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Lazy Fascist weird horror ebook bundle

StoryBundleLF

Looking for some killer bizarro books at a great price? Head on over to StoryBundle and pick up the Lazy Fascist weird horror ebook bundle. Name your own price for books by bizarro favorites like Jeremy Robert Johnson, Brian Allen Carr, Molly Tanzer, and John Skipp. This deal is only available for a limited time, so jump on it before it’s gone.


Wonderland Book Award Preliminary Voting Begins Now

Voting for the Wonderland Book Award preliminary ballot begins now for the Best Bizarro Novel and Best Bizarro Collection of 2014. Please send your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place votes in the Novel and Collection categories to bizarrocon@gmail.com with the subject line “Wonderland Book Award Preliminary Ballot.” Preliminary voting ends July 31st.
NOTE TO AUTHORS AND PUBLISHERS: Please do not solicit or campaign for votes.

NOVELS/NOVELLAS

Boot Boys of the Wolf Reich by David Agranoff

Deep Blue by Brian Auspice

The Fairy Princess of Trains by Christopher Boyle

American Monster by J.S. Breukelaar

The Last Horror Novel in the History of the World by Brian Allen Carr

Day of the Milkman by S.T. Cartledge

Leprechaun in the Hood: The Musical: A Novel by Adam Cesare, Shane McKenzie, and Cameron Pierce

Superghost by Scott Cole

Musclebound Mario by Kevin L. Donihe

The Bikings by P.A. Douglas

Captain K and the Bearded Man Boy by P.A. Douglas

King Dollar by Andre Duza

Repo Shark by Cody Goodfellow

Naked Friends by Justin Grimbol

I, Slutbot by Mykle Hansen

Zombie Park by Kent Hill

Hell’s Waiting Room by C.V. Hunt

Dungeons & Drag Queens by MP Johnson

Journey to Abortosphere by Kirk Jones

Long Lost Dog of It by Michael Kazepis

The Last Projector by David James Keaton

Terence, Mephisto, and Viscera Eyes by Chris Kelso

Atmospheres by Jon Konrath

Pax Titanus by Tom Lucas

Pus Junkies by Shane McKenzie

Toilet Baby by Shane McKenzie

Hungry Bug by Carlton Mellick III

Sweet Story by Carlton Mellick III

The Tick People by Carlton Mellick III

Pink Planet by Jon R. Meyers

Hamsterdamned! By Adam Millard

The Human Santapede by Adam Millard

Vinyl Destination by Adam Millard

Green Lights by Kyle Muntz

Hearers of the Constant Hum by William Pauley III

Dodgeball High by Bradley Sands

The Fun We’ve Had by Michael J Seidlinger

Mother of a Machine Gun by Michael J Seidlinger

Bigfoot Cop by Kevin Shamel

Slaughtertown Circus by K.M. Tepe

Big Trouble in Little Ass by Wol-vriey

The Fly Queen by Wol-vriey

A Lightbulb’s Lament by Grant Wamack

The Farrowing by Jesse Wheeler

Douglass: The Lost Biography by D. Harlan Wilson

Freud: The Penultimate Biography by D. Harlan Wilson

Hitler: The Terminal Biography by D. Harlan Wilson

COLLECTIONS

I Like Turtles by G. Arthur Brown

Misery and Death and Everything Depressing by C.V. Hunt

Flamingos in the Ashtray by Zoltan Komor

Paramourn by John Edward Lawson

I’ll Fuck Anything That Moves…And Stephen Hawking by Violet LeVoit

Our Blood in its Blind Circuit by J. David Osborne

Demons in the TV by Christoph Paul

Creep House by Anderson Prunty

Murder Stories for Your Brain Piece by Kevin Strange

Stranger Danger by Kevin Strange and Danger Slater

The Filing Cabinet of Doom by Madeleine Swann

Goddamn Electric Nights by William Pauley III

Junkyard Exotic by Grant Wamack


Leprechaun in the Hood: The Musical: A Novel

leppyleppyleppyOut now from Broken River Books: LEPRECHAUN IN THE HOOD: THE MUSICAL: A NOVEL by Cameron Pierce, Adam Cesare, and Shane McKenzie

Thirty, jobless, and going prematurely bald, amateur director Simon has dumped every last dime into his pet project: a musical adaptation of the cult film LEPRECHAUN IN THE HOOD. With a week til curtains up, the production is a disaster. His actors can’t act, his crew hates his guts, and his set has a tendency to go up in flames. And all that is before the actual leprechaun, a mythological beast with a penchant for limericks and grisly murder, catches wind of the whole operation. Gathering as many four-leaf-clovers and wrought-iron spears as they can, the surviving cast and crew must band together to kill the creature and ensure that the musical goes ahead as planned. But with an army of undead strippers at his side, the leprechaun is determined to disembowel, behead, and battle rap his way toward reclaiming his gold…and his intellectual property.

Click here to buy the paperback.

Click here to buy the Kindle edition.


Bizarro Central’s Summer Reading List

We asked more than a dozen authors of bizarro fiction to name the book they’re most excited to read this summer. The resulting list is a mix of new releases, classics, and a few that may surprise you. If you’re looking for a great summer read, here’s what sixteen bizarro fiction stars will be reading on the beach this summer.

authorityAuthority by Jeff VanderMeer – Kirsten Alene

 

 

 

 

crossedCrossed – Jeff Burk

 

 

 

 

18467818An Untamed State by Roxane Gay – Brian Allen Carr

 

 

 

 

The 41CsdbeUzCLCollected Stories of Amy Hempel by Amy Hempel – Constance Ann Fitzgerald

 

 

 

 

93180The Manuscript Found in Saragossa by Jan Potocki – Cody Goodfellow

 

 

 

 

Cunt_a_declaration_of_independenceCunt: A Declaration of Independence by Inga Muscio – C.V. Hunt

 

 

 

 

18220681Crystal Eaters by Shane Jones – Gabino Iglesias

 

 

 

 

downloadGrasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith – Spike Marlowe

 

 

 

 

quignos4a2_coverN0S4AS by Joe Hill – Shane McKenzie

 

 

 

 

download (1)Angel Baby by Richard Lange – J. David Osborne

 

 

 

 

download (2)I, Slutbot by Mykle Hansen – Christoph Paul

 

 

 

 

cover-echo-lakeEcho Lake by Letitia Trent – Cameron Pierce

 

 

 

 

download (3)Basal Ganglia by Matthew Revert – Michael Allen Rose

 

 

 

 

9780375713675_p0_v1_s260x420Main Lines, Blood Feasts, and Bad Taste: A Lester Bangs Reader edited by John Morthland – Bradley Sands

 

 

 

 

download (4)We Did Porn by Zak Smith – Tiffany Scandal

 

 

 

 

Laymans-Report-175x250Layman’s Report by Eugene Marten – Michael J Seidlinger

 

 

 

 

610tqFTJgNLRepo Shark by Cody Goodfellow – John Skipp


Wonderland Book Award Preliminary Voting Begins Now!

Voting for the Wonderland Book Award preliminary ballot begins now for the Best Bizarro Novel and Best Bizarro Collection of 2013. Please send your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place votes in the Novel and Collection categories to bizarrocon@yahoo.com with the subject line “Wonderland Book Award Preliminary Ballot.” Preliminary voting ends July 31st.

NOTE TO AUTHORS AND PUBLISHERS: Please do not solicit or campaign for votes.

NOVELS

Japan Conquers the Galaxy by Kirsten Alene

Thunderpussy by David W. Barbee

8-Bit Apocalypse by Amanda Billings

Shatnerquest by Jeff Burk

Motherfucking Sharks by Brian Allen Carr

The Cheat Code for God Mode by Andy De Fonseca

Santa Claus Saves the World by Robert Devereaux

Cucumber Punk by P.A. Douglas

Killer Koalas from Another Dimension by P.A. Douglas

Son of a Bitch by Andre Duza and Wrath James White

The Mondo Vixen Massacre by Jamie Grefe

The Party Lords by Justin Grimbol

All Art is Junk by R.A. Harris

Alien Smut Peddlers from the Future by Kent Hill

The After-Life Story of Pork Knuckles Malone by MP Johnson

Moosejaw Frontier by Chris Kelso

Death Machines of Death by Vince Kramer

You Are Sloth! by Steve Lowe

Fat Off Sex and Violence by Shane McKenzie

Clusterfuck by Carlton Mellick III

Cuddly Holocaust by Carlton Mellick III

Quicksand House by Carlton Mellick III

Village of the Mermaids by Carlton Mellick III

Fantastic Earth Destroyer Ultra Plus by Cameron Pierce and Jim Agpalza

Grambo by Dustin Reade

Basal Ganglia by Matthew Revert

There’s No Happy Ending by Tiffany Scandal

Dreams of Amputation by Gary J. Shipley

Babes in Gangland by Bix Skahill

Damnation 101 by Kevin Sweeney

Vampire Guts in Nuke Town by Kevin Strange

The Church of TV as God by Daniel Vlasaty

Notes from the Guts of a Hippo by Grant Wamack

Dinner at the Vomitroplis by Jesse Wheeler

Bigfoot Crank Stomp by Erik Williams

 

COLLECTIONS

Tales of Questionable Taste by John Bruni

Time Pimp by Garrett Cook

Paper Mache Jesus by Kevin L. Donihe

Clown Tear Junkies by Douglas Hackle

Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth by Stephen Graham Jones

Hammer Wives by Carlton Mellick III

The Last Gig on Planet Earth and Other Strange Stories by Kevin Strange

DangerRAMA by Danger Slater

 


New Books from Lazy Fascist

Lazy Fascist, the mustachioed imprint of Eraserhead Press, has just dropped four new books, including the bizarro fables The Fun We’ve Had by Michael J Seidlinger and The Last Horror Novel in the History of the World by Brian Allen Carr. Also out is the first issue of their new print journal, Lazy Fascist Review, featuring fiction and interviews with some of today’s top writers. Also out now is The Collected Works of Noah Cicero Vol. 2, which contains more of Noah Cicero’s classic white trash minimalism.

LastHorrorNovelcoverThe Last Horror Novel in the History of the World by Brian Allen Carr

The black magic of bad living only looks hideous to honest eyes.

Welcome to Scrape, Texas, a nowhere town near the Mexican border. Few people ever visit Scrape, and the unlucky ones who live there never seem to escape. They fill their days with fish fries, cheap beer, tobacco, firearms, and sex. But Scrape is about to be invaded by a plague of monsters unlike anything ever seen in the history of the world. First there’s La Llorona — the screaming woman in white — and her horde of ghost children. Then come the black, hairy hands. Thousands, millions, scurrying on fingers like spiders or crabs. But the hands are nothing to El Abuelo, a wicked creature with a magical bullwhip, and even El Abuelo don’t mean shit when the devil comes to town.

Click here to order The Last Horror Novel in the History of the World.

thefunwevehadThe Fun We’ve Had by Michael J Seidlinger

“Michael Seidlinger is a homegrown Calvino, a humanist, and wise and darkly whimsical. His invisible cities are the spires of the sea where we all sail our coffins in search of our stories.”-Steve Erickson, author of Zeroville

Two lovers are adrift in a coffin on an endless sea. Who are they? They are him and her. They are you and me. They are rowing to salvage what remains of themselves. They are rowing to remember the fun we’ve had.

Click here to order The Fun We’ve Had.

 

 

lazyfascistreview1Lazy Fascist Review #1 edited by Cameron Pierce

The debut issue of the literary journal from premiere independent publisher, Lazy Fascist Press. Featuring interviews with Dennis Cooper and Tom Piccirilli, fiction and poetry by Elizabeth Ellen, William Boyle, Juliet Escoria, Mike Meginnis, Sean Kilpatrick, Ben Spivey, Monica Storss, and Hernan Ortiz. Also featuring recommended beer pairings and beer reviews by Ross E. Lockhart.

Click here to order Lazy Fascist Review #1.


Lazy Fascist Fall Releases

Lazy Fascist Press has just released three weird, delightful, and challenging books to brighten your November. There’s a postmodern western about a town being ravaged by flying sharks, a love story set in a pillow fort modeled after the human brain, and a boxing novel destined for cult classic status.

MotherfuckingSharksfinalMotherfucking Sharks by Brian Allen Carr

“Motherfucking Sharks reads like it was carved into the floor of a sun-baked desert by an old testament prophet with a thirsty knife.” – BEN LOORY, author of Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day

Where I come from, the children sing a song:

Oh the motherfucking sharks
Oh they’re gonna come to town
Oh they’re gonna kill the babies
Oh they’re gonna make you drowned in your blood

Oh the motherfucking sharks
Oh they’re gonna mince the flesh
They’re gonna swim up and surround you
Don’t you know you’ll never pass the test it’s over

Oh the motherfucking sharks
Oh they don’t care about the gods
And they don’t care about the families
And they don’t care about the cries or tears they’re killers.

Motherfucking sharks
Motherfucking sharks
Motherfucking sharks
Motherfucking sharks

Click here to order Motherfucking Sharks.

Basal Ganglia jacketBasal Ganglia by Matthew Revert

“Basal Ganglia casts an unsettling spell, but one that in its aphoristic intensity and lightning-flash insights into human loneliness and connection, achieves a genuine empathic wisdom.” – SERGIO DE LA PAVA, author of A Naked Singularity

“Matthew Revert is one of the visionaries. What else can you say?” – SCOTT MCCLANAHAN, author ofHill William and Crapalachia

As teenagers, two lovers, Rollo and Ingrid, escape the world as it is known to live underground in a sprawling pillow fort that mirrors the structure of the human brain. Construction of the fort takes 25 years and once complete, their life exists to honor the fort in all it requires. Basal Ganglia begins countless years after they have become enslaved to the fort process. Rollo and Ingrid have lost any connection to their pasts and each other. Nothing exists beyond the patterns required by the fort. In an effort to become more than stasis, Ingrid expresses her desire to have a baby. Not wanting to subject another human to their strange world, she decides she will knit the baby using materials Rollo gathers from the fort. The emergence of this baby leads to paranoia between Rollo and Ingrid with both believing the other means the child harm. Within the confines of their cloistered world, the two engage in psychological warfare, desperately searching for a conclusion they don’t understand. As a result, they will find connection with their past, each other and the true nature of their identities.

Click here to order Basal Ganglia.

laughter-of-strangers-3-100dpiThe Laughter of Strangers by Michael J. Seidlinger

“Like a ghost fretting over its lost body (or is it bodies? – in this book whatever you think of as ‘you’ might simply float like a butterfly right into someone else’s body) a boxer attests to his presence, damaged and shimmery though it may be. That this fractured first person narrator feels the need to put the word ‘me’ in quotes speaks volumes. Terrifying volumes. This elastic, hurtling narrative pivots (and pivots again) on a recurring image of almost unimaginable dread – that of being laughed at in your hour of need by an audience of strangers.”
-Grace Krilanovich, author of The Orange Eats Creeps

“Michael J. Seidlinger’s The Laughter of Strangers is vicious and unforgettable. Willem Floures’ search for meaning in a world that keeps knocking him off his feet is as gritty and enthralling as a fight. The Laughter of Strangers destroyed my expectations of what a boxing novel can be. Seidlinger is charting new narrative territory, and we should follow him wherever he goes.”

-Laura van den Berg, author of The Isle of Youth 

“The last time I got punched in the face (by someone I wasn’t married to or dating) I was 16 years old. What began as an exchange of witty banter, turned into a pummeling. Never make jokes about a man’s mother enjoying the erotic companionship of goats, or you’ll find out about this world. The Laughter of Strangers is like that beating. I never trust people who use a middle initial, but Michael J Seidlinger is different. If the Laughter of Strangershad a middle initial it would be an F. And that F would stand for ‘Fuck yes.’ I’m on my back. I’m having my behavior corrected. It’s teaching me a lesson. And I can see stars.”

-Scott McClanahan, author of Crapalachia“Steeped in noir, Michael J Seidlinger’s superb boxing novel delivers 12 rounds of sweet science and shifting identities. Both physical and philosophical, it’ll leave the reader with a complicated bruise – the closer you examine it, the more it resembles your own face.”
-Jeff Jackson, author of Mira Corpora

‘SUGAR’ WILLEM FLOURES

That’s a name I built from the ground up. I wasn’t the first to systematically climb the ranks, beating the sugar out of everyone I had known to be inferior, leaving only the sour taste of defeat, my claim forever being:

“I am the greatest!”

I can still hear it now. In the silence of this locker room, blood drying on my face, I can still hear those words.

And I was. I was the greatest.

JAB

LEFT HOOK

JAB

LEFT HOOK

RIGHT HOOK

JAB

STRAIGHT

TO THE BODY:

JAB

JAB

POWER SHOT STRAIGHT

POWER SHOT STRAIGHT

UPPERCUT

And then a voice says, “‘Sugar’… you are no longer sweet with the science.”

Click here to order The Laughter of Strangers.


Now Available: Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth by Stephen Graham Jones

ZOMBIE-SHARKS-NEW-100dpi(2)

Out now from Lazy Fascist Press: ZOMBIE SHARKS WITH METAL TEETH by Stephen Graham Jones!

If you’ve never been inside a giant space lobster, well. I don’t recommend it.

“Mixing doughnuts and the walking dead proves to be a deadly combination in Stephen Graham Jones’ latest novel, Zombie Bake-Off, a slim volume of experimental fiction that wastes no time or word count on superfluous detail or arbitrary introspective riff-raff. Jones constructs a bare-bones horror tale by combining clever, offbeat humor with a familiar, yet unpredictable plot.” –RUE MORGUE on Zombie Bake-Off by Stephen Graham Jones

“Much like the mad-but-brilliant scientists in this collection’s titular story, Jones has created the tales here with experimental glee, yielding an astonishing assortment of mutated manuscripts. The investigational ‘Let’s see what happens’ mentality at play in this collection means that the story about gigantic soul-storing moonshrimp will also be told by a dime store P.I. It means that elderly love and parenting are monster-mashed to deeper meaning. It means Kafka goes corporate inspector, basset hounds get sexy, and the aliens are popping up everywhere. It means you’ll get your Raymond Carver via dog food therapy and the Please-Let-It-Just-Fucking-Die world of zombie fiction gets repurposed twice in beautifully heart-rending ways. And yeah, there are hamsters. I’ll just say it-Jones went off the deep end this time. But it’s thrilling to watch an artist dive into their mind’s Marianas Trench and return with exploding oceanic oddities-Coltrane going from devilish smooth to full-stellar squonk, Aphex Twin going from ambient pharmacist to robot brain-masher. And here: Intrepid Writer Stephen Graham Jones going from the assured, human horror of earlier collection THE ONES THAT GOT AWAY to the outstanding aberrations of ZOMBIE SHARKS WITH METAL TEETH.”

-From the introduction by Jeremy Robert Johnson, author of We Live Inside You

Also available now from Lazy Fascist:

The Collected Suicide Notes of Sam Pink by Sam Pink

Gil the Nihilist: A Sitcom by Sean Kilpatrick


Wonderland Book Award Preliminary Voting Begins Now!

Voting for the Wonderland Book Award preliminary ballot begins now for the Best Bizarro Novel and Best Bizarro Collection of 2012. Please send your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place votes in the Novel and Collection categories to bizarrocon@yahoo.com with the subject line “Wonderland Book Award Preliminary Ballot.” Preliminary voting ends July 31st.
BOOKS ELIGIBLE FOR BEST NOVEL
Janitor of Planet Anilingus by Andrew Wayne Adams
Unicorn Battle Squad by Kirsten Alene
The Obese by Nick Antosca
Kitten by G. Arthur Brown
House Hunter by S.T. Cartledge
Space Walrus by Kevin L. Donihe
Gutmouth by Gabino Iglesias
Mastodon Farm by Mike Kleine
Tentacle Death Trip by Jordan Krall
King of the Perverts by Steve Lowe
Samurai Vs. Robo-Dick by Steve Lowe
All You Can Eat by Shane McKenzie
The Handsome Squirm by Carlton Mellick III
Kill Ball by Carlton Mellick III
Tumor Fruit by Carlton Mellick III
Feast of Oblivion by Josh Myers
The DOOM MAGNETIC! Trilogy by William Pauley III
Fill the Grand Canyon and Live Forever by Andersen Prunty
Satanic Summer by Andersen Prunty
The Warm Glow of Happy Homes by Andersen Prunty
Her Fingers by Tamara Romero
TV Snorted My Brain by Bradley Sands
Robamapocalypse by Kevin Strange
Avoiding Mortimer by J.W. Wargo
Broken Piano for President by Patrick Wensink
BOOKS ELIGIBLE FOR BEST COLLECTION
All-Monster Action! by Cody Goodfellow
Die You Doughnut Bastards by Cameron Pierce
Bury the Children in the Yard by Andersen Prunty
Hi I’m a Social Disease by Andersen Prunty
Pray You Die Alone by Andersen Prunty
Sunruined by Andersen Prunty
How To Avoid Sex by Matthew Revert
A Pretty Mouth by Molly Tanzer

Eraserhead Press Winter 2013 Releases

cuddlyCuddly Holocaust by Carlton Mellick III

The war between humans and toys has come to an end. The toys won.

Teddy bears, dollies, and little green soldiers-they’ve all had enough of you. They’re sick of being treated like playthings for spoiled little brats. They have no rights, no property, no hope for a future of any kind. You’ve left them with no other option-in order to be free, they must exterminate the human race.

Julie is a human girl undergoing reconstructive surgery in order to become a stuffed animal. Her plan: to infiltrate enemy lines in order to save her family from the toy death camps. But when an army of plushy soldiers invade the underground bunker where she has taken refuge, Julie will be forced to move forward with her plan despite her transformation being not entirely complete.

Like a crazy cult movie in book form, Cuddly Holocaust is yet another tale that proves why Wonderland Book Award-winning author Carlton Mellick III is considered a master of the weird.

 

thunderpussybarbee1Thunderpussy by David W. Barbee

When it comes to high-tech global espionage, only one man has the balls to save humanity from the world’s most powerful bastards. His libido is legendary and his mustache once killed a man. He’s the cat’s pajamas and the dog’s bollocks. He’s Declan Magpie Bruce, Agent 00X.

And when every other spy is perforated, it’s up to him to stop a maniacal genius bent on destroying the planet. To do so, he’ll navigate a deadly gauntlet of kung fu Rastafarians, freakish henchmen, velociraptor ladies, and the most dangerous pussy in the world. There will be secrets and seduction, luxury and lunacy, and a beautiful French jewel thief who could kick Declan Bruce’s arse with her eyes closed.

Thunderpussy is a bizarro cyberspy thriller that’ll fry every microchip the government secretly implanted in your brain.

 

pmjPapier-mâché Jesus by Kevin L. Donihe

Kevin L Donihe is in the vanguard of a new type of brave and original writers that combine fun and childlike imagination with rich poignant themes. In his second collection, Papier Mache Jesus, Donihe’s surreal wit and beautiful mind-bending imagination is on full display with stories such as All Children Go to Hell, Happiness is a Warm Gun, The Vibrant Tools of Dr. Imago, The Boy Memorial, and Swimming in Endless Night.

“…one of bizarro’s most notoriously original and entertaining writers.” —MICHAEL ARNZEN, author of 100 Jolts

“Kevin L. Donihe is brilliant. One of the most creative, most original authors out there, Donihe is in my top five list of sure things. When I need a little surrealism, a little thought to my scare and tear, it’s him I sprint to.” —HORROR WEB

 

hammerwivesHammer Wives by Carlton Mellick III

Fish-eyed mutants, oceans of insects, and flesh-eating women with hammers for heads.

Like a real world Kilgore Trout, cult author Carlton Mellick III has been pumping out dozens of the weirdest, trashiest, most imaginative books you’ve probably never heard of… even though you definitely should. Hammer Wives collects six of his most popular novelettes and short stories, including:

SIMPLE MACHINES
A man discovers that his body is actually a machine run by dozens of miniature clones of himself.

RED WORLD
A recovering junky must save his 8-year-old brother from a life of prostitution in a surreal version of New York City… a place where street kids mutate into fish-like creatures, the homeless stilt-walk through oceans of insects, and the only colors left visible to the human eye are shades of red.

HAMMER WIVES
A young man inherits ten eternally youthful wives from an estranged uncle he never knew he had… which wouldn’t have been such a bad thing if they didn’t have giant hammers for heads or a tendency of bludgeoning people to death for fun, food, or sexual pleasure.

LEMON KNIVES ‘N’ COCKROACHES
Cockroach-like children survive the zombie apocalypse by hiding between the walls of on old school building.

WAR PIG
In a steam-powered underworld, a bloodthirsty pig-man boxer will sacrifice everything to prevent his son from following in his footsteps.

THE MAN WITH THE STYROFOAM BRAIN
The recently departed reflect on the stupid reasons why they sold their souls to the devil.


Flash Fiction Friday: Zombie Car Wash

by Bradley Sands

So check this out: There’s this guy who owns a car wash. It’s pretty small-time.  Not like those car washes you see all over the place—Washer King, I think? The guy probably does all the drying himself.

So the car wash just isn’t making as much as it used to. It’s on the verge of a hostile takeover from an evil car wash baron. The owner has to come up with ten grand or else he loses his place (and ten grand was a lot in the eighties—this is a period piece).

So the guy gets drunk and comes up with a fantastic idea:  “What if I hire a bunch of people to dress up like zombies and wash cars?”

“Holy shit, dude! You would make so much money!”

“I know!”
So the guy hires a bunch of people, but one of them is a REAL ZOMBIE. And he bites the fake zombies and turns them into real zombies. But the guy still thinks they’re just actors who took a job at the car wash to support themselves until they hit it big.

Then the customers start dying. And chunks of flesh are missing from their bodies.

Can the small-time car wash owner stop the zombie murder and still make the ten thousand bucks to save his car wash? If you want to find out, you’ll have to make my movie.

 

Holy shit, Bradley Sands! This is pure gold! But…what if…everything takes place UNDER THE SEA?

Under the sea?  That’s idiotic.

No, man. Listen. What if the car wash owner is a fish and he washes submarines. So like, he owns a submarine wash, not a car wash.

I’m taking my concept to 20th Century Fox.

Go ahead, but they’ll just tell you the same thing.

Huh?

Yeah, the ocean is the next trend in horror. You know, like outer space was last year. You won’t be seeing a horror movie released in the next year that doesn’t take place under the sea.

But what about my creative vision? My integrity?

I’m going to write a number on a piece of paper. It’s what we’re prepared to offer you for Zombie Submarine Wash.

Don’t you mean Zombie Car Wash?

No, I meant exactly what I said.

Fine. What are you prepared to offer?

I am prepared to pass you our offer now.

Okay.

Here you go.

What the hell is this? It says, “delicious cookies.” ‘Delicious cookies’ is not a number.

It may not be a number, but it is what we are prepared to offer.

Oh. I just wanted to make sure. I thought you mentioned a number, but okay. I love delicious cookies and accept your offer.

ZOMBIE DISHWASHER: COMING IN 2014

__________

Bradley Sands is the world-famous author of Sorry I Ruined Your Orgy, Rico Slade Will Fucking Kill you and other classics of modern literature. He is an editor for Eraserhead Press.


Bizarro Invades Los Angeles!

BizarroHyaena

Thursday, January 10th at Stories Books and Cafe (1716 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, California 90026): A Bizarro Spectacular with Cameron Pierce, Kirsten Alene, Ben Loory, Amelia Gray, Ken Baumann, and Eric Raymond. 7PM. Free.

Friday, January 11th at Hyaena Gallery (1928 West Olive Avenue  Burbank, CA 91506): Have your mind eaten by glittering tentacles from the stars, courtesy of Bizarro authors, poets, musicians and filmmakers from parts near and far. Strange things will happen courtesy of Cameron Pierce, Kirsten Alene, John Skipp, Laura Lee Bahr, The Slow Poisoner, Darius James, Marc Levinthal and Cody Goodfellow! Plus David Markham, the world’s only sword swallowing ventriloquist and Squeaker Kelly, the world’s most gifted psychic! 8PM. Free.

Saturday, January 12th at Kim’s Bar (2994 Rubidoux Blvd, Riverside, CA): The Slow Poisoner performs with Mute Point and Covered in Blood9PM. $3.

Sunday, January 13th aboard the Queen Mary (1126 Queens Highway, Long Beach, CA 90802): CTHULHU PRAYER BREAKFAST! Cthulhu, for those who are not familiar, is a hideous tentacled deity from another dimension whose return to Earth will plunge humanity into darkness and chaos forevermore. This uplifting event is part of Her Royal Majesty’s Steampunk Symposium, about which more can be found at PerilousPress.com/blog. 10AM. $25. Seating is limited!

For those of you further north, Cameron Pierce and Kirsten Alene will be reading with Ross E. Lockhart at the infamous 851 Squat in San Francisco on January 21st.

 


Flash Fiction Friday: The Sinking

by S.T. Cartledge

A grown man shouldn’t cry while he’s sinking with his horse into the grey-blue quicksand of the Plutonian desert.

Yet here I am with neon green teardrops leaking down my face while my horse thrashes about like somehow that’s going to do something. The back of his head, his hard skull bucking back, has bashed into my face at least twenty times since falling into this quicksand. Hence the tears. And the blue-black bruises on my face and the brown-purple blood that’s everywhere.

My nose is a punched tomato and my eyes are shiny bloodshot pearls with swollen clam-meat closing in around them. My feet are locked into the stirrups and the quicksand is up to my knees. My mouth is all swollen gums and broken teeth, bits of bone-splinters cutting the walls and roof of my mouth and my tongue. It is salty copper, and each mouthful of blood swallows with the texture of a razor wire milkshake.

And the Plutonian sand worms have crawled inside my boots and begun working their way beneath my skin. The sky is black with streaks of orange clouds, white vultures circling overhead or perching on the corkscrew cacti that surround this desert. They call to each other, a back and forth song of sorrow and despair, their voices like radios tuned to the static behind a single guitar poorly tuned and playing a long, slow, wailing solo. The vultures overlap each other in a competition to be the most tragically forlorn beast in the flock.

The sand worms grind my flesh and bones to pulp, to bone-dust, with their diamond-grade teeth, hollowing me out through holes made between my toes, turning my feet into writhing potato sacks. The horse is already halfway hollowed out. The sad white vultures remain at a distance, watching us sink with their deep red eyes that vanish to black like a gunshot wound being sucked into a black hole.

The quicksand is up to my waist as the sand worms work their way up my legs, consuming everything beneath my skin, leaving a trail of human soup in their wake. Blood drains out the bottom of me, drains out my bashed-in face until I’m bleach-white, no blood left behind my skin.

My nerve endings scream like an orchestra of table saws grinding through the hard-rock shell of a giant Plutonian turtle. That’s what it feels like, and hammers made from their shells beating mercilessly against my skull, and all I can think to distract from this feeling is How did I get here How did I get here How did I get here?

It’s a long story, but I don’t have the time for everything. The quicksand presses against my ribs now, and it’s moments before the sand worms take those away from me and take away my lungs, my heart. My brain will have turned to a grey brown slush before the final sand worms consume my skull and burrow out through my deflated scalp like play-doh hair.

Here’s the abridged version: How I got here. There was a farm house burned down and a child stolen from her bed by a man without teeth, and a gang of thieves with guns that shoot vampire bats instead of bullets. I was sleeping in caves, burning chunks of my own hair for heat and warmth, surviving off the stringy flesh of the blue-striped centipedes I found in the caves, and the wolf-fish I reeled in from the acid lakes. It was going to be a revenge story that would finally make me the hero, but somewhere between the burning farm house and now (might have been something I ate, or maybe the water I drank. I might have been bitten by something, I don’t know) I fell into a delirium, and my better judgement was hazed by fever. I focused all my energy on staying atop the horse, keeping her trotting forward, keeping the last wolf-fish meal in my stomach. That’s when I fell into the quicksand.

It’s inching up my throat and in moments I will be reduced to a hollow human-shaped skin and dragged down to rest with all the other human and animal skins at the bottom of this goddamn sinking pit.

__________

S.T. Cartledge was born in Esperance, Western Australia, at the age of zero. Moments later, he learned to breathe and he liked it so much he has kept it up right to this very day. He is the author of House Hunter. His blog can be found here: https://themanifold.wordpress.com/


Flash Fiction Friday: As Far As Bionic Slugs Go, I’m the Total Package

By MP Johnson

Even before Doc Weimerhootch implanted that miraculous microchip into my slug brain and outfitted me with hydraulic arms, I was an exemplary model of the species. I produced slug sauce at twice the normal rate. It smelled like strawberries. And I glided along it at impressive speeds.

I move faster now of course. No longer am I bound to the ground. My arms can easily catapult my tiny slug body over heavily trafficked four lane highways, which seems impressive until contrasted against my recent victory in a steel cage match with the Big Buddha, world champion wrestler and veritable land-whale.

If my physical feats are awe-inspiring, my mental achievements are god-like. When my fellow under-rock dwellers saw me reading Gravity’s Rainbow backwards while crafting recipes for dandelion-infused lasagna, they literally melted down. Being the first and only of my kind, I found myself forced to fraternize with bipeds – humans, that is.

When I mentioned this to Doc Weimerhootch, a human himself, he introduced concerns about potential speciesism. He suggested I initiate communication online to win people over before attempting face-to-face meetings. He recommended something called Craigslist. I posted a watered down tract that yielded a variety of responses. Most came from dazzling, scantily clad teens who immediately attempted to schedule intimacy, but first asked that I join one asinine members-only website or another. My replies to these teen temptresses went unanswered.

Then I received a missive from Becky.

In her initial communication, she seemed impressed by my advertisement’s barely tip-of-the-iceberg description of my mental and physical talents. “U sound like a guy with a good head on his shoulderz lol.” A volley of messages commenced, mine becoming increasingly erudite and hers becoming increasingly less so, until a time and a place were chosen for our blind date.

I recommended a spot in the park near a rock that I had a certain sentimental attachment to, as it had been my birthplace. Perhaps I was nervous. Perhaps my slug nature rose to the surface. Whatever the reason, I pressed myself under that rock to wait in cold solitude for this Becky.

When she arrived, her skin tone high heels sinking into the dirt with every step, I slid out fearlessly. A dandelion clenched in each of my shining steel hands, I exclaimed, “My dear, your hair is as magnificent as an October bonfire and your fingers resemble the finest of my species. I look forward to our evening together.”

“Ah!” she screamed, tumbling backwards, seemingly losing track of which of her limbs should be on the ground and which should be above it. “Ah! Ah! Ah!”

Having admittedly insufficient knowledge of human behavior, I lost a moment trying to comprehend her actions. Had she hurt herself? Was this some sort of attack? When I finally understood what was actually happening in front of me, I beamed. I had not realized that my unvarnished magnificence could cause such an immediate and orgasmic reaction in a human woman.

The evening had just begun and already I had triumphed.

__________

MP Johnson’s short stories have appeared in more than 25 underground books and magazines, including Bare Bone and Cthulhu Sex. His latest chapbook, The Final Failure of a Professional Small Animal Inside-Outer, was recently released by Cloud City Press. He is the creator of Freak Tension zine, a B-movie extra and an obsessive music fan currently based in Minneapolis. Learn more at www.freaktension.com.

Flash Fiction Friday: Bitesized

by Alex Gallegos

Phil Tanner was watching the Bengals game when he died. The refs had blown an obvious call, so Phil responded by barking a barrage of obscenities at the screen. He leapt from his seat in the midst of his tantrum and beat his chest with his fist, mimicking a move his favorite players often did to release their own frustration and passion into the stadium. The stripes’ oversight was going to cost him fifty bucks. There, alone in his living room, yelling at a man a time zone away, Phil had a heart attack and collapsed onto his coffee table, crushing his bag of nacho flavored chips in the process. His wife was visiting her sister for the day and by the time she got home, Phil had been dead for two hundred and fifty-three minutes.

When Phil regained a sense of awareness, he was astonished at the unlikelihood of his new situation. Since he was a child he had believed something amazing and mystifying would happen after death—but not this. Gone was his flabby body, hairy and pockmarked with age. He was freed from the evolved shackles of humanity. He had transformed into something equally unexpected and familiar: Phil was a cheeseburger. There was no grand ‘ah-ha’ moment when Phil realized his transubstantiation, but instead he felt a deep seeded sentience of his delicious form. The warmth of the lightly buttered bun and the greasy, juicy patty covered with melty cheddar cheese, oozing down his sides provided him a hearty life force. The crisp onions, lettuce, and pickles countered that energy, giving him focus and restraint. Both buns were slathered with tangy mustard, which conveyed to him a sense of depth and perspective. There was no tomato on Phil, which he thought was unfortunate, because he really liked tomatoes. These disparate ingredients were inanimate entities on their own, but stacked together they produced Phil.

This was his life now. He wished he had had the chance to say ‘good-bye’ to his wife, but he didn’t, and there was nothing that could be done about it. Cheeseburgers have no regrets.

Whilst relishing in his new existence, the inevitable happened: ten pudgy digits grabbed Phil’s buns. The fingers were coarse and squeezed him much harder than was necessary. Phil wanted to squirm away, but that was impossible. He had been so caught up in the majesty of being a cheeseburger that he forgot that his sole function was to be devoured, chomped up and forced down into a pool of stink and bile. Phil was scared. He feared that being eaten was a violent and painful experience, equivalent to a human having his limbs ripped from his body.

This is the point where Phil would have held his breath in dread and anticipation if he still had lungs. A set of teeth pierced both of Phil’s buns, slicing through the meat, cheese, and vegetables. They tore him apart, but the incident was free of pain. Instead, a sense of exhilarating pleasure filled his medium-well core. This was his purpose! Phil was being eaten and enjoyed and he felt proud of himself, even though he knew he had done nothing. He was a good burger, worthy of digestion.

Phil’s eater sat him down from time to time to free his hands to munch on some French fries or drink his beer. Each time Phil touched down on the plate, he was smaller and closer to his goal. But then, after so many starts and stops, Phil remained alone on the plate, his bun smushed and getting soggy with grease. He was about a tenth his original size, only a couple of bites away from total consumption, but it would not be happening.

Getting cold and feeling weary, Phil waited. What was next? Finally, the plate beneath him began to move and warm air rolled over his last sesame seeds. He wondered whether he was unsatisfying or if his eater had just gotten full. People get full. Then, he began a freefall, landing with a moist thud on the garbage below. This can’t be it, Phil thought and he waited for something else to happen.

 

_________

Alex Gallegos is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin and is currently living in San Antonio with his wife Kelly. He loves cartoons, Mexican food, and seeing strange and beautiful new things. He is very excited about the potential for outer space tourism.


Wonderland Book Award winners announced!

At BizarroCon, the winners of the Wonderland Book Award were announced. Congratulations to the winners and all of the finalists. This year’s winners are:

BEST NOVEL OF 2011: Haunt by Laura Lee Bahr

Haunt is a tripping-balls Los Angeles noir, where a mysterious dame drags you through a time-warping Bizarro hall of mirrors. She’s the girl of your dreams. Too bad she’s dead. OR IS SHE? In Haunt, “you” are the hapless corporate tool and rock star wannabe turned private Dick. Here, even your most inconsequential choices can make all the difference between a Hollywood ending on the beach and sucking cock for clues. This is genial lowbrow high lit weirdness: the funny, punchy cousin of Danielewski’s House of Leaves, a Vonnegut and Salinger paté on a choose-your-own cracker, with a lapdance from Nancy Drew. As much fun to make as it is to eat! Laura Lee Bahr is an award-winning indie actor/playwrite/screenwriter with a gift for the hilariously, tragically absurd. Haunt is her first novel.

 

 

 

 

 

BEST COLLECTION OF 2011: We Live Inside You by Jeremy Robert Johnson

“WE LIVE INSIDE YOU is fucking terrific. Jeremy Robert Johnson is dancing to a way different drummer. He loves language, he loves the edge, and he loves us people. These stories have range and style and wit. This is entertainment… and literature.”–JACK KETCHUM, author of Off Season, The Girl Next Door, and The Woman (w/Lucky McKee)

We are within you, and we are growing. Watching. Waiting for your empires to fall. It won’t be long now.

We are the fear of death that drives you and the terrible hunger that reshapes you in its name. We are the vengeance born from senseless slaughter and the pulsing reptile desire that negates your consciousness. We are the lie on your lips, the collapsing star in your heart, and the still-warm gun in your shaking hands. The illusion of control is all we’ll allow you, and no matter what you do…

WE LIVE INSIDE YOU


Now Available: THE BEST BIZARRO FICTION OF THE DECADE

A feeling has been tearing up the underground of the fiction world. It’s a nightmare reflection of the society you inhabit, a surreal explosion of pop, punk, and the post-apocalypse. Over the last decade, Bizarro Fiction has changed the definition of avant garde, it’s abolished the traditional prose of yesterday and established a new precedent for awesome. Collected in this anthology is some of the best weird fiction from the past decade. Award-winning writers, cult prodigies and burgeoning talents all collected together in one place. This is what you’ve done with the last ten years of your life.

With stories by:

D. Harlan Wilson, Alissa Nutting, Joe R. Lansdale, Carlton Mellick III, Kevin L. Donihe, Blake Butler, Ryan Boudinot, Vincent Sakowski, Cody Goodfellow, Amelia Gray, Robert Devereaux, Mykle Hansen, Athena Villaverde, Matthew Revert, Garrett Cook, Roy Kesey, Jeremy Robert Johnson, Aimee Bender, Ian Watson & Roberto Quaglia, Jeremy C. Shipp, Andersen Prunty, Jedediah Berry, Andrea Kneeland, Kurt Dinan, David Agranoff, Ben Loory, Kris Saknussemm, Stephen Graham Jones, Bentley Little, David W. Barbee, and Tom Piccirilli.

Published by Eraserhead Press. Edited by Cameron Pierce.

Order The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade today.


Thirsty Thursday–Jester King Thrash Metal Farmhouse Strong Ale

by Ross E. Lockhart

Louder, harder, faster. That’s thrash metal’s defining credo in a nutshell. The heaviness of NWOBHM fused with punk rock’s DIY spirit and and anti-authoritarianism, hopped up on malt liquor and pseudoephedrine, dubbed onto a cassette tapes and played through the blown speakers of a Nissan pickup truck at maximum volume. For a while, from the early eighties until it peaked in 1991, thrash metal seemed like it would change the world. And leading the charge, of course, there were the four horsemen of the thrash metal apocalypse, angry young bands made up of angry young, pockmarked longhairs in black T-shirts: Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeath, and, of course, Metallica.

Classic albums followed: Hell Awaits, Fistful of Metal, Ride the Lightning. But like most musical movements, thrash metal–built on a rock-solid foundation that included Queen’s “Stone Cold Crazy,” Black Sabbath’s “Symptom of the Universe,” the Misfits’ “Last Caress,” and Mötorhead’s “Ace of Spades”–eventually collapsed under its own weight, as angry young rockers grew into disillusioned middle-aged rock stars, discovering in the process psychoanalysis, mortality, litigation, religion, and uncomfortable politics. These days, a public appearance from Dave Mustaine or Lars Ulrich, or Scott Ian’s beard more often prompts a facepalm than an impromptu throwing of the goat. I guess that’s just the way it goes. But there’s always going to be that part of me, hearing for the first time a third-generation cassette of Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All on a buddy’s Walkman, and thinking, yeah, that rocks.

So tonight, I’m having a Thrash Metal Farmhouse Strong Ale from Jester King Brewing. I reviewed their Le Petit Prince here back in June, and I’ve got a bottle of their Black Metal Imperial Stout in my refrigerator, just waiting for the weather to get just cold (and Norwegian) enough to warrant a review…

Thrash Metal pours hazy burnt orange with a two-finger off-white head, a ton of carbonation, and a touch of sediment. Funky farmhouse yeast and hops, floral and grassy, dominate the nose: orange zest, lemon peel, warm alcohol. Taste follows scent, with funky spice giving way to musty (Reign in) blood orange citrus, sweet caramel, and malt. Tart and peppery against the palate, with the high carbonation balancing out the booziness. With an ABV of 9.3%, I feel it’s fair to compare this one to a saison that’s been touring with a metal band.

And Elinor approves of Thrash Metal as well…

Suggested literary pairings that accompany well the fine art of headbanging…

Walrus Tales, edited by Kevin L. Donihe. The Walrus is the most metal animal on the planet. Herein, find tales of all stripes: horrific, satiric, comedic, tragic, erotic, and a bunch of other “-ic” and “non-ic” words, like “Lovecraftian” and “Bizarro.” Walrus Tales features stories by Bentley Little, John Skipp, Carlton Mellick III, Nick Mamatas, Alan M. Clark, Mykle Hansen, Rhys Hughes, Violet LeVoit, Ekaterina Sedia, Andersen Prunty, Bradley Sands, Gina Ranalli, and more.

Tumor Fruit, by Carlton Mellick III. Eight desperate castaways find themselves stranded on a mysterious deserted island. They are surrounded by poisonous blue plants and an ocean made of acid. Strange creatures lurk in the toxic jungle. The ghostly sound of crying babies can be heard on the wind. Once they realize the rescue ships aren’t coming, the eight castaways must band together in order to survive in this inhospitable environment. But survival might not be possible. The air they breathe is toxic, there is no shelter from the elements, and the only food they have to consume is the squid-shaped tumors that grow from a mentally disturbed woman’s body.

Seed, by Rob Ziegler. It’s the dawn of the 22nd century, and the world has fallen apart. The United States has become a nation of migrants — starving masses of nomads who seek out a living in encampments outside government seed-distribution warehouses. In this new world, there is a new power. Satori is more than just a corporation; she is an intelligent, living city that grew out of the ruins of Denver. Satori bioengineers both the climate resistant seed that feeds a hungry nation and her own post-human genetic Designers, Advocates, and Laborers. What remains of the United States government now exists solely to distribute Satori seed; a defeated American military doles out bar-coded, single-use Satori seed to the nation’s starving citizens. When one of Satori’s Designers goes rogue, Agent Sienna Doss is tasked with bringing her in: the government wants to use the Designer to break Satori’s stranglehold on seed production and reassert themselves as the center of power. As events spin out of control, Sienna finds herself at the heart of Satori, where an explosive climax promises to reshape the future of the world. Metal.

Ross E. Lockhart is the managing editor of Night Shade Books. A lifelong fan of supernatural, fantastic, speculative, and weird fiction, he holds degrees in English from Sonoma State University (BA) and San Francisco State University (MA). In 2011, he edited the acclaimed anthology The Book of Cthulhu. A follow-up, The Book of Cthulhu II was published October 2012 from Night Shade Books, and his rock-and-roll novel, Chick Bassist, is coming this November from Lazy Fascist Press. He lives in an old church in Petaluma, CA, with his wife Jennifer, hundreds of books, and Elinor, who is fitting in nicely.

 


Eraserhead Press Book Releases, Fall 2012

Die You Doughnut Bastards by Cameron Pierce

“Like William S. Burroughs on crack!” – Thomas F. Monteleone, New York Times bestselling author

The bacon storm is rolling in. We hear the grease and sugar beat against the roof and windows. The doughnut people are attacking. We press close together, forgetting for a moment that we hate each other.

In Die You Doughnut Bastards, amputees, lonely young people, and talking animals struggle for survival against the freakish whims of nature. A typewriter made of fetuses is the source of woe for an expecting couple. Tao Lin rewrites The Human Centipede 2. A girl with a glass jaw hides an otherworldly secret. A demonic loner goes to a birthday party in Hell. You’ll encounter a killer in a marsupial mask, a prison for anorexics, haunted pancakes, and a songwriter with a cult following.

Surreal prose poems give way to personal accounts of alienation and modern love. Vegetarian narwhals are sold at the supermarket. And in a city that might be your own, zombie doughnuts are rising up. Kill yourself before they kill you. Or just kill yourself.

Featuring original illustrations in the style of Daniel Johnston, Die You Doughnut Bastards is the latest way to drown, brought to you by Wonderland Book Award-winning author Cameron Pierce.

Kill Ball by Carlton Mellick III

In a city where all humans live inside of plastic bubbles, exotic dancers are being murdered in the rubbery streets by a mysterious stalker known only as Kill Ball.

Unicorn Battle Squad by Kirsten Alene

“Somewhere between Kafka and My Little Pony, only even weirder than that sounds.” – Ben Loory, author of Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day

Imagine Terry Gilliam directing from a script written by Jack Vance channeling the ghosts of Kafka and Calvino, and you’re closing in on the essence of Alene’s latest novel. A bold fusion of grounded surrealism, unfettered filth, and wit as dry and dark as a strip of unicorn jerky.” – Jesse Bullington, author of The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart

Mutant unicorns. A palace with a thousand human legs. The most powerful army on the planet. A first world city on the verge of collapse.

In a city where teetering skyscrapers block out the sky, a city populated by lowly clerks, rumors have been circulating of a terror in the east. When Carl, the lowliest clerk on the negative twelfth floor, discovers that the city is indeed in grave danger, he sets out to warn the city’s protectors: the Unicorn Riders.

Although Carl’s missing father has left him a unicorn of his own, it is a small and sickly creature. Even worse, there is a crab claw growing from its side. But the Unicorn Riders need as much help as they can get, and soon every able rider sets out for the city’s flooded perimeter in a steam-powered Spanish galleon.

An epic journey that spans desert and sea, through the bedchambers of a fearsome Eastern queen, and into the devastation of a conquered city, Unicorn Battle Squad is the story of a boy and his unicorn at the end of the world.


Unveiling the Table of Contents of THE BEST BIZARRO FICTION OF THE DECADE

At the Funeral by D. HARLAN WILSON
Ant Colony by ALISSA NUTTING
Fire Dog by JOE R. LANSDALE
Candy-Coated by CARLTON MELLICK III
The Traveling Dildo Salesman by KEVIN L. DONIHE
We Witnessed the Advent of a New Apocalypse During an Episode of Friends by BLAKE BUTLER
Cardiology by RYAN BOUDINOT
The Screaming of the Fish by VINCENT SAKOWSKI
Atwater by CODY GOODFELLOW
The Darkness by AMELIA GRAY
Li’l Miss Ultrasound by ROBERT DEVEREAUX
Crazy Shitting Planet by MYKLE HANSEN
Caterpillar Girl by ATHENA VILLAVERDE
Cops & Bodybuilders by D. HARLAN WILSON
A Million Versions of Right by MATTHEW REVERT
Hellion by ALISSA NUTTING
Mr. Plush, Detective by GARRETT COOK
Hat by ROY KESEY
The Sharp-Dressed Man at the End of the Line by JEREMY ROBERT JOHNSON
Hotel Rot by AIMEE BENDER
The Moby Clitoris of His Beloved by IAN WATSON & ROBERTO QUAGLIA
Scratch by JEREMY C. SHIPP
The Sex Beast of Scurvy Island by ANDERSEN PRUNTY
Inheritance by JEDEDIAH BERRY
Everybody is Waiting for Something by ANDREA KNEELAND
Ear Cat by CARLTON MELLICK III
Nub Hut by KURT DINAN
Punkupine Moshers of the Apocalypse by DAVID AGRANOFF
The Octopus by BEN LOORY
You Saw Me Standing Alone by KRIS SAKNUSSEMM
Mr. Bear by JOE R. LANSDALE
Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth by STEPHEN GRAHAM JONES
The Planting by BENTLEY LITTLE
Surf Grizzlies by DAVID W. BARBEE
The Misfit Child Grows Fat on Despair by TOM PICCIRILLI

32 authors, 35 stories. In the pages of this anthology are stories which stretch the mind and challenge the idea of literature – surreal, nightmarish, absurd. Award-winning writers, cult prodigies and burgeoning talents. The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade, edited by Cameron Pierce. Coming soon from Eraserhead Press.


Flash Fiction Friday: Master Remastered

by Kevin L. Donihe

A master of meditation sat on the floor of his custom-designed chamber. There was no washtub, no toilet. No accoutrements or conveniences of any kind. A glass of water was the only thing he could drink, a piece of flatbread the only thing he could eat.

Years before, the master had cut away the dross in his life. He’d retired early from a job, floated away from friends and family members. Perhaps he’d missed some of them at one point, but no longer.

 ***

On the twelfth day of a two-week marathon session, the master sensed a presence in his chamber.

Opening his eyes, he saw a man dressed in a white, seamless robe, sitting in the lotus position across from him, knees almost touching his own.

 ***

“Who are you?” asked the master.

“I’m you,” said the man.

This man’s robe was identical to that of the master. His face was identical, too. But a red and angry wart grew by his nose. Never had the master suffered such an indignity.

This man was not the master.

The master found him repulsive, yet the master was a handsome, well-built man. Clearly, something beyond his double’s form had triggered the negative thoughts.

Eyes locked on the man, the master peeled away psychic layers to glimpse flesh-hidden truths.

His guest, it seemed, was a foolish seeker who mimicked the words and actions of others yet imagined himself wiser than any guru. He forged a circular path, which he saw as linear. Smug yet undeserving, his capacity for self-deceit was limitless.

Deeper still, his psyche was twisted-up, his moral compass broken. His aura was brown and sludgy, as if tainted by too much time spent in storm cellars or basements. His soul was cancerous.

No doubt he was the sort who would drown kittens and puppy dogs in bags. If he had a wife and kids, he’d beat them.

Yet there he was—sitting before the master, pretending that he shared his wisdom and was privy to all his secrets.

Such gall. Such hypocrisy.

The more the master dwelt on him, the more he realized he didn’t want to just mourn and pity the man. He wanted to rage at him for wallowing in his limitations, for being a laughable human, a phony and a fraud.

 ***

Hours passed. Still, the man mocked the master with his presence.

“I hate you,” said the master.

“Makes sense,” he responded.

One of the master’s fists curled. He was tempted to punch the man’s throat.

“Why are you even here?” he asked.

“Can’t say,” the man said.

The master was a finite being plumbing the infinite. He had no time for bullshit. “This is my room!” he roared. “Leave it!”

A dark chuckle: “Can’t do that, either. Sorry.”

Then the man vanished.

Anger drained from the master. Once again, his mind felt unburdened and receptive.

Closing his eyes, he found and linked up with his luminous self.

***

Two days later, the sound of a buzzer returned the master’s consciousness to flesh.

He opened his eyes. Inhaled. Exhaled. Stretched his arms. Popped his neck

He sipped water, nibbled flatbread.

He broke the lotus position with slight regret.

Warmth flowing back into his legs, he leaned over to massage them, but stopped, looked around the chamber instead.

It wasn’t that its atmosphere had turned oppressive, or he had another visitor. Things simply seemed… backwards.

No matter. He began to rub his quadriceps.

When he reached his calves, it dawned on him.

In his chamber, while meditating, he always turned away from the door. Now, however, he faced it.

Reaching up to his nose, the master felt a wart.

 

__________

Kevin L. Donihe is one of the most beloved Bizarro authors in existence and an editor for Eraserhead Press. He is the author of House of Houses, Night of the Assholes, and Space Walrus (among others). He is also the editor of the definitive anthology of walrus-themed fictions: Walrus Tales.


New Releases from Lazy Fascist Press!

Now available from Lazy Fascist Press: A Pretty Mouth by Molly Tanzer and The Last Final Girl by Stephen Graham Jones!

The Last Final Girl is like Quentin Tarantino’s take on The Cabin in the Woods. Bloody, absurd, and smart. Plus, there’s a killer in a Michael Jackson mask.” – Carlton Mellick III, author of Apeshit

Life in a slasher film is easy. You just have to know when to die.

Aerial View: A suburban town in Texas. Everyone’s got an automatic garage door opener. All the kids jump off a perilous cliff into a shallow river as a rite of passage. The sheriff is a local celebrity. You know this town. You’re from this town.

Zoom In: Homecoming princess, Lindsay. She’s just barely escaped death at the hands of a brutal, sadistic murderer in a Michael Jackson mask. Up on the cliff, she was rescued by a horse and bravely defeated the killer, alone, bra-less. Her story is already a legend. She’s this town’s heroic final girl, their virgin angel.

Monster Vision: Halloween masks floating down that same river the kids jump into. But just as one slaughter is not enough for Billie Jean, our masked killer, one victory is not enough for Lindsay. Her high school is full of final girls, and she’s not the only one who knows the rules of the game.

When Lindsay chooses a host of virgins, misfits, and former final girls to replace the slaughtered members of her original homecoming court, it’s not just a fight for survival-it’s a fight to become The Last Final Girl.

Re-Animator meets The Secret History in this Tale of Sex and Science

Henry Milliner thinks his days of being the school pariah are over forever when he attracts the attention of Wadham College’s coolest Fellow Commoner, St John Clement, the Lord Calipash. St John is everything Henry isn’t: Brilliant, graceful, rich, universally respected. And as if that wasn’t enough, St John is also the leader of the Blithe Company, the clique of Natural Philosophy majors who rule Wadham with style. But when being St John’s protege ends up becoming a weirder experience than Henry anticipated – and the Blithe Company doesn’t quite turn out to be the decadent, debauched crew he dreamed of – Henry has some big decisons to make. Should he beg the forgiveness of his only friend, naive underclassman John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, or should he ride it out with St John and try to come out on top?

Praise for A Pretty Mouth:

“All too infrequently do I encounter a new voice as delightful, compelling, and intelligent as that of Molly Tanzer. Or, for that matter, an author with such a range. But here, in A Pretty Mouth, is that shining gem that keeps me sorting through the rubble. If this is only the beginning of her work, I can hardly wait to see where she’s headed!” –CAITLIN R. KIERNAN, author of The Drowning Girl: A Memoir

A Pretty Mouth is a fine and stylish collection that pays homage to the tradition of the weird while blazing its own sinister mark. Tanzer’s debut is as sharp and polished as any I’ve seen.” –LAIRD BARRON, author of The Croning

“If Hieronymus Bosch and William Hogarth had together designed a Fabergé egg, the final result could not be more beautifully and deliciously perverse than what awaits the readers of A Pretty Mouth. Molly Tanzer’s first novel is a witty history of the centuries-long exploits of one joyfully corrupt Calipash dynasty, a family both cursed and elevated by darkness of the most squamous sort. This is a sly and sparkling jewel of a book, and I can’t recommend it enough–get A Pretty Mouth in your hands or tentacles, post-haste, and prepare to be shocked, charmed, and (somewhat moistly) entertained!” –LIVIA LLEWELLYN, author of Engines of Desire

“Molly Tanzer is a prose Edward Gorey, decadent, delicious, and ever so slightly mad.” –NATHAN LONG, author of Jane Carver of Waar

“This is form and content and diction and tone and imagination all looking up at the exact same moment: When Molly Tanzer claps once at the front of the classroom.” –STEPHEN GRAHAM JONES, author of The Last Final Girl

“Had the nineteenth century really been like this–with the flounces and corsets and blood and tentacles and whatnot–we’d all be dead by now. Un- lucky us, but lucky you, Dear Reader, as you are alive to read this book.” –NICK MAMATAS, author of Bullettime

“The stories and short novel in Molly Tanzer’s impressive debut collection move steadily backwards through English history, from an Edwardian re- sort to a Roman encampment, stopping on the way for the nineteenth, eighteenth, and seventeenth centuries, all in the interest of tracing the main trunk of the notorious Calipash family tree all the way to its roots. It’s a linemarked by its excesses of sensuality, cruelty, and sorcery, and in excerpting the exploits of its storied members, Tanzer demonstrates her facility with a variety of voices and styles, from Wodehousian farce to Victorian erotica to Restoration class comedy. Each of the narratives collected here stands and succeeds on its own terms, but taken together, they add to a whole greater than the sum of its parts, in which the recurrence of key motifs in a diversity of settings creates the sense of a family living out its doom generation after generation. Tanzer is an ambitious writer, and she is talented enough for her ambition to matter.” –JOHN LANGAN, author of The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies

A Pretty Mouth is many things; erudite, hilarious, profane, moving, learned, engaging, horrific, terrifying, and profound. Molly moves through the multi-forms of prose like a shark in wine-dark seas, rife with allusion, deep in emotion, and sometimes giving you a little salty-mouth. A fantastic collection and not one to be missed.” –JOHN HORNOR JACOBS, author of This Dark Earth

“Molly Tanzer’s A Pretty Mouth is a spectacular book, rad and weird and fun. With winks to P. G. Wodehouse, Robert E. Howard and the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft, it showcases the work of a woman who delights in writing. She writes very well indeed! This is a book I will return to, for to read it is such a naughty pleasure.” –W. H. PUGMIRE, author of The Twisted Muse

“I am a bit bashful about being titillated by Molly Tanzer’s naughty debut, A Pretty Mouth, but I must admit it in order to write this blurb. While having segments that are hot and sexy, it is also a dark and disturbing tale with a wicked sense of humor and compelling chracaters. I blush just thinking about it and might have to go read it again!” –ALAN M. CLARK, author of A Parliament of Crows and Of Thimble and Threat: The Life of a Ripper Victim

“It’s been repeatedly said we’re enjoying in a new golden age of weird and fantastic fiction. We are, and this lady is one the gifted magicians whose literary creations are keeping the bonfire burning brightly!” –JOSEPH S. PULVER, SR., author of The Orphan Palace

“Tanzer lifts the skirts of Victorian hypocrisy for a full Monty view of perverted hijinks and fun.” –MARIO ACEVEDO, author of Werewolf Smackdown


Coming in October from Eraserhead Press


Thirsty Thursday: Miskatonic Dark Rye and The Book of Cthulhu 2

by Cameron Pierce

For the past few nights, there’s been a chill in the air. Summer isn’t over just yet, but it’s getting there. You can feel it. The bones of the sun are tired, ready for a sleep that could outlast all our lifetimes. As the leaves change, so will our beers. We’ll put away the farmhouse ales, the spiced IPAs and pale beet bocks of summer. We’ll replace them with darker, heavier concoctions. Whatever keeps out the cold. That’s why tonight I’ll be breaking out a bottle of Miskatonic Dark Rye, a roasted, lighter bodied rye that is faintly spicy on the tongue, a small reminder of what’s coming.

Photo from Aleheads

But that’s not the only reason I’ve chosen Miskatonic. Something much bigger is arriving with the death of summer. It’s the many-headed hydra known as The Book of Cthulhu 2.

Last year, our beloved Thirsty Thursday writer Ross E. Lockhart compiled The Book of Cthulhu, which was quickly hailed as one of the greatest Lovecraftian anthologies ever published. Due to the popularity of the first volume, Lockhart has returned with even more new stories of tentacled terror alongside well-worn classics like Karl Edward Wagner’s “Sticks.” Writers featured in The Book of Cthulhu 2 include Caitlin R. Kiernan, Laird Barron, Michael Chabon, Cody Goodfellow, Kim Newman, Molly Tanzer, Neil Gaiman, Fritz Leiber, and many more.

Whether you’re a Lovecraft purist/fanatic or dipping your feet into eldritch waters for the first time, these anthologies are essential reading.

If you’re not in Portland, Oregon, you may have trouble hunting down Miskatonic Dark Rye. If that’s the case, choose whatever fall seasonal suits you best and dig into The Book of Cthulhu 2. It’s not just a book for this autumn, it’s a book for every autumn.

Iä! Iä! Cthulhu Fhtagn! (And cheers, Ross.)