The Function Room: The Kollection By Matt Leyshon – Reviewed

This is horror pornography. A non-stop and diverse collection of violent and brutal filth. The pages literally drip with ruin. This is horror for horror fans. This is for those wishing to push the boundaries of taboo.

Those familiar with Morpheus Tales will know of Leyshon’s work, the first of the Function Room stories have featured within the magazine’s pages, and these are true works of genius. Uninhibited, utterly sensual in their horroristic descriptions, his stories are thick with atmosphere. Reading the Function Room stories is like watching a snuff movie, hideously depraved and yet so fascinating you can’t take your eyes off it.

But this is just part of the Kollection, although many of the stories are linked and contain familiar characters, there are a few stand-alone, or less obviously connected, stories. There is a wide range here, from the dripping filth of “The Function Room” to mysterious Lovecraftian towns, mass suicides, vampiric creatures, nasty children and loads more. A full bucket of originality, depth, characterisation and atmosphere. Leyshon does not hold back, he is unafraid of exploring the darkness of humanity in the same way Clive Barker or Gary McMahon do.

My favourite are definitely the Function room stories, where his heavily stylised world drips with filth and decay. Leyshon writes stories that are so visceral and dripping with atmosphere and filth you feel the need for a shower afterwards. These stories are written with a knowledge of depravity that makes me smile. Very few stories, and this is especially difficult with short stories, can give you such a feeling of immersion that you feel disgusted and unclean. Leyshon’s twisted vision is sheer genius.

Having read far too many single author collections and anthologies this year (I much prefer novels), there is only one collection that every horror fan should read and that is The Function Room: The Kollection. It will likely disgust some, send others whimpering to their bed, but will also put a sick and disturbed grin on some (including my own) faces.

This first collection from Leyshon promises much and deliveries in filthy, dirty, brutal blood-filled bucket loads. I cannot remember when I felt impure and entertained at the same time. Twisted genius.

 

http://www.lulu.com/shop/matt-leyshon/the-function-room-the-kollection/paperback/product-20424435.html

Also available through amazon, on kindle and smashwords.com

Morpheus Tales Apocalypse Special Issue – Open to Submissions!

Ok, so I didn’t manage to submit anything to the Ripped Genes: Biopunk Special Issue, which closed to submissions yesterday. I hear it’s going to be pretty damn good though. Fortunately there’s another Special Issue from the people at Morpheus Tales, now this one really floats my boat…

Morpheus Tales Apocalypse Special Issue – Open to Submissions!

It’s 2012 – the year our world is supposed to end. Supposedly, on December 21st, we will cease to exist. But how is it going to happen? Fire? Flood? Earthquakes? Or something manmade, such as an unstoppable virus or a nuclear explosion?

You tell us. Morpheus Tales is looking for short stories of how the human race is going to die out. Use your imagination – it can be as realistic (fire, for instance) or as far-fetched (maybe zombies?) as you’d like. Is it quick and painless or slow and excruciating? Make us a little nervous that maybe, just maybe, your scenario is imminent.

We know zombies are the in thing right now – but we don’t want to dig through tons of zombie stories. Try to come up with something unique, something that will stand out in the crowd. We want to be freaked out and blown away by the methods you choose to wipe out the Earth.

What we DON’T want – vampires, werewolves, aliens, fantasy, sword and sorcery, biopunk. Otherwise, regular Morpheus Tales guidelines apply – no simultaneous submissions, standard manuscript format, only high quality character- or plot-driven stories of no more than 3,000 words. 

Please put Apocalypse  Special Issue Submission in the subject of your email and send to: morpheustales@blueyonder.co.uk

The Apocalypse Special Issue will be available as an ebook and via print-on-demand services. Contributor copies will be in ebook format.

Deadline 31st of December!

Morpheus Tales Biopunk Special Issue – 31st July Deadline for Submissions

Oh bugger me! Doesn’t time fly when you’re having fu… well, when you’re busy. It also flies when you have a deadline approaching, it seems much more quickly than when there’s no deadline. I really wanted to submit to this Biopunk Special.

With just a week to go until the issue closes I’m not sure if I have enough time to get something written, edited and submitted. I’ve been fortunate enough to have been published (fiction-wise) by Morpheus Tales a couple of times, by different editors.

When the issue was first announced earlier this year I was flooded with ideas, now, a week before the deadline, and having written no fiction yet this year, I am bereft. No idea, no time, no story.

Three thousand words can seem like a daunting challenge, but with the right story and the imaginative flow going, it’s difficulty to contain it within that amount of words.  But staring at a blank screen, nothing is coming to me.

One week. That’s all I have left. Will I even manage to submit something? I know the issue is almost complete, I’ve even had a sneaky peak, but didn’t get a chance to read any of the stories. It’s being edited by proof-reader extraordinaire Samuel Diamond, who is one of those responsible for polishing the Morpheus Tales Supplement until it shines.

Ok, enough with this procrastination. I haven’t got time for it. One week. To write a story, edit and submit. I can do it. Or can I? Well, I should at least try. Otherwise I’ve already failed, haven’t I. Bring it on!

Guidelines can be found here:

http://www.morpheustales.com/guidelines.htm

Morpheus Tales: The Best Weird Fiction, Volume 2!

I know, I’ve been slacking on the reviews recently, but I have a good excuse! I’ve been reading Peter F. Hamilton’s Great North Road, an 1100 page epic SF novel. It’s taken me the last seven weeks to read, in which time I would normally read about seven books! It was huge, and mildly exhausting! I finally finished the book on Monday, and have managed to acquire a copy of Morpheus Tales: The Best Weird Fiction, Volume 2 for review, so that will be appearing shortly.

This is a limited (1000 copies) first edition, and features some of my favourite stories from the second year of Morpheus Tales Magazine, including stories by Ray Garton and Joe R. Lansdale.

The printed version of the book is available to buy now from lulu.com, and will soon be available on Amazon:

http://www.lulu.com/shop/adam-bradley-and-fred-venturini-and-joe-r-lansdale-and-ray-garton/morpheus-tales-the-best-weird-fiction-volume-2/paperback/product-20218078.html

The ebook versions are available from smash words:

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/175324?ref=morpheustales

The kindle version of the book is available on amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Morpheus-Tales-Fiction-Volume-ebook/dp/B008EDXWA0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1340734223&sr=8-1&keywords=morpheus+tales+volume+2

Go get yourself a copy right now, and we can compare notes when the review finally appears!

 

Morpheus Tales Christmas Horror Special Issue

The Morpheus Tales Christmas Horror Special Issue is out now!

Featuring some great Christmas themed fiction:

Merry Christmas By Wayne C. Rogers

Christmas Rising By James Gabriel

Santa’s Tenure By Alan Spencer

On Christmas Eve By Iain Paton

Shop ‘Til You Drop By A.D. Barker

Christmas Mourning By Greg Chapman

Last Of The True Believers By Mark Zirbel

Christmas Yet to Come By Jeff Suess

Ye Merry Gentlemen By John S. Barker

All of the Other Reindeer By Peter Rawlik

Happy Christmas By Stanley Riiks (That’s me!)

Mary’s Boy-Child By Wayne Simmons

Morpheus Tales Magazine is published quarterly in January, April, July and October. Because of the publishing schedule seasonal material is rarely used, but the first story in the collection inspired editor Adam Bradley (my brother from another mother) to publish this completely FREE magazine. Work started on the issue in December last year, opening to submissions shortly after until 1st of September.

The cover, by artist Gareth Partington (whose work has been featured on Morpheus Tales covers before), was originally a Christmas card.

I wrote four stories with the Christmas theme over the summer, finding it difficult to think of snow, fat men with beards, gingerbread biscuits, and presents, with the sun shining, the windows open and the heat wafting in along with the smells of barbecues. Christmas has always been a happy time in my family, despite the stresses and strains of the year, we come together to celebrate and spend time together until we get sick of each other (normally boxing day, 26th December!), so it was just as difficult to think of a nasty situation to pair up with Christmas. Horror comes in many forms, and the Christmas theme certain brought out a good range, including murder, zombies and lots more.

The magazine is completely free of charge to view, download and distribute. Send it to a fiend for Christmas!

You can read and view the Issuu version of the magazine or download it here:

http://issuu.com/morpheustales/docs/christmashorrorspecial

You can download a pdf copy here:

Click to access christmashorrorspecialissue.pdf

Enjoy, and Merry Christmas to all!

Zombies… Pressure/Opportunity…

I was recently asked to contribute to an anthology of original dark fiction. Great, you may say, but then I found out who else was going to be in this book. The list was hideously. It sent cold shivers down my spine and made me feel a little nauseous. Two of my favourite writers were on that list, and the rest were pretty damn good too.

Now don’t get me wrong, I enjoy writing and when things are going well I feel like I belong up there with Stephen King and Clive Barker. But when things are not going so well, I fear anyone will read the dross I come out with.

Massive opportunity. Massive amount of pressure.

I waited for inspiration to strike, I waited and waited as the deadline loomed closer. Slowly but surely the deadline crept up on me and inspiration failed.

Having been a bit rusty in the fiction-writing department, I had thrown out a couple of stories for practice and to try to get a bit of a rhythm going. Managed to knock together a couple of zombie stories, one, at 60,000 words, the longest  I’d written in years.  Editing that down to the 10,000 maximum was too daunting a task, so I thought I’d adapt an old idea I’d had lurking around for a little while.

A futuristic warrior lands on a zombie infested-planet…

The basic concept needed sorting out into a plot with characters…

With the deadline ever closer I had no choice but to start writing, my brain had no more time to let ideas percolate. If things worked out marvellous, if they didn’t… Well, I didn’t want to think about that!

The story was written, twelve thousand words later, weeks worth of writing and I was done. But the story hadn’t turned out how I’d wanted it to. The editing job it needed would be enormous. I could certainly polish it up into something respectable, but editing isn’t exactly my idea of fun and it would take a lot of work.

With the deadline just around the corner I had a decision to make, and virtually no time to make it.

A personal post-apocalyptic tale I had written before I knew about the book had turned out pretty well, I was happy with it, as happy as us sensitive creative types can be that is.  I put it forward to the editor, on the deadline. He snapped my hand off, gave me a nod of affirmation and later emailed me confirmation that the story would be included.

Now I sit and wait, hunched up and trembling with a mixture of excitement, anticipation and fear…

ODD AND THE FRONT GIANTS By Neil Gaiman – Reviewed

This short book was made available for World Book Day in 2008, and sold for a £1.00. Worth every penny.

It’s now being re-released.

Odd is a young Viking boy who runs away from home after another argument with his step-father, and sets off into the forest, only to find himself helping out a bear trapped when trying to get some honey. After Odd helps the bear he finds out that not only can the bear, and his companions the fox and the eagle, talk, but they are also Norse gods trapped in animal bodies by a Frost Giant. They ask Odd to help them out, and with nothing better to do the young boy sets off with them to enter Asgard to help them take their rightful place.

This is part myth part fairy-tale, it’s exactly the type of story that Gaiman seems to revel in. Familiar enough, but new and fresh enough to make us keep reading. You have to find out what happens to Odd and his friends, and you can’t help but enjoy the simple tale. Gaiman is a great story-telling, his created world is brilliantly portrayed, and his characters are pretty much as real as you can get.

Gaiman tells stories like no other, and his unique ability is perfectly showcased in this brief story.

CIMARRON ROSE By James Lee Burke – Reviewed

Lucas Smothers is arrested for murder, except he was unconscious at the time. He’s put in prison between two hardened criminals, both murderers, one of whom brags about how he killed an old woman, the other escapes killing a guard in the process.

Billy Bob Holland is a pain in the ass according to most of the people who know him, that’s what makes him a great lawyer, and when Vernon, Lucas’ father, asks him for help, Billy Bob can’t refuse. You see, Lucas is in all likelihood his own son.

Add into this a whole lot of Texas mess, a massive back-story, DEA, outback mob, rich kids gone bad, and shake in some other family dramas and you have a Southern American crime novel the likes of which you’ll be familiar with if you’d read any of Burke’s novels before. Burke has a unique voice that’s compelling, his stories are riveting and his characters have such a back-story it’s hard to believe he just thought them up.

American crime thrillers don’t get much better than this.

A Pint of Bloody Fiction – Featuring MY story!

A couple of months ago I hadn’t written anything for ages. A couple of months, I thought, but when I checked it turned out to be almost a year. When I saw a call for submissions of 200 words by House of Horror for their new anthology A Pint of Bloody Fiction, the urge was irresistible. I whipped up a 200 word story in half an hour, and then spending twice that long editing it!

I sent it in, and the acceptance wasn’t long coming. Why isn’t it always that simple? The grin on my face stayed for over a week; anyone who know what a miserably bugger I normally am can testify this is an extremely rare event.

So my story “The Blade Bites Deep” appears in the collection, alongside some other stuff by some other writers. (Who are actually pretty good too!)

This burst of confidence also unleashed a six week write-fest, where I wrote something every couple of days. About twelve stories were produced in that time, and now the inspiration seems to have taken a backseat I better get to editing and submitting the buggers before my own version of writers block (life in general, grrr!) starts getting in the way again. So wish me luck!

And go get yourself a copy of  A Pint of Bloody Fiction and tell them I sent you!

Within the pages of this book of nightmares you will find horror stories in small doses, just enough to quench your bloody thirst. From an insomniac vampire to a library filled with human skin bound books, this collection will take you on a wild ride of chills and thrills without you even having to leave your seat. With each story being no more than 200 words, this collection is only a fraction of what these writers can do. Forty-Two chilling tales from many talented authors, trust me you will not want to put this book down.

Available now from House of Horror, Lulu.com and coming soon to Amazon.

Morpheus Tales #9 Out Now!

Morpheus Tales #9 is out now! Featuring the top quality fiction and artwork you’ve come to expect from the UK’s hottest and most controversial genre fiction magazine!

Free preview below!

Plus the free Morpheus Tales Reviews Supplement is out now, including an exclusive interview with Joe R. Lansdale, columns by horror screenwriter Trevor Wright and our very own Voodoo Jim Lesniak offering his opinions on your personalised horror soundtrack!

View or download your free copy from our website:

www.morpheustales.com/reviews.htm