Category: Horror Stories

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Sandkings – A DC Science Fiction Graphic Novel


By George R. R. Martin, adapted by Doug Moench, Pat Broderick & Neal McPheeters (DC Comics)
ISBN: 0-930289-20-X

During the 1980s DC, on a creative roll like many publishers large and small, attempted to free comics narrative from its previous constraints of size and format as well as content. To this end, legendary editor Julie Schwartz called upon contacts from his early days as a Literary Agent to convince major names from the prose fantasy genre to allow their early classics to be adapted into a line of Science Fiction Graphic Novels.

This macabre and compelling novelette by George R.R. Martin was first published in the August 1979 issue of Omni Magazine and has won a bunch of literary glittering prizes including the Hugo, Nebula and Locus Poll Awards.

In 1995 it was rather harshly re-imagined as the debut episode of the relaunched TV anthology series The Outer Limits, premiering on 26 March: a terrifying parable of cruelty and obsession. Good as it was, this version pales into insignificance when compared to the prose original’s tone and setting, which adaptors Doug Moench, artist Pat Broderick, painter/colourist Neal McPheeters and lettering mastermind Todd Klein have scrupulously adhered to here.

As always, any adaptation – no matter how well executed – is absolutely no substiture for experiencing an artist’s work the way it was originally intended. So Go Read The Story. It’s one of the most reprinted and collected short stories of the last thirty years. However, as this is a place to review graphic novels, let’s proceed on the assumption that you already have or will…

The often inconsistent Broderick was on top form for this chilling cautionary tale of pride and human vice, perfectly augmented by the subtle tones of McPheeters whilst Moench’s idiosyncratic writing style is perfectly harnessed to catalogue the descent of Simon Kress, playboy, businessman, collector of alien animals and the planet Baldur’s most affluent closet sadist.

Kress is fascinated by animals. Not the cute, cuddly, unconditional love sort, but rather the kinds that rip and claw and eat each other. Returning from a trip he finds that his Earth Piranha had done just that, and his carrion hawk was gone too. Only his Shambler was still alive. His biggest regret was that he had missed all the action.

Bored and finding nothing interesting at his usual xeno-fauna outlets, he stumbles upon the strange emporium of traders Wo and Shade, and discovers the bizarre hive-mind arthropods dubbed Sandkings. Like ant colonies these creatures build homes and make war upon each other in a perpetual dance of resource redistribution. Their glass tank housed four queens or “Maws” who will produce colour-coded warriors to fight and drones to build beautiful hive-castles. To better produce new “citizens” the Maws can and will eat anything …

The creatures also possess a rudimentary telepathy, enough to assess the power of their owner, and reshape their environment to reflect and venerate his appearance. Relentless, creative killers that will worship him… how could any arrogant sociopath resist?

Soon the creatures are the toast of the playboy’s dissolute cronies. Parties where Kress’ debauched friends pit their pets against the Sandkings become legendary, and nothing can stand up to them: not Shamblers, Silver Snakes, Sand Spiders… No organic creature can survive long once it encroaches on their territory, since when not battling each other the creatures join forces to destroy any intruder. As the colonies increase in size, so necessarily does their tank. …

When Jala Wo checks up on her sale she finds most of the Sandkings thriving but one faction lags behind in castle-building. The Black, Red and White armies are healthy and vigorous, their eerie citadels displaying Kress’s face over and over again but the Orange bugs are suffering decline. Kress has been starving the creatures and wrecking their constructions to make them fight harder…

As the playboy sinks further into cruel depravity, his sickened girlfriend protests, even setting the planetary authorities on him. Judicious bribery easily solves that problem whilst the Sandkings themselves prove the perfect way to dispose of her. Unfortunately during her murder the tank breaks and the creatures all escape into the confines of his house and estate.

Panicked now, Kress goes on a bloody rampage, clearing up all the details (and witnesses) that could implicate him in murder and illegal xeno-form trafficking, but the damage is done. The Sandkings are loose, having staked new territory. Moreover they have declared war on the god who treated them so harshly… And that’s where the story really begins.

This chilling adaptation is comfortably traditional in its delivery, fully allowing the story to shine, and is a perfect companion to DC’s other adaptations. It a huge pity they’re all currently out of print. This is an experiment the company should seriously consider resuming and I’ll repeat what I’ve said before: all these previously published DC Science Fiction Graphic Novels would make an irresistible “Absolute” compilation…
Sandkings © 1979 Omni International, Inc.  © 1981 George R. R. Martin.  Illustrations © 1986 DC Comics Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

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Yragael: Urm


By Philippe Druillet (Dragon’s Dream)
ISBN: 9-063-325210

The fantasy tales of Lone Sloane revolutionised graphic fiction not only in Europe but especially in Britain and America when the baroque and bizarre cosmic odysseys began appearing in the adult fantasy magazine Heavy Metal, which combined original material with the best that “Old World” comics had to offer. By the time French comics collective Les Humanoides Associes launched the groundbreaking magazine Métal Hurlant in 1975, Philippe Druillet, one of their visual and philosophical big guns, had been creating new myths for nearly a decade…

Born in Toulouse in 1944, Druillet was born and raised in Spain, a photographer and artist who started his comics career in 1966 with an apocalyptic science fiction epic Le Mystère des abîmes (The Mystery of the Abyss) which introduced the doom-tainted Earthling, intergalactic freebooter and wanderer called Lone Sloane in a far distant future: a tale heavily influenced by HP Lovecraft and A.E. Van Vogt. Later influences included Michael Moorcock’s doomed anti-hero Elric (and I’m pretty sure I can see some Jack Kirby and Barry Windsor-Smith also tinting the mix…)

He began working for Pilote in 1969, and revived his mercurial star-rover for a number of short pieces which were first gathered together as a graphic novel in 1972. Prior to the large scale (310mm x 233mm) 1991 collection from NBM (see The Six Voyages of Lone Sloane and the later compilation Lone Sloane: Delirius).

Following these early epics he further stretched himself with the astounding, nihilistic, “End of Days” cosmic tragedies of the doomed prince Yragael and his child of ill fortune Urm.

Readers of Moorcock, August Derleth and particularly Jack Vance will recognise shared themes in the woeful tale of the last times of Earth where declining humanity is beset by gods and demons keen on recovering their lost power, on a blasted planet where men still intrigue and kill each other for gain. From this guttering chaos arises Yragael, a potential messiah who founders and falls due to pride and a ghastly liaison with the dire Nereis, witch queen of the living city Spharain…

One hundred years later in the devastated wastelands of the world, the grotesque hunchbacked spawn of that illicit union falls under the spell of mendacious demons and attempts to reclaim both parts of his heritage. Urm is stupid but passionate and his cataclysmic visit to the horrendous city reveals that the Last Men are just as much playthings of the gods as the monstrous bastard himself…

This is a graphic odyssey of utterly Byzantine narrative and Brobdignagian, baroque scale and scope. The storytelling is reduced to the merest plot, as the text (more pictorial accoutrement than dialogue facilitator) and art goes into emotional overdrive. This isn’t a tale told, it’s a mesmerising, breathless act of graphic expression. If it helps think of it as ballet or a symphony rather than a novel or play: you’re supposed to go “wow!” not “a-ha!”

The visual syntax and techniques originated in these non-stories dictated the shape of science fiction – especially in movies – for decades. Character and plot are again pared to pure fundamentals so that Druillet could fully unleash the startling graphic innovations in design and layout that churned within him, and which exploded from his pen and brain.

His brand of universal Armageddon achieved levels of graphic energy that only Jack Kirby has ever equalled, and this is another work crying out for re-release in large format with all the bells and whistles modern technology can provide, but until that distant tomorrow this book will have to do – and do very well.

Luckily for you it’s still widely available and remarkably inexpensive…
© 1974 Philippe Druillet/Dargaud Editeur. © 1975 Philippe Druillet/Dargaud Editeur. All rights reserved.

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Vamps


By Elaine Lee and Will Simpson (Vertigo)
ISBN: 978-1-56389-220-2

As a long overdue antidote to the deluge of lovey-dovey, kissey-poo tales of forbidden love between innocent modern maids and moody, tragic carriers of the Curse of the Night’s Children, here’s a reminder of a different sort of Vampire Tale – one that is sleazy, nasty and very, very scary…

Vampires are heartless, bloodsucking raptors that wander the night, slaughtering whomever they wish. In this story set in the Badlands of modern America, they’re still generally regarded as creatures of myth, but apart from not turning into bats all the usual movie lore applies: fast, strong, non-reflective, scared of stakes and sunlight. The big new wrinkle is that blood gets them crazy-dumb drunk…

Our epic ride follows the liberating run of five hungry, hot and horny undead bad-girls called Screech, Whipsnake, Skeeter, Mink and Howler who begin their longed-for emancipation by finally killing Dave, the male Vamp who “turned” them all, then lorded it over them like a fat and lazy lion in a savannah Pride. After staking and dismembering him the girls go on a wild spree across the States, riding Harley’s down Hell’s highways, killing bikers and ne’er-do-wells (and the odd innocent bystander) wherever they find them.

They’re completely unaware that one of them has been manipulating her sisters all along and orchestrating the seemingly random slaughter. As a private detective and Howler’s psychic – and still breathing – sister Jenny tracks them, the pack hits Las Vegas and we discover that when she was alive Howler was a stripper whose baby was taken from her by a corrupt judge and sold in a black market adoption deal. Dave’s destruction, the road-rage, everything has been a plan to get her baby back.

All the pieces and pursuers are headed for a bloody crash and climax when Howler finally locates her son, but there’s an unwelcome complication: Dave has pulled himself together and is really, really annoyed…

Far more True Blood than Twilight (and predating both by more than a decade) this fast-paced, sardonic and gorily wild ride of love and death is a spectacular and absorbing riot by two of the industry’s best and most unsung talents: sordid, sexy and totally compelling, riddled with far deeper metaphors than “unrequited love sucks”, Vamps is a solid reminder that there are such things as monsters and some beasts just won’t be tamed…
© 1994, 1995 DC Comics.  All Rights Reserved.

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The Squirrel Machine


By Hans Rickheit (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN:  978-1-60699-301-9

¡Perfect Present Alert!  For him or her – if they’re “Of Age”

Hans Rickheit was born in 1973 and has been producing skilfully crafted art in many different arenas since the early 1990s, beginning with self-published mini-comics and graduating to full-sized, full-length epics as well as dabbling in film, music, gallery works and even performance art. A Xeric award beneficiary, he came to broader attention in 2001 with the controversial graphic novel Chloe, and has since spread himself wide contributing to numerous anthologies and periodicals.

He has been called obscurantist, and indeed in all his beautifully rendered and realised concoctions meaning is layered and open to wide interpretation. His preferred oeuvre is the imagery and milieu of Victorian/Edwardian Americana which provided such rich fantasist pickings for Poe, Lovecraft and Derleth, and his meticulously clear line is a perfect counterpoint to the cloud of mystery and cosmic confusion engendered by the protagonists of his latest book The Squirrel Machine.

The brothers Edmund and William Torpor live in a secluded 19th century New England town but have never been part of the community. Raised alone by their artist mother they are quite different from other kids, and Edmund especially is obsessed with arcane engineering and assembling musical instruments from utterly inappropriate components.  Fantastic dream-like journeys and progressions mark their isolated existence, which is far more in tune with a greater metaphysical cosmos, but as puberty gradually moves them to an awareness of base human sexuality they find the outside world impacting theirs in ways that can only end in tragedy and horror…

Moreover, just where did the plans for the Squirrel Machine come from…?

Visually reminiscent of the works of Rick Geary, this is also a uniquely surreal and mannered design, a highly charged and subtly disturbing delusion that will chill and upset and possibly even outrage many readers but it is also compelling, seductive and hard to forget. As long as you’re an adult and braced for the unexpected, expect this to be one of the best books you’ll read this decade.

© 2009 Fantagraphics Books. Contents © 2009 Hans Rickheit. All Rights Reserved.

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Vlad the Impaler: the Man who was Dracula


By Sid Jacobson & Ernie Colón (Hudson Street Press/ Penguin Group USA)
ISBN: 978-1-59463-058-3

Sid Jacobson was a hard man to write about, preferring to let his work speak for him. As writer and editor he masterminded the Harvey Comics monopoly of strips for younger American readers in the 1960s and 1970s, co-creating Richie Rich and Wendy, the Good Little Witch among others, and then worked the same magic for Marvel’s Star Comics imprint, where as managing editor he oversaw a vast amount of family-friendly material; both self created – such as Royal Roy or the superb Planet Terry – and a huge basket of licensed properties,

In latter years he has worked closely with fellow Harvey alumnus Ernie Colón on such thought-provoking graphic enterprises as The 9/11 Report: a Graphic Adaptation (2006) and its 2008 sequel, After 9/11: America’s War on Terror. This year they released Che: a Graphic Biography of Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, the now-mythic icon of rebellion.

Ernie Colón was born in Puerto Rico in 1931: a creator whose work has been seen by generations of readers. Whether as artist, writer, colourist or editor his contributions have benefited the entire industry from the youngest (Monster in My Pocket, Richie Rich and Casper the Friendly Ghost for Harvey Comics, and many similar projects for Marvel’s Star Comics), to the traditional comicbook fans with Battlestar Galactica, Damage Control and Doom 2099 for Marvel, Arak, Son of Thunder and Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld, the Airboy revival for Eclipse, Magnus: Robot Fighter for Valiant and so very many others.

There are also his sophisticated experimental works such as indie thriller Manimal, and his seminal graphic novels Ax and the Medusa Chain. Even now he’s still hard at work on the strip SpyCat which has appeared in Weekly World News since 2005.

Jacobson and Colón together are a comics maven’s dream come true and their bold choice of biography and reportage as well as their unique take on characters and events always pays great dividends. Vlad the Impaler is by far their most fun project to date: a fictionalised account of the Wallachian prince who was raised by his enemies as a literal hostage to fortune, only to reconquer and lose his country not once, but many times.

The roistering, bloody, brutal life of this Romanian national hero, and tenuous basis of Bram Stoker’s Count Dracula, is a fascinating, baroque, darkly funny yarn, capturing a troubled soul’s battle with himself as much as the Muslim and Christian superpowers that treated his tiny principality as their plaything.

With startling amounts of sex and violence this book makes no excuses for a patriot and freedom fighter who was driven by his horrific bloodlust and (justifiable?) paranoia to become a complete beast: clearly the very worst of all possible monsters – a human one.

Sharp, witty, robust and engaging, with a quirky twist in the tale, this is a good old-fashioned shocker that any history-loving gore-fiend will adore.

Text © 2009 Sid Jacobson. Art © 2009 Ernie Colón. All rights reserved.

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The Zombie Survival Guide: Recorded Attacks


By Max Brooks & Ibraim Roberson (Duckworth)
ISBN:  978-0-71563-815-6

I’ve never been the biggest fan of zombie stories but occasionally something really tasty comes along and I’m forced to re-evaluate my position. Such an item is this truly impressive little graphic novel from the writer of World War Z and the Zombie Survival Guide.

Max Brooks is a successful actor and screenwriter (most notably part of the team scripting Saturday Night Live) and cartoon fans might recognize his name from the voice credits of Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, Batman Beyond and Justice League. You probably laughed at a lot of his dad’s movie’s like High Anxiety, Young Frankenstein and the first version of the Producers.

As with his previous books the story is told with devastating, deadpan delivery in a documentary manner, with sparse captions and no dialogue, but the superb, tonal black and white artwork of Brazilian Ibraim Roberson transforms this compendium of “authenticated” undead attacks and assorted government’s cover-ups into a truly chilling catalogue of near-disasters.

The Living Dead are animated by a virus millions of years old, transmitted when a sufferer bites a victim. It can be found in every corner of the Earth, and these deadly dozen outbreaks clearly show how lucky we’ve been thus far.

These vignettes depict Us versus Them from Central Africa in 60,000BC to Joshua Tree National Park in 1992AD, via Egypt 3000BC, Scotland 121AD (just before Hadrian built that wall), the Central Pacific in 1579 (on one of Sir Francis Drake’s voyages), in Siberia, 1583, Japan 1611, on a Portuguese slave-ship in 1690, St. Lucia in 1862, a Foreign Legion fortress in 1893, China during Japan’s campaign during WWII, and at a Soviet science station during the Cold War, and the restrained matter-of-fact tone of the pieces make them some of the most gripping horror fiction I’ve ever seen.

Just keep telling yourself “Zombies don’t exist” and you’ll be fine.

Probably.
© 2009 Max Brooks. All Rights Reserved.

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Crossing Midnight book 2:


By Mike Carey, Jim Fern, Eric Nguyen & Mark Pennington (Vertigo)
ISBN: 978-1-84576-726-6

Lots of westerners are fascinated with the myths and culture of Japan, but superbly sinister storyteller Mike Carey (his work, not him; he’s a thoroughly decent and upright young fellow) has taken it to a staggering new level of wit and sophistication, blending elegant fantasy with contemporary horror and crime cinema in this tale of a magical quest through the darkest lands of the of the Rising Sun both fabulously mythic and brutally, bewilderingly raw and modern.

Kai and Toshi Hara are twins born either side of the Witching Hour in Nagasaki, and that crucial time difference has shaped and blighted their lives. Born seven minutes after midnight Toshi is no ordinary girl: bold, energetic and utterly immune to all harm from edges and points. No blade will cut her; butt her 14 minute older brother seems painfully weak and mortal.

Their loving parents have problems too. Their mother was killed by Aratsu, celestial Lord of the Knives and restored without a soul whilst their father has been sucked into the deadly world of the Yakuza…

This second volume (collecting issues #6-12 of the impressive and stylish Vertigo comic book) finds Kai still hunting for his missing sister through the darkest, nastiest places of the city, whilst his sister undergoes an esoteric training period before she can become a full – if reluctant – servant to her divine master.

Kai finds an unlikely ally among the police and discovers the utterly mundane horrors of the Enjokosai when a trio of schoolgirls aid him in the hunt for his sister, much to their short-lived regret, as a dreadful supernatural beast comes hunting in those places where innocence is unashamedly for sale.

Enjokosai: “reward” or “compensated dating” is a publicly acknowledged and generally accepted phenomenon and common practice that sees Japanese schoolgirls flirt and accompany men for gifts, and although the girl is nominally dominant and dictates how far she will – or won’t – go, the dangers of openly eroticized children bargaining with sexually predatory men is one that thankfully just isn’t tolerated in many places outside Japan.

Kai’s search brings the vindictive world of the Kami directly to these thoroughly modern ladies with horrific consequences, but they’re just more collateral damage in a millennial struggle that is swiftly approaching a bloody climax.

With war brewing in the realm of spirits and shadows, rebellious Toshi is working to her own agenda but against creatures so ancient and diabolically experienced how can she possibly succeed or escape?

Split into two story-arcs, ‘A Map of Midnight’ and the intensely disturbing ‘Bedtime Stories’ Carey, Jim Fern, Eric Nguyen and Mark Pennington have truly pushed the boundaries of horror fiction, interweaving legendary Nippon and modern Japan with dystopian culture clashes, childhood terrors, gangster action and even social politics into a dazzling and very adult fairytale epic that nearly defies categorisation. It really is a series no mature fantasy fan should miss…
© 2007 Mike Carey and Jim Fern. All Rights Reserved.

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Crossing Midnight book 1: Cut Here


By Mike Carey, Jim Fern, Rob Hunter & Mark Pennington (Vertigo)
ISBN: 978-1-84576-666-5

The variety and power of mythology is the greatest gift of our convoluted collective history as a species and for the imaginative amongst us it works twice. As children we absorb tales of magic and love and heroism with open-mouthed, unblinking wonder and they become part of our day-to-day existence: “fairy-tale romance”, “evil stepmother”, “Prince Charming” and a hundred other phrases are part of a verbal short-hand we all share without thinking. And when we’re older we seek out modern rehashings of those tales in our preferred media of fictional entertainment.

What horror-movie can’t be reduced to Hansel and Gretel or Little Red Riding Hood, and which action blockbuster hasn’t got an indomitable Jack overcoming all obstacles? And Rom-Coms?: c’mon!

For some there are also tales from other cultures which can be ingested in pure form such as the various interpretations of China’s Monkey King (see Journey to the West, Monkey Subdues the White Bone Demon or Havoc in Heaven for example) or even the triumphant Fables revising our childhood landscape with all the scary, salacious bits restored…

And then there’s synthesis…

Lots of westerners are fascinated with the myths and culture of Japan, but scary storyteller Mike Carey has taken it to a captivating new level, blending elegant fantasy with contemporary horror stories and gangster cinema in this tale (comprising issues #1-5 of the much-missed Vertigo comic book) of a magical quest through the darkest parts of the modern lands of the Rising Sun.

Kai and Toshi Hara are twins born in Nagasaki, one either side of the Witching Hour, and that crucial time difference will forever blight their lives… Born seven minutes after midnight Toshi is no ordinary girl: bold, energetic and utterly immune to any and all harm from edges and points; no blade will touch; but her older brother seems painfully weak and mortal. Unknown to all when they were little kids they accidentally slipped into a spirit world, and although they came back their friend Saburo was never seen again.

Their loving parents have problems too. When father asks the wrong question about shipments at the office he falls foul of the Yakuza, and always Toshi is becoming more difficult, more rebellious…

One night when they are barely into their teens a figure appears in her room: Aratsu, celestial Lord of the Knives has come to claim her as his new servant, and unless she complies her family will suffer. Suddenly discovering his own supernatural ability Kai drives Aratsu away but he will return and if she goes it will be as if she never existed…

Seemingly helpless the twins are inexorably drawn into the world of the Kami, spirits and shadows real and hungry who shed no tears when their mortal pawns die in horrendous ways. As the real and unreal increasingly weave together Kai finds himself in the unusual role of protector, saving his father and rescuing Toshi from a life of immortal servitude and unending horror

Burt eventually Aratsu gets his way and Kai determines to get his sister back at all costs…

Carey, Fern, Hunter and Pennington have crafted a superb blend of legendary Nippon and modern Japan with dystopian culture clashes, childhood nightmares and gangster action swirling together in this compelling horror, mystery fairytale epic that almost defies categorisation. I define it as a book no adult fantasy fan should miss…
© 2007 Mike Carey and Jim Fern. All Rights Reserved.

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Dracula


Adapted by Otto Binder & Craig Tennis, art by Alden McWilliams (Ballantine Books)
No ISBN: U2271

You’re never to young to be exposed to the classics or scared out of your wits, and this delightful remnant from my own far-distant youth always brings back the gory, glory days of Bela Lugosi on TV and trying to sneak in to the latest Hammer Horror at the pictures (too young, not too cheap!) as well as such diverse treats as Famous Monsters of Filmland and other assorted illicit thrills that made we baby-boomers such terrific well-rounded, fully-socialised individuals.

At a time when scary movies, as well as Super-Spies, superheroes and comics in general, were all experiencing a popular revival, lots of strips made the jump to paperback format as publishers courted new markets. Along with lots of Mad collections, newspaper comic-strips, resized black and white comicbook reprints (such as High Camp Superheroes) and a host of other retreads, the occasional all-new item appeared.

One such is this delightfully forthright, faithful and respectful – if tension and terror free – adaptation of Bram Stoker’s gothic classic, adroitly encapsulated by comics and pulp sci fi legend Otto Binder (and Craig Tennis – of whom I know almost nothing other than he was a TV scripter) and drawn by the “deserves-to-be-legendary” Al McWilliams, a superb comics illustrator and draughtsman often confused with and nearly as good as his near-namesake Al Williamson.

The story is as you remember it; effective and pretty rather than beautiful and terrifying, but for a little seven year old it was a treasured item to be pored over, traced and adored, and today’s film fans might be enticed by Christopher Lee’s voluble introduction.

Even though it was reprinted by Manor Books in 1975, I suspect this isn’t the easiest of books to find, and to be completely honest the alternating portrait and landscape layouts make reading it a bit of a juggling act, but still and all I wish somebody somewhere would rescue this little gem from near obscurity. Any opportunistic publishers listening out there?
© 1966 Russ Jones Productions.

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Requiem Vampire Knight Tome 2: Dracula and The Vampires Ball


By Pat Mills & Ledroit (Panini Books UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-438-6

The second double compilation of Pat Mills and Olivier Ledroit’s darkly spectacular masterpiece of nihilistic anti-heroism intensifies the decadent horrors with the next two translated volumes that created such a storm when first released in France. Dracula and The Vampire Ball resumes the tale of Heinrich Augsburg, a Nazi soldier doomed to unlive his life as a vampire warrior in a macabre inverse world of evil, which began in Requiem Vampire Knight Tome 1: Resurrection and Danse Macabre.

Resurrection is a brooding, blood-drenched world of eternal strife and warfare: a grim, fantastic mirror of Earth with the seas and land-masses reversed, where time runs backwards, populated by all the worst sinners of Earth reincarnated as monsters of myth – a realm where the ranked dead expiate or exacerbate the sins of their former lives.

This tome further explores the deeds that brought Heinrich (now called Requiem) to the very apex of the hell-world’s hierarchy as a full knight at the court of Dracula, trapped in a spiral of bloodletting, debauchery and intrigue. His position is not secure. Not only has he earned the enmity of the treacherous faction of elite Nosferatu led by Lady Claudia Demona, Lord Mortis and Baron Samedi, but it appears that he may be a returned soul…

Long before Augsberg died on a frozen battlefield, killed by a Russian he was trying to rape, the Templar Heinrich Barbarossa had committed such atrocities in the name of Christianity that he was guaranteed a place in Dracula’s inner circle when he inevitably reached Resurrection. But soon this new Vampire Knight Thurim committed an unpardonable crime and was excised from the court and Resurrection itself.

But now Requiem, already plagued by memories of his doomed affair with the Jewess Rebecca, is the subject of dangerous talk. Far too many vampires are remarking how similar to the disgraced Thurim the newcomer seems…

And what’s worse for him is that as the interminable battles (incredibly realised by the epic mastery of Ledroit) with such foes as the Gods of Limbo, the arcane order of Archaeologists, Lamias, Werewolves, Ghouls and others, Requiem discovers that Rebecca too is on Resurrection and the only way she can find peace is to “expire” the one responsible for her being there…

Blending decadent, opulent, Machiavellian dalliance with the wildest dreams – and grim, black wit – of a new De Sade, the tensions of the palace even outstrip the constant eye-popping action on myriad battlefields, so this book ends far too quickly on yet another cliffhanger when Rebecca is first captured by the Vampires only to escape with the still besotted and now wildly off-reservation Requiem. And their headlong flight has catapulted the doomed ex-lovers straight into the mouth of a cosmic dragon storm…

Supplemented by a gallery of the artist’s series paintings this astonishing, captivating work for the Goth within is an adult fantasy fan’s darkest dream come true. More please and soon…

© 2000, 2001, 2009 Nickel, Mills, Ledroit. All rights Reserved.