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Deathbell #2
Demons
1st Arrow edition paperback fine
- GenresHorror
192 pages, Paperback
First published November 19, 1987
1 person is currently reading
69 people want to read
About the author
Guy N. Smith
175 books297 followersI was born on November 21, 1939, in the small village of Hopwas, near Tamworth, Staffordshire, England. My mother was a pre-war historical novelist (E. M. Weale) and she always encouraged me to write.
I was first published at the age of 12 in The Tettenhall Observer, a local weekly newspaper. Between 1952-57 I wrote 56 stories for them, many serialized. In 1990 I collated these into a book entitled Fifty Tales from the Fifties.
My father was a dedicated bank manager and I was destined for banking from birth. I accepted it but never found it very interesting. During the early years when I was working in Birmingham, I spent most of my lunch hours in the Birmingham gun quarter. I would have loved to have served an apprenticeship in the gun trade but my father would not hear of it.
Shooting (hunting) was my first love, and all my spare time was spent in this way. In 1961 I designed and made a 12-bore shotgun, intending to follow it up with six more, but I did not have the money to do this. I still use the Guy N. Smith short-barrelled magnum. During 1960-67 I operated a small shotgun cartridge loading business but this finished when my components suppliers closed down and I could no longer obtain components at competitive prices.
My writing in those days only concerned shooting. I wrote regularly for most of the sporting magazines, interspersed with fiction for such magazines as the legendary London Mystery Selection, a quarterly anthology for which I contributed 18 stories between 1972-82.
In 1972 I launched my second hand bookselling business which eventually became Black Hill Books. Originally my intention was to concentrate on this and maybe build it up to a full-time business which would enable me to leave banking. Although we still have this business, writing came along and this proved to be the vehicle which gave me my freedom.
I wrote a horror novel for the New English Library in 1974 entitled Werewolf by Moonlight. This was followed by a couple more, but it was Night of the Crabs in 1976 which really launched me as a writer. It was a bestseller, spawning five sequels, and was followed by another 60 or so horror novels through to the mid-1990's. Amicus bought the film rights to Crabs in 1976 and this gave me the chance to leave banking and by my own place, including my shoot, on the Black Hill.
The Guy N. Smith Fan Club was formed in 1990 and still has an active membership. We hold a convention every year at my home which is always well attended.
Around this time I became Poland's best-selling author. Phantom Press published two GNS books each month, mostly with print runs of around 100,000.
I have written much, much more than just horror; crime and mystery (as Gavin Newman), and children's animal novels (as Jonathan Guy). I have written a dozen or so shooting and countryside books, a book on Writing Horror Fiction (A. & C. Black). In 1997 my first full length western novel, The Pony Riders was published by Pinnacle in the States.
With 100-plus books to my credit, I was looking for new challenges. In 1999 I formed my own publishing company and began to publish my own books. They did rather well and gave me a lot of satisfaction. We plan to publish one or two every year.
Still regretting that I had not served an apprenticeship in the gun trade, the best job of my life dropped into my lap in 1999 when I was offered the post of Gun Editor of The Countryman's Weekly, a weekly magazine which covers all field sports. This entails my writing five illustrated feature articles a week on guns, cartridges, deer stalking, big game hunting etc.
Alongside this we have expanded our mail order second hand crime fiction business, still publish a few books, and I find as much time as possible for shooting.
Jean, my wife, helps with the business. Our four children, Rowan, Tara, Gavin and Angus have all moved away from home but they visit on a regular basis.
I would not want to live anywhere other than m
I was first published at the age of 12 in The Tettenhall Observer, a local weekly newspaper. Between 1952-57 I wrote 56 stories for them, many serialized. In 1990 I collated these into a book entitled Fifty Tales from the Fifties.
My father was a dedicated bank manager and I was destined for banking from birth. I accepted it but never found it very interesting. During the early years when I was working in Birmingham, I spent most of my lunch hours in the Birmingham gun quarter. I would have loved to have served an apprenticeship in the gun trade but my father would not hear of it.
Shooting (hunting) was my first love, and all my spare time was spent in this way. In 1961 I designed and made a 12-bore shotgun, intending to follow it up with six more, but I did not have the money to do this. I still use the Guy N. Smith short-barrelled magnum. During 1960-67 I operated a small shotgun cartridge loading business but this finished when my components suppliers closed down and I could no longer obtain components at competitive prices.
My writing in those days only concerned shooting. I wrote regularly for most of the sporting magazines, interspersed with fiction for such magazines as the legendary London Mystery Selection, a quarterly anthology for which I contributed 18 stories between 1972-82.
In 1972 I launched my second hand bookselling business which eventually became Black Hill Books. Originally my intention was to concentrate on this and maybe build it up to a full-time business which would enable me to leave banking. Although we still have this business, writing came along and this proved to be the vehicle which gave me my freedom.
I wrote a horror novel for the New English Library in 1974 entitled Werewolf by Moonlight. This was followed by a couple more, but it was Night of the Crabs in 1976 which really launched me as a writer. It was a bestseller, spawning five sequels, and was followed by another 60 or so horror novels through to the mid-1990's. Amicus bought the film rights to Crabs in 1976 and this gave me the chance to leave banking and by my own place, including my shoot, on the Black Hill.
The Guy N. Smith Fan Club was formed in 1990 and still has an active membership. We hold a convention every year at my home which is always well attended.
Around this time I became Poland's best-selling author. Phantom Press published two GNS books each month, mostly with print runs of around 100,000.
I have written much, much more than just horror; crime and mystery (as Gavin Newman), and children's animal novels (as Jonathan Guy). I have written a dozen or so shooting and countryside books, a book on Writing Horror Fiction (A. & C. Black). In 1997 my first full length western novel, The Pony Riders was published by Pinnacle in the States.
With 100-plus books to my credit, I was looking for new challenges. In 1999 I formed my own publishing company and began to publish my own books. They did rather well and gave me a lot of satisfaction. We plan to publish one or two every year.
Still regretting that I had not served an apprenticeship in the gun trade, the best job of my life dropped into my lap in 1999 when I was offered the post of Gun Editor of The Countryman's Weekly, a weekly magazine which covers all field sports. This entails my writing five illustrated feature articles a week on guns, cartridges, deer stalking, big game hunting etc.
Alongside this we have expanded our mail order second hand crime fiction business, still publish a few books, and I find as much time as possible for shooting.
Jean, my wife, helps with the business. Our four children, Rowan, Tara, Gavin and Angus have all moved away from home but they visit on a regular basis.
I would not want to live anywhere other than m
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Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 25, 2009
First published back in 1987, Guy N Smith’s novel ‘Demons’ formed the sequel to the popular 1980 title ‘Deathbell’. The novel ‘Deathbell’ sat within the Hamlyn publication period of Smith’s career, which is widely considered to be the ‘golden’ period of his lustrous career. The later sequel of ‘Demons’ was published by Arrow, which also saw the releases of the novels ‘Thirst II: The Plague’, ‘Alligators’ and ‘Bloodshow’ within the same year.
The novel is once again set within the quaint village of Turbury, where a decade ago Martyn Hamilton had erected his giant Deathbell, which he had used to control his son with who had become one of the slaves to the Seekers of Silence. This strange cult was formed in the mountains of Tibet, where the priests worshipped the deafening chimes of the Deathbells; cutting off the ears of their followers, allowing only the sound of the gigantic Deathbells to penetrate their eardrums. The chimes made these poor unfortunates into slaves, driving them in their madness to acts of bestial savagery.
Ten years after the death of the Hamilton family, the Deathbell has once again been erected within the chapel of the Caelogy Hall. The local thug Dai Charlton and his two nervous friends were responsible for this foolish erection of the Deathbell, as a prank during one of their late night excursions. Unsurprisingly, the group of youths come to a nasty end when the Deathbell toll’s a single note, as it steadies itself high up in the now derelict Caelogy Hall.
Over the years, Turbury has slowly died away leaving only a small number of residents remaining in this now ghost like village. After pressure from the local water authority to have the village submerged in water, allowing for a reservoir to take its place so that an enterprise in trout fishing can be realised, the town is evacuated to the nearby community of Bryncalid.
But Turbury doesn’t stay fully submerged for long. Now that the Deathbell had once again been put in action, the water that had submerged it mysteriously dries up. The derelict town of Turbury has seemingly risen from its watery grave, bringing with it the evil that surrounds the Deathbell. The few remaining inhabitants around the area are now cursed by the random tolls of this cursed bell. The haunting chimes turn the local farmer boy Frankie Thomas, into a crazed murderer. The evil of the Deathbell has truly awakened once again.
A band of roaming hippies learn of the deserted village of Turbury, and so after being rejected from the grounds of a nearby magic mushroom festival, move on to the now resurfaced village. These carefree hippies make natural successors to the Deathbell’s original Tibetan worshippers. A human sacrifice is soon required for the Deathbell, and so its chimes ring out summoning a victim from across the local landscape...
Following on from ‘Deathbell’ was never going to be a difficult thing to do. Smith had already set down the impressively original premise to this book, with this unique idea of a bell that turns its deafened followers into savage murderers.
However, with ‘Demons’ Smith has produced a novel that plods along at a broken pace, never really getting anywhere until the final couple of chapters. This fractured and ultimately loose storyline makes the tale seem like small snippets of an ongoing story.
There are moments of real underlying darkness within the novel that will satisfy any good Guy N Smith fan. The chapter where the reservoir drains away, revealing the figure of a man squirming in the mud around the derelict and decaying village of Turbury, is truly a haunting moment.
The rampage of Frankie Thomas on his parents and his nearest neighbour, Vicki Mason, is nothing short of classic pulp horror violence. In ‘Demons’, Smith has managed once again to reflect the true power of the evil that is given off by the Deathbell. Smith’s descriptive nature of the madness induced by the clanging tones of the bell is remarkably eerie. The inclusion of the first-person-perspective at the moments when the madness hits them, adds another creepy dynamic to the tale.
Alas, for all of its strong points, ‘Demons’ falls short on so many others. The developing relationship between the principal characters of Aden Darrell (the new bailiff for Turbury reservoir) and Vicki Mason (Turbury school’s ex-principal) is laughable. Within a matter of a paragraph the two are practically lovers. Within the space of a few chapters you’re thinking wedding bells will be accompanying the Deathbell.
The characterisation throughout the novel is otherwise of a rich and well developed nature. As with many of Smith’s novels, the more undesirable of the characters within the book are given prominent characteristics. This helps to bring them to life more in the short amount of time that they are present in the developing storyline.
The grande finale is dramatic and conclusive, with a real edge-of-the-seat ending wrapping up the whole Deathbell series. The ultimate conclusion is somewhat predictable due to suggestions towards its plausibility hinted at a mere twenty odd pages beforehand.
What remains confusing once finishing the novel is the chosen title for the book – ‘Demons’. At no point does the reader encounter any demons as such. The cover illustration also seems to hold no true bearing towards much of the storyline as well, which is unlike most other Guy N Smith novels.
All in all, Smith’s novel ‘Demons’ is an enjoyable pulp horror read, with plenty of over the top action and violence surrounded by dark horror, to keep any fan of this style of writing happy. Not quite as fast paced as many of Smith’s other novels, the storyline does stop and start on frequent occasions. In the end, it does make for a suitable sequel to his classic tale ‘Deathbell’.
The novel runs for a total of 184 pages and was published through Arrow Books.
The novel is once again set within the quaint village of Turbury, where a decade ago Martyn Hamilton had erected his giant Deathbell, which he had used to control his son with who had become one of the slaves to the Seekers of Silence. This strange cult was formed in the mountains of Tibet, where the priests worshipped the deafening chimes of the Deathbells; cutting off the ears of their followers, allowing only the sound of the gigantic Deathbells to penetrate their eardrums. The chimes made these poor unfortunates into slaves, driving them in their madness to acts of bestial savagery.
Ten years after the death of the Hamilton family, the Deathbell has once again been erected within the chapel of the Caelogy Hall. The local thug Dai Charlton and his two nervous friends were responsible for this foolish erection of the Deathbell, as a prank during one of their late night excursions. Unsurprisingly, the group of youths come to a nasty end when the Deathbell toll’s a single note, as it steadies itself high up in the now derelict Caelogy Hall.
Over the years, Turbury has slowly died away leaving only a small number of residents remaining in this now ghost like village. After pressure from the local water authority to have the village submerged in water, allowing for a reservoir to take its place so that an enterprise in trout fishing can be realised, the town is evacuated to the nearby community of Bryncalid.
But Turbury doesn’t stay fully submerged for long. Now that the Deathbell had once again been put in action, the water that had submerged it mysteriously dries up. The derelict town of Turbury has seemingly risen from its watery grave, bringing with it the evil that surrounds the Deathbell. The few remaining inhabitants around the area are now cursed by the random tolls of this cursed bell. The haunting chimes turn the local farmer boy Frankie Thomas, into a crazed murderer. The evil of the Deathbell has truly awakened once again.
A band of roaming hippies learn of the deserted village of Turbury, and so after being rejected from the grounds of a nearby magic mushroom festival, move on to the now resurfaced village. These carefree hippies make natural successors to the Deathbell’s original Tibetan worshippers. A human sacrifice is soon required for the Deathbell, and so its chimes ring out summoning a victim from across the local landscape...
Following on from ‘Deathbell’ was never going to be a difficult thing to do. Smith had already set down the impressively original premise to this book, with this unique idea of a bell that turns its deafened followers into savage murderers.
However, with ‘Demons’ Smith has produced a novel that plods along at a broken pace, never really getting anywhere until the final couple of chapters. This fractured and ultimately loose storyline makes the tale seem like small snippets of an ongoing story.
There are moments of real underlying darkness within the novel that will satisfy any good Guy N Smith fan. The chapter where the reservoir drains away, revealing the figure of a man squirming in the mud around the derelict and decaying village of Turbury, is truly a haunting moment.
The rampage of Frankie Thomas on his parents and his nearest neighbour, Vicki Mason, is nothing short of classic pulp horror violence. In ‘Demons’, Smith has managed once again to reflect the true power of the evil that is given off by the Deathbell. Smith’s descriptive nature of the madness induced by the clanging tones of the bell is remarkably eerie. The inclusion of the first-person-perspective at the moments when the madness hits them, adds another creepy dynamic to the tale.
Alas, for all of its strong points, ‘Demons’ falls short on so many others. The developing relationship between the principal characters of Aden Darrell (the new bailiff for Turbury reservoir) and Vicki Mason (Turbury school’s ex-principal) is laughable. Within a matter of a paragraph the two are practically lovers. Within the space of a few chapters you’re thinking wedding bells will be accompanying the Deathbell.
The characterisation throughout the novel is otherwise of a rich and well developed nature. As with many of Smith’s novels, the more undesirable of the characters within the book are given prominent characteristics. This helps to bring them to life more in the short amount of time that they are present in the developing storyline.
The grande finale is dramatic and conclusive, with a real edge-of-the-seat ending wrapping up the whole Deathbell series. The ultimate conclusion is somewhat predictable due to suggestions towards its plausibility hinted at a mere twenty odd pages beforehand.
What remains confusing once finishing the novel is the chosen title for the book – ‘Demons’. At no point does the reader encounter any demons as such. The cover illustration also seems to hold no true bearing towards much of the storyline as well, which is unlike most other Guy N Smith novels.
All in all, Smith’s novel ‘Demons’ is an enjoyable pulp horror read, with plenty of over the top action and violence surrounded by dark horror, to keep any fan of this style of writing happy. Not quite as fast paced as many of Smith’s other novels, the storyline does stop and start on frequent occasions. In the end, it does make for a suitable sequel to his classic tale ‘Deathbell’.
The novel runs for a total of 184 pages and was published through Arrow Books.
April 7, 2022
Three idiots put up the Deathbell again after a decade break. The village will be flooded to make a reservoir and the Deathbell will toll again and it will consume people to commit evil acts. Ears will bleed again. Bloody bonkers, doesn't make much sense but that's what is fun and addictive from Guy.
October 18, 2013
Few writers do pulp horror as well as Guy N Smith. A great read.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews