NIGHT OF THE DEMONS directed by Adam Gierasch

Have you ever wondered if there is a living and breathing version of Gollum somewhere out here in the real world? Well, have I got news for you! There is, and his name is Edward Furlong. He stars in the ill advised remake of one of the classic horror films from the 80's, NIGHT OF THE DEMONS.

Classic? Yeah, that's what I said. When I first viewed the original in the basement of my parents house, home alone with the lights out, I knew I was witnessing a film that would forever hold a place in my heart next to other classics like RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD, EVIL DEAD (I and II), and FRIGHT NIGHT.

Each of those movies were funny but also scary. They helped define and shape my love of horror movies. I craved this stuff and ate them up like a bowl of Halloween candy.

This remake has none of the atmosphere of the original. Instead of taking place in a mortuary like the '88 film, called Hull House (just the name sounds creepy), this one takes place in a New Orleans manse. It is something more suited to an Anne Rice vampire movie, instead of something involving punk rock demons.

Although the demon masks are grotesque none can match the hellish visage of Angela from the original. I also found the inclusion of a guy dressed as Jigsaw from the SAW movies rather strange (he even rides a tricycle). Perhaps the director was subconsciously wishing he could be directing one of the hundred SAW sequels instead of this NIGHT OF THE DEMONS remake.

The acting is mediocre at best, with Edward Furlong seeming to walk through most of the movie with a sweaty, dazed and confused, look on his face. Strangely, his acting is so bad that he ends up providing some good eye rolling laughs. Now, I'm not saying the original movie was chalk full of Academy Award acting chops but I've seen better acting in an amateur porno movie.

You know, it doesn't compare to the original, but if you got nothing better to do, and the video store is all out of copies of the '88 film, be my guest. But know I warned you. Hey, at the very least you will get to see the real Gollum. Andy Serkis beware!

"My...my precioussss!"

ALTITUDE directed by Kaare Andrews

I had high hopes for this one. I mean, look at that poster. A small airplane caught up in a terrible thunderstorm and tentacles!

My first thoughts were, this is going to be a pretty clever take on Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos (instead of taking place in a small port town on the East coast, it would take place in the sky).

Unfortunately ALTITUDE starts to dive bomb almost from the moment the cast shows up on screen. I don't know how they did it, but the casting director managed to find and gather five of the most annoying teenagers in the history of annoying teenagers. I don't think I've seen movie with so much bickering and insulting among "friends" (example: one guy openly tries to win the heart of another guys girlfriend while that dude gets drunk and basically does nothing but act obnoxious the entire time he's on screen).

The pilot of this doomed flight is played by 90210's Jessica Lowndes, who for the first hour is the only one who manages to be slightly less annoying than the rest while fighting constant remarks from her friends about whether she is qualified to fly. None of them seem very comfortable getting on a plane with her, especially Lowndes soon to be ex-boyfriend (I know!) which begs one to wonder why they got on the plane in the first place!

Anyway, it's not long after takeoff that things begin to go wrong. A screw comes loose in the body of the plane and gets lodged in the part of the plane that allows it to descend. This is bad news for more reasons than the fact it sends them directly into the path of the scariest thunderstorm ever. They lose communication with the ground and this leads to panic and an even greater amount of bickering and teenage outbursts of emotion.

It isn't long before they come to learn there is a big Cthulhu-like creature inhabiting the storm that wants to destroy their aircraft (and which we ultimately see too little of).

To go into where the creature came from or how the passengers deal with the situation would be giving away too much of the plot. I will say, however, that it takes a very Twilight Zone, Amazing Stories twist which ties everything together nicely at the end but left this viewer a bit disappointed.

I think the film could have been a whole lot better with a slightly older cast, one that wasn't so dramatic and snarky and teenagy. The idea of a massive tentacled creature haunting the skies, I think, is a good one. Unfortunately ALTITUDE barely gets off the ground before crash landing.

ODD IS ON OUR SIDE by Dean Koontz & Fred Van Lente (illustrated by Queenie Chan)

Odd Is on Our Side is the second manga style graphic novel after 08's In Odd We Trust. It clocks in at around 160 pages and includes an excerpt from Forever Odd (Odd Thomas Novels), and a bit of insight into the graphic creations of some of the characters.

It's the perfect time of year to pick this one up as the mystery surrounds a Halloween festival in Pico Mundo, the tiny California town where Odd lives.

Odd, as you may or may not know, has the macabre gift of being able to see dead folk (of course this affliction seems to becoming more and more common, or at least since THE SIXTH SENSE and the television show THE GHOST WHISPERER). Odd can also see what he calls bodachs, inky wolf-like creatures, that are harbingers of evil and terrible deeds. When he starts seeing bodachs in and around the local school, site of the Halloween festival, Odd knows he has got to find out why and put a stop to whatever dastardly deed is in the works.

The story is a fun one, if a little on the predictable side. I'm not the biggest fan of manga style graphic novels but they don't annoy me either (my only real complaint: for some strange reason Chan draws Odd to look very feminine, sometimes looking out right like a girl). The writing is solid and the story moves along at a quick pace.

The funny thing is I've yet to read any of the Odd Thomas novels and yet I've now read both graphic books and enjoyed both. So why haven't I read the books? No idea, but one of these days I'll try to fix that. Until then, if you are needing your Odd Thomas fix these graphic books should do the trick until the next Odd book comes out.

Note: Queenie Chan is the author and illustrator of a cool looking series called THE DREAMING. Fred Van Lente is co-writer of the graphic novel COWBOYS AND ALIENS, which is being turned into a movie directed by Jon Favreau, starring Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford and Olivia Wilde.

DARKNESS UNDER THE SUN by Dean Koontz

Darkness Under the Sun (Novella): A Tale of Suspense is a novella recently released by Bantam in anticipation of Koontz' up coming ghostly thriller What the Night Knows: A Novel.

DARKNESS UNDER THE SUN is broken up into seven chapters and spans a little more than twenty years of Howie Dugley's life. Dugley is a lonely boy, maimed by his father, and left most days to his own devises. Then one day Dugley encounters a man named Alton Turner Blackwood on top of an abandoned store. At first he thinks Blackwood is some kind of monster because of the way he looks (something like a giant Raven in human form).

Dugley quickly bonds with the enigmatic and charming Blackwood. Blackwood seems to understand Dugley's troubles better than almost anyone. In Blackwood, Dugley sees a father figure, a protector, someone to lean on.

But there is something off about Blackwood. Something dark and evil. Soon Dugley will discover he has made a terrible mistake befriending Blackwood, a mistake that may cost him the lives of his mother and sister, and his very own soul.

Dean Koontz is a master of suspense and delivers the creepy goods. DARKNESS UNDER THE SUN is a fun, fast, read delivered with Koontz' always spot on dialogue and descriptive prose. It will only provide about half hour to an hour of suspenseful reading but for a $1.59 you can't really go wrong. As a bonus the download comes with a sneak peak at the first chapter of WHAT THE NIGHT KNOWS.

Valley Of The Scarecrow by Gord Rollo

Valley of the Scarecrow is the fourth novel from Gord Rollo and unfortunately my least favorite of the bunch. Rollo's last release,Strange Magic, was one of the best books I read from last year, so maybe my expectations were too high.

VALLEY OF THE SCARECROW starts off promising enough with a back story about the priest of Miller's Grove being crucified by his flock for making a pact with the Man In Black (a devilish creature we never really learn much about). After the dirty deed is done the town folks pack up and leave the area. The town becomes a place lost by the minds and maps of men. Until, that is, a corpse is found with a note that leads six young people on a hunt for a treasure in the forgotten town.

What they find will make them wish they had never heard of the treasure or Miller's Grove.

VALLY OF THE SCARECROW reminded me, strangely enough, of Richard Laymon's The Stake and the movie JEEPERS CREEPERS, but with less positive results. I found the writing emotionless and the characters nothing more than your typical horror story fodder.

The one redeeming factor was Rollo's setting for the book. The town of Miller's Grove is one I would find fascinating to visit, and terribly creepy. Just imaging a town lost to the world, forgotten by time and an evil past was enough to give me the chills. It's too bad the villain in the novel, the Scarecrow/Priest, doesn't really rise above the level of your everyday horror villain (read Freddy; Leatherface; Jason, etc...).

Still, the novel moves along at a pretty good clip and provides a scare or two, if nothing unexpected. It's an average horror novel you'll probably read once and forget about it. But I would warn you not to forget about Rollo. His three previous novels are great. If you haven't read The Jigsaw Man (Leisure Fiction),Crimson or Strange Magic, then I recommend you pick them up for an example of horror done right.

BONE, CROWN OF HORNS by Jeff Smith

And so we come to it.

Bone, Vol. 9: Crown of Horns marks the final volume in Jeff Smith's superb fantasy adventure book. And what a finale it is.

I'm not going to say much. I don't want to spoil the fun and adventure for new readers to the series, other than to point out that Smith pulls it all together wonderfully.

Aidan and I began reading BONE in the summer as a father and son thing to do together and it has been a lot of fun. After every volume we talked about what we dug about it and what parts we thought were funny and what parts we thought were scary or thrilling. Now we are both huge Jeff Smith/BONE fans.

Lucky for us there are still a few more BONE books out there to read, particularly Rose (Bone) and Tall Tales (Bone Prequel), not to mention a future three book adventure penned by Tom Sniegoski. So, lots to look forward to.

Of course I can't recommend the series highly enough. If you have a youngster at home, and whether or not he/she is a voracious reader, the BONE series might be just the thing for them.

As a side note, where we live teachers send home Scholastic flyers where your children can purchase books at a heavy discount. You can get all nine BONE books for a very reasonable price (about seventy bucks I think) that beats the cost of getting the books individually. Of course you'll have to take a leap of faith that what I recommend to you is worth it. All I can say to that is, read other on line reviews and you will see I'm not alone in thinking this series kicks all kinds of butt!

DRACULAS by Crouch, Konrath, Strand and Wilson

The last few weeks I've been on a particularly good run of books that included Dark Harvest by Norman Partridge, Instinct (A Chess Team Adventure)by Jeremy Robinson and Dracula The Un-Dead by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt.

Each one of those could easily top my list of favorite books I read this year. So could the latest book I read, DRACULAS (A Novel of Terror), that combines the immense talent of four authors that deliver a balls to the wall vampire epic. Say hello to Joe Konrath; Jeff Strand; Blake Crouch and the legendary F. Paul Wilson.

The story centers around a terminally ill millionaire named Moorecook who buys a skull believed, by some, to be that of a vampire. When it arrives he jabs the skull's huge jaws into his neck hoping to recreate the creatures legendary bite that brings with it the powers of eternal life. After being rushed to the local hospital for his injuries, the desired effects begin to take place. Only this wasn't your average, everyday vampire. Monstrous teeth sprout from the man's mouth, tearing out the lower half of his face. Razor sharp claws rip free from the ends of his fingers. Soon Moorecook is biting, infecting, killing, slaughtering everyone in sight. Over the next several hours a few survivors will struggle to stay alive and try and stop the draculas. The blood is knee deep and rising and the action is pretty much non-stop.

This is the kind of book Twilight fans will hate. These vampires have nothing in common with Meyer's sparkly hunks. In fact, I would bet even die hard Bram Stoker fans will disparage DRACULAS, claiming it takes the romance and mystery out of the vampire tale. But for all it lacks in those departments it makes up for with tons of blood and guts. The action is fast and furious and the monsters as mean and frightening as they come.

You want tame? Read Twilight. You want hardcore? Check out DRACULAS.

As this was my first e-book experience, I have to say I was impressed. For $2.99 I got a full sized novel of vampiric terror plus tons of extras, including interviews, deleted scenes and extra content from each of the authors. It's a can't lose deal, Wormies. If you have an e-book you would be sorry to miss out on this kick ass monster book.

DRACULA, THE UN-DEAD by Dacre Stoker & Ian Holt

There is a blurb on the front of the Penguin paperback for Dracula The Un-Dead that reads:

"Good, clean, bloody fun." Maclean's

And that's exactly what DRACULA, THE UN-DEAD, is. Surprisingly, I think this might be my favorite book from this year. Surprising because before I purchased the book I checked out Amazon.com reviews and saw that a lot of folks didn't think very much of it. In fact, it garnered a lot of nasty, almost angry, reviews. So going in I was pretty skeptical. I read the book with particular care for the first fifty pages, just in case I hated it and wanted to exchange it for something else.

I need not have worried. DRACULA, THE UN-DEAD kept me hooked from start to finish with exceptionally smooth prose and a story that moves along like an out of control hansom on a busy London street.

At first I thought I was going to be reading a vampiric love story. Not so. This book is blood drenched with tons of violence and gore. The suspense gets ratcheted up chapter by chapter and I have to say; the last hundred and fifty pages are some of the best horror action I've read in recent memory.

Some people might be disappointed that the main antagonist in this story in not the title character (though he does figure in the tale) but another historical figure, Elizabeth Bathory. She was a countess from the 16th century who supposedly murdered over 600 virgins and bathed in their blood. But not to worry. Bathory is just as scary, if not more so, than everyone's favorite Count (and no, I'm not talking about The Count from Sesame Street...the other Count!).

This is a nice thick book, too, so you really get a chance to sink into the atmosphere of early 20th century London. And it was a lot of fun revisiting the original vampire hunters, seeing what had become of them, what paths each traveled after the events of DRACULA.

Some reviews of the book said Stoker would be rolling in his grave if he knew this book had been published but I say boo to that. DRACULA, THE UN-DEAD, is pulp fiction at it's best and that's all the original was. So get over it people!

If you're looking for a scary Halloween book to read, you could do a hell of a lot worse than this. That I promise. 

I Am Number Four Trailer 2011 HD

I reviewed the book here. Now check out the trailer.

Skyline - Trailer 2 (2010)

Looking forward to this one.
I love seeing the Ferrari get smashed. Ha ha!

DARK HARVEST by Norman Partidge

The air is cool. The leaves are turning colour and falling. And bright orange pumpkins are showing up on porches all across town.

It's that time of year again.

The best time of year again.

Looking for something to read that suits the world around you? Something with Halloween pumping between it's pages like the motor oil on old Chevy? If so, I got just the book for you. It's called Dark Harvest and was written by none other than Norman Partridge, American writer extraordinaire.

It's about a town with a curse, one which keeps it's residents from ever leaving. However, there is one way out for the youth of the town, but to do it, they have to kill the October Boy. The October Boy is a nightmare creature that rises out of the black earth of a dead cornfield. His goal is to reach the center of town, to reach the church, before the bells can toll midnight. If one can kill the Boy, they win freedom and riches for his family.

But the October Boy isn't the only monster the kids of the town have to deal with. There is one evil sonofagun sheriff named Jerry Ricks. They don't come much meaner, or more sadistic than Jerry Ricks. And he's not alone in making sure things run the way they're supposed to. He's got the backing of the Harvester's Guild.

The story is enough to make DARK HARVEST a modern Halloween classic but for me its more to do with Partridge's scribing skills. Check this out:

Autumn leaves and candy wrappers and wax paper Bazooka Joe comics churn in the night. And now the town is behind us, and we're racing down the licorice-whip road. By the time that dust devil stops swirling on Main Street, we're a mile away.

Rows of dead cornstalks on each side of the road blur by like a crop of bones. There's something up ahead in the middle of the road, something that's pulling away even as we gear up the night's own tach and close on it.

A pair of coal-red brake lights glow in the rusty ass-end of that thing.

A pair of dead-white headlights glare up front, raking the blacktop like a Gorgon's stare.

Reading DARK HARVEST is like having Norman Partridge in your head with a pallet and brush stroking away on the canvas of your brain. It's a dark and beautiful painting.

Of course, the October Boy knows what stands between him and the church. Packs of teenagers roaming the street like armed villagers in some old Frankenstein movie. Loners clinging to the shadows, ready to take off his head with baseball bats and fire axes. Young men sitting on the scar-colored brick steps of the church, waiting for their hometown's own personal Big Bad Wolf to come sniffing at the door.

Fast paced, full of action and Halloween goodness, DARK HARVEST is the Halloween treat you're looking for at this time of year. So make yourself a hot coffee and settle down in your favorite porch chair, next to the pumpkins you just bought from the local farmer and start reading. 

RED HARVEST cover

Okay, I know some Star Wars fans out there were a little "whatever" about my NIGHT OF THE LIVING TREKKIES review earlier this week.

I know.

You want a zombie novel to call your own.

But it's already out there, Wormies! Though not as humorous as NOTLT, Star Wars: Death Troopers (Hardcover)  will satisfy that zombie hunger. I read it when it first came out and it wasn't half bad. I like Joe Schreiber's writing and would recommend anything the dude publishes. If you don't want to spring for the hardcover, the mass market pb hits shelves just in time for Halloween. Check it out Star Wars: Death Troopers.

For those of you that read and loved the first Star Wars zombie mash, Star Wars: Red Harvest, it's sequel,  hits stores just after Christmas. I for one will be getting that quicker than Han Solo can draw his blaster. I dig the cover for the new book but it doesn't quite have the "hook" of DEATH TROOPERS.

HELL ISLAND by Matthew Reily (a review)

I remember a little while back, on a now defunct message board, a small press publisher telling me it's about the quality of a story and not quantity. You see, I had made a comment regarding the ever growing trend towards shorter and shorter books in the small press to go along with their higher and higher prices.

I don't mind paying fifty or sixty bucks if I'm getting a 400 page book with a few illustrations and some signatures. The thing was, we were getting 150 pages or less and being told this was a novel. No, no it's not. And I don't care how good the book is (and most times they were decent at best) 60 bucks for 150 pages is a ripoff.

I have since cut my small press purchases to just about zilch and a big reason for it was the lack of bang for the buck.

So why am I bringing this up? Hell Island, that's why.

Matthew Reilly's latest is a hardcore, kickbutt, guns-a-blazing, nonstop action extravaganza. Hyperbole? No. Wormies this book rocks along at a breakneck speed that will give you whiplash if you're not careful.

Something is wrong on Hell Island. Communication has been lost on a U.S. aircraft carrier. Several elite teams are sent in to find out what the heck is going on. What they discover is monstrous and deadly and most won't be leaving the island alive. Within minutes of touchdown the teams are attacked by something they've never seen before, a savage fighting force, a new breed of super-soldiers.

Adrenaline fiction at it's best, HELL ISLAND doesn't let up until the last page has been turned. To go along with the story, like some kind of small press limited edition, are some dang cool illustrations. The comic book style drawings go perfectly with the story and help to add to the thrill.

HELL ISLAND, like a small press book, is only a little over 120 pages. It has illustrations and it's a kickbutt story to boot. All for 60 dollars!

No. Not really.

That's the great thing. HELL ISLAND is $7.99 in Canada ($6.99 in the U.S.). Funny thing, it was originally released FREE in Reilly's native Australia, as part of a reading initiative program to get citizens into book stores and reading. A quarter million copies were given away and was considered a roaring success. Go figure. Even at 8 bucks this a great deal.

This is the first Reilly book that I've read but it won't be the last, I can assure you. If you are looking for something fun and fast and worth every penny you pay for it, check it out.

NIGHT OF THE LIVING TREKKIES by Kevin David Anderson and Sam Stall

Night of the Living Trekkies may not be the best novel I read this year but it's certainly one of the funnest. It's been a long time since I read a zombie novel I could say I thoroughly enjoyed. Anderson and Stall breath life into a horror sub-genre that is woefully filled with hordes of stinking, lifeless, garbage.

What is your basic zombie novel premise? That's easy. Six to ten people trapped in a warehouse (hotel, community center, whatever) surrounded by hordes of man eating zombies. They try to escape to some place they hope is zombie free (an island, mountain retreat, the moon, whatever) and most end up dying as a result.

But NIGHT OF THE LIVING TREKKIES is different. This time the zombie outbreak happens during a Star Trek convention!

As ridiculous as that sounds, it makes all the world of difference. And Anderson and Stall tell a fun story that isn't as dumb as the title might suggest.

Of course, if you are a Trek fan from way back, NIGHT will be that much more fun. It is full of references, some easy to spot, others not so much. I won't claim to catching most of these but I certainly got the ones thrown out there for the casual fan of the original and Next Generation series. Pretty much, this is a Trekkie/zombie lover's dream come true.

Another great thing about the book is the pace. It doesn't plod and stumble like some undead couch potato trying to catch the neighbors cat for a light snack. The story rips along at warp speed.

And there really isn't that much more to say about NIGHT. It is what it is. An extremely fun zombie book.

INSTINCT by Jeremy Robinson (a review)

Instinct (A Chess Team Adventure) is one of those big thrill adventure books that I personally love to read over the summer. To me they are the literary equivalent of watching a blockbuster popcorn action movie on the big screen, something by Michael Bay or Sylvestor Stallone, for that matter. We're talking guns, babes, big explosions, exotic locations, more guns and more explosions.

So why am I reviewing it in October? I don't rightly know why I waited. It came out in the late spring and I should have gobbled it down then, but I was too busy reading BONE and DINKIN DINGS. Either way, I'm glad to be reviewing it now. I was getting worried you Wormies would think all I did was read YA books. Not the case. And when I want something a little more grown up, INSTINCT, is the kind of book I like to dig into.

The second of Jeremy Robinson's Chess Team adventure pits King, Queen, Bishop, Knight and my favorite, Rook, up against an ancient enemy of mankind in the deep jungles of Vietnam. When the President of the United States is the victim of a biological assassination attempt, the Chess Team (the number one Delta force team in the US military) are called in to discover the source, find a cure and kill the bad guy (not necessarily in that order).

Just like in Robinson's first Chess Team Adventure, Pulse, our heroes come up against an unexpected and unbelievable element they are not expecting. Something not quite supernatural, but certainly super scary.

INSTINCT is a fast paced, well written, thriller that will hold your attention all the way through. Imagine if you took everything you loved from the books of Tom Clancy and James Rollins, mixed them with the myth and wonder of a Raiders Of The Lost Ark and sprinkled some monsterish mayhem on top for the sweet tooth. Do that and you got INSTINCT. And the great thing about it is, this is exactly what you expect when reading a book such as this. Robinson knows this and delivers. He doesn't try and make it any more than what it is, an adrenaline junkie's must read.

Check out Robinson's PULSE and then, after you're convinced of that of which I speak, grab INSTINCT. You'll be glad you did. (Thanks, Jim. I'm glad I listened when you recommended PULSE to me!)

Next spring will see the release of Threshold: A Jack Sigler Adventure (A Jack Sigler Thriller), the next Chess Team Adventure and I can hardly wait! (Note the subtitle change. I guess the author or publisher decided A Jack Silger Thriller sounded better than A Chess Team Adventure)