Asian Horror Encyclopedia : Asian Horror Culture in Literature, Manga, and Folklore

Rating:
Summary: A useful resource in an unexplored area
Review: In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. And so it is with the "Asian Horror Encyclopedia." Flawed? Absolutely. But as the only book of its kind in English, it stands as a useful and interesting reference guide for those interested in Asian horror. The range of creatures, authors, films, manga, folklore and other is truly startling, covering such sub-genres as the Japanese Cthulhu mythos authors, and Chinese skeptic societies.

None of the entries are particularly long, and there are no pictures to accompany the text. It is very much a case of "wide but not deep." The book started as an encyclopedia of Japanese horror only, but the author found he could not separate the roots of Asian horror from only one culture. Due to this, author Laurence Bush exceeded his language abilities, and had to rely solely on the available translations of others, including unreliable resources such as internet websites and film reviews.

However, as stated in the introduction, Bush only intends to introduce the reader to the wide and varied flavors of horror in Asian countries. I have found my interests piqued by more than one of his shallow notations, enough to do my own research and have a wider area opened up for me. On this level the book works very well, and is recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Reads Like A Fanzine
Review: Occasionally useful as a checklist of obscure English-language sources, but often let down by amateurish slips, the Asian Horror Encyclopedia lacks both an editor prepared to stay the author's outbreaks of fanboy gush and unsupported speculation, as well as a proof-reader who could have corrected the many, many errors. Without an index, it is less obvious that many words are spelt differently each time they occur; though this is a book for English speakers, its usefulness to someone who cannot check the primary sources is severely limited. Seemingly scooping up any information to hand without much sense of its quality, Bush's work reads more like a series of notes than a book in its own right. Researchers in Asian literature may stumble across occasional crumbs of interesting information, but will need to find help elsewhere in digesting them.

Rating:
Summary: Unique Look at Asian Horror Literature
Review: The Asian Horror Encyclopedia contains a lot of unique material available for the first time in English. It collects literary and folkloric information to give a complete look at the roots and directions of Asian horror. From Tang Dynasty ghost stories to modern Japanese horror bestsellers, it covers the broad range of this little known subject. It has an article on H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos in Japan as well as coverage of many Asian mythos writers. It mentions horror films only if they have a literary or comic-book connection. It is of interest to manga and anime fans as well as those interested in folklore, vampires, werewolves, yokaigaku, Chinese metaphysics or international horror culture in general.

Rating:
Summary: The Horror
Review: The author admits that "a large part of this book is the product of internet research." He continues by noting that the book "is by no means complete or entirely accurate, as the internet web pages and my skills as a translator are of questionable reliability" (XV). This indeed is an accurate statement, and should serve as a warning not to trust the contents. Not only are there two to three typos per page, but there are also substantial errors in many of the entries (too many to mention here). The author claims that his book is "intended to be a guide for further research," but one wonders about the usefulness of a research guide which is not only inaccurate and badly (if at all) edited, but fails to provide references (even to questionable websites).

Rating:
Summary: The Horror
Review: The author admits that "a large part of this book is the product of internet research." He continues by noting that the book "is by no means complete or entirely accurate, as the internet web pages and my skills as a translator are of questionable reliability" (XV). This indeed is an accurate statement, and should serve as a warning not to trust the contents. Not only are there two to three typos per page, but there are also substantial errors in many of the entries (too many to mention here). The author claims that his book is "intended to be a guide for further research," but one wonders about the usefulness of a research guide which is not only inaccurate and badly (if at all) edited, but fails to provide references (even to questionable websites).

Rating:
Summary: Flawed but interesting
Review: Typos and amateurish enthusiasm flaw this book, but it has a lot of interesting information. A quick check of the Library of Congress shows that this is indeed the only book on Asian, Japanese or Chinese Horror in English. No one else has tried to look at Asian horror as a whole, a huge subject entirely unknown in the West. It has hundreds of entries on subjects as diverse as haunted bridges, Kabuki ghost plays, Oiwa, Asian psychics, Kwaidan, Hearn, Ikiryo, biological horrors, Liaozhai, Yuen Mai, The Ring, etc. It tries to cover too much, but what it does do is fascinating. For example, magical paintings appear to be an entire subgenre in Asian literature. Though the bibliography is hardly exhaustive, it is sufficiently long (10 pages) and its breadth shows that the author did substantiate his work.