-orientated tales around the novels events.

My favorite was easily the spec-story involving the sailors and cargomen who happened to be aboard the doomed ship Demeter, by Damon Shaw. Lee Thomas opening story about Van Helsings first encounter with the undead and a modern day lineage tale by Sven Davisson were also noteworthy.
1495603
With stories connected to Kim Harrison's Hallows, Jeaniene Frost's Night Huntress, Vicki Pettersson's Sign of the Zodiac and Jocelyn Drake's Dark Days and the first foray out of the Young Adult world by Wicked Lovely author Melissa Marr, Unbound is definitely worth your time.  For me, all of the stories were interesting enough that I enjoyed this anthology, despite the fact that the shorts these popular urban fantasy authors contributed to the collection are not feel good reads - most of them left me feeling sort of melancholy - offering the reader only at best a `not quite happily' every after.

Kim Harrison's "Ley Line Drifter" - Series regular pixy sidekick Jenks gets to solve a case on his own when another pixy's children are threatened by moonlight madness.  - Though off the main line of Harrison's series, like most of the other Hallows shorts, Jenks' story doesn't really standalone from the series that well.  There is so much about Jenks and about pixies in general that readers of the series will know, but will leave newbies a bit confused.  As a fan of the series, I've always wanted to see more of Jenks and this was the short that I was looking forward to the most in this anthology, but Jenks wasn't really able to carry this story on his own - fortunately he had a little help. (3.5 stars)

Jeaniene Frost's "Reckoning" - Before he met Cat, vampire Bones is on the hunt in New Orlean's for a pair of brutal supernatural serial killers -  I am a huge fan of Bones and Cat, so it feels weird to see him on his own. And though Frost still tells an interesting story, with the way things go down, the Bones here is a lesser one - he doesn't seem as smart or powerful as usual.  (4 stars)

Vicki Pettersson's "Dark Matter" A prequel to Pettersson's series, the back-story to one of her series regulars as one of her Light characters flirts with a Dark temptress - though Pettersson's series is my least favorite of the four represented here, I did like her story - she fits an awful lot into the short space and her character really grows up both literally and figuratively. (4.5stars)

Jocelyn Drake's "The Dead, the Damned and the Forgotten" - A prequel to Nightwalker, vampire Mira's control of her territory is threatened with a killer hunting down those under her dominion and Mira must elimate the killer or she will be forced to return to the dreaded Council -  If you are thinking about trying Drake's series, this short is a pretty good introduction to series lead, vampire fire starter Mira - (4 stars)

Melissa Marr's  "Two Lines" - A heroine is stalking a white-slaver, lured by the promise of sex and death that is her heritage - I actually really liked Marr's entry and would be interested in reading more about her unique supernatural heroine, who struggles to maintain her humanity against the irresistible call of her supernatural hungers. (4.5 stars)
4482148
a fun 'trick or treat' style anthology of short short horror stories with some young up n comin actors. not as 'full circle' as some other anthologies, but definitely a funny, stylized romp through some classic Halloween spook tales
3236929
I would argue that the book is worth the price for "The Tall Dog" alone. Personally, I love my monsters and evil spirits and there are several stories right up my alley. That being said it is a very good anthology with a little bit of everything from almost every subgenre of horror you can think of. If you enjoy a good story that makes you look over your shoulder every now and then this is a great one pick up.