Scenes from the Second Storey

by Gerard Brennan, Ian Whates, K.V. Taylor

Thirteen tales of murder, revenge, betrayal, obsession and desire - your usual fare? Well not when adding the fact that all these stories were inspired by The God Machine’s album of the same name, a concept queried by some before reading the first of these two themed

When I first became aware of the Scenes from the Second Storey anthology (from Morrigan Books), I was sceptical. I believed it would be simply another of those themed anthologies that was so bizarre and narrow in its vision that it possessed little value except as a novelty. How could it be anything else?

…Publisher Mark S. Deniz should be congratulated for bringing an obscure band back into the light. Since reading the anthology and listening to the songs, I've become fond of The God Machine's music, which is a cross pollination I'm sure Deniz was hoping to achieve.

Shane Jiraiya Cummings
Horrorscope review

Now comes the second instalment, following on from the Australian authors penning their wonderful versions of The God Machine’s classic tracks to a mix of international authors, commissioned by Morrigan Books to give their take of the songs. How similar are the two written versions to the album’s tracks? Do they capture the essence? You the reader can decide for yourselves!

264 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 10, 2011

About the author

Gerard Brennan's latest novel is Disorder, Published by No Alibis Press. His short stories have appeared in a number of anthologies; including three volumes of The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime and Belfast Noir. He co-edited Requiems for the Departed, a collection of crime fiction based on Irish myths which won the 2011 Spinetingler Award for best anthology. His novella, The Point, was published by Pulp Press in October 2011 and won the 2012 Spinetingler Award for best novella. His novels, Wee Rockets and Fireproof, were published as ebooks by Blasted Heath in 2012. He graduated from the MA in creative writing at Queen's University Belfast in 2012 and is currently working on a PhD.

Reviews

[KV Taylor]

I'm not saying I have favorite children. But if I DID, my story in this might be... one of them. Yeah. That.