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The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 20

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by Stephen Jones (ed. )




  STEPHEN JONES lives in London, England. He is the winner of three World Fantasy Awards, four Horror Writers Association Bram Stoker Awards and three International Horror Guild Awards as well as being an eighteen-times recipient of the British Fantasy Award and a Hugo Award nominee. A former television producer/director and genre movie publicist and consultant (the first three Hellraiser movies, Night Life, Nightbreed, Split Second, Mind Ripper, Last Gasp etc.), he is the co-editor of Horror: 100 Best Books, Horror: Another 100 Best Books, The Best Horror from Fantasy Tales, Gaslight & Ghosts, Now We Are Sick, H. P. Lovecraft’s Book of Horror, The Anthology of Fantasy & the Supernatural, Secret City: Strange Tales of London, Great Ghost Stories, Tales to Freeze the Blood: More Great Ghost Stories and the Dark Terrors, Dark Voices and Fantasy Tales series. He has written Coraline: A Visual Companion, Stardust: The Visual Companion, Creepshows: The Illustrated Stephen King Movie Guide, The Essential Monster Movie Guide, The Illustrated Vampire Movie Guide, The Illustrated Dinosaur Movie Guide, The Illustrated Frankenstein Movie Guide and The Illustrated Werewolf Movie Guide, and compiled The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror series, The Mammoth Book of Terror, The Mammoth Book of Vampires, The Mammoth Book of Zombies, The Mammoth Book of Werewolves, The Mammoth Book of Frankenstein, The Mammoth Book of Dracula, The Mammoth Book of Vampire Stories By Women, The Mammoth Book of New Terror, The Mammoth Book of Monsters, Shadows Over Innsmouth, Weird Shadows Over Innsmouth, Dark Detectives, Dancing with the Dark, Dark of the Night, White of the Moon, Keep Out the Night, By Moonlight Only, Don’t Turn Out the Light, H. P. Lovecraft’s Book of the Supernatural, Travellers in Darkness, Summer Chills, Exorcisms and Ecstasies by Karl Edward Wagner, The Vampire Stories of R. Chetwynd-Hayes, Phantoms and Fiends and Frights and Fancies by R. Chetwynd-Hayes James Herbert: By Horror Haunted, Basil Copper: A Life in Books, Necronomicon: The Best Weird Tales of H. P. Lovecraft, The Complete Chronicles of Conan and Conan’s Brethren by Robert E. Howard, The Emperor of Dreams: The Lost Worlds of Clark Ashton Smith, Sea-Kings of Mars and Otherworldly Stories by Leigh Brackett, The Mark of the Beast and Other Fantastical Tales by Rudyard Kipling, Clive Barker’s A–Z of Horror, Clive Barker’s Shadows in Eden, Clive Barker’s The Nightbreed Chronicles and the Hellraiser Chronicles. A Guest of Honour at the 2002 World Fantasy Convention in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and the 2004 World Horror Convention in Phoenix, Arizona, he has been a guest lecturer at UCLA in California and London’s Kingston University and St. Mary’s University College. You can visit his website at www.stephenjoneseditor.com

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  The Mammoth Book of New Gay Erotica

  The Mammoth Book of New Terror

  The Mammoth Book of On the Edge

  The Mammoth Book of On the Road

  The Mammoth Book of Pirates

  The Mammoth Book of Poker

  The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance

  The Mammoth Book of Prophecies

  The Mammoth Book of Roaring Twenties Whodunnits

  The Mammoth Book of Sex, Drugs and Rock ’N’ Roll

  The Mammoth Book of Short Spy Novels

  The Mammoth Book of Sorcerers’ Tales

  The Mammoth Book of True Crime

  The Mammoth Book of True Hauntings

  The Mammoth Book of True War Stories

  The Mammoth Book of Unsolved Crimes

  The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance

  The Mammoth Book of Vintage Whodunnits

  The Mammoth Book of Women Who Kill

  The Mammoth Book of Zombie Comics

  THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF

  BEST NEW

  HORROR

  VOLUME TWENTY

  Edited and with an Introduction by

  STEPHEN JONES

  Constable & Robinson Ltd

  3 The Lanchesters

  162 Fulham Palace Road

  London W6 9ER

  www.constablerobinson.com

  First published in the UK by Robinson,

  an imprint of Constable & Robinson, 2009

  Collection and editorial material copyright © Stephen Jones 2009

  The right of Stephen Jones to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication

  Data is available from the British Library

  UK ISBN 978-1-84529-932-3

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  First published in the United States in 2009 by Running Press Book Publishers All rights reserved under the Pan-American and International Copyright Conventions

  This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or hereafter invented, without written permission from the publisher.

  9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Digit on the right indicates the number of this printing

  US Library of Congress number: 2008944135

  US ISBN 978-0-7624-3727-6

  Running Press Book Publishers

  2300 Chestnut Street

  Philadelphia, PA 19103-4371

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us on the web!

  www.runningpress.com

  Printed and bound in the EU

  CONTENTS

  Acknowledgments

  Introduction: Horror in 2008

  Front-Page McGuffin and the Greatest Story Never Told

  PETER CROWTHER

  It Runs Beneath the Surface

  SIMON STRANTZAS

  These Things We Have Always Known

  LYNDA E. RUCKER

  Feminine Endings

  NEIL GAIMAN

  Through the Cracks

  GARY McMAHON

  Falling Off the World

  TIM LEBBON

  The Old Traditions Are Best

  PAUL FINCH

  The Long Way

  RAMSEY CAMPBELL

  The Pile

  MICHAEL BISHOP

  Under Fog

  TANITH LEE

  Arkangel

  CHRISTOPHER FOWLER

  The Camping Wainwrights

  IAN R. MacLEOD

  A Donkey at the Mysteries

  REGGIE OLIVER

  The Oram County Whoosit

  STEVE DUFFY

  The New York Times at Special Bargain Rates

  STEPHEN KING

  Our Man in the Sudan

  SARAH PINBOROUGH

  “Destination Nihil” by Edmund Bertrand

  MARK SAMUELS

  The Overseer

  ALBERT E. COWDREY

  The Beginnings of Sorrow

  PINCKNEY BENEDICT

  The Place of Waiting

  BRIAN LUMLEY

  2:00 pm: The Real Estate Agent Arrives

  STEVE RASNIC TEM

  Necrology: 2008

  STEPHEN JONES & KIM NEWMAN

  Useful Addresses

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank David Barraclough, Kim Newman, Mandy Slater, Amanda Foubister, Rodger Turner and Wayne MacLaurin (www.sfsite.com), Hugh Lamb, Peter Crowther, Gordon Van Gelder, Barbara Roden, Andrew I. Porter, Johnny Mains, Robert T. Garcia, Mark Samuels, Simon Clark, David J. Schow, Tina Jens and, especially, Duncan Proudfoot, Pete Duncan and Dorothy Lumley for all their help and support. Special thanks are also due to Locus, Variety, Ansible and all the other sources that were used for reference in the Introduction and the Necrology.

  INTRODUCTION: HORROR IN 2008 copyright © Stephen Jones 2009.

  FRONT-PAGE McGUFFIN AND THE GREATEST STORY NEVER TOLD copyright © Peter Crowther 2008. Originally published in The Land at the End of the Working Day. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  IT RUNS BENEATH THE SURFACE copyright © Simon Strantzas 2008. Originally published in Beneath the Surface. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THESE THINGS WE HAVE ALWAYS KNOWN copyright © Lynda E. Rucker 2008. Originally published in Black Static Eight. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  FEMININE ENDINGS copyright © Neil Gaiman 2008. Originally published on Four Letter Word: Original Love Letters, February 14, 2008. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THROUGH THE CRACKS copyright © Gary McMahon 2008. Originally published in How to Make Monsters. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  FALLING OFF THE WORLD copyright © Tim Lebbon 2008. Originally published in The Second Humdrumming Book of Horror Stories. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE OLD TRADITIONS ARE BEST copyright © Paul Finch 2008. Originally published in Shades of Darkness. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE LONG WAY copyright © Ramsey Campbell 2008. Originally published in The Long Way. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE PILE copyright © Michael Bishop 2008. Originally published on Subterranean, Winter 2008. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  UNDER FOG copyright © Tanith Lee 2008. Originally published as “Under Fog (The Wreckers)” in Subterfuge. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  ARKANGEL copyright © Christopher Fowler 2008. Originally published on Exotic Gothic 2: New Tales of Taboo. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE CAMPING WAINWRIGHTS copyright © Ian R. MacLeod 2008. Originally published in PostScripts Number 17, Winter 2008. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  A DONKEY AT THE MYSTERIES copyright © Reggie Oliver 2008. Originally published on Exotic Gothic 2: New Tales of Taboo. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE ORAM COUNTY WHOOSIT copyright © Steve Duffy 2008. Originally published in Shades of Darkness. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE NEW YORK TIMES AT SPECIAL BARGAIN RATES copyright © Stephen King 2008. Originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, October/November 2008 and Just After Sunset: Stories. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  OUR MAN IN THE SUDAN copyright © Sarah Pinborough 2008. Originally published in The Second Humdrumming Book of Horror Stories. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “DESTINATION NIHIL” BY EDMUND BERTRAND copyright © Mark Samuels 2008. Originally published in PS Showcase #4: Glyphotec & Other Macabre Processes. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE OVERSEER copyright © Albert E. Cowdrey 2008. Originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, March 2008. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE BEGINNINGS OF SORROW copyright © Pinckney Benedict 2008. Originally published in Sonora Review No. 54, November 2008. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  THE PLACE OF WAITING copyright © Brian Lumley 2008. Originally published in The Ghost Quartet. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  2:00 PM: THE REAL ESTATE AGENT ARRIVES copyright © Steve Rasnic Tem 2008. Originally published in Crimewave 10: Now You See Me. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  NECROLOGY: 2008 copyright © Stephen Jones and Kim Newman 2009.

  USEFUL ADDRESSES copyright © Stephen Jones 2009.

  In memory of old friends

  Forrest J Ackerman

  and

  Christopher Wicking

  plus

  Fantasy Centre

  London’s last genre used bookstore

  INTRODUCTION

  * * *

  Horror in 2008

  FOLLOWING THE SURPRISE resignation of Jane Friedman, CEO of HarperCollins US, in June, executive editor of Children’s Books Ruth Katcher was fired after fifteen years with the company, and children’s executive editor Melanie Donovan was also let go in apparent cost-cutting measures. Several other editors and staff also lost their jobs.

  Having lost its Arts Council grant in January, British publisher Dedalus Books was in danger of having to close down after twenty-five years. The imprint mostly specialized in translations, including genre fiction.

  After twenty-nine years, the British weekly trade magazine Publishing News produced its final issue in July. Loss of advertising revenue was blamed.

  Bertelsmann sold its struggling North American Direct Group, which included the Science Fiction Book Club, to a private firm, and all the assets of the Greenwood Publishing Group were transferred to a California company. As a result, Greenwood closed its UK office in early December.

  With the global economic slowdown starting to bite, December 3 became “Black Wednesday” in the New York publishing industry when the mighty Random House, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Simon & Schuster all announced major firings, layoffs and restructuring of staff.

  Casualties included Irwyn Applebaum, president and publisher of the Bantam Dell group, who left after twenty-five years with the company.

  The following week Macmillan fired sixty-four people (4% of the company’s US workforce), while several other imprints announced pay and hiring freezes.

  In February, a survey of 3,000 people discovered that more than half of Britons thought that Sherlock Holmes was a real person. Probably even more worryingly, 47% of people believed that Richard the Lionheart was not real, almost 25% didn’t believe that Winston Churchill ever existed, and 3% were convinced that Charles Dickens was a fictional character.

  This perhaps comes as no surprise when, the p
revious month, Woolworths announced that it was launching a range of bedroom furniture online for young girls called “Lolita”. When it was pointed out that this was maybe not the most appropriate name, a spokesman for the soon-to-be-defunct British retail chain admitted that nobody at the company, or from the website responsible, had actually heard of Vladimir Nabokov’s 1955 novel, Stanley Kubrick’s 1962 movie adaptation, or even the 1997 remake.

  A study in March from the National Foundation for Educational Research discovered that comics and celebrity magazines have overtaken fiction books as children’s favourite reading matter in the UK.

  It did not help that, from September, English Literature A-level students could study books selected by teachers rather than compulsory set texts. Critics of the move said that it was another example of exams being “dumbed down” in Britain.

  That same month, compilers of Collins’ English dictionaries announced that they would have to cut certain obscure words for the forthcoming edition because there was not enough space for newer words. With the help of celebrity supporters and a public vote, words could be saved if it could be proved that they were still in popular usage. Among the words threatened with eradication were “Caliginosity” (darkness or dimness), “Exuviate” (to shed, skin or similar outer covering), “Fatidical” (prophetic), “Malison” (a curse), “Olid” (foul-smelling), “Periapt” (a charm or amulet) and “Vaticinate” (to foretell or prophesize).

  When NASA’s Phoenix space probe landed on the surface of Mars on May 25, it was carrying a DVD compiled by the Planetary Society of the United States containing “personal messages from visionaries of our own time to future visitors or settlers on Mars”. Made from a special form of silica glass designed to last for 500 years, the disc contained messages “from beyond the grave” by Arthur C. Clarke and US astronomer Carl Sagan, along with books and audios that helped shaped mankind’s impression of the Red Planet. These included works by Edgar Rice Burroughs and Leigh Brackett, a “Flash Gordon” story, and Orson Welles’ 1938 radio broadcast of War of the Worlds.

  October 26 was designated “World Zombie Day”, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. People dressed up as the walking dead in cities all over the world, with many using the event to raise money for charity.

 

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