Publisher’s Description

Raw Dog Screaming Press resurrects
the multi-award winning novel
that made reader’s skin crawl
with ungodly scrawl two decades ago.

Grave Markings follows the tortured mental breakdown of Mark Michael Kilpatrick — an artist driven to purge visions of hell from his tainted mind by permanently working his ink into the skins of unwilling victims…the flesh of both the living and freshly dead.

News reporter Roy Roberts finds himself drawn into an obsession with tattoo culture, at the same time as Kilpatrick’s own compulsions produce sicker and sicker masterpieces that attract media attention, twisting in a spiral that inevitably brings Roberts and his loved ones into Kilpatrick’s morbidly perverse universe, and the artist’s deadly inkgun turns toward them….

And the ink keeps spreading.

Now, for the first time in trade paperback, readers can find out why this novel won the Bram Stoker Award, the International Horror Critics Guild Award, and such widespread acclaim across the horror genre. Included in this special Twentieth Anniversary edition are 50 pages of insightful BONUS material by Arnzen: a new preface, five literary essays, and four short stories (two never before published) involving bikers, tattoo and terror. And a secret link to more multimedia bonuses available online!

Praise

Winner of both the Bram Stoker Award and International Horror Critics Guild Award.

“TOP RECOMMENDATION. Grave Markings’ several surreal, eerie flashbacks — as well as the grim attack scenes — easily place it on a level much spookier than your regular cop-chases-psycho yarn… Arnzen’s well-paced prose keeps things interesting at every turn. Seek out and find Grave Markings; it’s a wild change of pace for serial-killer fans, and for horror fans who want to meet one unique villain.” — Nick Cato, Horror Fiction Review

“Grave Markings is a high-speed chase into madness, unpredictable and twisted as a mountain road, written by one of the most inventive and outrageous new talents in the horror genre.” — Karl Edward Wagner, Author

“A Horse’s Mouth from hell. A piercing look at art’s illegitimate underbelly. Michael Arnzen is an excellent writer, and Grave Markings is a uniquely disturbing debut. Arnzen has a big future ahead of him.” — Bentley Little, Author

“Michael Arnzen’s debut novel is garish, unsettling, and darkly beautiful — just like the artwork of its main character. Like that artwork, it makes a statement that simultaneously fascinates and repels. You want to turn away. You must turn away. But, oh God, you can’t. Arnzen’s definitely a writer to watch.” — Paul F. Olson, Author

“Michael Arnzen pulls the reader into the world of Grave Markings with a vivid, surreal hook, then makes it impossible to escape as the nightmares are unveiled. A great thriller.” — Sidney Williams, Author

“An authentically painful read, which conveys a real sense of a mind and a culture dangerously out of control.” — Ramsey Campbell, Author

Contents of the 20th Anniversary Edition

Preface: “My Tattoo” by Michael Arnzen

Grave Markings: The Novel

BONUS MATERIALS:

Arnzen’s Anthology of Articles:

  • “Permanent Ink: An Introduction to Grave Markings.” From the Tenth Anniversary Edition (Delirium Books, 2004).
  • “Art Can Kill.” Unpublished. Written for the Tales from the Abyss Newsletter (Dell Books, 1993).
  • “No Guts, No Gory.” The Iguana Informer (Oct 1994).
  • “Luck of the Draw.” The Genre Press Digest (Sept/Oct 1994).
  • “The Gargoyle on My Gables: On Winning the Bram Stoker Award.” Genre Writer’s News (Jan/Feb 1996).

Corky’s Collection of Tattoo Tales:

  • “Marked.” First published in Outlaw Biker’s Tattoo Revue (June 1991).
  • “Bald Tires.” Unpublished manuscript (1991).
  • “Copycats.” First published in Outlaw Biker’s Tattoo Revue (Feb 1992).
  • “The Living Tattoo.” Unpublished manuscript (1992).

Plus secret link to multimedia bonuses hidden online!

Excerpt

Here’s a chapter from Grave Markings in which a tattoo artist tells a tall tale to a newcomer to ink. This tale was originally published in Outlaw Biker Tattoo Revue magazine in 1991 and was reprinted in The Year’s Best Horror Stories Vol. XX (DAW Books, 1992). If for some reason you can’t open the window below visit scribd.com.

Excerpt from GRAVE MARKINGS by Michael Arnzen

Specs

GRAVE MARKINGS
20th Anniversary Edition
Trade Paperback and E-book, Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2014
305 pages. ISBN: 978-1-935738-69-5

+ Trade Paperback. List price $15.95 from Raw Dog Screaming Press.

+ E-book. List price $4.99 from from Amazon.com

PREVIOUS EDITIONS:

Paperback, Dell/Abyss Books, 1994
383 pages. ISBN: 0440213398. Out of Print

Hardcover: Tenth Anniversary Edition. Delirium Books Dark Essentials Series #2.2, Signed/Limited to 150 Copies. Delirium Books, 2004. 365 pages. Out of Print.

Tattoo. (German Edition)
Paperback, Bastei-Verlag, 1996.

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