October Dreams: A Celebration of Halloween

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Look at Horror's Favorite Holiday
Review: It's unfortunate most of the world will miss out on Cemetery Dance's October Dreams, a knockout anthology of new and classic short stories and non-fiction pieces revolving around every horror lover's favorite holiday, Halloween. Some of the excellent writers represented here are Jack Ketchum, Douglas Clegg, and the late Richard Laymon. The book is oversized and beautiful, so don't let the price tag scare you off. It's downright huge, and will keep you reading for days. While not the out-and-out genius that "Best of Cemetery Dance" is, "October Dreams" is probably going to go down as one of those anthologies in the small-press that everyone is sorry they missed a couple of years from now.

Rating:
Summary: A skim-reader.
Review: Just a few thoughts, not a full-fledged review:

I just came to the anti-abortion story in the book. It struck me as odd. I wanted to see the horror in it, but it seemed to me to be more like an author's crusade against abortion clinics. I guess I'm one of those readers who needs to feel justified in the victim's deaths--a la Crypt Keeper. (I don't know why. Horror is filled with good people dying. Isn't that what makes it horror?) This story, "Buckets," however, jolted me out of the Halloween experience.

I began October Dreams excited. The first couple of stories really worked on me. Then I saw that it was more than a collection of fiction. The short stories traded spaces off and on throughout the book with authors' memories of their favorite Halloweens. There are also a few essays on Halloween fiction, movies, and whatnot.

I thought, "This is a cool book."

And I guess it still is. But, in practice, I find myself skipping the favorite Halloween memories, the essays, the recommendations for books and film, and, of course, the "whatnot." I go straight for the fiction, and if I start getting bored with a story, which has happened several times--several, several times--I skip to the next one. I've only read half of this book, and at this rate I'll be finished in a couple of days, a skim-read of hundreds of pages. It's a thick tome.

Maybe the rest of you will like the filler. It does flesh out the book, almost giving the short stories a sense of glue. I think October Dreams is OK. It's unusual, a nice attempt at giving you something more for your dollar.

Rating:
Summary: A skim-reader.
Review: Just a few thoughts, not a full-fledged review:

I just came to the anti-abortion story in the book. It struck me as odd. I wanted to see the horror in it, but it seemed to me to be more like an author's crusade against abortion clinics. I guess I'm one of those readers who needs to feel justified in the victim's deaths--a la Crypt Keeper. (I don't know why. Horror is filled with good people dying. Isn't that what makes it horror?) This story, "Buckets," however, jolted me out of the Halloween experience.

I began October Dreams excited. The first couple of stories really worked on me. Then I saw that it was more than a collection of fiction. The short stories traded spaces off and on throughout the book with authors' memories of their favorite Halloweens. There are also a few essays on Halloween fiction, movies, and whatnot.

I thought, "This is a cool book."

And I guess it still is. But, in practice, I find myself skipping the favorite Halloween memories, the essays, the recommendations for books and film, and, of course, the "whatnot." I go straight for the fiction, and if I start getting bored with a story, which has happened several times--several, several times--I skip to the next one. I've only read half of this book, and at this rate I'll be finished in a couple of days, a skim-read of hundreds of pages. It's a thick tome.

Maybe the rest of you will like the filler. It does flesh out the book, almost giving the short stories a sense of glue. I think October Dreams is OK. It's unusual, a nice attempt at giving you something more for your dollar.

Rating:
Summary: Where's The Scares?
Review: Not here! This is truly a lame anthology.

The stories here range from the incomprehensible to the mundane. To say nothing of the anti choice screed by F. Paul Wilson masquerading as a horror story.

The Tim Lebbon story is good, and probably the best here. It's very atmospheric but still it's unsatisfying in the end.

And MORE THAN HALF of the stuff in here are boring essays and recollections of famous horror authors' own memorable Halloweens.
One has to wonder how they make a decent living from their imaginations if these are the most vivid memories of their real lives.

The book is really dreck and I suggest anyone looking for something to get really in the Halloween mood (re: seriously scared) give this thing a pass.

Rating:
Summary: Great October reading or for any old time you need a chill!
Review: October Dreams: A Celebration of Halloween edited by Richard Chizmar & Robert Morrish is a collection of new and previously published short stories, novellas and true-life memories taking place on Halloween, also included is a brief (and interesting) history of Halloween and guides to Halloween film and fiction all written by some of my favorite horror and dark fantasy writers. And if you think that's a mouthful you should see the size of this book . . .

I've been working at this one for over a month and not due to disinterest either (for a change). This sucker is HUGE and its anthology format makes it the perfect book to pick up and put down whenever the mood strikes. I feared I'd overdose on Halloween stories if I read a big chunk of it in one sitting so I've been savoring it. Fortunately, the stories were, for the most part, strikingly different. Since the list of stories alone is three pages long a blow by blow synopsis of them by me simply isn't going to happen. Instead I'll do my best to highlight the stories that lingered in my memory for one reason or another. Most of the stories range from good to excellent but there were a small handful that bored me enough to give up halfway through (a rare thing considering the size of this tome). The tone of the stories runs the gamut from mournfully sad to laugh out loud funny but the thing that the majority of these stories have in common is the lack of gore and sex and the reliance on atmosphere and good old fashioned storytelling to chill the bones. Here goes:

Dean Koontz story "The Black Pumpkin" begins this tome and is a creepy little tale about a decent and good little boy and his Eeeevil big bully of a brother. The two come across a spooky old man who has a talent for carving pumpkins into malevolent creations. Big brother picks out the ugliest scariest pumpkin in the bunch (naturally) and brings home much more than a spooky pumpkin. This story is a spooky-ooky but not terribly original tale about bad folks getting their comeuppance. I liked it.

"Mask Game" by John Shirley is about people and their nasty little secrets and it had me reading way past the point of exhaustion the other night. Unfortunately it got a bit cluttered and more than a bit confusing towards the end and, well, I fell asleep.

"Gone" by Jack Ketchum takes a look inside the life of the weird woman who lives down the road, the lady all of the neighbors whisper about. It's an affecting and sad tale about a woman's attempt to celebrate Halloween after a long stint of hiding away from the world and anything involving children.

Two other standouts for me were Richard Laymon's "Boo" and Douglas E. Winter's "Masks". "Boo" tells the tale of a young group of trick or treaters in the mood for a little fright. They end up getting much more than they bargained for when a stranger joins their merry little group. It's the stuff nightmares are made of and reminded me a bit of a warped Twilight Zone episode. Delightfully dark ~ I loved it. "Masks" is both an emotionally gripping and terrifying glimpse into the life of a young boy struggling with personal loss and a step-mother from hell. Written with a relentless sense of impending dread this story shook me up.

Sandwiched between the works of fiction are true life stories of the author's Halloween memories. Most of these I enjoyed even more than the fictional tales. Might it be because I'm nosey and enjoy indulging in a bit of literary rubbernecking? Probably. But knowing that all of this creepy, odd and sometimes very funny (or very sad) stuff really happened made these pages fly. Growing up shy and traipsing from house to house in my cheesy store bought costume with my dad and (also shy) younger sister made my Halloween outings a relatively boring affair. These true life walks back in time about tricks gone awry or funky handmade costumes fascinated me and have inspired me to be a bit more creative this year.

Also included is an informative short history of Halloween and its origins, a handy list of must see Halloween movies with interesting synopsis for each that had me rushing to Blockbuster to find the gems I've missed (few of which they carried I might add) and then there's a guide to Halloween reading for those who feel the need for more after gobbling up this book.

Overall this is one of the best collections I've come across and it comes highly recommended to those looking for the ultimate in Halloween reading.

Rating:
Summary: Varies from delightful to dismal
Review: Some of the stories and memories in this long book are literate, charming, and atmospheric, capturing the candy apple and night glow essence of Halloween in many and varied ways. There's nostalgia, real horror, and comedy. Unfortunately, some of the bad entries (F. Paul Wilson's "Buckets" would be more at home in Clinic Bomber's Monthly than this publication) bring the rating down. Such stories are horrifying only in the political sense.
Buy the book if you're not spooked by the high price tag, but be prepared to skip around. I read it cover to cover, and would probably have liked it better if I'd been more discriminating, since the editors weren't.

Rating:
Summary: A DEFINITE HALLOWEEN TREAT
Review: This huge Halloween anthology is not only chock full of horror stories but it also includes favorite Halloween memories from some of the authors themselves. While easily better then Marvin Kaye's The Ultimate Halloween, this book ranks right up there with Alan Ryan's Halloween Horrors as an excellent collection of stories set at my favorite time of the year. If you love Halloween, you need to add this book to your personal library. A definite Halloween treat for anyone who appreciates this holiday.

Rating:
Summary: A Celebration of Halloween Indeed
Review: This is a celebration indeed. It's not a horror anthology; I can't say that a lot of it is even scary. More than half of the stories are essays of the author's memories of Halloween. I feel that this is as it should be. Halloween is a look backwards, before the disenchantment of the world. When there were still dark corners of the earth, where the unexplained still covered a wide variety of phenomena, before positivist materialism drew the colors out of life, leaving only gray. Halloween has both a dark and an exciting side, where the dead may rise to life and spirits of the dead may revel, but also where people can see and experience that something more than this world exists, that we are more than just ashes and dust and that life is has a purpose more than the 70-odd years we have. We love to be comfortably scared, and so we have one night a year where we allow ourselves to believe in phantoms and faeries, that we can feel "something that's just not right."

That's why I like the memories better than the stories. Most people who write about Halloween write about things that scare themselves, things that they allow themselves to be afraid of once a year. For many people that's losing a child, or or a spouse, being confronted with an unbearable secret, or whatever lives underneath the bed at night. If you don't share the author's fears, or if frankly the fear is too personal for you, it is difficult to lose yourself in the story. Suprisingly, the memories were better. They were sort of a safe nostalgia, most of which involved some weird or supernatural occurrence. And we, the readers, can comfortably enjoy imagining being in the same circumstances. The memory essays were also better at evoking the mood of Halloween - the dry, crumbly leaves, the cool wind and crisp nights, the dark sky above and bonfires below, the good food at home as the harvest time begins.

One of the agonies of modern man is that he has lost his sense of time. In the soulless cubicle, spring is summer is autumn is winter. The world turns, but he lacks any markers to delineate the passage of time. Without any means to measure his progress through time, he loses any sense of meaning for the here and now. We appreciate the present more when we build snowmen in winter, fly kites in the spring, eat ice-cream and catch fire-flies in the summer, and rake leaves in the fall. We need Halloween to keep faith with the past, to share feelings we normally repress with those who have gone before us. So happy Halloween, even if all you get is a bag of rocks!

Rating:
Summary: Perfect for an Autumn Day!
Review: This is a fun book to read! As I went from story to story, my own Halloween memories rose to remember again! What a treat! The best thing about this book is that it isn't a rehash of the same story - each author has his/her own twist to their essays and memories. I had no expectations and was pleasantly surprised at the variety of stories. A good read for anyone who loves Halloween!

Rating:
Summary: Where's the fun?
Review: Yes, some of the stories were good, but even the better ones were uniformly depressing. Please be warned that selection after morbid selection is based on grief-stricken parents and dead, missing, kidnapped and/or murdered and mangled children (sometimes entire pits of them); of the dead children stories, the "Buckets" (ghosts of aborted children) offering several other reviewers mentioned was the MOST cheerful. I'm sorry I bought it, and even sorrier that I waded through the entire thing in the hope that there had to be at least one gem of entertainment in there. I like horror as a genre, and rarely part with books, but this one hit the trashcan.