by John Everson
Turned out, Shane really loved my work and slotted me for a hardcover release.
I had hit the big time!
At least, it felt like it back then. I spent the next few months suggesting and re-editing the stories, and looking for artists I liked on the Internet to solicit for the cover art (I found Andrew Shorrock’s work and he did an amazing cover). I asked P.D. Cacek, who I had met at the World Fantasy Convention in 1997, and whose work had appeared in the Hot Blood anthology series, if she would consider introducing the collection. Both she and Andrew agreed, and slowly, the book took shape. At the time he was creating the art, roses were out of season in the part of the UK that Andrew lived in, so I actually bought, scanned in and emailed him the rose that appears on the cover so that he could use as part of the art… and later, after his initial collage inspired the book's final story, “Bloodroses,” I sent him some handwritten prose from the story which ended up being included at the bottom of the final cover treatment.
Cage of Bones & Other Deadly Obsessions originally was released as a signed, limited-to-300-copies edition in October, 2000. It was a black-bound hardcover with gold foil stamping. Andrew Shorrock’s cover art illustration was printed on the inside, because Delirium didn’t print dustjackets. However, I had suggested to Shane on a couple occasions that he might get more bookstore distribution if his releases had normal dustjacket book covers, and so a month after Cage of Bones was released, he decided to dive into that market, and retroactively issued a dustjacket for Cage of Bones, which was shipped to anyone who had ordered the collection. From that point on, most of Delirium’s releases had dustjackets.
Cage of Bones received good reviews (including one in Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine – which was a coup for me, since that was a magazine I had read religiously as a teen!) but since Delirium’s business model was “limited editions,” ultimately it disappeared from easy access for many years. I saw copies pop up and sell on eBay for as much as $150 at one point in the mid-2000s.
In 2010, at the dawn of the e-book revolution, Shane re-issued the title as an e-book on his Darkside Digital imprint, but that edition was lacking P.D. Cacek’s introduction, as well as the short introductions I had written to all of the stories. It also had a slightly different cover text treatment. When I got the rights back to the book in 2013, I reinstated the introductions and original cover art for this Dark Arts Books re-release – which also will make the book available in trade paperback for the first time ever.
It’s been 13 years since its original publication, and I still think some of these tales are the best – and most daring – things I’ve written. I hope you found some fun in them – because they were definitely a lot of twisted fun to write.
Dark Dreams, indeed!
– John Everson
Naperville, IL
July, 2013
About The Author
John Everson has developed a deep fascination with the culinary joys of jalapenos and New Mexican chiles over the past decade-plus since the original edition of Cage of Bones, his first book was published. His favorite band remains The Cure, but he was first in line to buy the new Ke$ha CD. Over the past decade, he has authored seven horror novels and dozens of short stories.
His short work, ranging from light fantasy to erotic horror, has appeared in anthologies like Best New Zombie Tales (Vol. II), Best New Werewolf Tales (Vol. I) The Necro Files: Two Decades of Extreme Horror, The Green Hornet Case Files and many more. His fiction has also appeared in a variety of magazines, including Dark Discoveries, Grue, Literary Mayhem, Doorways, Bloodsongs, Dead of Night, Terminal Fright and Sirius Visions.
In October of 2000, many of his erotic horror tales were collected and published in hardcover by Delirium Books as Cage of Bones and Other Deadly Obsessions. A second collection, Vigilantes of Love, originally published by Twilight Tales, followed three years later. His more recent fiction collections include Needles & Sins, Creeptych and Deadly Nightlusts.
Over the past decade, Everson has written seven novels – Covenant, Sacrifice, The 13th, Siren, The Pumpkin Man, NightWhere and Violet Eyes. His first novel, Covenant, won a Bram Stoker Award upon its original limited edition release through Delirium Books in 2004. It was later reissued in mass market paperback. NightWhere was a 2012 Bram Stoker Award Finalist.
Everson is the publisher of Dark Arts Books (www.darkartsbooks.com), a member of the Horror Writers Association (HWA), a past participant and publications director for the Twilight Tales Reading Series and has served as a longtime copyeditor for Necro Publications and Cemetery Dance. From 1999-2002, he served as a fiction editor for Dark Regions magazine.
Despite an omnipresent nagging dream of relocating to warmer climes, John still lives in the west ‘burbs of Chicago with his wife Geri, his son Shaun, and three petulant birds.
Find out more about his fiction, art and music at www.johneverson.com.
