I'll continue doing it because I know I can... Of course I've continued my feat of re-harvesting the work of Graham Masterton, one of the most exciting horror/suspense authors of our time...
Walkers (1989) is the second and last part of the earlier mentioned GM omnibus and though it's quite different from its side-kick Feast/Ritual, it still keeps up the complete intensity and boosts it up little further. Jack Reed accidentally stumbles across an almost forgotten Gothic building, deep in the Michigan woods and immediately wants to buy it and turn it into country club in grand style. The problem is that it used to be a mental assylum for the worst criminally insane. And worse: the inmates suddenly decided to quit the place -- by reciting ancient druid magic that gives them total control of all elements, and thus allowing them to disappear into the walls of the building. There they were trapped by a Catholic priest. However, they kidnap Jack's son and use him as a way of coercing him to finally let them free. But it will take many sacrifices to bring the inmates their ultimate freedom... This is a strange novel with people being able to move into walls and through the earth as if it were only air itself; it is also filled, in usual Masterton style, with some of the most gruesome and painful deaths conceivable. All in all a great novel, not as good as Ritual but still very, very entertaining and unputdownable. Grade: 9
Mirror (1988): My gosh! This was not the first book (that was Death Dream) but the first and only book by the man I bought in English at the local bookstore. I read it during a few tempestous days while our new appartment was being re-modelled. I got it, as always, due to the outrageously cruel pictures on the covers and dustjacket. What's inside was a strange interpretation of the tale Alice Through The Looking Glass: The Hollywood screenwriter Martin has found a mirror that used to belong to the 30s child star known as Boofuls. The famous, eight-year-old boy was hacked to pieces in front of that mirror by his own grandmother. And now, through that mirror, he comes back and demands that his unfinished musical may finally be finalized. When theatres open all of the world, that musical will bring forth the Devil... There are some great scenes in this great vintage-like story that makes you shudder the next time you look at yourself in the mirror. Not as bloody as really spooky and downright macabre and absurd! Grade: 9
The Sleepless (1993): This is definately the most strange Masterton book I've ever read. Beside the most brutal and unimaginably tortures and depravities ever put on paper, this novel waves a far-fetched, nonetheless cleverly crafted, intrique weaving together biblical mythology with myths of vampyrism, the divine need for adrenaline and a people that cannot ever sleep... Unfortunately, The Sleepless is a bit too convoluted for my taste and not as "breathtaking" as some other perusings he's entertained us. Grade: 7
Flesh & Blood (1994): Why this ridiculously embarrassing and underachieving title on such a masterful work? Certainly, it's about flesh and blood... but not in a Z-grade manner, not at the least. This tale undoubtedly brings the reader food for thought as it blends the mytholgy of The Green Traveller, or Janek-the-Green, who is a farmer that according to legend was sacrified and turned into a hybrid of man and tree. This thing has to travell with his few followers to bring the farmers healthy crops -- the only thing you have to do is invite him in ... so he can go to bed with your wife and 36 years later have his reward for the good havests -- the guts and blood of your children and grandchildren... Aside from these horrors, there's the great hog Captain Black that has gotten a brain implant from a child that was brutally murdered by his farther in order to save himself and his children from the Green Traveller. But it doesn't end here: There are the politicians and animal rights activists that are trying to pass a law against using animals in any way, may it be research or food... All these three parts come together magnificently in this story. Perhaps it is the best he's ever written. Grade: 10
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