The Curse of the House

“The Curse of the House” is an early short story authored by Robert Bloch (1917-1994). It first appeared in the February 1939 issue of Strange Stories. It was later included in Subterranean Press's The Reader's Bloch series that concentrates on the writer's fantasy, horror, and science-fiction offerings. 

One of the unique features of “The Curse of the House” is that it upends the haunted house formula, proving that Bloch was already thinking outside of the box with his macabre artistic style. Instead of the average-man thrust into nightmarish home ownership or positioned as a haunted house-guest, Bloch flips the narrative by having a house “haunt” the average-man. The key is that this haunted dwelling can travel and follow the man throughout his life. It is an animate object with the ability to transcend boundaries – both physical and literary.  

The story is presented in first-person perspective by an unnamed doctor. He is interviewing his newest patient, a guy named Will Banks. Banks explains to the doctor that a house is haunting him. He then reveals that as a student he delved into the Black Arts. So much so that he traveled across the globe in a pursuit of olden devil-worship. His most alarming stop is in Edinburgh. It's here that Banks interviewed a warlock, Brian Droome. Droome invites Banks into his home and explains that his family have generations upon generations of active witchcraft. Droome is very open and hospitable to Banks, but as he temporarily leaves he instructs Banks to never go into the home's basement. He is adamant about this. But, Banks does and this creates the awful predicament that plagues his every waking moment. The house is alive.

There is a lot to this story that I can't divulge here. If you enjoy a classic horror tale that offers a non-traditional approach then look no further than Bloch's excellent “The Curse of the House”. While I'm not certain what Bloch is transcribing here, my guess is that it is a look at the mental health industry and its inner strengths and weaknesses in the early 20th century. The basement could represent an abstract approach to healthcare with authorities suggesting it is off-limits. The side-effects and long-term ailments could parallel the idea of the “house” haunting the patient. 

You can read this story HERE.

Chartered Love

Not much is known about author Conrad Dawn (1933-2002). He served in the U.S.M.C. From 1951 to 1954 and was wounded in action during America's involvement in the Korean Civil War. According to a brief book bio, Dawn was employed as a sailor, newspaper man, and also boxed. He traveled extensively and was married three times. Paperback Parade founder, writer, and literary scholar Gary Lovisi described the author as having “...the background and lived the life to write these kinds of wild action books true and accurate – and kick-ass!”. Lovisi's commentary on Dawn can be found in a new edition of Chartered Love, the author's 1960 paperback that was originally published by lowly Chicago sleaze word-slingers Novel Books. The novel is now available through Black Gat Books, an imprint of Stark House Press, with the original paperback cover. 

The book stars Captain John Darrow, a 200-pound muscular man with a leathery face blackened by years of hot sunny nautical travels. Darrow ships freight with his boat Malacca Maid and a hardened skipper named Adams. While at a bar in Macao, China, Darrow entertains a lucrative offer. A woman named Elizabeth wants to hire Darrow and his boat to help her locate a treasure she believes is in the Sulu Sea aboard a downed ship. Darrow isn't particularly interested until he hears the terms – four-million in gold for the taking. His share is half. 

The first half of the book details Darrow's preparation for the journey and deep-dive. He buys weapons from a suspicious arms dealer and gathers aquatic gear, both of which attract a Chinese gang led by a villain named Hayama. There's a kick the tires and start the fires battle before Darrow and Elizabeth can get up and running.

The second half of the book focuses on Darrow's chemistry with Elizabeth. The book was presented to consumers as a sleeze novel ripe with graphic sex. Like so many sleaze novels from the likes of Beacon and Monarch, the sex is tepid at a mere PG rating. But, Dawn has a flirtatious style to his writing that describes Elizabeth's undressing in such a marvelous and provocative way. These scenes counterbalance the propulsive central plot. As Darrow and Adams eventually find the ship embedded in the ocean floor, the struggle to free the gold safely becomes the prevalent story arc. Dawn adds in Hayama's fierce determination to rob Darrow as a side-quest that enhances the action and gunplay quite well.

Conrad Dawn had a real knack for nautical adventure and Chartered Love, despite the poor title, is a testament to his talent. The book's plot was reminiscent of another stellar 1970s adventure novel titled Pieces of the Game, authored by Lee Gifford and published the same year. If you are a fan of nautical adventure then Chartered Love is sure to please. Highly recommended! Get it HERE.

The Wilds

Claude Teweles, now Julia Teweles, was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She was first published at the age of 15 by the National Geographic Society and worked as a production manager on the film City on Fire in 1979. Teweles' first novel, The Stalker, was published by Zebra Books in 1984. The only other novel I could locate was The Wilds, originally published in 1989 by Dell. Putting my hands on that book first, I decided to brave the elements and march in. 

The Wilds works like a survival adventure novel with an embedded sense of unease and suspense. The cover suggests this may be a woodsy slasher outing, which roped me, but the book is placed in my Paperback Warrior “disaster” tag due to the unexpected raging blizzard that entraps the characters.

One of three main characters is Gordon, a displaced former high-school teacher that is now working as an experienced camp counselor for Wolf Gulch. His nightmare happened last year when a young boy was mauled by a wild animal on his watch. Gordon is hoping all of this is behind him now as he launches into a new season of camp counseling.

The other two main characters are Del and Kyle, both of which have an underlining feud. Del is a 15-year old camp counselor that has some reserved psychotic tendencies. He must be first at everything and experiences an inferiority complex. His counterpart is Kyle, a teenager dealing with the loss of his baby brother in a freak bathtub drowning. Kyle has natural leadership qualities, but squanders opportunities with a reckless abandonment. The three characters are lumped into a group of about 15 campers total. 

As a confidence exercise, the group have the looming requirement to climb and cross a treacherous pass in the Sierra Nevada mountains. This is the same stretch that the famed Donner party experienced in the 1800s – the one with the people eating each other to stay alive. The group constantly spook each other with the phobia of a “Donner Man” stalking them through the wilds on a quest for human flesh. This tense urban legend maintains momentum as the group embark further into the forest, eventually creating hallucinogenic effects on the group when they are snowbound in a freak blizzard halfway up the mountain. 

The Wilds is a really interesting novel that has an identity crisis. It works like a horror novel – void of any traditional 80s horror. Instead, as the blizzard envelopes the group, the narrative evolves into a survival of the fittest campaign akin to Lord of the Flies. Kids turn on kids, hunger outperforms human decency, and people begin dying. In the book's finale, all three main characters are having terrifying experiences that they have created in their own minds due to the fatigue, hunter, and harsh elements. Whether any of this is real or not isn't a question – it isn't and every reader knows that. But, one has to suspend disbelief to really put themselves into the shoes of these stressed characters. If you can successfully do that, then The Wilds is an enjoyable read. If you want Jason in a hockey mask plowing down campers then you have taken the wrong trail.

Get The Wilds HERE. 

Ranking November Reads

In this video, I'm ranking my ten favorite reads from the month of November. Included are book covers, insert scans, and capsule reviews of books in the horror, crime-fiction, science-fiction, and fantasy genres. Watch below or directly on the YouTube channel HERE.

Conan - The People of the Summit

Bjorn Nyberg (1929-2004) briefly associated himself with Conan lore beginning in the 1950s. The Swedish author collaborated with L. Sprague de Camp in 1957 to write the novel The Return of Conan, published by Gnome Press. Nyberg authored two short Conan stories, “The People of the Summit” and “The Star of Khorala”, and both are featured in the paperback collections published by Bantam and Ace. Lately, I've been reading early The Savage Sword of Conan magazines and stumbled up on a story titled “Demons of the Summit” in issue three. It was based on “The People of the Summit”, so I decided to check out Nyberg's story before reading the comic adaptation. 

“The People of the Summit” features a twenty-something Conan taking a job as a mercenary to serve King Yildiz of Turan. Conan is provided the role of makeshift sergeant and ordered to lead a small army of Turanians into the Khozgari Hills in hopes to bribe and threaten the restless tribesmen from raiding Turan's lowlands. Sounds easy enough, right?

The Khozgari are brutal barbarians and they ambush the Turanian force leaving only Conan and a fellow soldier named Jamal alive to escape. The two are spotted by the daughter of a Khozgari chief and Conan takes her hostage to secure a safe pass back to a Turanian city. But, to avoid any unnecessary engagement, Conan decides to take the trio across the Misty Mountains. The chief's daughter begins screaming at Conan's decision and swears they will all be killed by the mysterious people there. She describes it, “'Tis a land of terror and death! Do not go there!”. 

But they do and this is where the bulk of the story remains. Nyberg's action scenes were well-written, but I felt Conan's dialogue left something to be desired. Additionally, Conan's strategies were nothing short of awful – he led his men into an ambush and then foolishly took a shortcut that led to even more danger than the original Khozgari warriors. On top of that, the chief's daughter is captured. It's just a complete failure on Conan's part, but I suppose without that we don't have a story. Nyberg's descriptions of a tower existing in the foggy whiteness of the Misty Mountains was very effective and moody, leaving a supernatural atmosphere to blanket these characters and story. 

As I mentioned in my opening, “The People of the Summit” was adapted into “Demons of the Summit” by Roy Thomas and printed in Savage Sword of Conan #3. The story's original appearance was in The Mighty Swordsmen collection published by Lancer in 1970. Additionally the story was also edited and published in Conan the Swordsman by Bantam in 1978 and was also included in a collection titled Sagas of Conan by Tor in 2004. Get the Bantam paperback HERE.

Hired Lover

Hired Lover was first published in 1959 under the pseudonym Fred Martin, but the real author was king of the sleaze-crime genre, Orrie Hitt (1916-1975), and its supposed to be one of his best novels. Thanks to Stark House Press, the short novel is back in print in a double paired with Summer Hotel (1958) and a fascinating introduction by paperback scholar, Jeff Vorzimmer.

Our narrator is a Chicago driving instructor named Mike Callahan who is giving a wealthy young woman named Kitty driving lessons. She’s super sexy and wastes no time seducing Mike. Kitty is married to a much older man. She claims he’s a sickly and cruel man nearly three-times her age. You see where this is going.

Girls like that in books like this are addictive and Mike becomes hooked on the sex with young Kitty. Opportunities abound when Kitty’s husband hires Mike to be her full-time chauffeur. This gives Mike access to Kitty but also access to her husband’s estate and proximity to the life of wealth and privilege he’s never enjoyed before.

Eventually, it occurs to Kitty and Mike that all of it could be theirs if Kitty’s husband was dead. No surprise to the reader who has enjoyed this plot dozens of times within the genre, but Hitt does a nice job managing the twists, turns and betrayals along the way.

If you enjoy femme fatale classics by James M. Cain (The Postman Always Rings Twice) or Gil Brewer (The Vengeful Virgin), you’ll love Hired Lover. This is Orrie Hitt at the top of his noir game. Recommended. Get it HERE.

Quarry #17 - Quarry's Return

Quarry’s Return (2024 Hard Case Crime) is the 17th novel by Max Allan Collins featuring his contract killer character - a series that has spanned the author’s entire adult life.

We join Quarry in modern times at age 71. He’s a widower twice and living alone in a cabin during the tourist off-season. He has an adult daughter who is a successful true-crime author based in the Quad Cities that straddle the Mississippi River between Illinois and Iowa.

The novel also marks the return of an Asian-American female assassin named Lu who was introduced in Quarry’s Deal (aka The Dealer, 1976) and Killing Quarry (2020). For his part, the author does an admirable job of reminding the reader who Lu is. She’s a great partner for Old Man Quarry.

Quarry and Lu are dealing with two problems in this novel. First, hit men are trying to kill Quarry, and he needs to find out why and deal with the client who commissioned his murder. Second, Quarry’s true-crime writing daughter disappeared while researching an active serial killer case for a book.

Quarry and Lu basically serve as murderous detective partners investigating the serial murders in hopes of shedding light on the daughter’s disappearance. They are competent detectives and the solution to the paperback’s mysteries makes for a satisfying read. You can’t go wrong with a Quarry novel, and this one is a winner.

Despite that, you probably shouldn’t read Quarry’s Return without reading Killing Quarry and Quarry's Blood as the new novel is a direct sequel to the other "Old Man Quarry" paperbacks. Collins brings you up to speed just fine, so you won’t be lost, but why not read them in order? For that matter starting the four-book miniseries with Quarry’s Deal probably makes the most sense, but you’re certainly old enough to make your own decisions by now.

Solid novel. Solid series. Go buy them all HERE.

Open Letter to Max Allan Collins:

Big fan, here. Love the Quarry books best of all.

Not to bring up a touchy subject, but you’re 76 years old, and I can’t help but wonder how many more Quarry books you have in you. I hope there’s many more, but you’ve indicated you may be done with the series.

Mickey Spillane did you - and the reading public - a great service by allowing you to keep Mike Hammer alive in your excellent continuation novels. Any chance you can pay it forward by picking a young, talented author and allowing him to continue the Quarry stories (which have always been unstuck in time) after you’re gone?

It’s seems like a no-brainer and your fans will be able to enjoy new books in the series long after you’re gone. Or maybe the new books will suck, and everyone will spend an eternity talking about how you were the only one who could make Quarry work. Either way, you win.

Chew on it.