Mark McLaughlin's Blog: Revenge of the B-Movie Monster - Posts Tagged "mark-mclaughlin"

Once upon a time, life on Earth was happy. All creatures were sea life, and all were united in the great womb of the world’s water.

Oh sure, big critters still ate little critters, but that was to be expected. And really, when they devoured each other, it didn’t matter too much — they were still a part of each other. Life was connected. Life was interactive. Life was good.

But then The Big Mistake happened.

Some scaly scroundrel washed up on land and decided to raise a family there. And it’s been downhill ever since.

Let’s face it: sea life has it all going on. The amazing mobility: venture wherever you want, whenever you want — just let the currents take you there. The streamlined lifestyle: just do your own thing! It’s so delightfully uncomplicated. Eat and poop without ever having to look for a fork or a toilet — the ocean is both your banquet hall and your bathroom!

Modern life-on-land tries vainly to recreate all the wonderful conveniences of ocean life. Millions of people get on the Internet, trying to do business and socialize across vain distances via electrical cords and cables. Pathetic!

Internet interaction is just a shadow-play, creating the illusion of actual interaction. Of course, us land-dwellers still use it because it’s the best we can expect — sad, dry-skinned, stick-fingered creatures that we are! Fish and their aquatic colleagues have no need for electronic hocus-pocus when they want to network. They just mingle with a school of their buddies, slip into a current, and zoom here, there, everywhere.

Land-dwellers are always seeking comfort. But actually, how comfortable can we be, always walking around, jolting our knees and spine with every herky-jerky step? Our dry skin is always chafing against the rough fabric of our clothes – we're all cursed to the same friction-filled abrasive Hell.

Sea creatures, on the other hand, are always comfortable. They’re floating in water, like happy fetuses in a joyfully buoyant mommy-zone. If the water’s a little too hot or a little too cold, they just rise or sink to a level with the right temperature. What could be simpler?

By now, I’m sure I have you convinced: ocean living totally rocks, while the dry life is the existential equivalent of cheap European toilet-paper ... in a word: harsh.

The Creature from the Black Lagoon definitely had the right idea, livin’ the dream in his wet ‘n’ wild world. As always, old horror movies show us the way to ultimate bliss!

So what can we do to get back in the swim? The solution is simple…

Accelerate global warming!

Buy a bigger car and drive it as often as you can! Use up all the aerosol products in the house, and then go out and buy some more (even aerosol cheese)! Only buy products that are made by huge smoke-churning factories!

Come on, gang, let’s melt those polar ice-caps and jumpstart a really strong thaw. The objective is to cover all the ridiculous dry land with beautiful, nourishing, lovely sea-water. That’s Step One!

Step Two: Tell genetic scientists to get off their academic derrieres and make with the oceanic mutagens. We aren’t getting any younger — or wetter! By this time next year, I want to see gills and scales on every man, woman, child and housepet around the world.

Step Three: Obviously, smokers are going to have to break the habit. The world is going to be one big no-smoking zone.

Step Four: Fans of Mythos fiction will know what I’m talking about when I say it’s time to ditch the current crop of land-dweller gods and switch to deities with higher moisture contents. What’s that blowing up your cellphone? It’s the call of Cthulhu and you’d better not put Him on hold.

This season and every season, the Innsmouth look will be the one-and-only big fashion craze, and trendy Dagon worshippers will be sporting dorsal fins and come-hither googly fish-eyes. Some say that many hands make light work, but worshippers of the octopus god Kugappa will soon come to realize that a cluster of agile tentacles makes every task as easy as eel pie!

Step Five: Say goodbye! — to lawn-mowers and SUVs and bumper stickers and outrageous gas prices and insurance coverage and music videos and vacuum-cleaners and hair-conditioner and furniture and styrofoam cups and washing machines and DVDs and doilies and paperclips and TV dinners and phonebooks and furnace filters and of course, bicycles. You won’t need any of those follies ever again.

Then say hello! — to utter bliss as the waters rise above your scaly head.

Working together, we can implement my six-step plan and reverse The Big Mistake. And in the meantime … start eating more sushi. You’ll want to get used to it now, because that is what’s going to be on the menu for the rest of your life.

This story has been published in both the U.K. and America, and I think it may be my weirdest story yet. The character known as the Cat Man also appears in the story, "Melina Mavrodakis and the Five Something-or-Others of the Apocalypse" in my story collection, BEACH BLANKET ZOMBIE.


Your Turn
by Mark McLaughlin


She sweeps toward you, laughing, her lace-swathed arms outstretched. She is the Red Nurse and she is about to put her large hot hands on you.

So you run, because you know no one survives her brand of care. You see a small blue house with all the lights on and toys scattered in the front yard. The Red Nurse abhors children so you hurry up to the door and start knock-knock-knocking. Oh please, let all the horrible children be home.

The door glides open and a beautiful young Asian man with platinum hair takes you by the hand and wordlessly leads you inside. You slam the door behind you and command the young man to lock it. He shrugs and does as he is told.

In the kitchen, he makes you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. "Say something," you insist. "I'm being chased by the Red Nurse and I want you to take my mind off her."

"Well, let me think," he says. "How about this? My name is Peter. My mother is French and my father is Japanese but I never knew him. I'm making you a P, B & J because it has a lot of fat and sugar and protein in it and those are all good things to eat when you're scared. So here, eat this. Want some milk?"

You nod and take the sandwich. You watch as Peter picks up an empty glass from the counter and turns around. Time passes. He's just standing there doing something, but you can't see what. So you watch and eat and watch. Finally he turns around and hands you a full glass.

The glass is fridge-cold and filled with a bluish-gray liquid.

"What is this stuff?" you ask, eighty-five percent disgusted, ten percent amused, five percent intrigued.

"It's milk," Peter says.

"No it's not. It came out of you."

"Well, yeah. It's my milk."

You look him up and down. "What did it come out of?"

He brushes his fingers along your jawline. "If the Red Nurse catches you, you'll never have any milk ever again."

Something jumps up on the counter, startling you - you almost drop the milk. At first you think it's a cat, but it's too big, and it's a biped, and it's wearing a gold mask and a black rubber suit crisscrossed with zippers, and you suddenly realize it's the Cat Man, and you KNOW that the Cat Man is a very good friend of the Red Nurse, and you turn toward Peter and shout, "Is this a trap?"

He cradles your face in his hands and says, "No, no, no, calm down, the Cat Man is mad at the Red Nurse and he's staying with me. He's the one who put all the toys in the front yard. Pretty smart, huh?"

You face the Cat Man. "How do I know this isn't a double-cross? Why are you mad at the Red Nurse?"

"She lied to me." His soft little voice sounds like a big tree growing. "She promised me Australia and India and most of Africa and all I got was Hawaii. I mean, Hawaii is pretty and all, but I was expecting a lot more. We had a deal. Hey, if you're not going to finish that, can I have it?"

You let the little guy have the rest of your sandwich. He removes his mask to eat and you almost pass out because his face is so ugly (pale damp flesh, protruding blue-green veins, watery golden eyes). He eats like a frenzied boar-hog, grunting and heaving and gurgling as he chews.

Peter taps his chin thoughtfully. "So Cat Man. What's the plan? How you gonna get back at her? What sort of nasty trick do you have up your black rubber sleeve?"

The little guy flashes a slick grin. "Tell ya what. You two help me and I'll cut you in. Petey, you can have France and Japan and any ten of the fifty states of America. And you, Scaredy Pants: you can have Germany and Argentina and any ten states, too - but Petey gets first pick. Is it a deal?"

---

It takes days of cool persuasion and heated negotiation, but finally the Cat Man and Peter convince you to join in on the scheme. It takes so long because they won't tell you what the scheme actually is.

Peter leads the way down into the murky basement. At the Cat Man's command, he fills a laundry bag with things from a big wooden crate under the stairs. You aren't quite sure what the things are, but they look like black books or boxes.

The Cat Man hangs the Seal Of Wounds That Won't Heal on the handle of the old furnace's heavy metal door. He swings the door open and you find yourself looking into one of the ultra-white corridors of the House of the Ankh. In you all crawl, one, two, three.

"That was easy," you say.

The Cat Man waves a blacknailed hand dismissively. "Getting into trouble is always easy." He reaches back into the opening and pulls out the Seal, closing the way behind him.

"Why did you do that?" you whisper hotly into his damp triangular ear. "That was our escape hatch!"

Suddenly an Iguana Man guard rounds the corner of the hall. The Cat Man pulls a wee gun out of one of his many pockets and shoots the reptile between the eyes. The silencer is almost as big as the gun, so the shot only makes a tiny pfffft!

"Hatch schmatch," the Cat Man hisses. "What a big wetsy baby you are. Let's get moving."

You help Peter carry the sack as you follow the little guy through the winding halls. On both sides of you: walls dotted with framed certificates (there's one signed by the Marquis de Sade) and doors, doors, doors, hundreds of them, all white, some slightly ajar. Every now and then you peek into one of the rooms. In the various rooms you see: locusts feasting on exposed brains; looping, living guts stuck with glowing pins; orifices crammed with gardening implements; and you keep saying to yourself, Italy, they promised me Italy.

In all these rooms, set high up on the walls, are video monitors, all playing exotic, brightly-lit torture scenes. For ambiance, perhaps, like music in elevators.

At last you come to a door guarded by two Iguana Men. The Cat Man plugs them both with his tiny gun before they even have a chance to reach for their weapons. Dying, one of the guards fouls his pants, filling the hall with an eye-watering ammonia stench.

The room you now enter is huge, and filled with computer stations. Each station features a bluish-gray zombie, staring at a monitor and typing. A cable runs from the side of each monitor to the base of the spine of its zombie-typist.

"Here we are," the Cat Man says. "Took a little longer than I thought to find it. She changes the location of this room constantly."

"Is this the nerve-center of operations?" you ask. The little guy shakes his damp head. "Nah, this is just where they play the torture videos."

Each zombie is wearing a black burlap shirt. The Cat Man rips the shirt off the nearest zombie, revealing a square slot in the middle of its back. He presses a button by the slot and a video cassette pops out.

Peter opens the sack and takes out a video labeled SWEDISH HOT-TUB NIGHTS, which he slides into the zombie-slot. One by one, he replaces the torture videos in all the zombies with selections from his porn library.

"Is this the big plan?" you say, exasperated. "Why did you two even bother to get me involved? You didn't need me at all!"

The Cat Man takes your hand and tugs gently downward. You kneel to look him in the eye. "You, my friend," he says, "play a vital role in this curious enterprise. A starring role. Starting now."

He unzips one of his many zippers, reaches in and pulls out a sort of collar, studded with small gems and computer chips. You want to look at it more closely, but before you can, he snaps it around your neck.

From another of his pockets he pulls an oval device covered with buttons. He points the thing at you and presses a big red button.

---

And now you are a woman, or at least, female: the Green Nun.

Of course, the name is all part of the joke. After all, the Red Nurse isn't really a nurse. Most nurses like to cure people, not chop them into bits. And while nuns aren't supposed to like sex, you certainly don't have a problem with it.

Like the Cat Man, you wear a skintight, many-zippered rubber suit - yours is lime-green, with a yellow and blue swirly pattern over the breasts. You don't wear a mask, but you do cover your face with a bridal veil.

The revolution was a success: the energy from the torture rooms - the secret source of the Red Nurse's power - has been channeled away from her and into you. And you feel fantastic.

Your first order of business was to give the Cat Man a kiss and a big hug. Then you twisted off his smelly head. You confiscated the remote (as if he could ever control you), that tiny little gun, and of course, the Seal of Wounds That Won't Heal, along with the other goodies in those deceptively deep pockets of his. You commanded your new guards, the Tarantula Men, to seize and detain Peter. Then you shifted the location of the zombie room to a transdimensional bunker in Q Sector. There's no air in Q Sector, but the zombies won't mind.

In the Imperial Boudoir, you watch as the Tarantula Men strip off Peter's clothes. You raise an eyebrow at the sight of his convoluted, inhuman privates.

"You were supposed to save us!" Peter cries.

"I am saving you. For myself."

You press a green button on the nightstand and a silver communications monitor rises out of the floor. The screen lights up to reveal the bristly face of the Head Tarantula Man.

"Any word on the Red Nurse?" you roar.

His mandibles tremble. "She has escaped the grounds. Six-dozen death-squads are out searching. We think she has found her way into the Swamplands."

"The Swamplands! But - that's where the Resistance is headquartered!"

You grab a crystal torture device out of your curio cabinet and fling in at the screen. The monitor explodes in a shower of shards and sparks.

Out of the corner of your eye, you see Peter yawn. Yawn? How enraging! "Am I boring you?"

He smiles apologetically, then nods to the left and right at the Tarantula Men holding him. "Maybe we should talk. But first, get rid of your goons. You wouldn't want them to hear what I have to say."

You command the guards to chain him to the bed. They do as they are told and depart.

Peter stretches out on the mattress. For a prisoner, he seems awfully unconcerned. "I really envy you," he says. "You get so far into it, you can actually forget what's going on."

His words disturb you, and yet you say, "Continue."

"You. Me. Her. The three of us." He taps his chin. "I used to be the Purple Queen. You were the Brown Hunter. She was the Yellow Bishop. Then I was the White Dollmaker. You were the Blue Shaman. She -"

You turn away. "Enough! I don't have time for these games."

"No," he says, "that's the problem. We have too much time, and only for games."

You think about this for a moment. Then you sigh. "Say whatever else you've got to say."

"I love you. But I love her, too. Even though she doesn't care about me." He laughs softly. "She's still wild about you. And we're never sure how you feel about either of us! It's sad, really, and so very tedious. But at least we have our games! Tricks and terrors, puzzles and perversions. They make it all seem so glamorous."

You turn back to him, wiping at your eyes with the veil. "I think I liked it better when we were-" Were what? What? "-playing."

"Well, then," he says, "let's keep playing. But bring back the Cat Man. I made him the last time I was evil, and ... well, the game's more interesting when he's around. He's so deliciously treacherous."

You give him a small nod. Then you push another button on the night-stand and a new communications monitor rises out of the floor.

You square your shoulders. "Reanimate the Cat Man's corpse," you thunder, "and bring him to my antechamber."

Peter's reflection beams at you from the rounded silver edge of the monitor. How happy he looks. You open a door on the nightstand and bring out a corkscrew and a magnum of passionflower wine. Before long, you and your handsome prisoner are laughing and taking swigs from the big bottle.

There is a knock on the door. You purr, "Be back in a second," and then glide away from the bed. At one point, you glance back and give Peter a wink.

You enter your antechamber, where a Tarantula Man waits, holding the Cat Man in his arms. The little guy's head has been reattached, but he is still extremely groggy.

You open one of your zippers and take out a gold pill case and a shiny greenish-blue sliver of metal. The case holds a single hyperstrength super-energy pill, which you slip under the Cat Man's tongue. Then you slide the metal sliver - a cerebral implant - deep into his damp triangular ear.

These words you whisper into that ear: "Go into the next room, straight to the bed. There you will find a drunken man and a stainless steel corkscrew. Use the corkscrew to remove the man's brain, a little bit at a time."

You smile to yourself. Pretty, silly Peter. You still can't believe that your false tears fooled him. Bored? Soon he will be bored out of his skull! Serves him right for acting so damnably sincere, so real. Ordinarily you like that sort of thing, but not when it's your turn to be the evil one.

Thinking back, it seems to me that horror movies stopped being scary back in the 1970s. Is it the movies, or is it me? I was younger then, so maybe it didn't take much to scare me. Or maybe the real world was less frightening back then, making cinematic terrors seem more intimidating by comparison.

Back then, nobody worried about terrorism or AIDS or mad-cow disease or flesh-eating bacteria or any of the other dozens of bugaboos plaguing society today. Yesteryear's shockers didn't have to compete with planes flying into skyscrapers or anthrax threats or beheadings in the Middle East.

What scared me back then? The hideous, charred face of "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" was pretty darned scary, but the stylish doctor was a sophisticated creampuff compared to the deep-South inbred maniacs of the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" gang. When I first saw that title, I thought it might be some kind of wacky dark comedy, a la "Little Shop of Horrors" – boy, was I wrong!

The grainy film quality, the herky-jerky camera action, all gave a jittery, realistic quality to the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" nightmares up on the screen. And the first time you see old Leatherface, revving up his chainsaw in that ramshackle house of madness – that's a sight you won't soon forget.

Not all movies of that era achieved that same degree of realism, but they were still plenty horrific. For example, the plot of "Sssssss" was utterly implausible, but that's okay – its sheer exuberance carried it through.

Strother Martin played a mad scientist bent on turning humanity into a race of super-intelligent king cobras, for all sorts of goofball reasons. And gee, he'd even invented the formula that would do the trick.

Soon his handsome young assistant's hair is falling out and his skin begins turning scaly. Now if I was working for a mad scientist who was cuckoo for reptiles and my skin suddenly began growing scales... I'd put two and two together. I'd figure out that little Scooby Doo mystery in no time.

But sadly, the assistant in this slithery potboiler never connects the dots. Before long he's the poster boy for the world's most effective slimming program. No arms, no legs, just a lanky serpentine abdomen – that's about as slender as you're gonna get.

"The Devil's Rain," with it's ghoulish cult of wax-blooded devil-worshippers, is a great example of the many Satanic horror movies of the Seventies. The Devil was scarier back then! William Shatner's super-exuberant acting style fit perfectly into this Mephistophelean drive-in shocker.

Even made-for-TV movies were scarier in those days. The old "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" TV movies, and the weekly series that followed, worked my young nerves into a frenzy with their cheesy chills and thrills.

Darren McGavin played a gonzo reporter in a cheap suit who was forever chasing vampires and werewolves and even Jack the Ripper around town in his continuing quest for the ultimate scoop. And he usually ended up vanquishing the monster – but gosh darn it, his camera film wouldn't develop, or the cops would lose the evidence, or some other exasperating inconvenience would foul the deal, so that Kolchak's crabby editor would have to axe the story.

They never showed more than a glimpse of the monsters, and that actually made it even scarier. You'd wait and wait for that choice moment when suddenly the creature would pop out of the shadows, ready to flay poor Kolchak to bits. Fortunately, he always did his research, so he'd have the necessary cross or wolfbane or whatever was needed to conquer the boogeyman du jour.

But I will admit, in recent years, I've seen a few movies that conveyed the same macabre mood as those '70s favorites of mine, so I guess it is still possible for me to be captivated by cinema horror. They aren't super-new releases, but you can find them in most stores that sell DVDs.

"Jeepers Creepers" and "Jeepers Creepers 2" tell the tale of a hideous creature that wakes every 23 years to feast for 23 days. If the Creeper needs to replace a hand or leg or other segment of his body, he'll just eat that bit off a tasty victim and presto! New replacement part. That's a pretty gonzo idea for a monster. "Cabin in the Woods" and "Dead Silence" are other, more recent movies that also hit the bull's-eye with plenty of exhilarating weirdness.

Weirdness -- that's what a lot of movies since the '70s have been missing. Many of today's movies seem to be retreads of earlier, better movies.

Plus, '70s horror movies had a lot more energy. The critters leaped into the horror arena with savage gusto. A lot of today's monsters either hover in the shadows or straggle across the screen like damp tomcats that have been left out in the rain all night.

So if you're looking for a creepy chiller and the new releases aren't cuttin' it for you, try hunting down some vintage '70s classics. You have nothing to lose – except your SANITY! Bwaaah-haaa-haaaa-haaaaaaah!

If it weren’t for English and Japanese entertainment, I probably wouldn’t be a writer.

My rural childhood was extremely boring. One day, when I was caught up with my farm chores and no one else was in the house, I turned on the TV and saw, on PBS, a completely fascinating show called Dr. Who.

My first thought was, “What the heck is this?” Silver-haired, urbane Jon Pertwee was the Doctor in that episode. I later learned that lots of actors have taken on the role of time-traveling Dr. Who over the years. Pertwee played the part with a jaunty James Bond-style air of adventure and sophistication.

I was instantly intrigued by Dr. Who’s sophisticated accent, and well as the chirpy, cheerful voice of his assistant, Jo Grant, who always started each question with “But Doctor!” And I was entranced by the monster: a Chronovore, or time-eater, that looked like a cross between a canary and a flying chess piece. I also loved the show’s quirky scientific principles and wild plotline.

The next year, I had the opportunity to see King Kong Escapes at a drive-in, and that, too, was utterly enthralling and exotic to little country-boy Mark! It featured King Kong fighting a mad doctor (named Dr. Hu ... quite a coincidence!) who plots to take over the world with the help of a giant mechanical version of King Kong. (I used to think the movie was Godzilla Vs. MechaGodzilla, but eventually I came across the right movie at a store and my memory cleared up once I watched it.)

Speculative fiction, in print and movie form alike, gets a lot of flack because some people think it will inspire readers and/or audience members to evil. But really, evil folks don’t need inspiration. They’re bad to begin with. In most cases, speculative fiction inspires people in a good way.

Dr. Who and that King Kong movie made me realize there was more to life than just country life and chores. Those shows, with their high-flying adventures, did me a huge favor by planting discontent in my heart. They made me discontent with the thought of a boring future in a rural area where I didn't have any friends.

I often hear people talk about the fact that they are discontent with their relationships, or careers, or their lives in general. Many, for example, are discontent with their lack of opportunities. Many worry if they'll even have a job the next day.

Well, don’t just shrug off your discontent by saying, “Oh well, I can’t do anything about it. Things will get better eventually.” Don’t paste on a fake smile and say everything is peachy. Embrace your discontent and learn from it, and then get rid of it by doing something to correct or improve the situation.

Pursue your future. Don’t wait for someone to drop it in your lap, because that may never happen. You’ll only end up with an empty lap and a lot of wasted years. If you hit a roadblock, drive around it. Build a new road if necessary.

Eventually I discovered writing, and now I write constantly, both at home (where I’m writing this) and as part of my office career. See Mark write. Write, Mark, write. Mark has friends now. Mark is happy.

Speculative fiction is the literature of inspiration, and it is a good thing because it can encourage people to take action in their lives. It is also the literature of escapism, and that's good, too, since it can remind trapped people that yes, they can escape from unhappy situations if they are willing to work hard on their own behalf.

So thank you, Dr. Who, Dr. Hu, and King Kong, for inspiring an unhappy child to work toward a better future.

BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM, my new collection of 25 Mythos-inspired tales, is now available.

Welcome to the Best Little Witch-House in Arkham. In this midnight den of dread and desire, you will find twenty-five rooms, each with a story of its own to tell. Here you will enjoy a delectable variety of otherworldly nightmares and blasphemies ... enough to satisfy even your most eldritch desires.

Here you will find evil pop-stars longing to devour their fans. You will meet a sophisticated secret agent in search of supernatural super-villains.

You will learn the vile secrets of Kugappa, the writhing octopus-god, and Ghattambah, a grotesque insect deity whose soul dwells beyond time.

You will smell the unhallowed stench of the Odour out of the Terrible Old Man. You will drink the creamy Milk of Time, an unholy substance which flows through the depths of a forbidden house of horrors known as Der Fleischbrunnen. You will even travel through deep space to a futuristic restaurant for alien connoisseurs, where you will sink your teeth into the monstrous specialty of the house.

You will find all of these horrors, and so much more ... in the Best Little Witch-House in Arkham.

Check out the book's cover here:

http://www.amazon.com/Best-Little-Wit...

Excerpt No. 1 -- from the story, "The Embrace of Kugappa," one of the 25 horror tales in the Mythos-inspired collection, BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM:


Jasper always knew when he was dreaming, and yet the realization never woke him up, like it did most people.

He dreamed that he was on the beach of an island with bone-white sand, and before him stretched a horizon of dark green sea.

Sinuous – vines? – stretched up out of the water, huge vines overgrown with many smaller vines, and all those vines held an abundance of small, squirming things.

One of the vines swirled up out of the water close to shore, and he saw that it wasn’t a vine after all – how silly, how stupid, vines didn’t grow in oceans. It was a huge tentacle, overgrown with smaller tentacles, and those had even smaller tentacles on them, and so on in a sort of bio-fractal progression.

He knew he should be afraid, but he wasn’t. Not really. Because.

Because they.

They wanted.

Wanted him to be happy. Yes, the Great Old Ones wanted him to be happy, and Kugappa was one of the Great Old Ones, and the best way to be happy was to be like them.

Be.

Like.

Them.

Who’d told him that? Who’d told him about the Great Old Ones? He giggled – the initials of that spelled ‘goo.’ Why, that was who had told him. The goo had told him.

Before he knew it he was swimming in the dark green sea, even though he didn't know how to swim, and tentacles and tentacles-upon-tentacles were handling him, exploring him, sliding into every part of him, even into his pores, infiltrating his cells, embracing his soul...


----------


Excerpt No. 2 -- from the story, "Squidd, Inc.":

Henderson snapped one day in the department head meeting and began speaking in tongues: "Ulala pizani! Y'kha Shub-Niggurath ghakala! Azagga pupago ma'azu!"

Henderson's seat is right under the huge chrome Squidd, Inc. logo mounted on the wall, and his outburst was more than a little blasphemous – an affront to our disciplined business world. Or so I thought. We all looked to bulbous-eyed Old Man Squidd, our flabby corporate pooh-bah, to watch the fireworks.

The Old Man sat up in his chair (a formidable task for one so huge) and said, "By God, Henderson, I like a man with Spunk."

———

Spunk. Spunk. Spunk with a capital S became our watchword, our password, our office shibboleth.

At that time, Squidd, Inc. specialized in the production and distribution of pharmaceuticals, with interests in medical equipment and biochemical research. I was Director of Sales, and I longed for Spunk like the cartoon coyote longs for roadrunner meat.

I'd been with the company for twenty years; my hair had turned grey and my skin had grown spotty in the service of Squidd. My chair at the meeting table was choice: only three seats down from the Old Man. But did the younger Directors have any respect for my years of experience? Sorry, no. Whenever they deigned to speak with me, their smug expressions told the story too well. They saw me as nothing more than a corporate leftover – a dried-up old piece of sushi.

I wasn't about to let the matter of Spunk, and my lack thereof, cripple my standing with the company. I prayed at my desk: Gods of Commerce, I need more than just daily bread. Lead me deep into temptation and give me a magnum of champagne, a midnight-blue BMW, a penthouse office, a stock portfolio to die for, and most of all, a generous helping of high-energy, high-octane, high-and-mighty Spunk....


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Excerpt No. 3 -- from the story, "Cthulhu Royale":

Part I. Her Majesty’s Secret Shoggoth

“Bondcraft,” said the tall, lean, dark-haired, lantern-jawed man in the tuxedo. Black, of course: a tuxedo of any other color was madness, a veritable mountain of madness. “H.P. Bondcraft.”

“Dash it all!” ejaculated W., the Minister of Arcane Defense, a balding, heavyset man. “I know your name! Why, we’ve known each other since we roomed together at the London Academy for Young Espionage Gentlemen.”

Miss Tuppenceworth, W.’s pretty blonde secretary, looked out the window of her office, which served as antechamber to her superior’s sanctum sanctorum. “Why is it that whenever H.P. shows up, the sky is suddenly filled with multi-colored silhouettes of shapely women flying about? One can see outlines of guns among the female forms, and hear music filled with saxophones and trumpets. And there’s this sort of swirly gun-barrel shifting to and fro... Decidedly odd.”

“Not at all,” W. said. “It’s that private club down the road – the Society for the Advancement of Musical, Gun-Collecting Lady Gymnasts. Their ostentatious laser lightshows happen to coincide with Bondcraft’s visits.”

Miss Tuppenceworth fluttered her lashes at the spy. “So you went to school with W.? What was he like as a young lad?”

H.P. puffed thoughtfully at his cheroot. “Though Z. is the Ministry’s resident expert on curious devices, W. also showed signs of great mechanical aptitude back then. I remember one summer, he bought one of those jolly vibrating massage chairs, and added parts from a milking machine and an automatic taffy-puller, and we took turns–”

“Now, now,” W. chided, “Miss Tuppenceworth doesn’t have time to stroll down memory lane.”

H.P. smiled. “Oh, and once, W. played the part of Juliet in our espionage school production of—”

“Come with me, Bondcraft!” W. led the spy into his office and then locked the door behind them. H.P. headed straight to the liquor cabinet, where he made himself a tequila sunrise. Swizzled, not agitated.

“Drinking on the job!” W. scolded. “And tuxedos, always tuxedos. Why? Explain yourself!”

“Why?” Bondcraft smirked. “Why not?”

“You’re a spy! You’re supposed to blend in with the common rabble.”

“Or so one would think!” H.P. drained his glass. “But because I’m usually a little drunk and stand out so, no enemy would ever suspect that I am in fact a secret agent. They’d be expecting someone sober and utterly nondescript.”

“I say! I never thought of it that way. Ingenious!” W. sat down behind his enormous mahogany desk, which was littered with stacks of papers and several anatomically correct primitive fetish dolls.

“So what’s new in the Ministry of Arcane Defense?” the spy asked.

“Some good news from our research base on Antarctica.” W. flashed a merry grin. “We’ve found and captured a shoggoth! All very hush-hush, of course – top secret! We’re still trying to figure out what to do with the blasted thing... It’s so big and squishy. It eats quite a lot ... it can change its shape ... perhaps the awful thing has some potential as a biological weapon.”

“You could always drop it on an enemy camp,” Bondcraft said, “and let it eat everybody.”

“Not a bad idea, but afterward, recapturing it would be a problem. Right now it’s very sluggish, since it’s down at that research base. The thing can’t move very fast in that frigid climate. If we let it loose in a warmer spot, we might never be able to pen it up again. We’re trying to figure out how to control the beast ... perhaps even communicate with it. Maybe we’ll find some more – the research chaps say Antarctica used to be crawling with them, back when it was less chilly down there. Anyway, let me tell you about your assignment.”

Bondcraft smiled. “Is there an international casino involved? And a sexy double-agent?”

“Silly boy,” W. said. “There’s always an international casino involved. Master-criminals cluster around those casinos like flies around a dead street urchin. And yes, naturally here’s a sexy double-agent. Vadda Fookenhottie.”

Bondcraft smirked. “Such language!”

W. rolled his eyes. “That’s her name: Vadda Fookenhottie. We have no pictures of her on file, but it wouldn’t matter anyway because she is a master of disguise. Or should I say mistress of disguise...? Anyway, in addition to Miss Fookenhottie, you will be dealing with – not one, not two, not four, but three arch-villains.”

H.P. allowed himself a small gasp. “Not ... the 3D Cult? Dagon’s Deadly Disciples...?”


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To find out what happens next in any of those stories, read BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM. Available on Kindle or as a trade paperback.

A link to the e-book on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Best-Little-Wit...

A link to the book's page here on GoodReads:
...Best Little Witch-House in Arkham

Five-star review by Bruce Blanchard of BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM:

http://www.amazon.com/Best-Little-Wit...

The text of the review:

Back then, H.P. Lovecraft was plying his stories to the pulp market and centering their locale around the eldritch haunted town of Arkham, just another writer trying to make his fortune. He built up a following around some of the best writers in the horror business including the likes of Robert Bloch, Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E. Howard and many others who fashioned their stories around the Old Ones, those monstrous beings seeking to return and impart their own version of madness. He died and his stories almost died with him except for the devoted determined to keep alive the cult of Cthulhu, Nyarlethotep, the dreaded Necronomicon, and Arkham University. Today, almost every horror writer seeks to add his own story. Most of the stories are serious in writing about the Hounds of Hell, haunted witch houses, midnight rituals, and the mysterious inhabitants at Innsmouth. And now, let me present to you Mark McLaughlin's additions which promises, no lie!, to make you giggle, guffaw, and snort milk out your nose or which ever potable you're drinking. The humor in the book may see spurts out your ears. Isn't that an image?

Mr. McLaughlin's Best Little Witch-House is a collection of 25 stories taking what we have today, mixing in that little swirl of H.P. and coming up with the likes of Cthulhu Royale (Bond), Hound-Dog McGee (Scooby Doo), Tony Tar-Pit and Monkey-Face Joe (the Flintstones), When We Was Flab (the Beatles). You'll run across a wonderful place to stay, Pickman's Motel. Attend the healings at St. Toad's Medical Center (you've seen the commercials). Try this title on for size: The Slivering Quiver of the River Lizard's Twisted Liver-Blisters. I have nothing but Praise for the stories in this collection. These are stories mixed with the serious and take a left turn into the absurd. If it was possible, H.P. Lovecraft would be involuntarily giggling. Download this treasure. The stories don't run long. For the true fans of Lovecraft out there, The Best Little Witch-House is one bringing out your laughter. For those unacquainted with his works, check out the genre and get a good laugh yourself. You will not go wrong in downloading this book.

...Best Little Witch-House in Arkham

Available as a trade paperback and on Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/Best-Little-Wit...

I'm Mark McLaughlin, author of the Mythos-inspired horror fiction collection, Best Little Witch-House in Arkham.

How much do you know about the life and works of New England horror author H.P. Lovecraft? Take the Great H.P. Lovecraft Quiz and find out....

http://www.goodreads.com/quizzes/2848...

So many of you liked my Great H.P. Lovecraft Quiz, I created a new quiz to test your knowledge of HPL and his various cosmic creatures.

You can take the Eldritch H.P. Lovecraft Gods & Monsters Quiz by following this link:

http://www.goodreads.com/quizzes/2886...


...Best Little Witch-House in Arkham

Excerpt No. 1:

Along the far wall was a four-poster bed with sky-blue silk curtains. Lounging in the middle of the bed on a pile of navy blue pillows was a willowy, dark-haired woman in a white dressing gown edged with pink lace.

She seemed normal enough – from a distance. But as Melina walked closer, she gradually realized there was something very wrong with the woman.

Mrs. Hamogeorgakis had fine bone structure and large blue eyes. But the eyes had an intense, vicious look to them, like those of a wild animal.

The woman’s pale skin had a slight olive cast – and was coated with a shining layer of tiny, iridescent scales.

Her dark hair was full and lustrous – far too lustrous. It glistened with a slick sheen, as though covered with a layer of oil.

Mrs. Hamogeorgakis smiled, revealing a mouthful of yellow, needle-thin teeth. “So this is the fancy expert,” she said in a wet rumble of a voice. “The miracle worker. Do you think you will be able to make a goddess of me?”

-- An excerpt from "A Beauty Treatment for Mrs. Hamogeorgakis," one of the 25 Mythos-inspired ‪horror‬ stories in the fiction collection, BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM by Mark McLaughlin.

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Excerpt No. 2:

The land of Computronea used to be ruled by a power-mad mega-computer known as the Continuum. To save the day, a noble warrior scientist had overloaded the evil machine with data on goodness, causing it to explode. The explosion released a great amount of the mysterious Zing Energy that powered the Continuum. All this unleashed power created a new race of beings known as Nekronomi Pals, composed of either digital goodness or evil, or sometimes an unpredictable mix of both.

Basically, there were four main types of Nekronomi Pals. The most common by far were the Tulus – loyal, doglike creatures with tentacled faces, bat wings, claws and scales. Brott’s very favorite Pal was one of these, and his name was Peeka-Tulu. Most of the Tulus were friendly and relaxed. Their favorite pastime was taking long naps in dark, damp basement corners. But some could be quite snarly and ill-tempered, and their claws left awful scratches. Tulus contained high levels of Zing Energy.

Daggies resembled monkeys that had been crossed with goldfish. They had pale, lanky limbs, big fishy eyes and blubbery lips. They enjoyed swimming and splashing around in cool streams. Though electro-digital by nature, Nekronomi Pals could move about in water when in solid form – in fact, many enjoyed it. All the Pals had to eat and drink to nourish their solid bodies, just like real animals. Daggies loved water the most. Each Daggy was either all-the-way-good or all-the-way-evil.

Fungos had the appearance of hermit crabs, but instead of shells, they sported over-sized mushroom heads on their backs. Their stretchy eyestalks allowed them an expansive field of vision. They were aggressive fighters, with sharp, fast pincher-claws. Also, each type of Pal had its own special power – and the power of the Fungos was an especially formidable one. The other Pals certainly did not like to fight Fungos.

Shoggies were big, bouncy, rubbery Nekronomi Pals. They looked like juicy globs of gelatin with funny little wiggly bits suspended inside. These wigglies were their internal organs. Each Shoggy had two sturdy hearts and three pulsing brains, and so they were very industrious and intelligent. Their Zing Energy burned with a steady glow....

-- An excerpt from "Super Digital Nekronomi Pals Are Zing!" ... another strange tale from BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM.

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BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM ... available as a trade paperback or a Kindle download:

http://www.amazon.com/Best-Little-Wit...


Best Little Witch-House in Arkham

Mark McLaughlin