The Best Horror of the Year

by Ellen Datlow

An elderly man aggressively defends his private domain against all comers?including his daughter;a policeman investigates an impossible horror show of a crime; a father witnesses one of the worst things a parent can imagine; the abuse of one child fuels another’s yearning; an Iraqi war veteran seeks a fellow soldier in his hometown but finds more than she bargains for . . .

The Best Horror of the Year showcases the previous year’s best offerings in short fiction horror. This edition includes award-winning and critically acclaimed authors Adam L. G. Nevill, Livia Llewellyn, Peter Straub, Gemma Files, Brian Hodge, and more.

For more than three decades, award-winning editor and anthologist Ellen Datlow has had her finger on the pulse of the latest and most terrifying in horror writing. Night Shade Books is proud to present the ninth volume in this annual series, a new collection of stories to keep you up at night.

Table of Contents: Summation 2016 - Ellen Datlow Nesters -- Siobhan Carroll The Oestridae -- Robert Levy The Process is a Process All its Own -- Peter Straub The Bad Hour -- Christopher Golden Red Rabbit -- Steve Rasnic Tem It's All the Same Road in the End -- Brian Hodge Fury -- DB Waters Grave Goods -- Gemma Files Between Dry Ribs -- Gregory Norman Bossert The Days of Our Lives -- Adam LG Nevill House of Wonders -- C.E. Ward The Numbers -- Christopher Burns Bright Crown of Joy -- Livia Llewellyn The Beautiful Thing We Will Become -- Kristi DeMeester Wish You Were Here -- Nadia Bulkin Ragman -- Rebecca Lloyd What’s Out There? -- Gary McMahon No Matter Which Way We Turned -- Brian Evenson The Castellmarch Man -- Ray Cluley The Ice Beneath Us -- Steve Duffy On These Blackened Shores of Time -- Brian Hodge Honorable Mentions

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Anthologies, Fiction, Audiobook, Collections, Short Story Collection

442 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 20, 2017

About the author

Ellen Datlow has been editing science fiction, fantasy, and horror short fiction for forty years as fiction editor of OMNI Magazine and editor of Event Horizon and SCIFICTION. She currently acquires short stories and novellas for Tor.com. In addition, she has edited about one hundred science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies, including the annual The Best Horror of the Year series, The Doll Collection, Mad Hatters and March Hares, The Devil and the Deep: Horror Stories of the Sea, Echoes: The Saga Anthology of Ghost Stories, Edited By, and Final Cuts: New Tales of Hollywood Horror and Other Spectacles.
She's won multiple World Fantasy Awards, Locus Awards, Hugo Awards, Bram Stoker Awards, International Horror Guild Awards, Shirley Jackson Awards, and the 2012 Il Posto Nero Black Spot Award for Excellence as Best Foreign Editor. Datlow was named recipient of the 2007 Karl Edward Wagner Award, given at the British Fantasy Convention for "outstanding contribution to the genre," was honored with the Life Achievement Award by the Horror Writers Association, in acknowledgment of superior achievement over an entire career, and honored with the World Fantasy Life Achievement Award at the 2014 World Fantasy Convention.

Reviews

[Adam Nevill · Rating 5 out of 5]

In a time of endless multi-author horror anthologies, in which only two or three stories usually ring my bell per volume, this was the best anthology that I’ve read in years, in terms of its quality and variety. Excellent addition to an excellent series.

[Phillip Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really impressed with this collection, particularly the stories from Adam Nevill, Siobhan Carroll, Peter Straub, Gemma Files, C.E Ward, Livia Llewellyn, Rebecca Lloyd, Brian Evenson, and Ray Cluley.
Brian Hodge's excellent "On These Blackened Shores of Time" was the perfect endpiece.

[Bill · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's not you, Best Horror of the Year, vol 9, it's me. You are typically a quality horror anthology each year, but this year, I just couldn't get into you.

The stories I enjoyed most in this year's collection tended to be straightforward narratives involving a (non-Lovecraftian) monster, such as "The Oestridae,""Grave Goods,""Between Dry Ribs," and "The Castellmarch Man." The two-page "No Matter Which Way We Turned" is quick, nasty, and had the only glimpse of dark humor in the entire collection.

There were a few too many Lovecraft-like stories throughout this volume. One or two is ok, but I count at least four here ("Nesters," "It's All the Same Road in the End," "Bright Crown of Joy," and "On These Blackened Shores of Time"). To be fair, only a couple of these stories alluded to the Lovecraft mythos directly, but they all share themes that spring straight from "The Shadow Over Innsmouth."

There were two stories that touched on domestic abuse, "The Days of Our Lives" and "The Beautiful Thing We Will Become." I found both these stories disturbing, but I'm not sure if the authors conveyed a deep sense of the truly horrific, or if I was just grossed out. I'll reserve judgement on these for now.

Two clunkers: Peter Straub's "The Process Is a Process All Its Own" and "Bright Crown of Joy" by Livia Llewellyn. Straub's "Process" was pretentious, and seemed to have a major continuity flaw in the plot that I would not have expected from someone of Straub's caliber. "Bright Crown" used a device meant to switch the narration back and forth between the protagonist and a computer-like mind that I found miserably annoying.

There are a few gems here buried between stories I wish I had been able to skip, and the stories I didn't mention at all are just fine. It's probably just that I wasn't in the mood for contemporary horror this winter. Maybe I should have stuck with some older stuff like Kurt Wagner's Year's Best Horror or one of the Shadows series, since the stories I most enjoyed in this collection were reminiscent of those older collections.

[Richard Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was just looking over the other reviews, and it's just so subjective. There were stories in here I loved, stories I liked, and some I didn't care for at all. And that's 100% okay. Some people agree with me and some hated the ones I love. What I really enjoy is that Ellen always gives us a wide range of stories—quiet horror, violent horror, Lovecraftian (quite a few this year), psychological, rural—you name it. I'd rather have 50% blow me away, than 100% be just good.

All this being said, this was a great collection, my favorite work by the following authors: Brian Hodge (twice), Siobahn Carroll, DB Waters, Adam Nevill, Livia Llewellyn, Kristi DeMeester, Brian Evenson, and Ray Cluley.

If you want to keep up with the best in horror, read this every year. You won't love every story (nobody ever does, except Ellen, I suppose LOL) but you'll for sure find some that floor you.

[Shawn]

Well, as usual, a wide variety of approaches because Datlow shares with me (in the co-editing of the PSEUDOPOD podcast) the idea that variety is the spice of fiction. But that doesn't mean our ideas of quality in that variety always mesh. I started this one a few years ago but got lost in other readings after consuming the first piece (which we bought for PSEUDOPOD: here) - and only recently picked it back up - which is ironic because my tastes have undergone something of a shift in that time. But here we go, weakest to strongest (just imho, of course):

The "no" rating
"Bright Crown Of Joy" by Livia Llewellyn - I've bought and run a few stories by Livia LLewellyn on the PSEUDOPOD Podcast (selections), but I opted out of reading this when I quickly realized it was SF-Horror set far in the future (and lengthy in doing that). The whole setting is most decidedly not "my bag" and approaching 60 years of age, I've decided I want to spend my time reading things I enjoy. May be a great story - I really have no idea. One I did read was "The Beautiful Things We Will Become" by Kristi DeMeester - a girl with an eating disorder romantically fixates on her best friend who is, we presume, being sexually assaulted by her father while he seemingly is also building a replacement for her ala Frankenstein. Yeah, not my kinda thing. Meant to be read metaphorically, until it isn't, but then it is again. "No Matter Which Way We Turned" by Brian Evenson is flash length - an idea not a story.

The "Okay" rating
"Fury" by D.B. Waters - a psychic/psychometrist who works with the homicide division of a police force enters a crime scene but soon finds it overwhelms him... Eh, I wasn't a fan of this. I don't like "Urban Fantasy" (even in the reduced form, as here) as the assumption of organizations acknowledging and employing those with "wild talents" just seems too much like less of a story and more of a pitch for a Netflix series. And I found this overwritten as well, and it goes nowhere. No so much of a story as an idea for a story. Meanwhile, "Between Dry Ribs" by Gregory Norman Bossert has female guests at an Ice Hotel in Scandinavia finding one guest there a bit suspicious in her actions... It didn't really work for me. The action sequence near the end wasn't easy to follow. Not bad but nothing noteworthy either. Finally, "What's Out There?" by Gary McMahon has a man deal with his scared cat and ask the titular question. Solid start, weak payoff.

The "Good but weak" rating
"The Oestridae" by Robert Levy - A month after their mother goes missing, a brother and sister find themselves entertaining a previously unknown Aunt, sister to their Mom, who just happened to come by looking for her... or something that their mother took from her. Okay little tale of backwoods menace. In "The Process Is a Process All It's Own" by Peter Straub, a serial killer in the 1950s, the Ladykiller, has a peculiar form of synesthesia (he "smells" words) which we experience as he takes us through his usual stalking routine in Milwaukee. Engaging, but the ending is a little... underwhelming? Kat, an Iraq war vet, arrives in Vermont at an isolated village that seems deliberately cut off from the world, in search of a fellow soldier who she had lost contact with in Christopher Golden's "The Bad Hour." But the town seems very interested in repulsing all strangers... .Well, this starts well, but it's one of these unresolved scenarios complicated by an extra, unneeded twist at the end. Not bad, but feels more like a great opening to a movie. In Brian Hodge's "It's All The Same Road In The End" two brothers aimlessly search the Midwest for their father, a rural folk music researcher (ala Alan Lomax) who went missing decades ago while on a discovery trip, though his camera and recorder were later found with a disturbing last photo and piece of tape, a nearly inhuman song being sung by whom? or what? This is a pretty good, if slightly longish story. It could use a *little* pruning but I give Hodges the credit that his verbosity often serves the story well. The only problem is the ending which - again kudos - is not what you initially expect, but does go a little far afield from purely satisfying into "feels like a larger novel" terrain. Would make a good found-footage film!

Still in "Good But Weak": "The Days Of Our Lives" has a man recount his bizarre marriage to an abusive, psychotic and possibly supernaturally powerful woman, part of a strange cult called "The Movement" - a marriage that is essentially enslavement, with the wife killing anyone he shows a passing interest in. This story by Adam L.G. Nevill is a strange one. I initially didn't like it and while I wouldn't say it "won me over" I did grow to being intrigued by its Thomas Ligotti meets Ramsey Campbell evocations. Strange. In "The House Of Wonders" by C.E. Ward club friends discuss the removed chapter of a recent book chronicling the history of Wonder & Oddity attractions in England, the missing chapter having chronicled some of the details of a strange seashore emporium with a rather sordid history attached to it, seemingly linked to an ancient slide projection contraption it contained... Well this was a good example of a "not fully successful story". Why? The set-up and plot points are great (ancient coin operated device with a final feature promising a 'disturbing display,' reports of murders and disappearances linked to a small, hunched figure in a cape, the rise and fall of such a ramshackle emporium). It's just that, everything is told 'after the fact' and so feels removed from any tension, while also promising almost no climax. Its one of the oddities of fiction writing that great ideas (or, in this case, even pretty good ones) are sometimes extremely difficult if not impossible to craft into satisfying stories. Meanwhile, a well-meaning but apathetic/in-over-his-head member of a farming family tries to beg some help from his sister-in-law, and is wisely rejected. But his reaction to this is to completely snap, in "The Numbers" by Christopher Burns. Very much like what I said about "The House Of Wonders," but different, this is a story so basic in its plot that there's almost nowhere for it to go. Not bad, but just kind of there. Finally in "The Ice Beneath Us", two elderly ice fishing pals don't want to talk about what happened last year when, in the middle of a threatening snowstorm, in the middle of the night, on the middle of the lake, there was an unexpected knock on the door of their tiny ice fishing shack. Not bad work by Steve Duffy, but kinda easy as well.

The "Good" Rating (there were no "Excellent" ratings, this time around
"Nesters" by Siobhan Carroll is a variant of Lovecraft's "Colour Out Of Space," set in the Dustbowl of the Great Depression. Some singularly unnerving imagery, language manipulation/distortion and overall bleakness. We bought it for PSEUDOPOD (see above). Steve Rasnic Tem's "Red Rabbit" has a man worried over his increasingly anxious/mentally unbalanced wife who is fixated on whatever is killing and leaving dead rabbits in their backyard. Over and over again. Not a bad little creeper, just as long as it needs to be and with no explanation in sight, but short enough not to really need one. An archeological team is sent to excavate a large grave in remote Canada in "Grave Goods" by Gemma Files, but the obviously important subjects buried don't seem like they were fully human... Well this was a solid read, with some good (and well-informed) bickering over disputes between religious rights, how to treat remains, etc. The trans main character was nicely handled. In Nadia Bulkin's "Wish You Were Here" a tour guide in Bali has to put up with his childish tourist charges who are constantly causing troubles while he takes them to famous spiritual and haunted spots and grieves over his own mistakes and guilty hauntings. This is a good, if a little raggedly put together, story that reminds you how every country is existing in its own moments of crisis and regret, without them having to deal with Americans dragging their own vices and ghosts along. In "Ragman," a daughter is worried about her father's seemingly increasing dementia as he retreats to the family's 'Scrapyard Emporium' business, filled with reclaimed and scavenged accoutrements of decades and centuries past. But while working there, to keep an eye on him, she begins to realize that there may be something unnatural about a very old Venetian mirror, which the father seems aware of as well. This is a good, if a bit overlong (overwritten in some parts) story by Rebecca Lloyd that juggles a great setting with an honest depiction of familial friction, along with its supernatural threat. Would make a good short film for the BBC. Ray Cluley depicts a man visiting a hotel and, later, a castle, going back over a recent trip with his wife during which an unlikely event happened, in "The Castellmarch Man." This is solid. Slightly overwritten (which is becoming a feature and not a bug of this book, but in this case not as egregious as some and justified to some degree), this does a good job weaving together a lost love, the 'sport' of geocaching, and ancient folklore. Finally, in "On These Blackened Shores Of Time" by Brian Hodge, A father and mother cannot accept that their son and his car disappeared into a sinkhole following flooding in their Pennsylvania Coal Country neighborhood, eventually uncovering a tragic history of a covered-over mine and entombed miners. But further research only deepens the mystery and horror. A good, if long, exploration of subterranean horrors.

And that's it.

[Alan Baxter · Rating 5 out of 5]

A benchmark anthology of horror, as ever.

[Alisi ☆ wants to read too many books ☆ · Rating 1 out of 5]

Been reading this since last year. By far the worst of this series. I'd say 2/3s weren't even technically stories -- they were just scenes or thoughts, or they had no point and told no real story. Only 2 or 3 held my attention. None were remotely scary.

Here's two examples of the stories within:

A. man goes to brother look for work. brother turns him down and has wife cook him breakfast. he asks her for work and she turns him down too. Then he kills her, waits for his brother, kills him, and kills everyone he meets to the seashore before he kills himself. the end.

B. strange girl brought to random clinic where, no matter which way you turn her, you only see her back. so random clinic guy abandons her in a house until she probably starves to death (the house was boarded up and the narrator says something like 'we guarded it until we couldn't hear her moving about anymore.') the end.

It's like 'alrighty then. there's time i wasted on asinine stories that i'll never get back.'

[Elle Maruska · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall a very strong collection! There was a bit of repetition in the Lovecraftian pieces unfortunately but otherwise I really enjoyed these stories. I loved "The Days of Our Lives" for it's absolutely nonsensical yet still terrifying narrative and it's ricocheting pace somewhere between a British domestic comedy and a terrifying cult-esque tale of murder and inexplicable horror. "Grave Goods" was also really well written and an interesting exploration of archaeology, ethics, identity, and (of course) monsters. "Ragman" was also a deeply unsettling exploration of the relationship between parents and children as well as the stories piled up in physical things.

The weakest of the bunch was definitely "Numbers," in that it seemed to have...very little reason for existing. Straub's piece "The Process is a Process All Its Own" started out promising but ended up rather disappointing and I felt the last story, "On These Blackened Shores of Time" was good but perhaps not the strongest ending for the anthology.

But as a whole I definitely enjoyed this collection!

[Ally McCudden · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some were far better than others. I had trouble paying attention to a lot of them.

[Bill Hsu · Rating 2 out of 5]

I should just stop getting Ellen Datlow anthologies.

But after many pages of plodding and pedestrian prose (Livia Llewellyn being a notable exception), I'm finally at Brian Evenson's "No Matter Which Way We Turned". It begins:

No matter which way we turned the girl, she didn't have a face.

Yes.

Update: the Evenson is only 2 pages! Other than the Llewellyn, the Bulkin story is also worthwhile. I don't think the Cluley holds up to his last collection.

[Brad Hodges · Rating 4 out of 5]

The ninth volume of Ellen Datlow's The Best Horror of the Year is a particularly strong one, and has Lovecraftian overtones, as a handful of stories appeared in her Children of Lovecraft connection. Therefore the stories aren't the kind that make your hair stand on end, but make your skin crawl.

Those stories are the "Bright Crown of Joy," by Livia Llewellyn, which I found difficult to get through; "Nesters," by Siobhan Carroll, about a family that stuck it out through the Dust Bowl and don't like to think about what happened to a neighboring farmer, and what I think is the best story in the whole collection, "On the Blackened Shores of Time," by Brian Hodge, which involves a young man disappearing into a sinkhole that leads his family on a quest to find himself inside an old coal mine.

Some of the stories are quite brutal, including two involving mutilated animals: "Red Rabbit," by Steve Rasnic Tem, and "What's Out There," by Gary McMahon. Animal lovers be warned. There is also a story about a serial killer who is also a necrophiliac, Peter Straub's "The Process Is a Process All It's Own." Try reading that to the kids at night. "The Days of Our Lives," by Adam LG Nevill, explores the world of sado-masochism, and "The Numbers," by Christopher Burns, is about a guy who snaps. Boy, does he snap. Don't pick on your loser brother.

Here are the other of my favorites in this collection, in no particular order: "The Oestridae," by Robert Levy, which has a couple of teenagers holding down the fort after their mother disappears and a very strange aunt show up. I love this opening: "White dust rises from the road like tobacco smoke, followed by the grinding of car wheels on dry Pennsylvania dirt as a silver compact rumbles into view, up the hill on its way to the house." "House of Wonders," by C.E. Ward, is a tale about a sleazy tourist attraction that has some deadly secrets.

"The Ice Beneath Us," by Steve Duffy, involves two ice fisherman and the secret they share, which has to do with an Indian myth (or is it?), and "The Castellmarch Man" is also about a legend, this time a Welsh one, about a man with the ears of a horse, who doesn't like them to be seen.

A few stories didn't grab me, such as "No Matter Which Way We Turned," by Brian Evenson, which is short but completely confusing, and "The Bad Hour," by Christopher Golden, which I found a bit amateurish and not up to the quality of the rest of the collection.

Still, this may be the best of the Datlow-edited books I've read. I've just started another one.

[Sonja · Rating 2 out of 5]

Normally I give short story compilations a three star. Good stories versus not so good, usually even out. I have to drop this one to a two star. There were a lot of sci-fi stories and just plain short general stories.

[Jeanine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent!

[Luz · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some good ones in this collection but most are just so-so

[Ctgt · Rating 3 out of 5]

5/10

[Jonathan Briggs · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The Best Horror of the Year" makes its welcome ninth appearance in a volume beefier than last year's annual, which was slightly puny in the page count. Not returning is Laird Barron, breaking a remarkable string of consecutive "Best Horror" performances. Barron's "Triumvirate of Terror" compatriots, Nathan Ballingrud and John Langan, are also no-shows. I expect all three writers are brewing something mind-blowing for their inexorable return to these pages. Despite their absence, editor Ellen Datlow practically guarantees at least three stars from me by including a new Peter Straub story and a hefty double-dose of Brian Hodge.

Datlow's opening Summation of the past year's novels is encouraging. She runs off a list of several books to be added to the must-read list. I hope "Hex" is as compelling as she makes it sound. But "Best Horror" is focused on superior short work. Among 2016's notables, for better or worse:

The Grapes of Wrath glow a Colour out of Space in the opening "Nesters." When author Siobhan Carroll describes strange visitors as too pale and too well fed, the vampire bell might go off, but it's a false alarm. No, this is our persistent old pal Mr. Lovecraft back once again. The story's Dust Bowl setting and Irish immigrant narrative voice give the formula a few tweaks. Otherwise, Carroll regrettably confines herself to following that formula, and soon enough, characters are reciting the inevitable, untenable tongue-twisters of jumbled alphabet and apostrophe.

The precipitous drop into the fragmented perspective that opens "The Process Is A Process All Its Own" is likely to perplex readers, but in a few pages, the story reveals itself as something altogether more prosaic: We're in the mind of another serial killer. What lifts "The Process" beyond the hackneyed ranks of standard psycho slaughters is Peter Straub's shimmering prose. "Often, he felt other," Straub writes of the "dark, disturbing criminal sociopath" at the center of "The Process." Straub's creative process ensures that sense of the alien, that unsettling otherness. Protagonist Tilly Hayward has a kind of synesthesia (whether real or delusional is up to us as readers) in which he can smell words. "He could already catch the meat-sack stench of 'please' and 'mercy' as they slid through the girl's sweetheart lips." Tilly describes words as "blue collar guys." Sometimes. But Straub's words are the elegant elite -- glittering, masterfully ornamented confections that offer a wealth of mysteries to be plumbed upon multiple readings. They are beautiful even as they incite disgust and dread. The clinical description of Tilly's methodical cleanup process is the most chilling single paragraph in the book.

"The Bad Hour" gets off to a good start. An Iraq War veteran searches for a sandbox buddy through a picturesque autumn countryside in Vermont (complete with pumpkin harvest) until she comes across the classic horror setting of the secluded New England town spurning outsiders and harboring secrets. This is all genre boilerplate, but it's effective up to the point when author Christopher Golden goes full-on pedantic, trying to lay down the "rules" of his supernatural threat and doing more damage with each poorly planned detail. It's like one of those "X Files" episodes that's fully committed to a bad premise and only digs itself deeper into a hole the more Mulder and Scully try to explain. You know what's scary? The unexplainable.

Brian Hodge may be getting tired of shouldering the label "underrated." It's certainly not an accurate one among his regular readers, who rate him very highly indeed. Underread might be a tad closer to the mark. We just want more people reading along with us. Hodge has been at this a long while, steadily improving since his already impressive beginnings in "The Horror Show" and the Dell/Abyss days. Yet Hodge isn't as well-known as some of us think he deserves to be, and we've been wondering: What's delaying the rest of you? He's like the Michael K. Williams of horror writers. He may not have all the honors and prizes and recognition that are due him, but fans cheer when they hear Omar's comin'. Datlow knows how good Hodge is and devotes a sizable chunk of this volume to him. She must rate him pretty highly.

The first of his stories is "It's All the Same Road in the End." The Brothers Pine, Clarence and Young Will, have been on this road trip for so long, it's all become a blur: "Another stop, another chance for the truth" in their quest for their grandfather Willard Chambers, who disappeared more than 50 years ago. The brothers pass around a photo that captures something off, something wrong, something that unnerves would-be witnesses. There's also a tape recording on an old Walkman that some listeners can't even finish before yanking the headphones off. Grandpa Willard was a songcatcher, Marlboro Man as musicologist, preserving the tuneful heritage of various cultures. Somewhere out in Dust Bowl territory, in search of folk songs to record, Willard was lost. Now the Pine Brothers follow an unearthly siren call that probably resembles blind idiot piping.

Scientists in Gemma Files' "Grave Goods" uncover a prehistoric pit in Canada's coniferous old growth and have to wade through a sodden mess of rain, mud, mucus and rancid racial and gender politics. Similarly, the reader finds himself bogged in a morass of eye-blurring archaeological info dumps (Files mansplains Chris Golden under the table), muddled action and groan-inducing dialog ("Hey, don't denigrate my spirituality"). Files has been writing good stories for so long that she should be past the point of producing something this erratic and amateurish.

The traditional British ghost story gets another airing in C.E. Ward's "The House of Wonders." Or maybe it's not the traditional British ghost; maybe it's another traditional revenant, whose frequent, fanged anthology appearances tend to annoy me. Or maybe it's someone/thing altogether different (though still traditional). The ambiguity carries the story quite a ways, despite Ward's maddening habit of inserting "of course" into every other sentence.

Familial friction lays the basis for Christopher Burns' "The Numbers" as an undependable brother visits the family farm uninvited for breakfast. The discomfort builds until the story takes a wrenching, unpleasant turn (I mean that as a compliment) and proceeds toward its inevitable ending coldly and efficiently. The tale seems quite simple -- especially considering how often we hear real-life variations of it -- but if it was really that simple, everyone would be writing it. Though Burns isn't working at Peter Straub's level, both authors illustrate the same principle: Good writing elevates even the most basic plot. "Shotgun Joe" Biden might like this one.

Old age addles the thinking of a junk shop owner who presides over scary mirrors in Rebecca Lloyd's overlong and haphazardly edited "Ragman." After a few years of progressive improvement, the copy editing slipped a notch in "Best Horror" Volume Nine. Make no mistake: The rules of language matter. The improper execution of those rules affects readability ("Where did I put what Dad?"), and of far less importance, it irritates online reviewers who work as professional editors in their day job. "Ragman" lacks not only key commas but entire words. Internal logic and common sense go missing as well. There's an old joke about the family that lacks the self-preservational smarts to move out of the haunted house when the faucets start spewing blood. When the narrator of "Ragman" witnesses an ominous black stinky creature trying to climb out of a mirror, she retreats to her cot and duvet where "I felt the huge solemnity of how each of us is alone on Earth," then she goes to work attaching price tags to the items in "the bric-a-brac outhouse." (Though it's certainly no fault of Lloyd's, the word "outhouse" has a significantly different meaning on this side of the Atlantic.)

Gary McMahon's "What's Out There?" is likely to be especially upsetting to animal lovers. It should elicit dazzling mental special fx sequences along the lines of pre-CGI greats Rick Baker or Rob Bottin. I don't really have a critique, just a question: In England, do cats really beat up foxes?

Ray Cluley's "The Castellmarch Man" reminds me why I sometimes envy the British. Though we have the Constitution and real football, they have near-constant gloomy weather and gothic castles all over the place. Cluley's geocaching couple are enjoying the Welsh countryside, and I was enjoying the story and atmosphere. Then, much like he did in "Bones of Crow" in "Best Horror" Volume Six, Cluley takes a detour into the daffy. Deep in the dark innards of a castle, his protagonists are set upon by a randy refugee from Disney's "Pinocchio." Perhaps it's not entirely fair to blame Cluley for essentially being faithful to folklore, but it's a bit frustrating to invest as a reader in a story -- and this is a fairly lengthy story -- and be rewarded for it by an ending this silly. The buildup did make me want to revisit Wales though, so the tourism bureau might want to send Cluley a nice note.

In Brian Hodge's second story, "On These Blackened Shores of Time," a father endlessly replays "four seconds of eternity" in his mind -- the time it took to register the sudden loss of his son in a calamity millions of years in the making, down a seemingly bottomless pit that opens in suburbia. Just when you think Old Man Lovecraft has been stripmined to the dried-out (but obstinately omnipresent) bones, along comes Hodge with a string of superb Mythos reworkings (that's reworkings, not rehashes, this is key). I assume his next collection will assemble this sequence of cosmic horror. Everyone should buy a copy. If Hodge becomes disgustingly successful, he won't have to hear about how underrated he is, and those of us who have been reading since "Dark Advent" can shrug and wrinkle our noses and smugly say, "Eh, his early stuff was better."

Hodge and Straub push the highs of Volume Nine higher, but the lows ... are pretty low. The past couple of volumes established a baseline of quality that was solid but a little safe. This volume takes more risks, but at times, that means it dares to fail. Steady but safe, or daring but uneven? I'm not sure which is better.

Next year will mark a decade that Ellen Datlow has been bringing us this incarnation of "Best Horror." I don't know whether Night Shade Books plans anything special to mark the anniversary, but I hope all of Datlow's contributors will do her the honor of making her job especially arduous by overwhelming her with exceptional work and making Volume Ten the best yet.

Maybe someone could even coax Thomas Ligotti out of hiding.

[Nicole Tul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not that great

If you make it the junk at the beginning to read the stories. They are to choppy of stories. No real endings to some and other no point. Didn't care for it

[Baal Of · Rating 3 out of 5]

I usually like any anthology edited by Ellen Datlow, so I was a bit surprised by this one when I didn't enjoy this book as much as I expected. It's not bad, it was just heavily packed with stories that left me saying "What The Fuck?" and not in a good way. Many of the stories meandered around with no clear idea of what they were trying to do or where they were going. There were some notable exceptions, especially toward the end.

[Aaaaaaaaa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nestors by Siobhan Carroll: 10/10
Slick, consistently good the whole way through, great perspective in the main character. Some really beautiful writing, I love the setting. Feels polished.

The Process is a Process All its Own by Peter Straub: 9.5/10
LOVED this, the strong suit is the dialogue. entertaining. I feel like it harped on the smell thing a little too much, it was kind of annoying, but also spaced out the dialogue well and helped the pacing so many its better to be included.

The Oestridae by Robert Levy: 6.5/10
I liked this, like some of the other stories the ending kind of weakened it. It would have been creepier if they left the horror more open ended and unexplained like the "red rabbit" story later. The ending where she is secretly some kind of a creature? I think it might have been some kind of an allegory for generational abuse, but I wasn't clear and it could have been accomplished better I think.

The Bad Hour by Christopher Golden: 5/10
Was decent at first, ends up kind of stupid. The ending where the main character is like "our kid.... has too many teeth" Idk, it had "it's standing right behind me, isn't it" vibes. The idea wasn't totally amazing

Red Rabbit by Steve Tem: 7.5/10
I like this one a lot, although its a little sparse and doesn't have a clear plot, really good horror though and it's has an amazing tone. I like the car crash near the end, which has nothing to do with the characters, but creates an incredible atmosphere for the climax. Just a mastery of tone.

It’s All the Same Road in the End by Brian Hodge: 5.5/10
meh. A little too long for what it accomplishes

Fury by DB Waters: 5/10
It was not horribly written but the plot was really stupid. felt like something I'd read on r/nosleep and just didn't creep me out.

Grave Goods by Gemma Files: 4/10
Way too many characters for how short this is, it was hard to keep everyone straight because it's trying to fit like 5 characters, give them each a unique personality and conflicts, into like 15 pages. I couldn't totally parse what was happening sometimes, very confusing and the plot was creepy for like 10 pages until the last 5 where I think the main character is related to the monster bones or something? Confusing

Between Dry Ribs by Gregory Norman Bossert: 6/10
I liked it, for some reason the monsters description at the end wasn't exciting to me. I liked the creativity of the setting more than anything. The setting feels fleshed out and the continued return to things like the monkey bathing scuplture helped.

Wish You Were Here by Nadia Bulkin: 6.5/10
Feels like it accomplished what it set out to do. There's parts that feel a bit bland or like it could be worked more, but the ending is nice.

House of Wonders by C.E Ward: 7/10
I liked it

The Days of Our Lives by Adam LG Nevill: 8/10
Weird, usually I find this style of writing kind of pretentious and annoying but it's really well executed and the weird works in the stories favor, rather than detracting from it which I often see. I like this one a lot, and will probably return to it.

The Numbers by Christopher Burns: 8/10
short, to the point, no twists and turns, good. complete feeling. Goes to show you don't need to have a twist or harangue on suspense to tell a decent story.

Bright Crown of Joy by Livia Llewellyn: 5.5/10
a bit too long, but interesting. Could have trimmed this and had the same effect.

The Beautiful Thing We Will Become by Kristi DeMeester: 3/10
by far my least favorite in the book. writing felt kind of pretentious but doesnt pull it off. The subject is kind of stupid. execution of subject matter does not seem particularly good.

Ragman by Rebecca Lloyd: 9/10
the best writing in the book and probably my favorite story. The ending is somewhat disappointing and the creature reveal is not great. Just not a satisfying conclusion, but I will probably read again because the prose and dialogue is out of this world.

What’s Out There? Gary McMahon: 6.5
Writing is not the best in the book but its passable and the subject matter is interesting, feels human. I liked it.

No Matter Which Way We Turned by Brian Evenson: 6/10
maybe too short for me to write much home about, but interestingish.

The Castellmarch Man by Ray Cluley: 5.5/10
A little stupid subject matter but not terribly executed. The female lead annoyed me, she didn't feel fleshed out, felt more like her only appearance was as a "quirky and lovable" subject who didn't vary much, outside of the mc referencing her actions outside of the story which are not addressed. She felt like a manic pixie dream girl trope rather than a character, and her quirky behavior was not well executed, nothing she said was actually particularly likable or funny outside of the husband's reacting to it in a way that would suggest it is meant to be likable. The best part is the husband alone when he is reacting to things like the noises coming from the next room or ruminating to himself.

The Ice Beneath Us by Steve Duffy: 5.5/10
Not bad, I liked the characters, but I forget the ending already which doesn't bode well.

On These Blackened Shores of Time by Brian Hodge 10/10
Great writing, really entertaining the full way through, and the ending was satisfying. A lot of stories seem to struggle with the ending so it was pleasant when this one had a great conclusion.

[Anne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Keeping in mind this the first horror collection I've read, I think it's a great collection -- wide-ranging. I was really super-happy to see a flash fiction, the incredible "No Matter Which Way We Turned" by Brian Evenson, included. The opening and closing stories of the collection, "Nesters" by Siobhan Carroll and "On These Blackened Shores of Time" by Brian Hodge are fantastic bookends for the collection, and as a matter of fact Hodge has two stories in here (the other being "It's All the Same Road in the End," which would have been a fantastic X-Files episode), both dealing with families trying to repair themselves through journeys, that are really strong. My other faves included a reworked folk tale, "The Castellmarch Man" by Ray Cluley, that had some narrative feints and dodges that were very playful and enjoyable as a reader, and the everyday gun horror of Christopher Burns's "The Numbers." I skipped over a few stories -- for instance I feel like I'm supposed to appreciate "Bright Crown of Joy" by Livia Llewellyn, but the use of italics and other features made me feel like I had to work too hard for the enjoyment as a reader. Definitely recommend this as a great snapshot of horror writing today.

[Andi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a decent anthology, with a few standouts, like The Oestridae, House of Wonders, Ragman, and On These Blackened Shores of Time.

1. Nesters | Siobhan Carroll - B
2. The Oestridae | Robert Levy - A
3. The Process is a Process All its Own | Peter Straub - didn’t finish!
4. The Bad Hour | Christopher Golden - B
5. Red Rabbit | Steve Rasnic Tem - C-
6. It’s All the Same Road in the End | Brian Hodge - C
7. Fury | DB Waters - C
8. Grave Goods | Gemma Files - C
9. Between Dry Ribs | Gregory Norman Bossert - C-
10. The Days of Our Lives | Adam LG Nevill - C
11. House of Wonders | C.E Ward - B+
12. The Numbers | Christopher Burns - B-
13. Bright Crown of Joy | Livia Llewellyn - D
14. The Beautiful Thing We Will Become | Kristi DeMeester - C
15. Wish You Were Here | Nadia Bulkin - C-
16. Ragman | Rebecca Lloyd - B+
17. What’s Out There? | Gary McMahon - C
18. No Matter Which Way We Turned | Brian Evenson - C
19. The Castellmarch Man | Ray Cluley - B-
20. The Ice Beneath Us | Steve Duffy - C
21. On These Blackened Shores of Time | Brian Hodge - B+

[Victoria Pasche · Rating 3 out of 5]

As always, an enjoyable collection, though probably not the best of the three I've read. There was one story, "Bright Crown of Joy," by Livia Llewellyn that I couldn't finish at all it was so nonsensical, long and tiresome. There were also a fair number of just meh stories -- more than usual -- and I would say no clear theme (the edition I read last year had a bunch of apocalyptic/zombie tales, definitely influenced by "The Walking Dead"), though perhaps there was a tendency toward vague,Lovecraftian monsters.

Best story was the last in the book, "On These Blackened Shores of Time" by Brian Hodge. Just chilling piece about a man whose son is sucked into an ancient, filled-in coal mine. Sad and chilling all at once. Another good one was "The Castellmarch Man" by Ray Cluley, and "Ragman," by Rebecca Lloyd," about a creepy monster that crawls out of empty mirrors. And it's about a bittersweet father-daughter relationship. Very interesting.

Worth a read, but overall not a topnotch collection.

[Lady Olenna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Volume 9 for me was a mixed bag like the rest of them. I thought at first maybe I’m jaded by all the “scary” stories I’ve read and I’m just getting too used to the supposedly creepy. However, the last 2 stories did awe me with its content. So I guess I’m not jaded, the sandwiched stories in the middle just weren’t very good?

I am so very glad the anthology ended with On These Blackened Shores of Time by Brian Hodge because wow. I loved this so much I am willing to forget the 60% of the book that was lacklustre.

My favourites were:

•On These Blackened Shores of Time by Brian Hodge
•Nesters by Siobhan Carroll
•The Bad Hour by Christopher Golden
•Grave Goods by Gemma Files
•Between Dry Ribs by Gregory Norman Bossert

[Christine Marshall · Rating 2 out of 5]

As with most horror short stories or anthologies, given there are a few, there is just not enough time for the reader to really care about the protagonist or set up the given horrific circumstances to really build the creep factor in... every time I buy a book, with horror short stories, I go into it really excited and wind up very disappointed for this very reason... I don't believe it is the author's fault I just think it is a fact of this genre that you have to build suspense and creepiness over deeper characterization and for that you just need the full length of a novel.

[Des Lewis · Rating 4 out of 5]

From Siobhan Dust to Hodge Hawling, this anthology reaches its own “giant hook” within. Then Evenson-lodges in some part of your Azathoth soul that you did not know existed till now as a core of Uncertainties. Catching the song as well as the dream.
And the calamity that needs healing after such hawling, the calamity that is our world today.
Many great stories, especially the Straub, the DeMeester and the Lloyd.

The detailed review of this book posted elsewhere under my name is too long to post here.
Above is its conclusion.

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

As w/ all anthologies this is mix of strong and weak stories. I found most of them interesting while only 2-3 struck me as uninteresting. The through-line seems to be family. The two stories by Mr. Hodge were a compelling blend of ancient horror and American mythology. Ms. Llewellyn’s story is creepy in it’s madness and I like the perspective of the narration. Was a pleasant read and I’m happy to have learned about this series. Will look into some of the earlier volumes.

[Frank McGirk · Rating 3 out of 5]

A solid anthology. I particularly enjoyed Peter Straub's "The Process Is a Process All Its Own" and Nadia Bulkin's "Wish You Were Here," which not only did a great job with setting and characters, but also left a lingering chill about what comes next.

Having been playing some Cthulhu boardgames for the past few years, I also enjoyed Brian Hodge's "On These Blackened Shores of Time" for its feels-like-a-RPG-Adventure flavor.

[Chris B · Rating 3 out of 5]

Diverse mix of settings and styles. I see these books as vessels to introduce readers to new authors. It succeeds in this manner. Overall, it's not a book I'd ever read in it's entirety again. All stories were professionally written. The narrator's were equally professional, although I found the accent in the first story very grating. Thankfully, she only uses this accent in the first story and the remaining stories are easy listens.

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good combination of different types of horror; some were more gory, some were paranormal, some had monsters, and some were just regular people Doing Bad Things. Definitely a few misses, but you'd probably expect that from a collection.

Stories that I liked in particular:
- nesters
- the oestridae
- red rabbit
- it's all the same road in the end
- the days of our lives
- the numbers
- the beautiful thing we will become
- no matter which way we turned
- on these blackened shores of time

[Brenda Clark Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book even more than last year's and can't believe that's even possible. My favorite stories were by Brian Hodge, Siobhan Carroll, Rebecca Lloyd, Steve Duffy, Peter Straub, and Ray Cluley. Seriously though, I enjoyed most of the stories. I started this book some time ago and just sort of fed myself stories as I felt the need. I didn't want to finish the book in three days.