The new issue is at press now and will be mailed out in a couple of weeks. Seven stories from familiar names and rising stars Alexander Glass, Tony Richards, Garth Marenghi creator Matthew Holness, Ian R. Faulkner, Will McIntosh, and debut sales from Carole Johnstone and Seth Skorkowsky. The usual columns and features are here, including book reviews by Peter Tennant, DVD reviews by Tony Lee (plus competitions), comment from Christopher Fowler, Stephen Volk, Mike O’Driscoll… And art by David Gentry. (more…)

Tags: Black Static • DVD • Faulkner • fiction • Fowler • Gentry • Glass • Holness • Horror • issue 3 • Johnstone • Langan • Lee • Marenghi • McIntosh • ODriscoll • Richards • Skorkowsky • Tennant • Volk • zombies

SOMETHING BORROWED by PAUL MAGRS
Headline hardback/trade paperback, 310pp, £19.99/£11.99

The sequel to Never the Bride, Magrs’ latest novel continues the fan boy sensibility of his recent work with yet more of the adventures of Brenda, the Bride of Frankenstein, who now lives in Whitby and tackles mysteries with her good friend Effie, the descendant of a long line of wise women. And the ladies certainly have more than their fair share of troubles to contend with, what with their old friend Jessie being transformed into a flesh eating womanzee, a plague of poison pen letters that have the town held in the grip of fear, a troublesome haunting and a set of wicker garden furniture with attitude, to name just a few. To complicate matters further, Brenda‚Äôs former beau Henry is back on the scene, an immortal who stirs old memories of things best left forgotten, of their long ago involvement with the Smudgelings and fight against Count Alucard. (more…)

Tags: black • book • Borrowed • Bride • Frankenstein • Magrs • reviews • Something • static • Tennant • Whitby

THE CAGE by KENZO KITAKATA
Vertical paperback, 230pp, $14.95

The author is billed as ‚Äòthe undisputed don of hardboiled and mystery writing in Japan‚Äô, which is fair enough, but there‚Äôs nothing distinctively Japanese about this book. Change some of the names, substitute mafia for yakuza, or use the more generic gang, and it could just as easily be set in New York or LA. Plotwise it in part reprises Cronenberg‚Äôs A History of Violence, or any Bellow/Updike novel about a man undergoing a mid-life crisis, with the proviso that in this case the man is a gangster. (more…)

Tags: black • book • Cage • Japan • Kitakata • Peter Tennant • reviews • static • Tennant

ABIDING EVIL by ALISON BUCK
Alnpete paperback, 500pp, £9.99

So, a new publisher and a new writer, but to some extent the same old, same old, with a story straight out of the backwoods horror school of Hollywood fright flicks, plus grace notes courtesy of Richard Laymon and Jeepers Creepers. (more…)

Tags: Abiding • black • books • Buck • Evil • reviews • static • Tennant