B.P. Gregory's Blog: These Characters Aren't Terrified Enough

Haunted Houses, Haunted People, Haunted Space: These Are a Few of My Favourite Things...

It's finally happening: my Best Reads of 2021. The list is choc full of stories that will bend your mind and expand your horizons, something I think I really needed spending so much time in lockdown staring at the walls.

Quick note: these are books that I read and loved during 2021, not specifically things that were published in this year.


Best Reads of 2021


Scariest Read: Nothing But Blackened Teeth, by Cassandra Khaw

"Tradition insists the offerings be buried alive, able to breathe and bargain through the process, their funerary garments debased by shit, piss, and whatever other fluids we extrude on the cusp of death. I couldn't shake the idea of an eminently practical family, one that understood that bone won't rot where wood might, ordering their workers to stack girls like bricks. Arms here, legs there, a vein of skulls wefted into the manor's framing, insurance against a time when traditional architecture might fail."

Cat steps into a decaying ancient Japanese mansion, on a jaunt to celebrate her ghost-hunting friends' wedding. Except that since her bout of severe depression and hospitalization her companions both are and aren't her friends, their lives having closed smoothly over her absence like soil over a grave.

Khaw's beautiful writing ensures that the haunted mansion never takes a back seat to the dynamics of the group, instead it intertwines and holds them close and will never let them leave.



Weepiest Read: The God is Not Willing, by Steven Erikson

"'She's a madwoman!' Benger hissed, wiping at the sweat on his brow. 'She was going to cut my ear off! I'm the last serious healer left - did she think I wouldn't make her pay for that?'

'You should've just healed that finger along with all the rest,' Oams said.

Benger leaned close and whispered, 'But I did!'

Oams frowned. 'But you - she - oh, fuck.'

'I do it every time!' And Benger started laughing, shoulders jumping, face deepening its hue, mouth wide, eyes starting to stream tears.

'Fucking illusionists.'"

I seriously needed some kind of rehydration drink, I cried so hard after reading this. Laughed, too, but laughing doesn't ruin your electrolytes.

There's epic fantasy, you see, and then there's EPIC FANTASY. Erikson returns to the Malazan universe and fans will eat The God Is Not Willing up with a spoon just like I did.

If you've been wanting to get into Malazans but the sheer girth of The Malazan Book of the Fallen daunted instead of thrilled, in The God Is Not Willing Erikson delivers a leaner more refined tale still brimming with the humour, brutal reality, and tender humanism that defines the series.



Most Fun Read: Man, Fuck This House, by Brian Asman

"Michaela hefted the rock like a chest-passed basketball. The stone caught the Hal-thing in the face, snapping his head around.

He fell, face-first.

Into the mower's rapidly spinning blades.

CRRRRRRONCCCCH!!!!!!

The Hal-thing's body jumped and spasmed as the blades tore through his face. He flailed, pushed at the mower. One hand got caught in the blades, then-

CLUNK, CLUNK, CLUNK.

The mower stopped.

The air smelled like burning metal. If the Hal-thing were human, the lawn should by all rights be covered in a spray of blood and gore, lacerated flesh, splintery bone chips.

But no - the detritus spewed across the lawn looked more like wood shavings and powdered drywall than anything that might have come from a human body."

This was my first time reading Asman and I'm excited for more. So much about this story was unexpected as the ordinary family begin their ordinary lives in their new suburban home. The approach starts wry and judgmental before expanding into forgiveness of these messy difficult people, and ultimately being quite kind.

Don't get me wrong: there's more than enough horror and trauma along the way but it's your attachment to the dysfunctional Haskins family that really draws you in.





Shock and Awe: The Wingspan of Severed Hands, by Joe Koch/Joanna Koch

"Adira looked across dim Carcosa, revealed and reflected in her mother's dark eyes. In the landscape of Adira's future, there was no visible king. The yellow tatters that blew in the wind were the shredded labia of the murdered queen, putrescent with the stench of disease. They were the burned clumps of blonde hair billowing from her scalp, the ropey flags of vocal cords torn from her howling throat."

This was one of my Top 5 Halloween Reads this year, as Koch takes us on a wild ride through flesh and physics gone mad.

Magical realism meets tides of blood and bulging ripe flesh, beautifully written to layer the awe with the gore. While I admit that baroque language isn't for everyone, this novel brought a sublime beauty to its horror that's definitely not to be missed.




Best Vision of the Present: Negative Space, by B.R. Yeager

"He was the first guy who ever got me high. He asked me: 'Want to feel something amazing?' I nodded. He put his hands around my neck. I started to scream, and the world swam when he let go, like seeing it for the first time. Like a baby. And when the world turned normal, I asked him to do it again."

Also placing as one of my Top 5 Halloween Reads this year, Yeager challenges their audience: you'll need nimble reading to keep up with this skillfully interwoven narrative.

Youth, drugs, identity and reality melt together as a suicide epidemic turns a small town into a nightmare, with the potential to hatch something entirely new if you can just reach for it.



Best Vision of the Future: Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir

"'Consciousness detected,' the computer says. 'What's your name.'

'I still don't know that.'

'Incorrect. Attempt number two: What's your name?'

I'm Caucasian, I'm male, and I speak English. Let's play the odds. 'J - John?'

'Incorrect. Attempt number three: What's your name?'

I pull the IV out of my arm. 'Bite me.'

'Incorrect.' The robot arms reach for me. I roll off the bed, which is a mistake. The other tubes are still connected.

The butt tube comes right out. Doesn't even hurt. The still-inflated catheter yanks right out of my penis. And that does hurt. It's like peeing a golf ball."

Weir is back! I really enjoyed The Martian, but I have to confess Artemis didn't ring my bell so much (which is totally fine - not every book will suit every person).

But romping space adventure Project Hail Mary returns with the science, the fun, the science, the drama, did I mention the science which Weir excels at making dynamic and enjoyable for any reader, even if you don't think you're a "science-y" person.


And finally, drumroll please, my Best Read of 2021 was:


Best of 2021: There Is No Antimemetics Division, by qntm

"Kim paces the elevator. I don't remember what my face looks like. It said it had eaten all my secondary languages, but I don't remember learning anything other than English. so - It's eating my memories. It's consuming information. And I can't contact anybody directly, which means I'm on my own.

I'm not trained for this.

He hammers his head once against the elevator wall, and stares at his shoes. But I don't know that. What if I've been trained, but I don't remember my training anymore? What if I've been working here for years and I only think this is my first day? What if I've met this thing before? What if everybody on the site has met it multiple times ... and ... and nobody remembers? Is this what an antimeme is?

Kim remembers the near-empty cafeteria. And miles of totally unoccupied corridors and vacant office and lab space. Maybe it's not just eating my memories. Maybe it eats people whole, removes them completely from history. Maybe it's been haunting the site for years and that's why the site's so empty, because it's nearly finished exterminating us all?"

How to fight and fight and fight a losing war against an enemy that literally destroys any trace of its existence?

Many of you will be familiar with the SCP Foundation collaborative universe: a quiltwork of stories based on a Foundation that controls anomalous (i.e. dangerous/supernatural/hilarious) objects, most often told in the format of a written report about the object and how to manage it.

But if this is your first time and you like having your brain bent, There Is No Antimemetics Division is the perfect place to start. Because humanity is facing a deadly threat it can't even perceive. And the Antimemetics Division isn't about to give up.



Bonus Extra: Best Listens of 2021


My three favourite podcasts this year have been:

Janus Descending

Two scientists exploring a dangerous alien planet, their interwoven story told one forward in time from budding friendship, one backward from disaster and horror.


Parkdale Haunt

Claire inherits her family's creepy old cult building and brings her best friend Judith along for the ride to renovate it.


Tides
Dr Winifred Eurus was supposed to just explore the ocean planet Fons, not become stranded on it.



Wishing you a tremendously fun and safe time over the holidays, and I look forward to seeing you all back for incredible new stories in 2022

We've finally hit the spooky season!

Here are five of the best creepy stories I've read this year, to take you through October ...




5. Incarnate, Steve Stred

“Yes, it is certainly odd.

Odd that the book has no attributed author.

Odd that you're reading this while sitting in a car on the very property the Matthews house claims as its own.

Odd that you're still reading when you know damn well you've also fallen asleep and the thing that inhabited your wife is stealthily stalking towards your precious new station wagon ...”

Ryan, just turned thirteen, pleaded to stay at the shunned Matthews House over summer. He wanted something thrilling ...

Incarnate is the perfect spooky read for difficult times and already wracked emotions. Though plenty of terrible things happen Stred keeps the pace jumping by not lingering on trauma.

Not to give too much away but from a very traditional haunted house beginning Incarnate veers into unexpected and adventurous territory, and is just the tale to kick off Halloween.






4. The Wingspan of Severed Hands, Joanna Koch

“Dark, angry eyes, twin black suns sinking over lost, forbidden Carcosa. A skeleton hand reared like a banner of the king, ready to sting Adira's cheek, backside, flay her flesh to crimson strips. Lost lands and distant rivers in her mother's eyes; burning landscapes and desolate fields below broken obelisks. Nameless winds calling Adira.”

Angels and doubles, sentient weapons; the strictures of humble flesh and society gloriously slashed. Koch's rich evocative text is a feast as it spills off the page in this complex metaphysical tale, with a tip of the hat to Robert W Chambers.

Don't ask questions too early: rather, let the carmine tide carry you along and enjoy the ride toward immolation.






3. Dear Laura, Gemma Amor

“Confrontation was unavoidable, she supposed, a natural by-product of a missing child scenario, but that didn't make it any easier to deal with. Being the last person to see Bobby alive made quiet, uncommunicative young Laura a target for other people's frustration and grief. And Bobby's mother set her sights on that target early in the aftermath of her son's disappearance.”

Laura's best friend Bobby has gone missing, and every year she gets a letter that she can't ignore. Missives that keep her trapped in the neverending now of loss, unable to move forward. But they are also so much worse than that.

Amor pulls no punches in this story of power, victimization, and how far one might go for answers - in fact Dear Laura will knock you flat.

Dear Laura is so baldly and realistically written that it genuinely damaged my sense of safety for some time after reading so please approach this harrowing experience cautiously if you are vulnerable.





2. Negative Space, B.R. Yeager

“He told me he saw her. Perched over a lantern and an array of shimmering stones. Humming to herself. Her hands wet with red, dancing in the deep orange light. The way he described her, I could see her in my mind. Weeks later I was still seeing her in my dreams. It wasn't until I broke down in class, weeping crazy after five days of no sleep, that he finally admitted he'd made the whole thing up.”

The nuclear obsession of teen relationships, a suicide epidemic mediated online in the claustrophobia of a small town, and a new drug that promises much more than mere life has to offer. All told from interspersed perspectives, each of clarion clarity.

Don't expect spoon feeding from Yeager: you'll need to get your brain cells out to appreciate what Negative Space has to offer.

Although standard novel size, the scope of this story made it feel like a true epic. A jumble of threads which are drawn back together for a deeply satisfying conclusion.





1. Like Jagged Teeth, Betty Rocksteady

“There was a rhythmic ticking, so there had to be a clock here somewhere. Or was that the clicking of teeth? She could picture it all too well, her grandfather sitting behind those shadows, his thin frame crunched under a chair and his teeth in his hand, clicking and clicking rhythmically while his empty mouth smiled wide and she could practically see it and her breath came raspy and terrified and she could not sleep she would not ...”

Jacalyn's Poppa appears like a miracle to save her from a bad situation ... but from there reality stretches like rancid treacle running down a wall.

This is classic Rocksteady and if you've never tried her work before would make the perfect intro.

I chose it as my #1 Halloween read because it's lyrical, refreshing, immersive but not hopeless, with a horror that will really get under your skin.



That's it, my top 5 for this year! If you haven't read any of these yet I hope I've convinced you to take a chance on them and I really hope you enjoy them. Happy Halloween!

Welcome to the run up to Halloween, my jolly Spooks and Ghouls!

I have to confess that like a lot of you my reading hit a slow patch called 2020.

But fear not, the dark gods of literature have not withheld the sinews and splintered bones of their generosity. I have quite the mixed bag of treats here to get you into the Halloween spirit.

Read on for the best stories to take you through October ...



Best Halloween Reads of 2020!


#5: The Only Good Indians, by Stephen Graham Jones

"The whole backyard is shaking and loud and fast and dangerous, the kind of sensory trauma where Lewis is pretty sure that, if there were a sprinkler rainbowing a wall of water back and forth, that iridescent sheet of color would collapse, turn to mist.

It's the train that runs behind this neighborhood twice a day, what Peta calls the Thunderball Express. It's why her and Lewis can swing rent on a place with a ceiling this high. It's also why Harley can't be getting out of the backyard anymore.

Lewis looks up at the coal and graffiti smearing past, sees tomorrow's headline in his head: ONCE-LOCAL MAN CAN'T EVEN TOUCH HIS OWN DYING DOG."

Four American Indian men are pursued by a grisly event from their past, that might not have been as they remember.

I found The Only Good Indians to be genuinely unlike any other story I've read. The novel is many layered, moving through moods of mournfulness, guilt, and of course flashes of skin-crawling aberration that are nicely foreshadowed and not overused. In fact letting them stand alone and appalling is one of the story's great strengths, giving the reader time to recover from one aftershock, and time to dread the next.

I've seen authors fall into the trap of showing events from the "monster's" perspective, and by humanizing it they lose the tension. Stephen Graham Jones instead plays with the concepts of humanizing and othering, greatly emphasizing the horror as the tale builds to crescendo.




#4: Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef, by Cassandra Khaw

"Chinatown, Chee Cheong Kai, Petaling Street: all names for the rotted apple planted deep in Kuala Lumpur's eye. It is fecund with odours both nauseating and tantilizing, a duality of butter cream crabs and dried urine, fermented bean curd and roasting chestnuts, sewage and sweat and all the other fine accoutrements you can expect to find in a bloated tourist trap. There are a hundred reasons to part with your money here: roasted duck carcass, pirated DVDs with strategically comical sleeves, cheongsams like wisps of flame, and if you look carefully enough, mouths painted with conspiratorial promise."

Ok, let's switch tone for a bit. Not every story can be doom and scrabbling terror. Although given both its pantheon and descriptions lush enough to scrape off your tongue, tackling this first novel in Cassandra Khaw's Gods and Monsters series is definitely not for the squeamish.

Rupert is an indentured chef cooking lavish cannibal feasts for ghouls. He comes home at night to his beloved girlfriend, a blood drinking ghost. And now, to save his life and her soul he has to solve a murder.

Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef has shades of John Dies At The End (David Wong) and The Unnoticeables (Robert Brockway) in its combination of wry humour, large philosophical arcs and in your face gore, but it definitely blazes its own path. Halloween demands something this rollicking and fun to get into your costumes, candy, and cooking.

Plus I adore the 2015 edition cover art.






#3: Tide of Stone, by Kaaron Warren

"It smelled like a guinea pig's cage. They were lined up along the two walls, very little space between them, but enough walkway space that I wouldn't trip over their outstretched legs. They had no beds, no pillows. They sat on the floor, resting their backs against the wall.

There was a buzz; the prisoners murmuring, or perhaps simply breathing.

They were dried up, like shrunken heads, tongues protruding and slightly black. Nostrils broader than they should be. Eyes dull, opaque. Arseholes? I hoped not to see those."

Loving or hating it, the small town of Tempuston is centered around the Time-Ball Tower, where the worst criminals are secretly imprisoned and never allowed to die.

Craving the glory of those who've gone before her, Phillipa is readying herself to become the new Keeper of the tower. She thinks she's ready. But will all the time in the world be enough to uncover its secrets?

Given the themes of confinement this was an unusual novel to read while in COVID-19 lockdown (which in Melbourne, Australia has been dragging on for a rather long time). The horror of Tide of Stone is of a philosophical nature, to be chewed over. The rights and wrongs of punishment, blame, and mortification mentally debated.

Kaaron Warren has achieved something special with the book's structure. By allowing us to read the diary of past Keepers prior to following Phillipa into the tower, we feel that we ourselves are becoming Keepers and that we are privy to all their secrets. Of course nothing could be further from reality.

The structural repetition also marks the passage of time, the unrelenting nature of it, and prepares readers for the way truth refuses to be hidden away, that it continuously unfolds if you are just patient enough.




#2: We Need to Do Something, by Max Booth III

"Our phones won't stop screaming, each slightly out of synch with the other, making the noises jarring and insane.

We form a line and pile into the bathroom—Mom first, hugging a rolled-up blanket to her chest; followed by Bobby with a stack of board games nearly matching his height; then me, still soaked from the storm outside, walking on autopilot while jabbing my thumbs against the weather alert on my phone; and behind me, whiskey fresh on his breath, my dad. The only thing he's brought with him being his thermos. Nobody has to guess what's inside it."

Another confinement story for your delectation during COVID-19! This is a beautiful, taut dissection of a dysfunctional family as they find themselves trapped in their bathroom during a tornado.

Slightly supernatural and jarringly frightening in places—in fact one particular moment made me feel cold and sick and I had to stop reading for a bit. You'll know when you get there.

We Need To Do Something is the perfect combination of wild concepts and a grounded, unflinching but also compassionate look at human fears and failure.




#1: Everything Is Beautiful and Nothing Bad Can Ever Happen Here, by Michael Wehunt

"And it was there in the backyard that the sun finally bled out of that last Saturday, sinking into its pastels out toward the Smokies, treetops raking the last light from it. I walked across our quarter-acre. At the fence I brushed my fingers against the unstained cedar, still rough in some spots and wanting to give me splinters. I felt the compulsion of a commuter craning her neck to watch an accident out on the I-40, wanting in spite of myself to see where the blood had spilled."

Fontaine Falls is a perfect little American town. At least that is what most of the residents think, and they never imagine anything beyond that.

In fact, when a neighbour opens fire on a crowd of black demonstrators in the park, there are those who will do anything to avoid thinking any further than they must. Why can't things go back to normal?

Bea, teetering on the brink, does not want to know what the ghosts of this violence have to show her so very close to home. She will also find herself unable to look away.

Ok this is my number one. Everything Is Beautiful And Nothing Bad Can Ever Happen Here was mournful and scary in that gut-clenching existential way of 2020, and also compassionate and made me cry.

Michael Wehunt has written the story of an ambiguous and chilling haunting, caught in the tension of trying to decide what to do. Is knowing worse than ignorance? What IS normal, and for who?

This isn't just an interesting story or a well-written story. It is an important story, and I strongly recommend it for anybody who has ever wondered "why is this happening?" If you can you should also definitely get your hands on the Nightscape Press 2019 Charitable Chapbook Edition with its eerie illustrations.




Honorary Mention: Wyrd and Other Derelictions, by Adam LG Nevill


Adam LG Nevill's Halloween release of Wyrd And Other Derelictions gets an honourable mention because I'm very excited about it but my copy hasn't actually arrived yet, seeing as post from England to Australia needs to arrive via submarine or something I don't know how post works I'm not a post expert or an expert on oceans and how to drive through them.

Also just look at that divine cover artwork by Samuel Araya.



Hope you add as many of these great titles to your to-read list as you can, and wishing you a happy and safe October.

For more recommendations and great reads visit bpgregory.com

Are you a writer keeping a diary, casual or otherwise, during difficult times? Have you been thinking of it?

Then you might wish to join Senior Librarian Greg and I as we show off our lounge rooms in a zoom chat about library collections, famous diaries, and what they can tell us about historic moments (such as the one we're in right now).

Click here to view Collecting Conversations Episode 5: Diaries

Kendall Reviews has kindly given a home to my short parallel world murder mystery

Just like that, I figured out how I'd died. And my first reaction was hot fizzing excitement. That's how messed up this was.

Pulled into another dimension, a detective must wade through the devastation of her own murder to catch a killer.



Parallel, by BP Gregory

'Ben. Seriously, love. let me in.'

Bet your bottom dollar the neighbours were only pretending to sleep; holding their breath like naughty children in a game where I wasn’t freezing my tits off out here in the hall. The gothic titillation of being Ben’s dearly departed scratching for admittance in the (ahem) dead of night wasn’t lost on me. Rather keen to get inside before I ended up on someone’s Instagram, to be honest.

Identical spot-lit cream doors, identically locked, demanded vertigo as they marched off down the frigid corridor. My thoughts were too one-dimensional to cope with this. Any of it. Struggling to stay upright and cling to dignity a while longer I leaned my inflamed head on the tacky plastic wall.

‘They kept me in Immigration for six fucking hours, Ben. I’m tired.’

Six hours wasted because how was any sane person supposed to sit in one of those help-yourself-to-my-anus paper gowns through a slideshow on what (not) to do after getting yanked into a parallel world, one where the original you wound up cooling her heels at the morgue, and come out chortling, ‘Gee, that’s cleared that up!’

Six hours. Trickling away. Finally, and in line with my growing sarcasm, Immigration decided it’d be just as productive to dump me in the deep end. Which I applauded (sarcastically)—not supposing for a bare second I might grow gills, mind. I just wanted out.

Since we’re counting it’s been forty-nine excruciatingly unsolved hours since some poor cleaner stumbled upon, and vomited on, the murder victim. I’ll bet forensics hate that, but I could hardly blame Sir Dustalot. I suspect I’ll spend the rest of my own wretched life regretting so much as glancing at photos of the scene. There’s no way to un-see all a skin’s meant to wrap and protect oozing freely into what looked like an antique rug.

Except … in this weird unnatural place there’d been two murders. The boy, and me. Now I’d swear blind there’d only been one, just he, and we’d have irrefutable proof if smartphones could be shanghaied from their proper timeline along with people (nope: I arrived as naked as a flabby Terminator). ‘Here, there are two victims,’ Immigration told me and then coughed to lower their tone, still inappropriately gleeful at how clever they’d been getting me here.

So of course I bloody well hot-footed it home the moment they turned me loose. All this added up to the nine longest hours of my husband’s life. He’d had to stand in this exact same doorway and hear, ‘Sir, your wife’s been found. I’m afraid it’s bad news. I’m afraid it’s murder,’ from officers with basset hound eyes, fiddling with their caps as they discharged the worst part of their job.

Pressed to either side of this wall Ben and I were shackled to the same impossible hope. That the lost aren’t really gone, and it was all a horrible joke.

I banged my forehead in frustration, tap-tapping at Ben’s chamber door, and listened to the rapt peanut gallery of neighbours listening to me. The latch eventually rattled, thank fuck; my knees were crapping out. My spouse’s familiar features slowly peeked around the frame ...


Read the full story for free at kendallreviews.com

Murderbots, Murder Caves, Exotic Worlds: These Are a Few of My Favourite Things...


That's right, I'm calling it. My Best Reads of 2019. Quick note: these are stories that I read and loved during 2019, not specifically things that were published in 2019.


Best Reads of 2019!

Scariest Read: The Reddening, by Adam Nevill

"There have been many times in his life when regret nearly disabled him; when a terrible disbelief in his own impetuous actions cleared his mind of all thoughts save a realisation that there had always been other choices, other ways of doing things. He just rarely chose the more considered alternatives. These days he experienced the epiphany less, because he was getting older and took fewer risks, but he felt it again now and powerfully too: that mixture of defeat, near haplessness and self-loathing, tinged with nausea."

Something hideous is lingering in the cliffs of Brickburgh. Iterated over aeons, drawing the desperate to it, and now shackled to a new and modern depravity.

Piteousness and dread characterize The Reddening, as a variety of characters are torn from their everyday lives to face a new reality of ancient horror. The final reveal, as is characteristic of Nevill, is visceral and skin-peelingly glorious.

Bonus points in that he also has a habit of releasing exquisite limited editions of his novels and short story collections, and the cover artwork for The Reddening (by Samuel Araya) is incredible.


Weepiest Read: The Luminous Dead, by Caitlin Starling

"Then, her heart still racing, she turned off her reconstruction view and switched on her headlamp.

The cave looked remarkably similar. The difference between real sight and reconstruction was minimal, except that she'd lost some of her field of view and subtle pieces of information about her surroundings. The colours she could see - a dirty pale gray for the stone, with various iridescent whorls of inclusions, and the surround, oppressive dark - those were different. But the lines were the same. The features, the same. Nothing had changed.

Except for the body at her feet."

Cavers on this dangerous planet need to be the best of the best. Not a desperate dilettante lying her way into the job. But Gyre Price has her own reasons for descending into the underworld.

This novel was sheer immersive tension all the way through. The world building was enthralling, and the intense relationships that develop in the isolated dark not only between Gyre and her handler, but between Gyre and all the cavers lost before her left me emotionally wrung out.


Most Fun Read: Murderbot Diaries, by Martha Wells

"I yelled, 'No!' which I'm not supposed to do; I'm always supposed to speak respectfully to the clients, even when they're about to accidentally commit suicide. HubSystem could log it and it could trigger punishment through the governor module. If it wasn't hacked.

Fortunately, the rest of the humans yelled 'No!' at the same time, and Pin-Lee added, 'For fuck's sake, Ratthi!'

Ratthi said, 'Oh, no time, of course. I'm sorry!' and hit the quick-close sequence on the hatch.

So we didn't lose our ramp when the hostile came up under it, big mouth full of teeth or cilia or whatever chewing right through the ground. There was a great view of it on the hopper's cameras, which its systems helpfully sent straight to everybody's feed. The humans screamed."

It took me far too long to try this series (I’m ashamed to say I thought the title was kitsch, and now I’ve learned a valuable lesson about not being snobby). I loved Murderbot. Immediately and unashamedly. And I devoured every book.

This series is a masterful imagining of what being an artificial construct would be like living indentured in a human’s universe, and is incredibly funny. I'm not exaggerating when I say I enjoyed this the way I enjoyed the Belgariad the first time I read it, or the Obernewtyn Chronicles, or Tamora Pierce's The Immortals.


Shock and Awe: Starvation Heights: A True Story of Murder and Malice in the Woods of the Pacific Northwest, by Gregg Olsen

"Neither sister, of course, knew what had been told to the other. One afternoon, when the house seemed so very quiet, Dora pushed herself onto the fir-planked floor and crawled to her sister's bedside.

'Claire! Can you hear me?'

The skeleton stirred. Dora gasped at the sight. Her sister looked dreadful.

'Dora! You mustn't!'' Claire's eyes were wild, full of disgust and fear. She pushed at her sister's hand. 'You did not have to come. You mustn't come!'

Dora wanted to cry, but she was unable to conjure the strength for such an emotion. She doubted whether she had tears within her eyes.

'I want to be with you, dearie.'

'Go! Please, now!'

Dora complied. Like a yellow potato drawn across a stone, the skin on her knees rubbed off as she crawled back to her bed."

The story of the victims of Linda Hazzard, the Starvation “Doctor”, literally left me buzzing with outrage.

This is a fascinating examination of how social pressures exerted over time can be used to utterly control people, and how difficult it can be to stop the evil and greedy who hide under the cloak of “good standing”.


Best Vision of the Future: It's a Tie Between Escapology, by Ren Warom; and Rosewater, by Tade Thompson

"Stuck on a sidewalk swarming with meat suits, Shock stalks the edge for a safe place to cross a freeway locked into insanity mode. He's about ready to commit genocide. Mothball pockets require austerity measures, cheap-ass Slip shops are in Hanju, his home district, a place he expends considerable energy avoiding. To top it all off, he has to run this one unmedicated. Too risky otherwise. Dandy, just freaking dandy."

In the tradition of Neuromancer, only harder, sharper and faster: Shock Pao is the best in the virtual world, and an exploited loser in the unwelcome real. Caught in the coils of a conspiracy, he’s about to discover there’s a lot he doesn’t understand about either mode of existence.

Ren Warom’s playful and skilful use of language was a joy to read. This is a novel where you need to concentrate to keep up, and I loved every minute of it. My full review of Escapology is here if you’d like to know more.

"Suit man looks towards me. His head is abnormally long, and one of his eyeballs is missing, the empty socket gaping like a toothless second mouth. The head is also flattened in a way that accounts for the length, looking like it has been incompletely crushed. The nose is twisted as if the bottom half of his face wants to go one way while the top chooses the other. His left ear hangs by a thin thread of human tissue. Yet with all this there is no bleeding and he is not in obvious pain.

He is three, four feet way, and he charges toward me. When the dome brings a body back to life, sometimes it simply drools. And sometimes, like this guy, it wakes up angry. Scientists haven't worked out what makes them go one way or the other."

The chaotic town of Rosewater grew up around a mysterious alien dome. Most come because they’re desperate for a taste of the dome’s healing powers, or to make money off those who are, but not Kaaro. A government agent, Kaaro is one of the very few who have seen inside the dome … and he’s not keen to do so again.

Rosewater was instantly, compellingly immersive. A complex novel with a detailed cast, solidly grounded in its sense of place and history even as all else changes.


And finally, drumroll please, my Best Read of 2019 was:


Best of 2019: Girl Like a Bomb, by Autumn Christian

"Maybe if having to take care of a newborn and being confined back in my old childhood home hadn't made my brain so mushy, I wouldn't have ignored the blaring warning signs leading up to that point. But I wasn't thinking of how far I was from safety, how coolly he delivered each line as if he'd rehearsed it, how he seemed to insinuate himself into my presence like a too-convenient ghost.

I was, as you might say, only thinking with my clitoris."

In short this novel was a bold, compassionate and refreshing take on social identity and purpose. Full review here.

Young Beverly Sykes discovers, upon losing her virginity, that she can literally change people through sex. What else would a woman do but set out to change the world?


Hope you add as many of these great titles to your to-read list as you can handle, and that they set your brain on fire as intensely as they did mine.

Also wishing you a very happy and safe time over the holiday period, and all the best reads in 2020!

Free ebook - it's a treat!

October** only, visit Smashwords and enter code WH88D for a free terrifying stroll in the woods with Our Lady of the Trampled Beast.



Enjoy a free sneak preview:

"Our Lady of the Trampled Beast

Four live-long days of tramping scrag brush, getting scratched to hell like I'd tripped into a bushel of cats, an d I won't lie. All this hypnotic waving green had somehow along the way switched from idyllic to downright spooky. Whether it'd be mysterious and ooky remained to be seen. The signs weren't good.

I paused on trembling calves that felt like sticks had been rammed in. Ostensibly tugging my shirt to let sweat dry; actually, trying to get my head around another night in this sloppy organic purgatory.

When considered from high rise safety the jaunt had seemed a golden opportunity. Just land this one outdoorsy trick, and all those hunched meaty backs between me and the corporate horizon would become leapable.

Given ninety-six hours' worth of heel blisters spelling "ouch" in braille, and counting, I was willing to concede I'd been slightly too starved for promotion.

Garry and Jackson, my knights in white satin, chose that stupendously unhelpful moment to start in. We're lost, aren't we. Lost! Lost in these fucking trees!

Nanny state here rolled my eyes, although they weren't wrong. "Fucking trees" scarcely did these behemoths justice. More like the legs of scaly fossilized dinosaurs looming silently all around us. They had a repulsive muscularity, as though they might shift any moment. Resume a march aeons in the making.

Even the modest specimens were too broad for my trio to stretch our arms around. We tried, back on day one. When we still had energy for pissing about. I thought it would make a nice promo shot, the corporate logos on our windbreakers crisp and clear.

Ended up reeling, and frantically brushing to dislodge pissed off ants riding shards of diseased bark down our fronts like little surfboards. The photograph perfectly froze our moment of horrified revulsion as the first volcanic stings hit.

Muggins here even received a touch of good Old Mother Nature in her mouth the moment she opened wide to swear, because of course I fucking did. A jabbing finger of fuzzy rot that sent bile foaming past my molars. Sole consolation was that Gary copped it, too, his yap trading twenty-four seven. 'There's your promo,' he gagged and spat.

Come evening I lay like a limp rag tangled in my sleeping bag's fetid embrace. My clammy skin knew more than I did, flickering like a mule's rump. Paranoia prodded dentition and swore it could still feel some tacky tree residue, in defiance of a whole tube of toothpaste.

I squirmed uncomfortably. Wood blight scratching at my gut ..."

A big thank you to Bo Chappell for putting the idea to write a Wendigo story into my head, and for being so supportive. Happy Halloween!

** as I understand it, October is tomo for some of you weirdos with your weird time zones - the free ebook is available now

Damien Seaman has been busy constructing the ultimate blog on the hows, whys and wheres of writing, and he invited me in to discuss complicity, privilege, wild dynamic pantsing, and small moments of joy.


How this Australian author turned "thanks but no thanks" into an invitation to publish her own work...

It's a simple tale. A common one, too.

A young woman, full of talent, drive and ambition.

She writes. Wants to get published the old-fashioned way ...

So she sends manuscripts off to publishers.

She builds up a stack of rejections, only to see a pattern:

Thankyou for your submission, enjoyed the read, just can't see a market for it.

So ... encouraging?

But disheartening.

Also kinda inspiring. At least for this particular young woman:

"It got me thinking," BP says. "Traditional publishers face a lot of risk versus reward. This creates an artificial selection on what stories get offered to the market. Readers end up only being offered what the publisher thinks they'll like."

She wanted to offer readers like her the kind of stories that she likes.

So, having written them already, publishing them herself - without the risks publishers face - seemed like a no-brainer.

So, read on for more lessons from the Aussie Whirlwind, including:

* The pros and cons of self-publishing

* The benefits of her marketing experience so far - and her number one tip for promoting yourself as a writer (also why it's also "the simplest and most enjoyable" technique)

* Which elements of the writing craft all writers must master ...



Why did you decide to become a published writer? What motivated you to take the leap?

I think it was after sitting down and honestly asking myself, "What are you afraid of?"

After all, if I write a story and somebody doesn't like it, neither of us are going to die. Worst case scenario is we'd both be mildly disappointed, and then move on with our lives.

Also I'm an extremely clumsy person. If I'm not scared by the occasional pratfall in real life, why should professionally be any different?


Why did you decide to self-publish your fiction rather than go a more traditional route?

When I was younger I amassed a file of rejection letters from publishers. They all ran roughly to the same tune: thankyou for your submission, enjoyed the read, just can't see a market for it.

It was great for them to take the time to write a real letter rather than mail-merging my ass, but it got me thinking. Traditional publishers face a lot of risk versus reward.

That creates an artificial selection on what stories get offered to the market.

Readers end up only being offered what the publisher thinks they'll like.

This might be fine and efficient for those who only read one or two books a year; but I'm getting through a hundred, and it truncates my chances of making discoveries.

Weird and unusual stories that weren't commercial successes (at least not yet) have genuinely thrilled and changed me as a person. I certainly fee there's plenty of room on the field for traditional publishing, and the irregulars.


What kind of success have you had so far and what does success mean to you with your writing?

Well, I've completed stories. That's pretty successful. Some people have read them and left reviews, and that's amazing.

To date I'm still inching toward my first cumulative thousand in revenue, so in financial terms most accountants wouldn't give me the time of day - but every time somebody chooses to buy one of my books I die a little of joy inside.

Those couple of dollars will buy a coffee. They directly contribute to my happiness and wellbeing.


What are the pros and cons of indie publishing, as you see them?

I'm not going to pretend indie is the shiny be-all. It's a lot of unpaid administrative work. I find it a lot, and I'm a professional administrator.

On the up side, you get back the value that you put into it. Also your opportunity to do more, and do better, is constantly evolving.

Real time sales data is nice, too. It allows better targeting of marketing and promotions, you can see what's effective.


Do you think there's anything in your work that is distinctly Australian or clearly influenced by your having grown up there? If so, what?

Definitely the language. Australian English is a peculiar beast: birthed from UK English, but not shy about borrowing, and full of its own slang (furphy is a favourite of mine) and vowel-y rhythms.


Sci-fi novel Automatons is set in the hot, red Australian desert, and outback horror The Town in isolated rural Victoria.



White Picket is very much set in an Australian suburb, where residents struggle to reconcile their middle class privilege with the distant horrors pouring through the news every day.



Short horror The Elevator Story is actually based on a building where I used to work, here in Melbourne, where a coworker would regularly get stuck on their journey up to the twelfth floor.


As with lots of writers, you have a pretty interesting background. Corporate drone, archaeology student, psychology student, catwalk model, you've worked on film shoots ... you seem naturally restless. how does this come out in your writing, do you think?

Well, you never know when something's going to be useful.

A lot of my early life I felt like I was waiting for something to happen. Eventually I realized I was far better off trying random things, and building a bank of experience; rather than sighing out the window because the world hadn't swept me off my feet and shown my its secrets.

Also, I know a bunch of really interesting people. The opportunity to lend a hand on their projects crops up every now and again. Who WOULDN'T want to fly to New Zealand to film a half-naked barbarian, fling VFX blood at a zombie, or prance down a runway to see how it feels (terrifying, by the way) ...


Enjoy the full interview at damienseaman.com.

Damien Seaman has been busy constructing the ultimate blog on the hows, whys and wheres of writing, and he invited me in to discuss complicity, privilege, wild dynamic pantsing, and small moments of joy.


"Ponder your own complicity," says scifi author BP Gregory

"Sometimes I'm the asshole," she admits. Suggesting this could be why she has such a thing for writing unreliable narrators...


This B.P. Gregory writes disturbing fiction.

Hard to pin down?

Perhaps.

But that’s pretty much her ethos. Genre-defying. Creepy, horrorish sci-fi with an Australian twist.

This B P Gregory is from Australia, you see.

Which explains that latter point.

Her work is often about the evil inside of us.

All of us.

Yes, even you, madam.

No, you don’t have to read between the lines. Not at all. Ms Gregory is quite happy for you to take her entertaining work at face value if you prefer…

Yes, really.

Happy?

OK, good.

No, please don’t mention it.

This is part one of our sprawling interview, which covers why BP writes, what she writers, how she writes, and with whom she writes…

OK, spoiler alert, she writes with her husband.

As in, they don’t write stuff together. But while she writes he’s often in the same room working on something of his own.

Support is important – emotionally and financially.

Indeed, B P points to this as a huge advantage for her.

This is a good interview if you’re looking for tips on how to write when you have to work a day job.

When to write… how to keep motivated… and more besides.

Enjoy…


You’ve been self-publishing your fiction since 2012. How would you describe your work? What makes you stand out?

I’m aiming for the perfect storm of skin-crawling horror, wide-eyed science fiction, and fart jokes. I hope it’s the last that helps me stand out. Not irreverence for its own sake, but because it’s so human and relatable to giggle nervously when terrified.


Flora & Jim is one of your most recent novels. It’s quite the nightmarish vision of the future, very vivid. What inspired the story?

Studying archaeology leaves you with a tendency to view any city you’re standing in as transitory. What will it be like, you ask, when this is all over? And I’ve always wanted to write a post-apocalyptic story with the point of view flipped from hero to villain.

I love Cormac McCarthy’s The Road so much; but even when doing terrible things, the heart of McCarthy’s father is so unrelentingly good. Poor, struggling Jim grew from me turning that over in my mind. I didn’t feel such an unforgiving world would allow good people to exist.


You’ve said it’s the book you’ve always wanted to write. But for God’s sake, why? Its vision is so hideously depressing …

That’s the challenge, isn’t it? Asking a question like that opens up a whole can of worms: does a story need to be uplifting? What constitutes a story people would want to read? Who is this audience we’re imagining, when we write?

Personally I find that tragedy adds poignancy to my characters’ brief flashes of happiness. A sad ending doesn’t erase those moments: they existed, in a small protest against despair.

I hope that the comparison encourages readers to reflect on and treasure their own small moments of joy.


Who are your ideal readers?

I’d say people who don’t mind a bit of fun, but are also willing to stretch themselves. Not that there’s anything wrong with light reading!

In 2016 Laura Miller had this great article in Slate called In Praise of Reader Reviews on the equal validity of light and heavy readers (for convenience we’ll ignore that readers often move between the two states).

She warns against trying to sell the reader “… something he has no use for at a price he does not wish to pay.”



Who should steer clear of your work, and why?

I’d be the last person to gatekeep others’ access to content. That said, a co-worker once asked me if it’d be ok for their child to read Outermen and my immediate instinct was, “Oh my, no!”

In hindsight it’d probably be fine if you were willing to answer questions and discuss any content that made your kid uncomfortable. After all, I grew up on a steady diet of James Herbert and Jean M Auel and I turned out fine.


You seem to focus very much on character and on atmosphere in your work. Are these deliberate choices for you? How do you write scenes so that they become suspenseful and intriguing?

Very deliberate choices. I read Bronte a lot in school, and loved the way a character’s psychology would be imprinted on the landscape. I also enjoy Lynch’s ability to induce the protagonist’s distress in the viewer (as opposed to telling a traditionally linear story).

When putting a scene together I try to select language whose etymology contributes to the overall feel … when not busting out the puns, that is ...


Enjoy the full interview at damienseaman.com - part 2 of the interview coming soon!

When somebody says "seance", what do you imagine?

A genteel setting, commensurate with the rise of Spiritualism in the mid-nineteenth century?

Mustachioed gentlemen and women in high lace collars hold hands around a table, their apprehensive faces lit by a single flickering candle.

The medium speaks.

A few attendees begin to weep.

The table shakes.

The light goes out.


A cornerstone of both Spiritualism and the horror genre, a seance is a type of group ritual for contacting spirits of the deceased. The most commonly recognised type is the leader assisted seance, conducted by a person purporting special powers of communicating with spirits.

What I was off to wasn't strictly speaking a seance but Seance, an immersive art piece based around group fear, cultural superstition and suggestibility. It's the brainchild of Glen Neath, David Rosenberg and Andrea Salazar with Realscape Productions, who are delivering a series of terrifying experiences in Australia called DARKFIELD.

Held in the dark, claustrophobic confines of a shipping container, Seance's website specifically states:


WARNING: SÉANCE IS NOT SUITABLE FOR THOSE WHO ARE PREGNANT, CLAUSTROPHOBIC, UNDER THE AGE OF 15 OR SUFFER HEART OR BACK CONDITIONS.


How can I resist? I re-assembled my ghost hunting team ...

To enjoy our adventure, read the full blog post at bpgregory.com