Susan Hill’s first ghost novel, 1983’s The Woman in Black, had recently surprised this reader by being one of the scariest modern-day horror outings that I’ve run across in years. Thus, I decided to see if lightning could possibly strike twice, and picked up her more-recent The Small Hand (2010). This latter title is the fourth of Ms. Hill’s five ghost novels to date, following The Mist in the Mirror (1992) and The Man in the Picture (2007),
October 18th, 2017. Sandy Ferber´s rating: 4 | Susan Hill | Horror, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
The Beyond directed by Lucio Fulci
In the 1977 film The Sentinel, a character played by Cristina Raines moves into a Brooklyn Heights apartment building that, as it turns out, sits above the gateway to Hell. But as Italian director Lucio Fulci shows us in the third picture of his so-called Zombie Quartet, 1981’s The Beyond (which picture followed 1979’s Zombie and 1980’s City of the Living Dead and preceded that same year’s House By the Cemetery), there are actually SEVEN gateways on Earth that lead down to the infernal nether regions!
October 18th, 2017. Sandy Ferber | Film / TV, Horror | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
Fans of the Deadlands tabletop RPG series will be happy to know that Boneyard (2017), Seanan McGuire’s addition to the two previously published tie-in novels Ghostwalkers (2015) and Thunder Moon Rising (2016), is chock-full of Weird West goodness, steampunk-style mechanical creations, and mighty strange bumps in the night. Fans of McGuire’s fiction will be happy to know that Boneyard’s weirdness is matched by a strong and complicated main character,
October 17th, 2017. Jana Nyman´s rating: 4 | Seanan McGuire | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
The Fall of the Kings by Ellen Kushner & Delia Sherman
Ellen Kushner published Swordspoint in 1987. It gathered a swarm of fans who loved the prose, the magicless world with its glittering veneer and cloak-and-dagger intrigue, and the love story at its center. Readers clamored to know more of steadfast, enigmatic swordsman Richard St.Vier and his lover, the brilliant, neurotic noble Alec Campion.
In 2003, Ellen Kushner, writing with Delia Sherman, published The Fall of the Kings.
October 17th, 2017. Marion Deeds´s rating: 2 | Delia Sherman, Ellen Kushner | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
Tokyo Gore Police directed by Yoshihiro Nishimura
Those viewers who thought the pyrotechnic gore FX of Yoshihiro Nishimura in the 2001 cult item Suicide Club to be a bit too over the top may want to hold on to their seats and wrap themselves in a full-length rubber coverall as Tokyo Gore Police begins to unspool. Living up to its title in spades, this 2008 offering does indeed give us a look at the cops in Japan’s capital city in the near future, and ladles out more of the red stuff than The Wild Bunch,
October 17th, 2017. Sandy Ferber | Film / TV, Horror | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |
The Ship of the Dead by Rick Riordan
When Naglfar ― a ship made out of the fingernails and toenails of the dead, eek! ― sets sail, carrying hordes of giants and zombies warriors to fight the gods of Asgard, Ragnarok and a world-ending battle aren’t far behind. Ragnarok can’t be entirely avoided (unfortunately, it’s an inevitable prophecy), but perhaps it can be delayed for a while longer?
As The Ship of the Dead (2017), the third and final book in Rick Riordan‘s MAGNUS CHASE AND THE GODS OF ASGARD series,
October 16th, 2017. Tadiana Jones´s rating: 3.5 | Rick Riordan | Children | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
Cast No Shadow by Nick Tapalansky & Anissa Espinosa
Cast No Shadow, written by Nick Tapalansky and illustrated by Anissa Espinosa, is a mostly muddled graphic story that mixes the paranormal, teen romance/angst, and coming of age in a blend that never really coheres.
Greg Shepard is a boy born without a shadow in a small town whose mayor regularly tries to rejuvenate the town via a string of cheap tourist-trap draws (The World’s Biggest fill-in-the-blank). Being without a shadow is the least of his issues though: his mother died when he was young,
October 16th, 2017. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2.5 | Comics | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
Inferno directed by Dario Argento
In Dario Argento’s 1977 masterpiece, Suspiria, the viewer learns that the ballet school known as the Tanz Akademie, in Freiburg, Germany, was the home to a coven of witches led by a being later revealed to be the Mater Suspiriorum, Latin for “Mother of Sighs.” And three years later, in Argento’s semisequel, Inferno, the viewer learns something even more disturbing. The Mother of Sighs, the oldest, was apparently only one of three sister entities; living somewhere in Rome, there exists the Mater Lacrimarum (Mother of Tears),
October 16th, 2017. Sandy Ferber | Film / TV, Horror | SFF Reviews | no comments |
In this column, I feature comic book reviews written by my students at Oxford College of Emory University. Oxford College is a small liberal arts school just outside of Atlanta, Georgia. I challenge students to read and interpret comics because I believe sequential art and visual literacy are essential parts of education at any level (see my Manifesto!). I post the best of my students’ reviews in this column. Today, I am proud to present a review by Jacob Brummeler:
Jacob Brummeler is a sophomore at Oxford College of Emory University and is pursuing a double major in Playwriting and Media Studies.
October 14th, 2017. Brad Hawley´s rating: 5 | Alan Moore | Comics | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Bloodstained Shadow directed by Antonio Bido
A practically goreless giallo coming fairly late in that genre’s cycle, The Bloodstained Shadow (1978) yet manages to provide all the requisite thrills that Eurohorror fans might reasonably expect. This was the second picture from director Antonio Bido, whose initial giallo entry, The Cat With Jade Eyes (aka Watch Me When I Kill), released the year before, seems almost forgotten today. Drawing liberally from 15 years’ worth of giallo tropes and conventions preceding it (Bido, on this Anchor Bay DVD,
October 13th, 2017. Sandy Ferber | Film / TV, Horror | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
If the state of the arts puzzles you, and you wonder why so many novels are "retellings" and formulaic rework,…
I picked my copy up last week and I can't wait to finish my current book and get started! I…
Gentlemen, I concur! (Forgive me for jumping into your convo)
The cover is amazing. I love how the graphic novel (and the review!) hewed close to the theme of "good…
I've thought about picking that one up. The artwork looks perfect.