The Barnes & Noble Review
Stephen Jones should get some special award - he's done more to keep short horror fiction getting major recognition than any editor I know besides Ellen Datlow and the late Karl Edward Wagner (interestingly enough, Jones dedicated this volume to Datlow with the words: "This one is for Ellen, in friendly rivalry and sincere admiration"). Jones is tireless in his belief in the best that the genre can do, and his annual collections of Best New Horror volumes are truly amazing. This new one, volume nine in the series, is no exception. Jones, like Datlow, doesn't go for big names at all (although he always has a few or more in each anthology). Instead he goes for stories that resonate, tales that are dark and terrifying or, at the very least, disturbing. Writing in fine form in this new collection of stories are Ramsey Campbell, Dennis Etchison, David Schow, Yvonne Navarro, Brian Hodge, Pat Cadigan, and others. "The Zombies of Madison County," perhaps my favorite Douglas Winter story, is reprinted here, as well. Winter, a World Fantasy Award winner, proves again that horror cannot be dead (or if it is, perhaps it is "undead") with this moving and disturbing tale of love among human ruins. Part pretend autobiography, part dark love story, this may be the best story here. And that's saying a lot. This is a treasure trove of fantastic stories of nighttime imaginations. Brian Hodge's "The Dripping of Sundered Wineskins" is a standout, as is Navarro's "Four Famines Ago," a story of cosmic eating disorders that is simply brilliant and classic in a way that shows Navarro'sgenius.Thomas Ligotti's "The Bells Will Sound Forever" is a haunting story, and Pat Cadigan's marvelous "This Is Your Life (Repressed Memory Remix)" is a nightmare story about memories and the ones that can be faked. But other gems occupy the shadowy catacombs of The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, Volume 9, and none should be missed. -Douglas Clegg Douglas Clegg is the author of numerous horror novels, including The Halloween Man and Bad Karma, written under his pseudonym, Andrew Harper. His recent Bram Stoker-nominated short story, "I Am Infinite, I Contain Multitudes," can be found in the anthology The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Volume 11.