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King David and the Spiders from Mars
A ghost haunts King David's family. Brothers devour their enemies and each other. A rabbi opens a Chabad House in a sinister New England town. In this book, you will find seven stories as demented and horrifying as the Bible that inspired them.
172 pages, Paperback
First published March 3, 2014
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130 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 19, 2014
What first grabbed my attention was the title, with its weird Bible meets David Bowie cross reference. Then the introduction explained that it was fantasy and horror based on the Book of Samuel from the Old Testament, and I couldn't put it down. Not all of the stories are brilliant, but they're all intriguing. From Jeff Chapman's Hamlet-esque take on the story of David and Bathsheba to the very intriguing idea that the Cthulhu stories really are about the same Dagon the Philistines worshipped, each tale takes a strange path through an old testament story from the time period of David, or a story inspired by those tales. One is a science-fictional reversal of the roles of deities. At least one or two were convoluted enough that I wanted to go back and read the sources, but unfortunately there is no specific cross-reference in the book. Too bad, as it might lead to some fascinating discussions.
August 20, 2014
Amazing and creepy Jewish stories and reimaginings of biblical narratives.
February 11, 2014
2014 freshly minted, the dry, crackling cold, reckons as a harbinger for Dybbuk Press’s latest brick of pages, King David and the Spiders from Mars.
“Stories are never fixed,” writes Sonya Taaffe in her short story, Moving Nameless, the collection’s first piece, and so rolls a second volume of stories drawn from, influenced by, or otherwise inspired from the biblical Scriptures.
The anthology is linked to the Bible, and while the individual pieces might not inspire you to return to what may be the greatest works of all time, conceptually (here is the publisher’s presence) these stories, as an idea, will draw you into wanting to read them. How does the Biblicality arrive? Where does it draw you, take you, in the quiet of your mind, reading? You’ll have to buy the book to know how Tim Lieder’s Dybbuk Press manages this relationship between Genre writing and the Bible, but it does.
A good portion of the stories unravel nicely on the violence inhabiting Biblical works. Romie Stott opens his tale with description of how the body ends it’s existence at a stake burning. It is a purposeful, if not pleasant foreshadowing as he riffs on the trials of Daniel and his brothers at the court of Nebuchadnezzar.
Taaffe’s Moving Nameless brings to life the second wife of Adam the First, a lost personality, without a name, whose construct before Adam’s very eyes made her an abomination, repulsed him. She arrived after the wily Lilith, and before the womanly Eve. She has found her Adam, the woman knowing, the man feeling, until their kiss announces the disintegration of her form, from the unified whole perceived as human, into parts, pieces, the tiles of a mosaic, whose beautiful form is lost in the analysis. But, as she walks away, we note that in the end, these little details plant the seeds of sentiment, of the long desire for returning to that place, long ago dissected through the erosion of time, lost to the hand and held still, in the heart.
The author, Alter Reiss affects a Biblical timbre and recounts the death, birth and future demise of Kingdoms through a kind of prophetic flair, coupled with magical renderings of apocalyptic visions.
The nouveau gothic New England hauntings of Marsha Morman’s, Chabad of Innsmouth, takes only a seed and generates a new planting from old branches. In, Chabad of Innsmouth, the shimmering gold jewelry of mysterious origin and near priceless scarcity would seem to have been crafted from the Ark of the Covenant’s precious element. In the story’s present tense, the alloy is linked with a submerged terror, a deity and androgynous ancestor to a cursed and inhuman population.
The authors neither confront the bible or tenderly avoid upsetting it. Rather, the pieces are built on the ancient scriptures, imagined anew, paint by numbers with no lines or digits. Classic Jazz riffing over standards and vamps.
“Stories are never fixed,” writes Sonya Taaffe in her short story, Moving Nameless, the collection’s first piece, and so rolls a second volume of stories drawn from, influenced by, or otherwise inspired from the biblical Scriptures.
The anthology is linked to the Bible, and while the individual pieces might not inspire you to return to what may be the greatest works of all time, conceptually (here is the publisher’s presence) these stories, as an idea, will draw you into wanting to read them. How does the Biblicality arrive? Where does it draw you, take you, in the quiet of your mind, reading? You’ll have to buy the book to know how Tim Lieder’s Dybbuk Press manages this relationship between Genre writing and the Bible, but it does.
A good portion of the stories unravel nicely on the violence inhabiting Biblical works. Romie Stott opens his tale with description of how the body ends it’s existence at a stake burning. It is a purposeful, if not pleasant foreshadowing as he riffs on the trials of Daniel and his brothers at the court of Nebuchadnezzar.
Taaffe’s Moving Nameless brings to life the second wife of Adam the First, a lost personality, without a name, whose construct before Adam’s very eyes made her an abomination, repulsed him. She arrived after the wily Lilith, and before the womanly Eve. She has found her Adam, the woman knowing, the man feeling, until their kiss announces the disintegration of her form, from the unified whole perceived as human, into parts, pieces, the tiles of a mosaic, whose beautiful form is lost in the analysis. But, as she walks away, we note that in the end, these little details plant the seeds of sentiment, of the long desire for returning to that place, long ago dissected through the erosion of time, lost to the hand and held still, in the heart.
The author, Alter Reiss affects a Biblical timbre and recounts the death, birth and future demise of Kingdoms through a kind of prophetic flair, coupled with magical renderings of apocalyptic visions.
The nouveau gothic New England hauntings of Marsha Morman’s, Chabad of Innsmouth, takes only a seed and generates a new planting from old branches. In, Chabad of Innsmouth, the shimmering gold jewelry of mysterious origin and near priceless scarcity would seem to have been crafted from the Ark of the Covenant’s precious element. In the story’s present tense, the alloy is linked with a submerged terror, a deity and androgynous ancestor to a cursed and inhuman population.
The authors neither confront the bible or tenderly avoid upsetting it. Rather, the pieces are built on the ancient scriptures, imagined anew, paint by numbers with no lines or digits. Classic Jazz riffing over standards and vamps.
December 29, 2016
Interesting and amusing
I greatly enjoyed this take on tanach and torah stories and recommend it to all the yeshiva students who would be willing to see things from a slightly. Different perspective
I greatly enjoyed this take on tanach and torah stories and recommend it to all the yeshiva students who would be willing to see things from a slightly. Different perspective
February 25, 2014
A great read.
July 23, 2016
**Received from Goodreads First Reads giveaway.
I was immediately intrigued by the title – biblical stories and David Bowie? This collection of seven stories actually has nothing to do with Bowie, but they are related to stories from the Book of Samuel in the Bible, or the Torah, depending on your perspective. Some stories are based in biblical times, some are contemporary, and some are a combination of the two. I admit that I am not very familiar with most of the original stories, but these are fascinating takes on these ancient tales. Reading the stories in King David and the Spiders from Mars has brought about a desire to read the source material. I’ll need to dig out the Bible and see what was originally written.
This book is recommended for the open-minded and the curious. Not for the faint of heart, however. It was an interesting, quick read.
I was immediately intrigued by the title – biblical stories and David Bowie? This collection of seven stories actually has nothing to do with Bowie, but they are related to stories from the Book of Samuel in the Bible, or the Torah, depending on your perspective. Some stories are based in biblical times, some are contemporary, and some are a combination of the two. I admit that I am not very familiar with most of the original stories, but these are fascinating takes on these ancient tales. Reading the stories in King David and the Spiders from Mars has brought about a desire to read the source material. I’ll need to dig out the Bible and see what was originally written.
This book is recommended for the open-minded and the curious. Not for the faint of heart, however. It was an interesting, quick read.
January 11, 2024
Loved the unique theme of this collection and greatly enjoyed some of the stories.
Three Young Men - I know the story and found this to be a fascinating retelling of the story.
The Chronicles of Aliyat, Son of Aliyat, from the chronicles of the Kings of Ashdod - enjoyed the authors use of more “Biblical” prose to tell a classic Lovecraftian horror tale
Good King David - an interesting and grim retelling of a grim biblical story
God Box - loved this story. The heart of cosmic horror is often that moment of shocking realization, when characters are faced with the idea that the world is vast and unknowable and things they rely upon as true are false or insignificant. In this story, I thought it was very clever how the author retold the Biblical story and revealed the horror that must have been felt by the Philistines as they found their beliefs swept aside. A clever approach to the story, well done, and very ominous.
The Chabad of Innsmouth - I enjoyed how this author mixed the setting of Innsmouth with modern times and religious themes to tell a classic Lovecraftian story ark. I enjoyed the portrayal of our main character as a rabbi who, even in the face of the unknowable madness of Devil’s Reef chose to hold to his faith and face the horrors of bravely…
Three Young Men - I know the story and found this to be a fascinating retelling of the story.
The Chronicles of Aliyat, Son of Aliyat, from the chronicles of the Kings of Ashdod - enjoyed the authors use of more “Biblical” prose to tell a classic Lovecraftian horror tale
Good King David - an interesting and grim retelling of a grim biblical story
God Box - loved this story. The heart of cosmic horror is often that moment of shocking realization, when characters are faced with the idea that the world is vast and unknowable and things they rely upon as true are false or insignificant. In this story, I thought it was very clever how the author retold the Biblical story and revealed the horror that must have been felt by the Philistines as they found their beliefs swept aside. A clever approach to the story, well done, and very ominous.
The Chabad of Innsmouth - I enjoyed how this author mixed the setting of Innsmouth with modern times and religious themes to tell a classic Lovecraftian story ark. I enjoyed the portrayal of our main character as a rabbi who, even in the face of the unknowable madness of Devil’s Reef chose to hold to his faith and face the horrors of bravely…
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews