Top Ten Excerpts From the World of Horror

As you may remember I interviewed 13 Horror Authors this year as a special piece on Indie Author Tactics.6 were indie authors while 7 were from Sinister Grin Press. Aside from these interviews I had some of the authors give me excerpts or quotes form their books. These are some of the excerpts from their works. I hope you enjoy and if they interest you then feel free to check out their work.


1.
"Have you ever felt the sheer terror of teetering on the brink of the conscious and the unconscious, unable to wake up? Have you experienced the frustration and the powerlessness of being aware, yet, knowing that you are asleep? Do you recall your bitter struggle to pry away the malevolent hands of darkness that greedily choke the life out of you? Of loudly screaming your fight but knowing that it is as silent to the outside world as are your pleas to those holding you down in the world of impenetrable stupor? Then just as you resign yourself to death, you wake up.

The indescribable relief that spreads through you, allows you to breathe, cleansing away the remnants of panic and dread. Yet, sometimes, you can still hear the echoes of your cry for help. Were you foolish enough to dismiss it as a nightmare; complacent enough to assume that it could no longer touch you, harm you?

I did."- Captive, Wreath and Other Stories by Sangeeta Mahapatra



Paralysed by fear- that is an expression that I never understood. I don’t understand it now. It would be so much better to be paralysed by fear than be restless with it, not knowing what to do and how to do it, feeling the vicious claws of terror and trepidation tear one from within. Was that an alliteration? Fear makes me alliterative, who would have thought?- The Wait, Wreath and Other Stories by Sangeeta Mahapatra


2.
“Doubt if you want,” Reverend Stiles responded accusatorily. “But if you’ve read the Bible, you’d realize resurrection is a common theme. Lazarus was brought back to life. And Jesus himself rose from the dead on the third day.”

“I do read the Bible. I just don’t recall Jesus rising from the dead and then eating his disciples.” -- from “Cruise of the Living Dead” by Scott Baker


3.
From The Night-Watchman’s Tale by Ryan Willox, longlist Guardian UK’s Stephen King short story competition;

“You freaked yet? No? Somehow I didn’t think so. Well you kids are a lot hardier nowadays what with all your horror movies, satanic music and violent video games. I can see it though “ those heebie jeebies are gonna come a calling soon. Mark my words.”

From The Watcher at the Gate, Mausoleum Memoirs by Ryan Willox. House of Horror 2009

“Out of the corner of her eye, in her mind’s eye, she would see its giant bulldog head turn and angle toward her, contemplating her. She would hear its low rumbling growl and the grind of stone on stone, like the noise of a tablet being lifted from a sarcophagus, as it rose on its haunches and prepared to descend. She would see the shadows cast by its huge wingspan as it flexed, expanded and primed for attack.”


4.
“He’d imagined doing bad things to people, his neighbors, kids in his class, and it didn’t scare him. In fact, it excited him to the point of ecstasy, where he could get lost while thinking about slitting the throat of his teacher or the old man who lived down the block, the one who always said hello to him. It was getting caught that gave him pause, made him wake up in the middle of the night, sweating. Jail was not a place he wanted to go when he was older. He wondered if he was going to be a serial killer when he grew up. The tendencies were there; he was like many of the psychos he’d read about.

Only time would tell.” ----From the story “Invasion” in the collection A Mixed Bag of Blood, by David Bernstein



Scraping noises filled his ears. Nail on bone. He knew it was the creature’s claws raking against the inside of his wife’s skull, cleaning it out and wanting every last morsel, like a kid running a spoon around the inside of a emptied cake batter bowl.”----From the novel Goblins, by David Bernstein


5.
Quotes from Mayan Blue by Michelle Garza and Melissa Lason

“The massive chamber permeated the stench of decay and blood and it crawled down his throat, eliciting a wave of nausea. The shadows writhed about him as a hundred sets of eyes opened, casting an unearthly golden light and illuminating the lord of death. Beyond them came monstrous cries, and howling of hungry creatures.”

“His gaze drifted up beyond the open cavities in the corpse’s belly and chest and came to rest on its face. Its eyes were now widened black pits filled with those of a different beast and they were the same he had seen glowing beneath the light of the moon—the eyes of an owl.”


6.
“Yeah, I get it. I'll be cool as a well digger's ass.

He jumped when the front door slammed shut, the harsh bang echoing around the trees.

Mitch shook his head. That well digger must be working in a hot spring.” –Island of the Forbidden by Hunter Shea



“Jane Moreland couldn’t believe how heavy Henry was, now that he was dead weight and starting to ripen. She should have done this last night, right when it happened, but she’d needed a clearer head. Polishing off the bottle of Knob Creek and passing out on the kitchen table hadn’t helped matters much.” – The Jersey Devil by Hunter Shea


7.
“You can run away, but darkness has quick feet and large wings, and it will follow you…”

—Ronald Malfi, Cradle Lake



“Before we begin, I want your word that much of what I show you tonight stays between us.”

—Ronald Malfi, Floating Staircase


8.
Quote from Darkness Forbidden by J.M. Rankin



He did not know how long he had been standing in the gloom, listening to nothing, seeing nothing, remembering everything.

It did not do him any good to remember, he told himself, for it would not help him. Remembering meant to go back and he did not want to go back – he couldn’t.

His history was marred by grief and terror and he could not afford to remember even one minute of it for the sake of his sanity.

Quote from Retribution Darkened by J.M. Rankin

Death may be the greatest of all human blessings.

That was Socrates’ opinion, anyway. No one ever looks at it that way, of course, apart from just a few of us perhaps


9.
From The Witching House by Brian Moreland

The house that ate people stood within a coven of pine trees like an ancient god being worshipped. The high branches touched its shingled roof with reverence. Towering three stories, the rock house was far from being a flawless god. The moss-covered stones that cobbled its walls were pocked from years of rot and abandon. Fungus and creeper vines had spread across its facade, leafy tentacles invading cracks where boards covered the windows. The glass within their frames had long ago shattered. The Old Blevins House, as it came to be called, was set miles deep within the East Texas forest and rumored to be haunted.



From The Devil’s Woods by Brian Moreland

British Columbia, Canada

Five days after the tragedy, Jon Elkheart returned to the forbidden forest. With a vengeful glare, he challenged the looming wall of aspen, spruce and vine-choked pines that guarded this unsacred land. The only entrance was a trail that disappeared into a black hole inside the jungle-thick brush. The darkness within Macâya Forest was an impenetrable void, a shadow world of shape-shifters, and yet its mysteries beckoned him. There are places in the world where lost spirits never rest, Elkheart thought with a coppery taste in his mouth. And man is considered prey.


10.
Sweetgum Ridge by Quentin Wallace:

It took a few tries, but the Deacon was finally able to pause the tape in the right place. Paul felt everything inside of him turn to ice at what he was seeing. It was some type of mistake, it had to be. An optical illusion caused by faulty videotape, perhaps. But deep inside, he knew it was real. Uncle Saul was no longer lying in the bed. Instead, something else was there. It was huge, much bigger than the bed itself. It was blacker than the darkest pits of hell, and it had great leathery wings that could have sprung from the back of the Morningstar himself. It’s head was horned and it’s feet were hooves. The mouth was nothing but teeth, and the eyes glowed red. So this was the beast that had possessed Uncle Saul.



Brackett Hollister The Werewolf Pack by Quentin Wallace:

Mary heard a loud explosion that echoed throughout the

clearing and the werewolf exploded before her eyes. Dark blood

erupted from the animal in great spurts and the creature had a

look of surprise on its face before it crashed onto the ground

beside Mary. The force of the creature’s leap caused it to roll a

few times on the ground before coming to a stop. Mary blinked

her eyes a few times, uncertain of what she was seeing. There

was now a human man lying where the beast had fallen. He was

naked and his body was dirty and scarred. A large wound gaped

in his side, pumping blood out like a faucet. She closed her eyes

and shook her head as if clearing the cobwebs. She opened her

eyes again but the dead man still lay in the same spot, unchanged.

There had been no gradual transformation. It had been a

werewolf when it was shot, and when it landed it was a man.

“Ma’am? Are you hurt?” She heard a gravelly male voice

call to her from the opposite side of the clearing. She turned and

saw a large man carrying a repeating rifle. The moonlight made it

hard to make out his features but he was very imposing. He had

also just saved her life.



The Game Warden of Black Swamp by Quentin Wallace:

Before the men could say another word a giant spider the

size of a large dog scuttled onto the web and latched onto Archie,

sinking its fangs into his shoulder before he had a chance to

react. The spider appeared to be a type of Black Widow, as it was

jet black with the same body type. However this spider had

bright stripes of various colors running all over its back. Stripes

of bright red, blue, yellow, green, aqua, gray and several other

colors encircled the monster, making it beautiful in a grotesque

way. The men watched frozen as the spider began to weave its

web with its long spindly legs, slowly cocooning Archie up like a

mummy.

“Oh God, it burns! It burns like fire!” Archie screamed as

he fought to get free, his body held in place by the sticky web.

The spider hung onto Archie almost obscenely as it injected him

with venom which no doubt was meant to liquefy his innards and

turn him into a meal.



Tales from the Dark Distance by Quentin Wallace:

Come with me on a journey into the dark distance. What will we find waiting?

A wooden soldier that is much more than the toy it appears to be...

A father who wants nothing more than the forgiveness of his abused son...

The most tragic automobile accident in history...

A trip to Mexico that is anything but a relaxing vacation...

A less-than-professional private detective with a practice based in the realm of fantasy...

A tower with a valuable jewel that turns out to be not what's expected...

A vampire who finds faith can come in many forms...

An interplanetary outpost haunted by a rogue alien...

A serial killing shaman who takes refuge in the most dangerous swamp on the planet, with a gunslinging bounty hunter in hot pursuit...