Look Out For … Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix
“This is either going to be a work of genre-bending genius, or a honourable failure.”
Something strange is happening at the Orsk furniture superstore in Cleveland, Ohio. Every morning, employees arrive to find broken Kjerring wardrobes, shattered Brooka glassware, and vandalized Liripip sofa beds; clearly, someone or something is up to no good. To unravel the mystery, five young employees volunteer for a long dusk-till-dawn shift and they encounter horrors that defy imagination. Along the way, author Grady Hendrix infuses sly social commentary on the nature of work in the new twenty-first century economy.
A traditional haunted house story in a contemporary setting (and full of current fears), Horrorstör comes conveniently packaged in the form of a retail catalogue, complete with illustrations of ready-to-assemble furniture and other, more sinister accessories. We promise you’ve never seen anything quite like it!
Why We’re Excited About This Book: Well, this one could go either way. It’s either going to be a work of genre-bending genius, or a honourable failure. There’s no middle ground for this kind of concept: a horror story written in the form of a retail catalogue for a furnishing store (the publisher strenuously denies any resemblance to Ikea…). It includes floor-plans, assembly instructions, and an author’s biography in the style of an employee name-badge. In short, Horrorstor looks to be the most visually inventive genre novel since Mark Z. Danielewski’s House of Leaves. Hopefully it will also share with House Of Leaves a genuinely frightening and modern horror story beneath all the visual brio. As both books seems to be variations on the classic haunted house theme, the signs are good.
This Book Will Appeal To: readers who always feel a crippling sense of angst and horror when furniture shopping with a loved one (unless it’s for a new bookcase).
Horrorstor is out on the 23 Sep 2014 from Quirk Books.
Look Out For … The End by Gary McMahon
“Promises McMahon’s distinctive combination of brutal imagery and emotional depth.”
Forget zombies, they were only the beginning… This is The End.
A strange suicide plague grips the city of London, tearing apart the fabric of society. To escape this madness, a small group of strangers must journey north in search of safety. Everyone and everything must eventually come to an End, but in this case it happens quicker and with more savagery than anyone could ever have imagined. When chaos reigns and things start to fall apart, The End might be closer than you think…and sometimes The End is really the beginning of something much worse…
Why We’re Excited About This Book: There must be something in the water – only a few months after Richard Farren Barber’s excellent The Sleeping Dead about a mysterious epidemic of suicides, we get Gary McMahon’s take on a similar theme. What it says about the times we live in that two such talented writers are attracted to such an idea is probably not something to think about. Fortunately both books are different enough to be essential reading. The End is an apocalyptic story, featuring a group of strangers trying to flee the strange suicides and zombie-like creatures ‘The Leftovers’ and it promises McMahon’s distinctive combination of brutal imagery and emotional depth.
Gary McMahon’s sparse, downbeat and downright terrifying novels are some of the finest the genre has to offer at the moment, and The End looks likely to cement that reputation.
This Book Will Appeal To: those who know the end times are coming. And Richard Farren Barber.
The End is out on 15 September 2014 from NewCon Press.
JAMES EVERINGTON
