A demon is exorcised from a toe, a recovering addict takes on an ancient magus, an author is exposed to the strange totemic power of words, and a ruthless industrialist reaps what he sows during his foray into an unusual form of engineering. These are some of the ludicrous and unsettling delights to be found in Jeffrey Ford’s […]
Eric Schaller and Matthew Cheney have both been publishing short stories for well over a decade, and their debut story collections were released this year within weeks of each other. Schaller’s Meet Me in the Middle of the Air is published by Undertow and received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, who said that “Schaller is both […]
This post is part of an ongoing series on 101 weird writers featured in The Weird compendium, the anthology that serves as the inspiration for this site. There is no ranking system; the order is determined by the schedule of posts. Hagiwara Sakutarō (1886 – 1942) was a Japanese writer known primarily as one of the foremost poets of […]
The following article originally appeared on Scott Nicolay’s blog as the 8th entry in his Stories from the Borderland series which features original artwork by Michael Bukowski. Margaret St. Clair seems poised on the edge of rediscovery. Certainly few writers in speculative fiction are more deserving of a revival — or more undeservedly neglected. I know I am not alone in thinking […]
Conducted by Jeff VanderMeer Jeffrey Thomas and Scott Thomas are two of the most prolific brothers in the history of weird and horror fiction — with careers each spanning close to 30 years. Over that time they’ve published in numerous year’s best anthologies and had career highs with major publishers as well as critical acclaim in the small […]
This post is part of an ongoing series on 101 weird writers featured in The Weird compendium, the anthology that serves as the inspiration for this site. There is no ranking system; the order is determined by the schedule of posts. William Sansom (1912 – 1976) was an idiosyncratic English writer known for applying a surrealist’s sensibilities to the weird tale. Obscure […]
Last year, Weird Fiction Review took a close look at a nearly forgotten treasure of cosmic horror, The Rim of Morning by William Sloane. Following on our enjoyment of that two-novel collection, we decided to delve into a slate of other releases from New York Review Books Classics, one of seven imprints published by The New York Review […]
It’s one of the enduring mysteries of the fundamentalist tradition: the Bible, a book commonly taught to children, is filled with R‑rated horrors that would seem more at home in a Tarantino movie than a bedtime story. A twice-widowed woman seduces her father-in-law by the side of the road, as blackmail or a bargaining chip. A childless wife offers her […]
Rhys Hughes is a prolific Welsh writer of over thirty books, which include novels, stories, poetry, and essays. His work, tied to a planned cycle of 1,000 stories called Pandora’s Bluff, focuses on metafiction, horror, and the fantastical, often with a dose of absurdism and humor. Rhys’s stories have been praised by Weird luminaries that include Michael Cisco, […]
“Stories clawed and fanged, stories that feed on blood,” wrote Jean Muno in his story The Ghoul. It’s a line that neatly sums up Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Volume Two, edited by Kathe Koja and Michael Kelly (Undertow Publications). Within the pages of this collection lie stories of monsters that draw on the human body for […]