Terror Cell

by Tim Curran

For a hundred million years, the monstrous cell waited in the pit. Covered in tons of rock and earth, it waited for men to disentomb it. To bring it up into the world of the living. That time is now. It is awake and it is hungry. Humans are its prey, its pets, its toys to torment and break with fear. One man stands between it and its conquest of the world. If he fails, there will be no more human race. Only a global, insatiable evil without end.

Genres: Horror, Novella, Fiction

142 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 5, 2016

About the author

Tim Curran lives in Michigan and is the author of the novels Skin Medicine, Hive, Dead Sea, Resurrection, The Devil Next Door, and Biohazard, as well as the novella The Corpse King. His short stories have appeared in such magazines as City Slab, Flesh&Blood, Book of Dark Wisdom, and Inhuman, and anthologies such as Shivers IV, High Seas Cthulhu, and Vile Things.

For DarkFuse and its imprints, he has written the bestselling The Underdwelling, the Readers Choice-Nominated novella Fear Me, Puppet Graveyard as well as Long Black Coffin.

Find him on the web at: www.corpseking.com.

Reviews

[Karl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terror Cell Table Of Contents:

007 - Fly By Night (2009)
055 - Maggots (2009)
097 - When The Sea Runs Hot and Cold (2016)
137 - Der Wulf (2007)
175 -Terror Cell (2016)

"Terror Cell" is a nice representation if Tim Currans story telling ability. This is hardcore horror at it's best. Two of the stories tell of the horror of war time experiences, The first of the war stories is the second story in this collection and is titled "Maggots" and pertains to the French Campaign where they are fighting the Cossacks and the extreme conditions that were encountered in this particular war. Mr. Curran takes a unique approach to the theme of extreme hunger and lack of freedom of choice.

The second war related yarn concerns the German invasion of Russia and the characteristics of a family of werewolves that is encountered in this horrific conflict. thus the aptly titled "Der Wulf". The story certainly demonstrates that no one is a winner in war.

The collection begins with the story "Fly By Night", Mr. Curran's nod to the vampire mythology, and carving out his own territory.

The central story titled "When The Sea Runs Hot and Cold" tells of a doomed modern day fishing fleet and one ship in particular which manages to make a deadly catch, and the results this action has upon the fishermen.

Mr. Curran does not write that many short stories and thus it is a welcome treat to see this new crop of stories that he has created. So thus with the title story in this collection "Terror Cell", well, one really can't call it a short story as it's about half the book in length, even a bit long for a novella. The story is not what is expected. That's all I am going to say.

Kudos to Mr. Curran and Thunderstorm Books for bringing the reader this excellent collection. There is not a poor story in the book.

This book is number 14 of 52 copies printed, signed and numbered by Tim Curran.

[Kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

TERROR CELL, by Tim Curran is a collection of four short stories, and one, long novella. This book is number 16 in Thunderstorm Books' "White Lightning" line. While I love Curran's novels, he doesn't hold anything back in his short stories! Each and every tale was a unique tale of fear, madness, and gore aplenty. Two of the tales included here were written in 2016, and the others at an earlier date.

"Fly By Night" is the first story up, written in 2009. In this one, Donny Cerrone runs a pawn shop--at least, that's the job he'll admit to. When some of his hired muscle start turning up dead, with horrific mutilations and evidence of twisted tortures even he wouldn't have dreamed up, he decides to get to the root of the problem, to find out which "routine" job went wrong . . .
What do you do when you find that it was a "misunderstanding", and that the creative murderer has you next on the list?

"Maggots" was first written in 2009. This story takes place during the Napoleonic wars, and focuses on not so much the "killing" of the enemy, but of the simpler hardships, like hunger and fatigue, that can drive even the most hardened of soldiers down a path best not taken. A very vivid, and horrendous story that remains one of my favorites of Curran's short tales.

"When the Sea Runs Hot and Cold" was written in 2016. Alongside "Maggots", this was my favorite tale in the group. A story of fishermen out for their meager catch, this brings into play the Lovecraftian god of Dagon, and of other monstrosities never meant to see the light of the human world . . .

"Der Wulf" is another war tale, this one taking place in Russia, that was written in 2007. Curran's own take on the legendary werewolf, and how it could play out even amidst the most violent of wars.

"Terror Cell" was written in 2016. This story takes up more than half of the book, and I would classify it as a "long novella". A visceral and unique story that takes place in a small, seemingly uneventful town. This terror comes from an otherworldly source, and was not predictable at any point in my reading!

Overall, I think this book includes some great representations of Curran's shorter work. This author is never lacking for original ideas, and has the ability to take an "old horror", and turn it into something completely new with his words. A great collection for any horror fan.

Highly recommended!

[Chris Berko · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tim Curran is the best at what he does. This review is only for the story Terror Cell as that is the only story that came when purchased for my kindle but it is among his best. I love this guys writing because he does tension and suspense just as well as gore and killings. This is the 35th book I've read by Mr. Curran and I've come to trust him to deliver a solid story with every release. As with other Curran books this has that sense of going downhill out of control craziness to it along with awesome creatures and a whole bunch of different craziness with those buggers. A fun story that can be read in a day or two, highly recommended.

[Senf Dazu · Rating 2 out of 5]

Doppelroman, Teil 1/2
2.3/5 - lockflockiger Horror, leider belanglos ohne "Tiefe" (höhö, es geht um eine Grube, in der zu tief gebuddelt wurde).
Anfangs noch atmosphärisch wirds dann doch irgendwann zur Monster/Ekel Geschichte. Der Lovecraftsche Verweis ist nur anfangs da. Schade. War nicht mein, mal sehen wie teil2/2 "Mutter" wird.

[Sandra · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at 60%

Aller guten Dinge sind drei, sagt man ja :D und nach dem 3ten Buch von Curran weiß ich, dass die Horrorbücher einfach scheiße sind und somit nichts für mich.

Der Schreibstil ist schlecht, und noch schlechter übersetzt. Der vulgäre Ton ist mal weider so ultra vulgär und natürlich wieder NUR gegen Frauen, das ich die Augen rollen muss - weil God forbid, dass auch mal mit dem Rape-Horror-Aspekt gegenüber Kerlen gespielt werden würde, bcs. surprise, das würde vermutlich VIEL UNANGENEHMER FÜR MÄNNLICHE LESER SEIN BCS DUH.
Und ja, mich hat das plötzliche Pädophelie (gegenüber Mädchen) Thema nicht üebrrascht, dass die einzige Frau plötzlich Vergewaltigungsängste hat (surprise wieder nur sie) hat, auch nicht. Und auch nicht, das die plötzlich super horny geworden is ?????? aaaber ok.

Aber egal, ich weiß einfach, das Curran nichts für mich ist, fertig.

Oh und die Mine ist übrigens keine Mine, es ist ein Tagebau *schnaub*.

[Paulo "paper books only" · Rating 2 out of 5]

Tim Curran is one o my favorite horror writers. I've got 23 of his books, I missing 9 to complete all his publish books accordingly with fantasticfiction or wikipedia. Probably he has some more.
This one is a solo book published by Severed Press in 2018. One thing I can honestly say, a after reading 10 of his novels is that the latter books are worse than the older ones. all of my good ratings are books publish 2014 and before, only the Devil Next Door really stands in the last few years.

What is this novel about? Your guess is the same of mine. So you've got 3 police officers who are hailing a distress call in a mine and the eerie feeling starts just after a couple of pages. It made me read 70 pages in one go. I was really invested in Dew, Woody and Jerry. Then enter in chapter 7 Jay and Tanya - oh my god... the black chick and white (undercover supremacist) guy - basically you've got a black woman who his trying to get into his pants (not figurately (or is it)) trying to make him say he is a racist because he didn't enjoy Obama.

Let me say something - this argument is horrendous. If a guy is a idiot - he is a idiot - no matter his skin colour. So if I think a black guy is a idiot - I am not being racist - he is a idiot! oh well this back and forth about her and him was awful but he does something interesting here and I quote "Any time white people speak the truth they're racists and any time they stand up for their own cultural identity or take pride in who and what they are, minorities scream they are the KKK and nazis..." Pretty well said Tim Curran. I can applaud this.

So this isn't woke and maybe I have to step out from our nowadays events and this would be comic but Alas I cannot and therefore this is cringe to me..

Back to the review... in the story we go every chapter through a different character who is facing his worse fears (being that there is a real enemy down in the mines) and as we follow I expected more but nothing really happens and it ends in a chapter so rush that made me feel WTF? bah...

I cannot give this in good conscious higher than 4 - the Underdwelling is my least favourite and I have to say something: I believe Tim Curran writes better in longer fiction. Short fiction is hard to get people invested - unless you gonna go full scary or eerie ambience... I have more books from him and this hear I will read more.

[Jordan Anderson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Spooktober 2018 book 4

Though this book was only 140 or so pages, it still took me 6 days to finish...which seems a short time when you consider just what a chore it was to get through Terror Cell.

ITerror Cell was a huge disappointment because it was just so, I don’t know, “meh”. Nothing remotely important or interesting happens. The characters are bland. Their motivations and motives are one dimensional at best. The villain/evil entity felt unoriginal and a carbon copy of the same one from The Underdwelling. The violence and gore and descriptions felt literally no different from any of Curran’s other books and it got to a point that in trying to shock his audience, all Curran manages to do was bore them with yet another wordy description of the nauseatingly sweet stench of rotting flesh, etc. I know that technically Terror Cell is just one part of a larger collection that’s no longer in print and exceedingly difficult to find, so it’s possible a lot got lost between that and just a single story, but still, I have to say, basically the entire story just felt phoned in and bland.

And that’s a problem too because, generally speaking, I’m a fan of Tim Curran. I’ve read a lot of his stuff, and there’s been a definite lack of quality within the last few years, but I had the feeling that things were starting to look up, especially since my last Spooktober book, Monstrosity was also by Curran, and was a very good read and gave me hope Curran was out of his slump. Definitely not true here.

I still have hope that Curran will get back to well-written and original ideas. Hell, I just want him to publish an actual novel-length story. It’s been a long time and I’m thinking the novella and short story format isn’t giving him the time he needs to craft something that’ll blow me away in the same way that Resurrection and Biohazard did.

[M.A. Remy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let down

Warning contains spoilers: I love monster stories and thought the cover looked cool enough to give it a shot. But I was underwhelmed pretty much the whole way through. The monster is essentially pennywise from IT with absolutely no explanation for why it can do all kinds of crazy stuff like control time and apparently keep doors locked. I don't need a lot, but some kind of excuse, even a very flimsy one would have gone a long way. The characters are flat and don't really develop. The only female character in the book gets raped to death and there are some very clumsy racial politics. Really wanted to like this one but it just didn't connect.

[Oskar · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of five stories by Tim Curran, that's good news.From good to excellent, there is not
a single bad story in this book.Highlights for me are "Maggots" , "Der Wulf" and "Terror Cell".
A collection that deserves paperback and ebook editions to be enjoyed for far more readers.

[Marianne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like some horror and suspense, action and gore but this was just a bit much for me.

[victor geronemo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hold On To Your Hat!

Good old fashioned pants wetter. Don't read at night. Spooky, scary, and full of things that go bump in the night.

[Madeleine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nasty.

[AJRXII · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's ok, nothing original but hey what is 🤷‍♂️

[Thomas Hobbs · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was a tad confusing but I kinda understood it. A monster that kills you by using your own fear against you.