Fiction Recommendations

[Keel M.]

Lost by Gregory Maguire

[lizzieboo]

Johannes Cabal, Necromancer, by Jonathan L. Howard. It's by turns creepy, wickedly funny, and oddly affecting. (I'm presently reading the second book, Johannes Cabal, Detective, and I plan to snap up a copy of the third, Johannes Cabal: The Fear Institute when I get my next paycheck.)

Anything by Neil Gaiman, Jim Butcher, Connie Willis, Clive Barker, John Crowley...I'll add more when I think of them.

Thanks for all the great suggestions, folks...terrific thread!

[Taun]

In 1973 Dean R Koontz wrote a book called "The Haunted Earth"... Very good book with a lot of humor and some scares as well..

The premise is that an alien race visits the Earth and in the process unlocks all of Earths myths, monsters and legends... Years after the hero of the story forms a detective agency with a hell hound and they go about doing the usual "Sam Spade" type work - cheating spouses, embezzlement, stuff like that - but with a supernatural twist - a vampire can bite you but he must first read you your rights, etc...

I really recommend this book... It's not a typical Dean Koontz book so be prepared - if you are familiar with his writing...

[Taun]

Moorcock and Dick!

Though this was partially in jest - both authors Micheal Moorcock and Philip Dick are excellent... I especially enjoy Moorcocks' "Eternal Hero" series - particularly "The Jewel In The Skull", and "Elric of Melnibonie (sp)"...

[lizzieboo]

In 1973 Dean R Koontz wrote a book called "The Haunted Earth"... Very good book with a lot of humor and some scares as well..

The premise is that an alien race visits the Earth and in the process unlocks all of Earths myths, monsters and legends... Years after the hero of the story forms a detective agency with a hell hound and they go about doing the usual "Sam Spade" type work - cheating spouses, embezzlement, stuff like that - but with a supernatural twist - a vampire can bite you but he must first read you your rights, etc...

I really recommend this book... It's not a typical Dean Koontz book so be prepared - if you are familiar with his writing...

I love Koontz' "Odd Thomas" books. But right now I'm reading his 77 Shadow Street, and I am very disappointed. I'd read an excerpt from it and expected a somewhat old-fashioned ghost story with a twist related to the haunted building. It's less ghost story, more straightforward horror, and Koontz seems to be following the old Stephen King precept: "I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I will go for the gross out."

That is, Koontz seems to have settled for "going for the gross out." Given how genuinely scary the Odd Thomas books can be, he must have been off his game when he wrote 77 Shadow Street.

[None of the above]

Though this was partially in jest - both authors Micheal Moorcock and Philip Dick are excellent... I especially enjoy Moorcocks' "Eternal Hero" series - particularly "The Jewel In The Skull", and "Elric of Melnibonie (sp)"...

Absolutely. I've thumbed through a lot of Dick and endless Moorcock!

I can't believe that apart from one poor effort at Jerry Cornelius (The Final Programme), none of the Eternal Champion novels have been filmed.

If you ever fancy something similar try Jack Vance's 'Dying Earth' novels or Fred Saberhagen's 'Empire of the East' and his whole series of books of the swords.

Vance and Saberhagen are both absolutely first rate.

For that matter, if you are reading Saberhagen then check out the Berserker novels. Proper sci-fi

[Abramelin]

The 2 most famous ones: the Bible and the Qur'an: lots of action slaughter and mayhem, miraculaous healings, people walking on water, people flying to the skies on a white horse, spontaneously burning bushes, zombies rising from their graves, people trumpetting a huge wall to pieces, two people populating the whole earth, parting seas, angry gods, and so on, and so on.

I just love it.

.

Edited September 12, 2012 by Abramelin

[jackball74]

Gaiman's short fiction is great - I got hooked on him with "Closing Time". Also the McSweeney's Mammoth Treasuries are neat. And I recently found a book of short stories I had read years ago titled The Graveyard Companion by a father and son (Gray and Shaun Usher) - great tales, well written and creepy.

[MiskatonicGrad]

Anything by HP Lovecraft...

IMO he makes Stephen King's stories read like "Rebecca of Sunnybrooke Farm"...

H.P.'s whole cthulhu mytho's stories are awesome but you have to read Robert E. Howard's stories along those lines. Wow good stuff.

[buckskin scout]

In short fiction, I am fond of Ray Bradbury, Montague Rhodes James, Russell Kirk, Arthur Machen, and Guy de Maupassant.

Edited September 19, 2012 by Ambush Bug

[Wookietim]

In short fiction, I am fond of Ray Bradbury, Montague Rhodes James, Russell Kirk, Arthur Machen, and Guy de Maupassant.

I might also toss Connie Willis body of short stories into the discussion... She has a tendency to write a "Comedy of Manners" type story (Which are always good in her hands) but when she decided to go for the throat she could do it and make it look easy...