Beings From Beyond

Chapbook Collection by Jeffrey Thomas #3

by Jeffrey Thomas

Three horror tales of beings from beyond death, time, and space.

THE UNFINISHED MAZE – A guilt-ridden father seeks to save the soul of his little girl, whose death he’s responsible for, but in the process he draws the attention of two other people he killed, as well.

FEEDING THE DESCENDANTS – A brief and dismaying look into the future of an endangered intelligent race.

THE INFLUENCER – Sick and lonely men lust after teenage influencers on social media, and even make use of a living parasite to connect with them, but there is another voyeur looming unseen in the background...a god-like entity that feeds on human sensations.

From Jeffrey Thomas, author of Punktown .

67 pages, Paperback

First published November 30, 2022

About the author

Jeffrey Thomas is an American author of weird fiction, the creator of the acclaimed setting Punktown. Books in the Punktown universe include the short story collections Punktown, Voices from Punktown, Punktown: Shades of Grey (with his brother, Scott Thomas), and Ghosts of Punktown. Novels in that setting include Deadstock, Blue War, Monstrocity, Health Agent, Everybody Scream!, Red Cells, and The New God. Thomas’s other short story collections include The Unnamed Country, Gods of a Nameless Country, The Endless Fall, Haunted Worlds, Worship the Night, Thirteen Specimens, Nocturnal Emissions, Doomsdays, Terror Incognita, Unholy Dimensions, AAAIIIEEE!!!, Honey Is Sweeter Than Blood, Carrion Men, Voices from Hades, The Return of Enoch Coffin, and Entering Gosston. His other novels include The American, Boneland, Subject 11, Letters From Hades, The Fall of Hades, The Exploded Soul, The Nought, Thought Forms, Beyond the Door, Lost in Darkness, and A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Dealers.

His work has been reprinted in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII (editor Karl Edward Wagner), The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror #14 (editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling), and Year’s Best Weird Fiction #1 (editors Laird Barron and Michael Kelly). At NecronomiCon 2024 Thomas received the Robert Bloch Award for his contributions to weird fiction.

Though he considers Viet Nam his second home, Thomas lives in Massachusetts.

Reviews

[Paulo "paper books only" · Rating 3 out of 5]

I also read this in one day. The first tale is about the construction of a maze by a man ridden with guilt. Really liked the built up, didn't enjoy the ending.
Second is quite short, 2 pages, 4 sheet of nothing... sorry
Third story is quite interesting because I innitially thought, okay perverted people following girls on only-fans, other social media, and then sleeping with guys on a side note. The ending was confusing...

I really enjoy his tales, the endings are always quite unsatisfying. 50/100

[The Smoog · Rating 3 out of 5]

I normally really enjoy Jeffrey Thomas's work, but I’m afraid this one fell a little flat for me. The first story was good but very anticlimactic, the second a flash-fiction piece which felt extremely familiar, and the third was kind of interesting, although I’m not really sure what the point of it was. Hopefully this book is just a blip, because everything else I’ve read from the author has been excellent.