Get out of here and go read my guest blog entry at the Horror Library Blog-o-Rama, called “Worlds of Horror.” (If you’re on myspace, go here instead, where the conversation is). I issue horror fans a challenge to read more international horror writers and break out of their “literary isolationism” — and I offer some titles to help you get started on a tour of scary world literature.
Here’s a very short excerpt:
Browse your bookshelves and your video racks. What percentage of these titles are all published and produced in the same country in which you live? How many of them are in the same language you speak? How many are created by people who are just like you?
Nothing wrong with that. It doesn’t make you a racist or a bad person. But you may be guilty of “literary isolationism” — and maybe it’s time for you to break out of your protective, predictable shell.
How aware are you about the horror coming out of countries foreign to you? Are you aware how freaking WEIRD that stuff is? How bizarre and scary? Horror is ALL ABOUT the foreign, alien, and altogether OTHER, and I bet that if you haven’t read a lot of “multicultural” horror, you haven’t really seen just how weird and different tales from foreign lands can be.
 |
All the folks at Horror Library — like Fran Friel, RJ Cavender, Boyd Harris — are all passionate and talented. You should buy their books. A new anthology — Horror Library III — is slated for publication soon… just look at this advanced peek at the table of contents for HL3: |
“The Station” by Bentley Little
“Guarded” by Michael A. Arnzen (my story is about airport security checkpoints…arrrgh!)
“The Apocalypse Ain’t So Bad” by Jeff Strand
“Under the Bridge Downtown” by Gary A. Braunbeck & Matthew Warner
“After” by Kealan Patrick Burke
“Masks and Shadows” by Cullen Bunn
“Consumed” by Michael Cavillo
“Ashes of the Dead” by Kurt Dinan
“Clover” by Gina Ranalli
“Being Supreme” by Mark Justice
“The Steel Church” by Charles Colyott
“Them” by Sunil Sadanand
“The River Child” by R. Michael Burns
“Obsidian Sea” by Kurt Kirchmeier
“The Rhythm Method” by Mikal Trimm
“When The Skies Toss Down Rains Heavy” by Eric Grizzle
“The Orange Mammoth” by Matt Bain
“Short Stacked” by Rodney J. Smith
“The Review” by Richard Moore
“Extra Innings” by John Peters
“The Birdie” Stephen Couch
“Toll” by Blu Gilliand
“Blink The Blood Away” by R.M. Ridley
“Teeth” by Alison Campbell-Wise
Not only is the cover art very disturbing, but this line-up sounds like quite a library to me (not just because some of my favorite writers are in there… the fact is, I’m already scared by some of those titles — what the hell is an Orange Mammoth, Mr. Bain? Why should I be blinking blood away, M. Ridley? How can the apocalypse not be so bad, Jeff Strand? Carumba, this is going to be a crazy read!)