|
Post by steppedonwolf on Sept 3, 2009 0:07:00 GMT
Just goes to show - be very careful with your typing when listing on Greedbay. I bet the seller was gutted, DLS?
|
|
|
Post by steppedonwolf on Sept 3, 2009 7:27:18 GMT
Oh, hang on - Buy It Now?
What else is this lunatic selling?
|
|
|
Post by Dreadlocksmile on Sept 3, 2009 9:04:03 GMT
Oh, hang on - Buy It Now? What else is this lunatic selling? Yep yep the book was Buy It Now for £3.99. Not the best of conditions, but not too bad. I need to get my hands on a copy of 'Bamboo Guerillas' now. One's bound to turn up at some point that doesn't go for too much (don't really want to shelll out more than a tenner for a copy tbh). Glad someone else appreciated the bargin of getting 'The Ghoul' for just £3.99. Jennifer turned to me and said "You're paying £4 for a knackered old copy of some secondhand paperback? ". She just doesn't understand!!!
|
|
|
Post by funkdooby on Sept 4, 2009 17:35:49 GMT
Are copies of The Ghoul scarce these days?
|
|
|
Post by Dreadlocksmile on Sept 5, 2009 8:14:42 GMT
Are copies of The Ghoul scarce these days? It is indeed squire. Copies hardly ever seem to turn up anywhere. This is the first time I've ever seen a copy that's been under £15 - £20.
|
|
|
Post by steppedonwolf on Feb 20, 2010 0:51:49 GMT
An article I wrote for Guynecology:
Blood or Rust: The Killing Fields of Smithland
“Violence is different from horror. The former sickens, the latter frightens. The icy touch on the back of the neck on a dark night is terrifying, the bloodied mutilated body is revolting. Graphic carnage is best avoided or not described in full, mutilation must have a reason that fits the story.” “Violence in the basic horror novel is acceptable but even then it need not be described in every gory detail.”
Two quotes from Writing Horror Fiction, by Guy N Smith (A&C Black, 1996). Guy N Smith is not a fan of graphic violence in literature. And yet his own books are full of scenes of stomach-churning violence: death, mutilation, disembowelment and bloodletting are the order of the day in the Crabs and Sabat sagas; animals on the rampage have their vengeance on Mankind in the most gruesome ways in books such as Carnivore, Abomination, Bats Out of Hell, and man’s (and woman’s!) own inhumanity to man is shown in shocking ways in books such as The Sucking Pit and Satan’s Snowdrop, and Thirst.
Or are they? The violence is there, certainly – and eye-watering stuff it is too. But apart from some notable exceptions when Guy does go completely over the top, the violence is not gratuitous. In certain cases it is implied rather than described: Deathbell (Hamlyn 1979) contains the memorable chapter title Blood or rust.
Referring to the strange coating on the clapper and the bell itself. Just like on the executioner sword wielded by Sabat in The Druid Connection (NEL 1983) it may be rust…it may be dried, ancient blood. We know all too well what it is, but to have that ambiguity there is a nice touch. An ambiguity that is certainly not present in the series for which he is best known:
“My ‘Crabs’ series are packed with violence but I think this is acceptable because the crustaceans themselves are of a fantasy nature…it is a fantasy situation; mutilations are expected when Man meets monster.” Again, from Writing Horror Fiction. (A&C Black 1996). This is an important point. The Crab books are hugely enjoyable and yet full of the most stomach churning scenes of carnage I have ever read. The crabs don’t kill their victims quickly.
Bartholomew the beachcomber has his arms and legs cut off before being disembowelled, as do so many of the victims in the saga such as the captain of the Japanese poaching trawler in Killer Crabs (NEL 1978).
“But the giant crab’s mutilations did not end with the severing of legs, arms and head. The pincers were cutting deep into the abdomen as it disembowelled the remnants of its victim, working faster now with an obvious zest.” And always, unconsciousness cruelly eludes them. Entrails are greedily slurped into the crustaceans’ gaping maws like bloody spaghetti. Bones are cracked open for the marrow. They don’t believe in waste – even the dry bones are consumed.
And let’s face it, the crabs get as good as they give, especially in Crabs on the Rampage (NEL 1981): “The human was forgotten as another stampede of lust churned the shallows. Neither compassion nor respect for the corpse of one of their own species, fighting amongst themselves, tearing and munching…scavengers cleaning up their own dead…an army that fed off its own ranks. Cannibals!”
Sick. Disgusting. But acceptable. Because as GNS says, they are fantasy creations. Indeed, some of the scenes of carnage are so over the top they are almost comical – and laughter helps to distance you from the realities of physical horror. On a side note, it’s quite obvious that Guy has a sense of humour that is evident in some of his killing scenes. One of my favourites is this from The Unseen (Sphere 1990):
“…for a fleeting moment Cain thought that the other had developed an additional eye. Between two orbs protruded what appeared to be a third, several times larger and starkly white, fixed unerringly, accusingly on the smaller man. It was encased in a crimson rim that widened and oozed twin trickles down the sides of the upturned nose. Then slowly, sedately, John Cutler sank down on to the turf, limbs spreading out in a posture of relaxation, rolled over as if it was his intention to sleep in the heat of the day. Except that he was dead, killed instantaneously, deliberately, by a golf ball precision-driven with the force of a rocket launcher.” And when the retired colonel sees him the response is: “’Good gracious, the poor fellow looks in a bad way. We need help…’”
Well, perhaps we all do. But back to the crabs… For me, the main appeal of the Crab books is not the physical violence. It’s about the gleeful destruction and chaos inflicted on Mankind that is the hallmark of a good ‘animals amok’ story. I’ve always seen the Crab books as the literary equivalent of an 18 rated Godzilla film - and the scenes of devastation as the crustacean armies attack human strongholds are highly cinematic. Who can forget the Battle of Barmouth (Night of the Crabs, 1974); the apocalyptic climax in the mangrove swamps (Killer Crabs, 1978) as well as the fabulous set pieces in Crabs on the Rampage (NEL 1981) such as the trashing of Westminster Bridge and the attempted escape through the Blackwall Tunnel.
These are balanced by smaller, but no less effective set pieces in the more secluded spots of the British Isles, where single protagonists rather than huge crowds and armies meet their end at the claws of the crabs. The opening scene of COTR is set in the Wash of East Anglia; the entire Origin of the Crabs (NEL 1979) is set in the remote parts of Scotland. Secluded spots, where the character is far from human contact or assistance, are a staple ingredient in most horror tales and are utilised effectively by GNS as he brings them to us with the detail that only a countryman with knowledge and respect for his environment can deliver.
The animals on the rampage theme is one that Guy has returned to again and again, with less fantastic and more realistic – and arguably more horrific – creatures of the natural world. Carnivore, Abomination, Bats out of Hell, Alligators, Snakes…the list goes on. Many have a sound ecological message, and can be read as moral warnings on man’s interference with the natural world. All contain gruesome set pieces with the aforementioned creature, and what makes these unique to the GNS world is the presentation of the creatures. In almost all of the animals amok books that I’ve read by Guy, the attacking animals take on human qualities. Take these two quotes from Locusts (Hamlyn 1979):
“Its eyes mirrored its hate. Its gloating. The fear was gone. It knew. It saw the advancing army and waited patiently, savouring the intervening seconds.”
“She wanted to tear her own gaze away, but again she found herself compelled to watch. Kill me, but let the boy go! A silent, useless plea that was mocked with taunting music. We’re going to kill both of you, crawl over you in our thousands, into every orifice, drive you mad, suffocate you. You’ll be squirming, screaming, praying for death that will be a long time coming. The boy will die first. His resistance will be less.”
And how about this from Abomination (Arrow 1986): “The ants were pouring into organised formations, a kind of military line-up in a macabre parade of sinister understanding and precision. Platoons, regiments. A preparation for battle.”
Critics may point out that animals – even fictional ones attacking mankind – are unlikely to behave in this way, but that is missing the point. What Guy is doing here is putting us into the shoes of the victims. This is how the creatures appear to be behaving. Giving humanistic traits to your monsters makes them far more terrifying.
And it’s not just not just the negative traits of a human villain that Guy imparts to his animals – have a look at this from The Dark One, (Zebra 1995):
“The elephant called again, this time a mournful, sorrowful note as if it had suddenly realised what it had done. Its trunk reached out and touched the mutilated body gently in what might have been a gesture of elephantine apology. Its head was bowed, it did not appear to notice the pain in its injured foot any longer.” A brilliant quote that reminds us that the consequences of physical violence are felt not just by the victims. Even the perpetrators suffer.
Going back to Locusts, many readers were disappointed by this as the scenes of locust attacks on humans are extremely rare. Guy is concentrating on creating a highly accurate and terrifyingly plausible tale of a civilised Western nation undergoing an environmental calamity of Biblical proportions. The effects of an animal invasion are not confined to people being eaten by animals – they include economic collapse, homelessness, and the breakdown of civilisation. Guy concentrates more on this than on the animal attacks, which makes the book a far more plausible and terrifying experience.
The breakdown of ordered society is a recurring theme of the GNS world. When the world is at threat, civilisation breaks down, martial law is declared…and desperation and despair brings out the most terrifying monster of all. The human being. Witness the apocalyptic scenes of society’s meltdown in Thirst (NEL 1980). Thirst II – The Plague (NEL 1987) follows a different track. Whereas the first novel described a major urban settlement turning into Hell on Earth, its sequel focussed on the small Welsh village of Bryn Gawr cut off from the outside world by a fierce snowstorm. The results of the poisoned water supply are no less devastating, but the smaller, isolated setting and the fewer number of characters mean this is a more intimate story.
Although there are some gruesome moments and some chilling slayings, it isn’t as apocalyptic as the first, but there are some scenes that are just as haunting. Witness Eileen Briggs’ demise at the hands of the carol singers in Chapter 16. Thirst II – The Plague isn’t so much a sequel as a companion piece to Thirst, cleverly giving two sides of the same story - the rapid descent into chaos of a major UK city and the slower decline into self-destruction of a tiny rural community. With this, the full impact of Weedspray and its legacy is made all too clear. Environmental catastrophe + human failings = true horror.
It’s the human element that is to the forefront in Satan’s Snowdrop (Hamlyn 1980). With the spirit of a Nazi torturer loose in a Swiss mansion, the most harrowing scenes for me are the images of victims flogged to death by Reichenbach, wielding his whip with an accuracy that would put Indiana Jones to shame: “Veronica saw the whip raised, staring transfixed as it found its mark unerringly between the splayed, futile defence of those juvenile fingers, gouging an eye in its sunken hole and dragging it out like a stoat seizing a rabbit from its burrow. A scream. The other eye hung by a thread, dangling above the gashed mouth. Blinded, the boy fell back, lying there as the lash continued its merciless flogging, destroying his bloody, mutilated face, whipping it into a scarlet mulch, spraying blood across the room…the frail body twitched but there was no respite as the whip continued to flay it, biting deep into the brittle bones, and only when the faint whimpering ceased did the tormentor stop.”
This is as far from the cartoon like quality of the Crabs books as you can get. Combine this with the dildo torture of Sergey Prokop’s wife in Fiend and you have the uncomfortable side of physical horror in fiction – sequences which could just have really occurred. And no-one – apart from the truly twisted – reads those sequences for enjoyment. I’m not even going to get started on Bamboo Guerillas!
Later works show a mellowing of GNS in terms of physical horror. His works of the Zebra era (1995-1998) are noteworthy for the lack of physical violence and more sophisticated plotting. Dead End and Water Rites are unique works – the former an incredibly original reworking of the classical myth of a man going into Hell to reclaim the woman he loves – and the latter a chilling Lovecraftian tale of a sinister cult seeking to reclaim dry land for the oceans. The threat of large scale flooding and the anguished hunt for a missing child are the overriding themes here, themes that are uncomfortably close to the daily headlines.
Very little gore. Hardly any killings. And two of his best works. And with Blackout (Severn House 2006) and The Cadaver (Severn House 2008) we have confirmation that Guy N Smith is moving away from pulp horror to more sophisticated realms of dark fantasy.
Blackout is a time-travel thriller with supernatural overtones and a nice twist ending and The Cadaver is more of a psychological drama than an out and out horror thriller. Kroll is a creepy character, there’s no doubt about that, but it’s the community’s reaction to him and his death that drive the story forwards. And one of the questions that raged in my mind as I came to the final page was: Who is the real monster here? Kroll – or the community that spurned him?
Maneater (Severn House, 2009) is Guy’s most recent novel, and harks back to the glory days of his pulp career with another tale of a beast on the rampage – in this case a big cat, just as we saw in Caracal (NEL 1980). We even have Gordon Hall, the hero of Guy’s first published novel Werewolf By Moonlight (NEL 1974) as the main protagonist!
However, there are no references to Gordon’s earlier adventures battling werewolves. It’s almost as though this Gordon Hall has come from a parallel world, one where the lycanthropes and other assorted nasties of the pulp horror world never existed. Couple this with the fact that the violence is restrained, used sparingly (and all the better for it – this is a taut thriller high on suspense with some real surprises) and the impression I was left with after finishing the book is that Guy is rewriting his own history as well as Gordon’s. Back to the very beginning, 1974 all over again…but Gordon Hall, like Guy, is following a different path.
Having said that, Guy N Smith knows all too well that violence and gore has its place in the real world. Chapter 10 contains one of the most horrifying scenes he has written. “The leopard had Edward in its mouth, the pram sheet caught up with its prey, trailing on the ground, spotted with crimson. A crunch, then blood spouted, a slimy mass swung to and fro like old man’s dribble.” A harrowing description of the remains of baby Edward, discovered by Gordon Hall, follows in chapter 11 which I won’t repeat here. It’s harsh, it’s terrifying…but it’s real life horror. Leopards take native children in their own lands – why should it be any different here when one is on the loose? Guy is moving away from graphic violence in his novels but he’s not going to shy away from using it when the story demands it. “Graphic carnage is best avoided or not described in full, mutilation must have a reason that fits the story.” Less is more. Perhaps the blood is rust after all...
|
|
|
Post by steppedonwolf on Apr 10, 2010 17:54:09 GMT
For all you fans of the Great Scribbler, there's a new Facebook group: Guy N Smith/Black Hill Books. They're up to 55 fans already, we'd like some more... www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Guy-N-Smith-BlacK-Hill-Books/344165736640?v=wall&ref=nf A karma will be given to every one who brings a new member!
|
|
|
Post by steppedonwolf on Apr 12, 2010 20:57:18 GMT
For all you fans of the Great Scribbler, there's a new Facebook group: Guy N Smith/Black Hill Books. They're up to 55 fans already, we'd like some more... www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Guy-N-Smith-BlacK-Hill-Books/344165736640?v=wall&ref=nf A karma will be given to every one who brings a new member! And the challenge is on to bring the fan list up to 100 by the end of the week. Chris Harvey has kindly posted some snaps of the 2003 convention on there - that's when Lionel Fanthorpe (biker vicar from Fortean TV) and his wife came down to visit. So, go on over and take a look. By the way, is it just me, or would Lionel Fanthorpe make a great Father Christmas? ;D www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/pages/Guy-N-Smith-BlacK-Hill-Books/344165736640?ref=ts
|
|
|
Post by ceriadelle on Apr 13, 2010 21:03:17 GMT
Did you send that article to Annie for the new GR - the facebook page is up to 85 fans
|
|
|
Post by ian on Apr 13, 2010 21:16:04 GMT
Hi Ceriadelle and welcome to BHN.
|
|
|
Post by steppedonwolf on Apr 13, 2010 21:17:55 GMT
Did you send that article to Annie for the new GR - the facebook page is up to 85 fans Hello Ceriadelle! Welcome to the forum. Care to tell us a bit about yourself on the Introduction thread? Yep, I sent the article off to Annie. I sent it on the blackhillbooks@hotmail address - they got the short story I sent them so hopefully they're considering the article as well. 85 fans now? Brilliant stuff. 100 by the end of the week should be no problem...
|
|
|
Post by ceriadelle on Apr 14, 2010 14:05:08 GMT
for some reason i decided to use a different name to the 1 i use on the other proboard - on there im ME. so you no who i am now
|
|
|
Post by steppedonwolf on Apr 14, 2010 16:58:07 GMT
for some reason i decided to use a different name to the 1 i use on the other proboard - on there im ME. so you no who i am now Aha! Thank you for that - but now we're wondering why you called yourself 'me' on the GNS board... Caracal was your first GNS book? It's a good 'un and no mistake. Did you want a pet caracal after reading it? I did, because I liked the ears...I know, I'm strange. But then, as a child, I used to sleep with a plastic shark instead of a teddy bear.
|
|
|
Post by ian on Apr 14, 2010 17:24:20 GMT
Now it all becomes clear. Heres hoping you continue to post miss Ceriadelle/me.
|
|