Product Description
Behind urban life, weird and horrific things fester.
The whispers and chills of things long gone… the promise of power from the darkness… the seduction of those that lie in the shadows… the occult is all around us: in town houses, in mansions, and in your very own street.
Editor Colin F. Barnes collected together fifteen stories by a cast of critically acclaimed authors from around the globe who look into the stygian gloom, explore the dark corners of our houses, and peer into the abyss of human temptation.
Featuring stories by: Gary McMahon, Ren Warom, Gary Fry, Mark West, K.T. Davies, Nerine Dorman, Alan Baxter, Adam Millard, Julie Travis, Jason Andrew, James Brogden, A.A Garrison, Jennifer Williams, Sarah Anne Langton, and Chris Barnham.
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AJ Sikes – :
I’ve been following Colin F. Barnes’s production with Anachron Press, going back to last summer when I heard he was releasing the first in his series of cyberpunk thrillers, Artificial Evil. The anthologies he’s put out with the press have been excellent, and Colin wins again with Urban Occult, a grand collection of the weird and odd and bizarre and, at times, downright uncomfortable as all get out.
Colin avoids gore for gore’s sake in his own writing and the tales he’s picked for Urban Occult match up with his preference for atmospheric and psychological horror. Gary McMahon’s “Just Another Job” is a perfect example, and his story opens the collection beautifully, drawing on occult trope to paint a frightening first scene.
The following tale, “Spider Daughter Spider,” by Jennifer Williams, was one of two stories to really put me off my pins. Williams wrote a haunting tale of psychological horror, with just enough visceral horror to make me put the anthology down for a week to refresh mind with lighter reading. That’s said by way of compliment. The story is just damn good. And really freaky.
From Williams’ story, we get a parade of the strange and haunting. Tales of youth run amok or out on a dare, love lost only to return with a vengeance, and freakish worlds tucked away beneath the veneer of city life. The penultimate tale, “A Kind of Love,” by A.A. Garrison, is the only one to leave me a bit flat. I wanted something more to happen, more development and a stronger sense of closure to the various plot threads at play. The final tale, Jason Andrew’s “A Simple Job,” is perfect counterpoint to the collection opener, and one of the best in the anthology. Hands down, this was a great set of tales and proof again of the quality we can expect from Anachron Press.
I’m also a writer, and took great joy from many of the tales in Urban Occult. I write on the weird side of the aisle, scribbling stories with a lot of strange characters in them, strange happenings and the like. So this was a GREAT collection to get my brain working on new story ideas. Seeing what other authors have done successfully opened my head to some possibilities that I would not have considered otherwise. These stories were great entertainment, although more than one got too dark for my tastes.
Most of all, these stories were inspiring, and I think that’s the best thing that can be said about the written word.