The Commandments

I was really hoping I could start this review with "The Bram Stoker Award wining collection...." but I can't. I can start with: The Bram Stoker Award Finalist collection The Commandments by Angeline Hawkes and published by Nocturne Press was a great read. Given that this is Easter weekend it's a great time to look at a book that deals with Christianity in a horror fashion.

The short version is that there are eleven stories in The Commandments. One for each of the Ten Commandments and a story that encompasses them. I believe writing this kind of story without offending the core beliefs of the religion is a challenge. I feel Angeline did a wonderful job of telling her story without offending those beliefs.

The encompassing story is about a church that obtains a very old copy of the Ten Commandments. Once the tablet arrives and is put on display in the church things take a turn for the worse for the members of the congregation.

Each of the ten stories focuses on one of the commandments and the punishment for those that chose to it. I try to stay spoiler free here so I'll just give a short teaser on each of the ten stories.

I - When a husband and wife have different religious beliefs it can really stress a marriage. Be very careful which god you chose to worship but be more careful about choosing who you marry. You never know how far they will go to make a point.
II - Craven images are not to be made or kept. Keeping one around the house can just kill your relationship.
III - Taking the Lord's name in vain can do more than make your mother mad. It might just cost you your life.
IV - When you are supposed to keep the Sabbath day holy it's not a good idea to do any work. You won't believe the things you will see and sadly you won't live long enough to tell anybody about them.
V - This story got my attention because it shows the victim isn't always the person ignoring the commandment. Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. Failing to keep this commandment will cause suffering not only for you but for your entire family.
VI - Thou Shalt Not Kill because if you do the punishment will be swift and horrific.
VII - The problem with having a mistress is she may not want you to go home to your wife. At least not all at once.
VIII - Gold. It's shiny, it's pretty and you can't wait to get your hands on it. If it's somebody else's gold though you might just want to keep your hands in your pockets.
IX - One lie leads to another, which leads to another, which leads to another. It's a heavy price to pay when they all catch up to you.
X - What's yours is yours. Be happy with what you have because if you start wishing you had what your neighbor does you just might get it.

The encompassing story picks up again after the tenth commandment and wraps things up quite well.

While I do say I think Angeline did a wonderful job of not offending the core beliefs I must admit that knowing a woman wrote the way Angeline did about the tenth commandment can really put a man's mind on the seventh one. Of course knowing how the stories end will probably scare him right out of those thoughts.

There is enough horror variety in The Commandments for any horror fan. Unlike some books where you get one type of scare Angeline comes at you with ten different ones. This is a book you will enjoy.

Maybe next year at this time I'll be congratulating Angeline on wining the Stoker award. Her work deserves a win.

Big "Thank you!" to Angeline for allowing me to quote the following paragraphs from The Commandments.

How did they - how could they - Elias couldn't finish the thoughts. The skeletons had been piles of bones in the wood crate, but now they had somehow become connected again - whole - and moving as if alive before him in a clattering, creaking - but speechless movement.

Elias stood there petrified, rain soaking his shirt to his skin, molding it to his body. His hair was plastered flat on his head and water gushed over his nose and face.

One of the skeletons had retrieved the shovel and was studying it, while another one was curiously examining the golf cart. Elias stood there afraid to move; afraid to breathe, hoping the animated sets of bones would, perhaps, forget he was there; excecpt for the small detail of the rescuing-skeleton that was still tightly grasping his wrist.

Nothing To Lose

Nothing To Lose was written by Steve Vernon and published by Nocturne Press. Let me start by saying I really hope there are more stories coming from Steve about this character. I loved it.

The book contains three stories about Captain Nothing. This guy is my kind of hero. Yes he wears a mask, or two, and believes in helping others. It's the way he goes about helping people that makes him so entertaining. Who needs heat vision or lightning speed when you have a brick and the bad guy doesn't hear you sneaking up behind him?

After reading Nothing To Lose I found myself wondering if Captain Nothing is a hero out to protect the innocent or a institutionalized patient simply sharing his delusions with us. Either way he is quite entertaining in the three stories.

The Glint Of Moonlight On Broken Glass - Captain Nothing encounters two men assaulting a woman with plans to rape her. If she knew the horrors that awaited her in the future she would have prayed for death instead of a savior. This story gives us the supernatural villain that every superhero must one day face. A being that feeds on the suffering of others. A being that takes the form of it's victims so that it can feed again.

Lamprey Fellatio - The problem with being a hero is there are people out to get you. After all, you can't have good without bad. All our hero wanted was to enjoy a night at The Sloppy Seconds and a few beers. Next thing he knows is his life goes from pleasure to pain as he finds himself chained to a cinder block and rapidly sinking. It's a fear we all have.

The Frozen Axe Of Winter Love - When you have no reason left to live the only thing you can do is die. This is the kind of story that will make you stop and give your mother/wife an extra hug in the morning and an extra kiss at night. If someone is determined to die then the heroic thing to do is comfort them before they go. Captain Nothing is just the man for the job.

So where is the "horror" in Nothing To Lose? Each person will find it in a different way. To me the horror comes from the crimes discussed in the book that you can read about in your newspaper every day. The horror comes from Captain Nothing's point of view. Once you see how he sees the world you learn there is something to be afraid of everywhere. The horror comes from the choices people make when they feel there is no choice left.

For those of us that grew up thinking "Batman should be more bad ass than this. He's the Dark Knight for crying out loud!" Steve Vernon has given us what we wanted. Captain Nothing is beyond cool.

I can't help but wonder if I was the only one to hear KISS singing their song "Nothing To Lose" while reading the book.

Special "Thank you!" to Steve for allowing me to quote the following:
Then I heard the scream. It was more than a scream. More like something was being pulled out of her, yanked and uprooted. I run like my feet have suddenly grown anvils; the purse rattling against my side like a bagful of hammers. In the moonlight I look like the world's ugliest drag queen, cape, purse and all. I don't care. She needs saving.

By the time I get there the screaming has stopped. She's lying in the mouth of the alleyway. Lying wreathed in a halo of sodium lamp, something dark pooling around her, moonlight glinting on a fresco of broken glass.

I have one more point to make today. Why can't the major publishing houses produce books of the same quality as the small publishers? I recently received Ghoul from Dorchester and saw Hannibal Rising at the book store. Both of these books, all of the Hannibal Rising copies in this particular store, were in ragged shape. Apparently the cutting blade used during production was dull. In both books some of the pages were not separated and they both had the very ragged ends that looked like the pages had been ripped apart instead of properly cut. I'm am constantly amazed by the production quality of the smaller publishers and Nocturne Press is one of them. Wonderful production quality for Nothing To Lose.