3vil (volume 3): Volume 3

by Mike Miller

Monsters and ghosts, madness and murder, fear and suspense - this third volume in the 3VIL series features an all-new trilogy of original, spine-tingling horror stories which cover the entire spectrum of darkest evil: 1. A bickering couple drives together through a dark desert at night. When they enter the domain of a vicious monster, can they survive its carnage until morning? 2. An old man buys a dream. When the product is defective, is there a warranty to cover the nightmare? 3. A pair of defenseless children are trapped alone in the worst part of town. Can a young boy lead his baby sister to safety? Each story is crafted with punishing intensity and merciless brutality, and few readers will survive the experience unscathed.

138 pages, Paperback

Published April 3, 2015

About the author

Mike Miller lives in L.A. with his daughters and is a graduate of UC Berkeley and WGU. He has written numerous short stories, comics, screenplays and novels in all genres, such as "The Yeti," "Promoted," "Garrison Rex," and the "3VIL" series. He has also overseen the subtitling and translation for hundreds of films, video games and television shows like "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, "Seinfeld," "Madden," "Kung Fu Hustle," and "The Simpsons."

His favorite writers include Kurt Vonnegut, Philip K. Dick, David Mitchell, Matt Groening, the Coen Brothers, Ottessa Moshfegh, Billy Wilder, Dan Simmons and Stanley Kubrick.

Reviews

[Kurt Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is printed with white letters on black pages. It is one of the coolest tricks ever seen in print. A Google search finds nothing else like it. So this collection of short stories is historic – the first book with black pages. One might find that would be weird or hard to read, but it’s just like reading any other book. Except way more evil. Clicking over on this book’s "Look Inside" preview on Amazon, it appears that the eReader version does not pull this stunt off. So buy the print edition for maximum evil and to impress all of your evil friends. (I kid, but it’s a seriously neat effect.)

So beyond this wildly inventive gimmick, the stories themselves are all exceptional. All three have vastly different premises and styles: The first is more of a creature feature, the second a ghost story, and the third is an intense thriller. But the trio each have neat spins and twists which defy obvious classification into traditional horror subgenres. Between the three, they offer many different kinds of scares, from outright jump shocks to subtle, creeping dread. Amongst the entire series so far, I’d argue that the second entry here is the relative worst, but the third one is probably the best. There is an obvious effort to avoid redundancy amongst the stories, whereas many anthologies often have the same kind of story and writing repeated over and over.

Depending on your specific tastes, one story might be favored over the others. But all three are definitely quality tales of spooky suspense and vicious terror, perfectly sized for a quick, fun fright.

And did I mention it’s printed on these mind-blowing, super-cool black pages?!