Michael Kelly (9) (1963–)

Shadows and Tall Trees is the title of the seventh chapter of William Golding’s modern classic Lord of the Flies. It is a particularly unsettling section of the book, haunted by a sense of lurking, undefined danger and by the disturbing realisation that evil but may be lurking within each and every individual.

This baggage of associations makes Shadow and Tall Trees an ideal name for editor Michael Kelly’s anthology series of weird fiction, published by Canadian press Undertow Publications. The series is now in its eighth instalment and having devoured this latest volume over a weekend, I feel I have joined – alas, quite late – just my kind of party. This collection, in fact, is characterised by fiction which could presumably count as “horror” but whose terrors are more elusive than the mainstream fare.

The opening story – The Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell by Brian Evenson – provides a perfect example of what one should expect. Hekla, the protagonist, unwillingly joins a spiritual retreat or workshop in a remote house outside the city. The initial pages suggest that this story will pan out into either a haunted house or a typical “slasher” scenario. What we get, however, is something much stranger and nightmarish. This is not the only story with a surreal, dreamlike atmosphere – another one is The Somnambulists by Simon Strantzas, featuring a hotel powered by dreams.

Conspicuous by their absence are the well-established monsters of the horror genre: there are no vampires, no werewolves and no malevolent clowns, although Dollface by Seán Padraic Birnie features what appears to be an evil doll. Ghosts do appear, but possibly not in the guise one would expect. Alison Littlewood, fresh from her supernatural/timeslip novel Mistletoe (my review here) contributes Hungry Ghosts, a tale set in contemporary Hanoi and inspired by the Vietnamese festival of the dead - a familiar premise is made stranger by the unfamiliar context. A Coastal Quest by Charles Wilkinson is a bittersweet story of a woman escaping an oppressive household, doubling as a tale of ghosts. In Camera Obscura by C.M. Muller, a city photographer shoots a derelict farmhouse haunted by a supernatural being. It’s an entity which borrows as much from Scandinavian folklore as from classic ghost stories, giving this piece a folk horror feel. The same atmosphere permeates Down to the Roots by Neil Williamson, about a high-flying businessman who returns to the small Scottish village of his childhood.

Previous volumes of Shadows and Tall Trees have won prizes and accolades. Peter Straub (no less) has described it as “a smart, soulful, illuminating investigation of the many forms and tactics available to those writers involved in one of our moment’s most interesting and necessary projects, that of opening up horror literature to every sort of formal interrogation”. This volume is, indeed, a cross-section of the contemporary wealth of innovative horror writing. Editor Michael Kelly’s judicious choices ensure that the anthology comprises a variety of subjects, as well as different styles and approaches. Some stories, for instance, set out to be original in form and structure. Tattletale by Carly Holmes has the punch of flash fiction – it’s over in a flurry of dark, violent metaphors. KL Pereira’s You, Girls Without Hands delivers its potent feminist message in six, very brief chapters. The Quiet Forms of Belonging by Kristi DeMeester adopts a style close to prose poetry, rich in metaphors and images which seem to be taken from dark fairy tales. Workday by Kurt Fawver is a Chine-Mieville-like critique of capitalist society, in which increasingly urgent anonymous warnings delivered to the employees of “Corivdan Incorporated” urging them not to attend the corporation’s holiday party because they are “in grave danger”, are countered by reassuring emails and memos issued by management. The piece has no characters, no dialogue and no narrative in the usual sense of the word, consisting solely of these sparring exchanges.

The contemporary feel of this anthology, however, is not based only on originality of form but also on the timeliness of the subjects. This is indeed proof that genre fiction is no mere escapism (although there would be nothing wrong with that) but can also be the means to address burning issues and concerns. Thus, the eco-Gothic The Sound of the Sea, Too Close by James Everington references climate change, global warming and the rise in sea levels; the darkly comic The Fascist has a Party by M. Rickert parodies a recognisable President, who remains unnamed in the text (and will remain unnamed in this review); Rebecca Campbell’s Child of Shower and Gleam portrays the suffering of an abusive relationship. One could also mention Lacunae by V.H. Leslie, whose musical subject makes it one of my favourite stories in the anthology. The young wife of a composer past his prime takes him back to a remote Scottish island. The landscape had purportedly provided the inspiration for his best-known work and the couple hope that his talents will be rekindled. We discover, however, that not only was his famous composition co-written but his (uncredited) first wife, but also that its haunting theme and unusual structure were wholly her creation. Classical music is passing through its own #metoo moment, with powerful figures unmasked as sexual predators and its ‘traditional’ white male canon increasingly put in question. “Lacunae” fits the mood perfectly. It chimes in with Icelandic composer Hildur Guðnadóttir's recent Oscar-acceptance speech and its tribute "to the girls, to the women, to the mothers, to the daughters who hear the music bubbling within...please speak up. We need to hear your voices"

Whilst one appreciates and admires the “timeliness” of these stories and their subjects, it would be wrong to overlook the intrinsic capacity of horror and the Gothic to address “timeless” fears. Pieces like Sleepwalking with Angels by Steve Rasnic Tem, about an old widower who is succumbing to dementia, or Steve Toase’s Green Grows the Grief which presents us with a woman whose sanity unravels following the death of her father, are a reminder that some terrors never change. Loss, pain, growing old, mortality – throughout the ages, these shadows have stalked our worldly existence. Stories might be a way to exorcise them.

Shadows and Tall Trees is a superb collection. It feels like taking a trip outside reality, only to come back and perceive it with brighter, sharper edges.… (altro)

An outstanding premier collection that seems to not get as high a rating as it deserves. The [a:Emily Dickinson|7440|Emily Dickinson|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1198536260p2/7440.jpg] I thought was the weakest of the lot, followed by the [a:Wilum H. Pugmire|5741197|Wilum H. Pugmire|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1342558366p2/5741197.jpg] story and I would have still give them both a strong three stars. Maybe some people were looking for some just wild out there stuff, but Barron favors the weird but comprehensible, sorta, over bizarre experiemental writing that at times leaves me cold. It always seems like writers in love with themselves. Not here though.

I'm looking forward to volume 2.… (altro)

3.5 stars rounded up to a hesitant 4. While I liked most of the stories I don't think there was any new ground broken here as I would expect in a weird fiction anthology purporting to be the best. I didn't see some of these stories as that weird at all and feel like on the whole it read more like the usual tepid year's best horror anthologies. Other than the first volume in this series I've been somewhat disappointed as I expected this series to break out of the mold cast by Datlow, Jones, and Guran each year.

Maybe a year is just too short of a timeframe to find enough top notch weirdness to fill a book. I've found the Strange Tales series from Tartarus Press to be much more rewarding. I guess I just expect more from editors of this caliber and background. I guess I expect to be challenged more by either content or style in something like this where the boundaries are wide open.… (altro)