BORDERLANDS (3) Three: Ghosts of Christmas Present; Sixth Sentinel; The Banshee;

by Thomas F. Monteleone, Elizabeth Monteleone

The stories we tell are not limited to monsters and harsh otherworlds. Yet the fiction books in the Borealis imprint certainly belong to a world other than our own. This line encompasses our science fiction, fantasy and horror novels and anthologies.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Anthologies, Fiction, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Dark

Paperback

First published December 12, 1991

Reviews

[Phillip Smith]

Great range of stories that show how hard the editor pushed for creativity amongst his authors.

[Sarah]

I liked most of the stories in this book. It's an old book, from 1994, that I've had for a long time that I finally got around to reading. I skipped the introductions to all the stories because I didn't find them interesting, but the stories themselves were mostly good. The first one was about a nun who was captured by an evil regime in a South American country. She is forced to sacrifice "to save a life" but there's a twist in the end. Another story was about a greedy wife who believes her husband dry as he turns out to be "made of money" hazing has a weird ending in "the brotherhood" by John Alfred Taylor. An exotic dancer encounters an evil monster in another story, and the vengeful ghost of a pirate manipulates a Goth girl in another. A mysterious fat man leads an office worker on a crime spree, and a mysterious man instructs a photographer to take photographs of disabled and deformed children. A man with a withered hand terrorizes two children and a migrant camp and a woman has a very strange dinner party with guests who will not live out the night. I man is haunted by the hair of his dead lover. In one of my favorite stories, a woman starts to go insane – but she has really "descended" from a higher dimension and is fighting those who want to see her commit suici. This was an interesting story because it took a while to figure out what was going on, several the stories have been like that. A twisted story of child abuse by a former premature baby who captivated the nation but grew up twistedand, another one of my favorites, and unholy church where writers worship at the altar and consume communion which jump starts their writing careers. A man confesses to a murder that he committed as a child in a dark tunnel. In another one of my favorite stories, I deformed boy, a freak, who must constantly eat returns to his parents. And in the final story, two characters struggle to survive the whims of a man who is writing them, struggling to have free will as the author dictates what they can and cannot do.

Overall, this is a good collection of stories

[Ryan Pidhayny]

The third volume of the Borderlands series is strongest of the three I’ve read so far. Not all the stories within were for me, but the ratio of good to okay stories was a lot higher than in previous entries. I feel that this volume best represents its goal of original dark fiction, and I was surprised by the number of well-done non-supernatural stories there were. The standouts were “Brazos de Dios” by Elizabeth Massie and “Baby Sue, We Love You!” by Marthayn Pelegrimas.

[Megan Hex]

Solid anthology. Nothing very outstanding or any real misses, just a good collection of creepy stories.

[Nikki Mason]

3.5 ⭐️

[Jo]

3.5- This was my favorite of the series so far. It was also the installation that had the most women represented as authors (though still a low percentage). Correlation or causation?

[Christopher Gadomski]

An incredible collection of weird horror. I'm so glad I bought this series back when I did.

[Christian Mallon]

Another excellent installment of Borderlands!!! Creepy, weird and so much fun!!!

[Daniel]

The third book in this anthology series. This one, I feel has the strangest set of stories in it. It is filled with just broken human tales, for lack of better words. From housewives plotting and party lining to eliminate neighbors they consider too weird, to a man literally made of money, this one is just off!
But it has the unique standing of taking normal stuff we read about or see in the news and exploit those human flaws and expound on them. After all, are we all not unique, many faceted and extremely flawed?

Danny

[John W. Dennehy]

Borderlands 3 does not disappoint. The stories are a cohesive collection of horror stories that present quality commercial fiction at its best: Andrew Vachss, Poppy Z. Brite, Bentley Little, Thomas Tessier, and Steve Rasnic Tem among others. My favorite is Midnight Grinding by Ronald Kelly. A southern yarn that's chilling to the bone.This book is a fast read and a study in the style of writing that helps develop the budding novelist.

[Jenn]

Most times when I read short stories there are ones I skip and ones I dislike. This was not the case for this book. Everything was great and some were even scary. Not bad for a book from 1994.

[Gina]

eh. not the best collection of stories. i liked the first Borderlands way better. there were a couple decent ones here, but for the most part, this was disappointing.

[Mara]

It's been years since I read it, but I do remember this: when White Wolf asks for stories for than anthology, nothing but insanity and strange awesomeness can be the result.

[Mark]

Another “weird” horror collection that does not take our mundane lives for granted.

[Hunchback Jack]

Another excellent collection of short stories in the series that tries to steer clear of the usual horror cliches. Again, some are better than others, but all are top notch. Highly recommended.

[Rógener Castilho]

Most of the stories are really good, two or three not so much but the rest makes up for it.

[Melissa]

The stories are creepy and awesome...but the editing is terrible (odd returns, weird punctuation).

[Charles]

definitely one of the stranger entries in the Borderlands series. But it's good.