Scan barcode
dnemec's review
3.0
This is my fourth foray into the Dark Screams series. As usual, it is a great mix of authors, both known and unknown, and an interesting mix of stories.
Tumor by Benjamin Percy is an interesting little story about a man and his brain tumor.
The Boy by Bentley Little is a twisted take on suburban living and outcasts.
However for me the standout was Frank Darabont's Walpuski's Typewriter. Most people recognize the name from film, not story writing. I don't think I even knew he wrote (besides screenplays, that is). The imagery in Walpuski's Typewriter was great - the old man, the typewriter's death, the demon's installation - all incredibly vivid. He was awfully funny, too. At the risk of giving something away, let's just say it's worth the time.
Tumor by Benjamin Percy is an interesting little story about a man and his brain tumor.
The Boy by Bentley Little is a twisted take on suburban living and outcasts.
However for me the standout was Frank Darabont's Walpuski's Typewriter. Most people recognize the name from film, not story writing. I don't think I even knew he wrote (besides screenplays, that is). The imagery in Walpuski's Typewriter was great - the old man, the typewriter's death, the demon's installation - all incredibly vivid. He was awfully funny, too. At the risk of giving something away, let's just say it's worth the time.
james7634's review
5.0
This volume was wonderful!
India Blue...was .... not for me.
But every other story was great.
Walpuski's Typewriter was a fun creature horror
The Boy was great Stepford Wives thriller
Tumor is great body horror
Twisted and Gnarled is Murder thriller
And The Palaver was sooo gross wonderful.
I highly recommend these stories and will be looking at purchasing these author's work.
India Blue...was .... not for me.
But every other story was great.
Walpuski's Typewriter was a fun creature horror
The Boy was great Stepford Wives thriller
Tumor is great body horror
Twisted and Gnarled is Murder thriller
And The Palaver was sooo gross wonderful.
I highly recommend these stories and will be looking at purchasing these author's work.
wellwortharead's review
4.0
I have said it before but I'll say it again. Dark Screams has quickly become one of my favorite Horror Anthology series of all time. I was thrilled to be able to grab an advance copy of this most recent installment, and excited to see new stories by 2 of my favorite authors Bentley Little and Kealan Patrick Burke.
"The Boy" by Bentley Little was brilliant. Once again Bentley Little is able to take an ordinary every day experience such as settling in to a new neighborhood, and turn it into something horrifying. Christine the happy house wife is pleased to meet her new neighbors and discover that they are also home during the day. They have lots in common and will be the best of friends. I wish I could say more without giving away too much. Suffice it to say this story was shocking and quite relevant to current attitudes and events.
"The Palaver" by Kealan Patrick Burke also hit a high note for me. Poor Oscar has virtually no customers left in his failing barber shop. He spends more time sweeping up hair that isn't there than he does plying his trade. He doesn't want to retire. "It was his father's business and his grandfather's before him." As he is readying to close one day a stranger walks in, and tells him a story that will change everything.
"Walpuski's Typewriter" by Frank Darabont was both humorous and gruesome. A struggling writer with unpaid bills and a broken typewriter makes the deal of a lifetime to get it repaired.
These were my 3 favorites in the collection and I will leave at that so as not to avoid any spoilers.
I would highly recommend this volume (along with all previous volumes) to any horror fan.
I received an advance copy for review.
"The Boy" by Bentley Little was brilliant. Once again Bentley Little is able to take an ordinary every day experience such as settling in to a new neighborhood, and turn it into something horrifying. Christine the happy house wife is pleased to meet her new neighbors and discover that they are also home during the day. They have lots in common and will be the best of friends. I wish I could say more without giving away too much. Suffice it to say this story was shocking and quite relevant to current attitudes and events.
"The Palaver" by Kealan Patrick Burke also hit a high note for me. Poor Oscar has virtually no customers left in his failing barber shop. He spends more time sweeping up hair that isn't there than he does plying his trade. He doesn't want to retire. "It was his father's business and his grandfather's before him." As he is readying to close one day a stranger walks in, and tells him a story that will change everything.
"Walpuski's Typewriter" by Frank Darabont was both humorous and gruesome. A struggling writer with unpaid bills and a broken typewriter makes the deal of a lifetime to get it repaired.
These were my 3 favorites in the collection and I will leave at that so as not to avoid any spoilers.
I would highly recommend this volume (along with all previous volumes) to any horror fan.
I received an advance copy for review.
charshorrorcorner's review
4.0
3.5/5 stars!
Another entry in the, (overall), excellent DARK SCREAMS series is here, this time with a few surprising authors. I've listed what I thought were the standout tales below.
My favorite story in this volume has to be WALPUSKI’S TYPEWRITER from Frank Darabont. Known for his work directing movies like The Green Mile and The Shawshank Redemption, I had no idea the man wrote stories. This one was dedicated to Stephen King and it even has that SK vibe to it-reminding me a lot of King's early story THE MANGLER . In this case, the machine gone-wild is a typewriter and Darabont doesn't hold back. I LOVED this tale!
Coming in a close second for me though, was Kealan Patrick Burke's THE PALAVER. Those of you who have read Kealan's work in the past may already be familiar with the town of Milestone and be as happy as I was to return. There is something about human hair that creeps me out and Kealan takes that creep factor and amps it up to eleven. Just thinking about it makes me shiver!
I enjoyed THE TUMOR by Benjamin Percy as well. I believe this is the first story I've read from this author and I'm going to have to track down some more.
DARK SCREAMS 8 delivers the goods once again. Not all the stories resonated with me, but that's not unusual. The ones that did resonated deeply and that's what keeps me coming back to this series again and again.
Recommended!
Available on Halloween! Pre-order yours here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N18W7W0/chashorcor-20
*An e-ARC was provided by the publisher in exchange for my honest review. This is it.*
Another entry in the, (overall), excellent DARK SCREAMS series is here, this time with a few surprising authors. I've listed what I thought were the standout tales below.
My favorite story in this volume has to be WALPUSKI’S TYPEWRITER from Frank Darabont. Known for his work directing movies like The Green Mile and The Shawshank Redemption, I had no idea the man wrote stories. This one was dedicated to Stephen King and it even has that SK vibe to it-reminding me a lot of King's early story THE MANGLER . In this case, the machine gone-wild is a typewriter and Darabont doesn't hold back. I LOVED this tale!
Coming in a close second for me though, was Kealan Patrick Burke's THE PALAVER. Those of you who have read Kealan's work in the past may already be familiar with the town of Milestone and be as happy as I was to return. There is something about human hair that creeps me out and Kealan takes that creep factor and amps it up to eleven. Just thinking about it makes me shiver!
I enjoyed THE TUMOR by Benjamin Percy as well. I believe this is the first story I've read from this author and I'm going to have to track down some more.
DARK SCREAMS 8 delivers the goods once again. Not all the stories resonated with me, but that's not unusual. The ones that did resonated deeply and that's what keeps me coming back to this series again and again.
Recommended!
Available on Halloween! Pre-order yours here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N18W7W0/chashorcor-20
*An e-ARC was provided by the publisher in exchange for my honest review. This is it.*
mikekaz's review
4.0
DARK SCREAMS: VOLUME EIGHT would probably fall into the upper-middle ranking of the Dark Screams series. A good book with enjoyable stories but also a couple that fell short. On the plus side though, two of the stories worked away on my subconscious afterwards. I found myself thinking about them and pondering the events and characters and what happened. I've listed the stories below in my order of least favorite to most.
"Twisted and Gnarled" by Billie Sue Mosiman - Unfortunately this story did nothing for me. I didn't feel for any of the characters. The mystery / chase that made up the plot seemed forced. Much of the story is told by a serial killer who by definition could have been an unreliable narrator but his story was too straight-laced to be unreliable.
"Tumor" by Benjamin Percy - This story ended way too fast and was a quick tonal shift. Percy was describing most of the story in loving detail. The miscellaneous blood and guts. The events happening to the main character. And then suddenly on the last page of the story, the descriptions became vague. The gore was hidden. Plus the ending didn't seem to flow with the characters as we had seen them. I was basically thrown off and very disrupted by the ending. And not in a good scary type of way.
"The Palaver" by Kealan Patrick Burke - Burke weaves a tale within a tale with a moral in both stories that goes missed by the main characters. It was a very nice tale of how the monsters aren't always the true monsters of the story. I didn't find the scary parts with hair growth that scary but my wife would have freaked out, so I can definitely appreciate it from that angle.
"The Boy" by Bentley Little - Little is great at making parts of our every day life scary. He finds things in suburbia that are frightening. The normal rules of society that when streched can leave us powerless and afraid. I'm thinking here specifically of his novels THE ASSOCIATION and THE STORE and THE RESORT. This short story isn't as strong as those novels but I found it eating away at me a few days later. A sign to me of a good or great story.
"Walpuski's Typewriter" by Frank Darabont - When I started this story, I could have sworn I read it before. The title seemed so familiar. I quickly realized that I had not because I didn't remember anything about the story. And it's definitely a story that I would remember. It's fun, scary, and pretty creepy. The story has a feel back to the 80s and early 90s horror. Demons, hunger escalations, animal deaths, and finally a comeuppance.
"India Blue" by Glen Hirshberg - There is a lot squished into the final story of the book. The characters are richly developed; I heard all of their voices inside my head with their own accents and rhythm. The town and stadium are also flushed out and easily pictured. And probably best of all, I liked everyone even seeing and knowing their flaws. Who doesn't want to cheer the underdog as he tries to introduce Cricket to central California? An endeavor that we know will fail but not how badly it will fail. And just like Bentley Little's "The Boy", this story ate away at me afterwards.
"Twisted and Gnarled" by Billie Sue Mosiman - Unfortunately this story did nothing for me. I didn't feel for any of the characters. The mystery / chase that made up the plot seemed forced. Much of the story is told by a serial killer who by definition could have been an unreliable narrator but his story was too straight-laced to be unreliable.
"Tumor" by Benjamin Percy - This story ended way too fast and was a quick tonal shift. Percy was describing most of the story in loving detail. The miscellaneous blood and guts. The events happening to the main character. And then suddenly on the last page of the story, the descriptions became vague. The gore was hidden. Plus the ending didn't seem to flow with the characters as we had seen them. I was basically thrown off and very disrupted by the ending. And not in a good scary type of way.
"The Palaver" by Kealan Patrick Burke - Burke weaves a tale within a tale with a moral in both stories that goes missed by the main characters. It was a very nice tale of how the monsters aren't always the true monsters of the story. I didn't find the scary parts with hair growth that scary but my wife would have freaked out, so I can definitely appreciate it from that angle.
"The Boy" by Bentley Little - Little is great at making parts of our every day life scary. He finds things in suburbia that are frightening. The normal rules of society that when streched can leave us powerless and afraid. I'm thinking here specifically of his novels THE ASSOCIATION and THE STORE and THE RESORT. This short story isn't as strong as those novels but I found it eating away at me a few days later. A sign to me of a good or great story.
"Walpuski's Typewriter" by Frank Darabont - When I started this story, I could have sworn I read it before. The title seemed so familiar. I quickly realized that I had not because I didn't remember anything about the story. And it's definitely a story that I would remember. It's fun, scary, and pretty creepy. The story has a feel back to the 80s and early 90s horror. Demons, hunger escalations, animal deaths, and finally a comeuppance.
"India Blue" by Glen Hirshberg - There is a lot squished into the final story of the book. The characters are richly developed; I heard all of their voices inside my head with their own accents and rhythm. The town and stadium are also flushed out and easily pictured. And probably best of all, I liked everyone even seeing and knowing their flaws. Who doesn't want to cheer the underdog as he tries to introduce Cricket to central California? An endeavor that we know will fail but not how badly it will fail. And just like Bentley Little's "The Boy", this story ate away at me afterwards.
More...