The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies by John Langan

Jul 23, 2013 T.E. Grau rated it it was amazing

Every insular creative scene has its personalities, its movers, its stars. It's like the cover of Tiger Beat magazine. Or a boy band... covered by Tiger Beat magazine. These personalities have labels: The Shy One. The Flirt. The Bad Boy. The Heartthrob.

As mainstream publishing occasionally—and grudgingly—accepts while also further insulates indie press Weird fiction (not an easy bit of cultural gymnastics), a brighter light is being shed on the personalities in this scene, as well. The boy (and ...more

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Oct 20, 2018 Gabrielle rated it it was amazing

Shelves: weird, fantasy, horror, spooktober-books, short-stories, own-a-copy, read-in-2018, reviewed, goodreads-made-me-do-it, cover-art

October spooky read #7!

This collection of short stories was brought to my attention by a fellow Laird Barron fan: I can’t get enough of that dark, existential, creeping dread, so I am always happy to discover new authors who have some cosmic horror stories to tell me. And with its amazing title and cover art, this book basically sold itself anyway.

I am not always fond of the short story format, because it often fees rushed and compressed, but these are perfectly developed, balanced and October spooky read #7!

This collection of short stories was brought to my attention by a fellow Laird Barron fan: I can’t get enough of that dark, existential, creeping dread, so I am always happy to discover new authors who have some cosmic horror stories to tell me. And with its amazing title and cover art, this book basically sold itself anyway.

I am not always fond of the short story format, because it often fees rushed and compressed, but these are perfectly developed, balanced and satisfying. Now "short stories" is not quite right, as Langan stretches those over sometimes more than fifty pages: he takes his time, fleshes out all the details and concludes them with a masterful flourish. I don't use the word "masterful" very often, but this guy knows how to write one Hell of an effective story: I would often come to the end of a chapter slightly stunned by how carefully constructed what I had just read was, and how I had fallen for the juicy bait Langan had laid out for me without realizing what he was doing, up until the last line. I actually googled Prosper Vauglais only to find myself saying "Well played, Mr. Langan, very well played".

So just for the fact that this man weaves a mesmerizing web for a reader to get stuck in, this book is well worth the detour. But his choice of subject matters, and the way he deconstructs them and puts them in unusual settings (vampires vs. vets with PTSD or community theater about zombie invasions) gives old horror staples a really fresh twist that pays homage to the original material, while making it new and exciting again. I'd pick a few stand out stories, but honestly, all of them have a little something that makes them memorable, so my advice is to just read the whole collection.

I devoured this book while I should have been working and doing other productive things: when I stumble upon elegant writing and technically brilliant story telling, the rest of the world has a tendency to become less important... I will be looking to get my hands on more books by this man, as this was quite an excellent collection of weird and creepy stuff! 4 and a half stars, rounded up. ...more

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Apr 28, 2013 Justin Steele rated it it was amazing

John Langan's name has been in numerous "year's best" horror anthologies, and for good reason. The man can write, and the more he writes the better he gets. Langan's previous collection, Mr. Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters, was an astounding set of stories. I've yet to read his novel, House of Windows, although I've heard nothing but good things about it.

The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies has much to offer horror fans of all kinds. Langan enjoys playing with familiar John Langan's name has been in numerous "year's best" horror anthologies, and for good reason. The man can write, and the more he writes the better he gets. Langan's previous collection, Mr. Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters, was an astounding set of stories. I've yet to read his novel, House of Windows, although I've heard nothing but good things about it.

The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies has much to offer horror fans of all kinds. Langan enjoys playing with familiar horror tropes, but in a totally unfamiliar way. He is a stylist, and his stories are all fresh and unique.

The collections open with a vignette, Kids, a story from the collection Jack Haringa Must Die! For unfamiliar readers, Jack Haringa is a member of the Board of Advisers for the Shirley Jackson Awards. The collection featured almost thirty short pieces of flash fiction in which Jack Haringa met his untimely doom. Langan's contribution is a short take featuring child zombies. It's really short, and fun, but the weakest of all the stories.

How the Day Runs Down serves as a prime example of Langan's stylistic storytelling. This zombie tale reads like a play, and features a stage manager in a mysterious theater talking about the zombie outbreak. The manager's monologues are broken by appearances of other characters, who tell their own personal stories. This story has a good amount of humor, although at times it tugs at the emotions.

I first read Technicolor in one of Ellen Datlow's Best Horror of the Year anthologies, although it first appeared in her Poe anthology. This story is a brilliant look at one of Poe's famous tales, The Masque of the Red Death. The narrative once again stands out, as the entire story is told in the voice of a professor as he examines Poe's story and the meaning behind it.

The title story, The Wide, Carnivorous Sky, is one of the best vampire tales I've ever read and serves as a perfect example of the way Langan plays with familiar horror tropes. Vampires are typically nocturnal creatures, who spend the daytime sleeping in underground coffins. But Langan's "vampire" instead spends it's days hunting for prey and it's nights resting in a floating "coffin". In the story notes Langan said that as opposed to having his horror in a smaller, claustrophobic setting he wanted to instead embrace the open, and it doing so creates a true "bird (bat) of prey". Add to the mix some army veterans dealing with PTSD and the result is a truly brilliant story.

City of the Dog is another story I first read in one of Datlow's best-of anthologies, and another favorite of mine. Drawing from his own personal experiences, Langan takes readers to an early 90's Albany. The narrator is stuck in a most awkward living situation, with a relationship that is falling apart. Things only get worse when the things living under the city get involved. A great story, fans of Lovecraft's ghouls will have a good time with this one.

The Shallows first appeared in the anthology Cthulhu's Reign. This book's concept was that all the stories would take place AFTER the stars were right and Cthulhu and the old ones rise. Lovecraftians will know what I'm talking about. The Shallows is a stand out story in that anthology. Langan's approach wasn't as grandiose as some of the others in the book, as he decided to take a look at a rather mundane day in the life of a simple, middle-aged man. The man goes about his daily activities, talking to a crab creature that follows him around like a pet. The bizarre has become commonplace for this fellow, although it's creepy enough for readers. The story's true strength lies in the relationship of the father and his son, and is just as much about what it's like for a father when his son becomes independent. Another excellent story.

Langan's approach to the werewolf in The Revel also succeeds as an attempt to break down horror film. Another stylistic approach, the story reads as meta-fiction, and even breaks the fourth wall. One would think it would be difficult to write a piece of fiction that manages to foster terror in the reader while reading like a detached film study, but Langan more than succeeds. Another story I have to mark as a favorite.

June, 1987. Hitchhiking. Mr. Norris. is a short story much in the same spirit as the earlier kids. This time the target is horror author Laird Barron, who was subject to a literary "roast" when several authors of the weird posted stories from "The Secret Life of Laird Barron" to their blogs. While several of the stories were strictly humorous, Langan's manages to be quite dark as well. The story's plot deals with the danger of hitchhiking, while evoking darker, more ancient horrors.

The collection ends with an original story, which is also my overall favorite, the novella Mother of Stone. The story is penned in the risky second-person, a style of narrative which is hard to make work. This time, however, it does work, creating a slight distance that correlates with the protagonists general detachment. The story itself is a series of interviews conducted with several people in a small town pertaining to a mysterious statue unearthed and put on a display at a local Inn, and the bizarre and fatal incidents that followed. The story has some frightening imagery, and so perfectly evokes dread in the reader. I found myself thoroughly creeped out and disturbed, and I mean that as a compliment.

Langan's second collection is, as a whole, astounding. The variety of subject matter paired with his varied stylistic approaches makes for a horror collection that satisfies on many levels. An excellent collection, I highly recommend it to any fan of horror.

Originally appeared on my blog, The Arkham Digest. ...more

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May 25, 2013 Orrin Grey rated it it was amazing

Some books get booted to the front of the to-read list as soon as I get my hands on them. This was such a book. John Langan is one of my favorite living writers. There are people whose writing I love, and people who write about things that I love, in ways that I love. Then there are people who combine all of that. John's one of that latter group.

His first collection and his novel were both pretty great, but it's in the stories that comprise The Wide Carnivorous Sky & Other Monsterous ...more

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May 23, 2013 Sirensongs rated it really liked it

Shelves: hippocampus-press

John Langan is an amazing writer. Ever since reading the story "Technicolor" a few years ago, I've been excited whenever I see his name in the table of contents of an anthology. I was overjoyed to get the chance to read the story again in this collection. It still had the same mesmerizing effect on me, very fitting considering the subject matter of the story. I'm always worried about re-reading a piece of literature I remember adoring, thinking that maybe I'll be disappointed the second time John Langan is an amazing writer. Ever since reading the story "Technicolor" a few years ago, I've been excited whenever I see his name in the table of contents of an anthology. I was overjoyed to get the chance to read the story again in this collection. It still had the same mesmerizing effect on me, very fitting considering the subject matter of the story. I'm always worried about re-reading a piece of literature I remember adoring, thinking that maybe I'll be disappointed the second time around, whether because I have changed in some way, or my mood isn't right, or the story really isn't as good as I thought it was. Luckily, that was not the case with "Technicolor". It was still just as brilliant as I remembered it. As was "City of the Dog". What I love about John Langan is that he makes the irreal REAL and believable. When I read his work, it's too easy to suspend my disbelief, and expect that around every corner something dark and dangerous lies, waiting to get me. It's too easy to get into his character's heads and believe that you are experiencing just what they are. And what they are experiencing is usually nothing short of terrifying, and often completely awe inspiring. He takes familiar horror tropes, and makes them his own as well as universal. Paradoxical? Perhaps, but nothing gives me as much of a pleasurable frisson as a little bit of paradox in what I am reading.

As compelling as I found "Technicolor" and "City of the Dog", not to mention "The Revel", the real standout story in this collection for me was "Mother of Stone". My goodness, that story will haunt me forever, I think! I read and watch an abundance of horror, so I've gotten pretty de-sensitized over the years. It takes a lot to scare me. But "Mother of Stone" downright terrified me. It was jawdroppingly good. I was lying in bed, trying to finish it last night, and I had to put it aside because I kept thinking I saw a headless figure in white from the corner of my eye. On my way to work this morning, as I was continuing to read it on the bus, I had to actually stop and compose myself, as certain scenes made me weak and nauseous. I finally managed to finish the story, and was completely blown away by it's ingenious mixture of urban legend, academia, mythology, religion, and it's fascinating take on the exorcism. Again, I felt that the events in this story could have actually taken place, as outlandish as they were. And I loved his story notes! I wish more writers would include story notes in their collections. I really get so much out of knowing the background of a story, and the circumstances in which it was written. And Mr. Langan structured his notes so that enough information was given without taking away any of the mystery. Just perfect.

So why, after all this raving about how good these stories were, and how brilliant John Langan is as a writer, did I only rate this collection a four? The answer is quite simple. No matter how well written, I just can't stand zombie stories, and this collection included two. I read them, saw their relative merits, can concede that they were well written, and in the case of "How the Day Runs Down" were even quite original as far as zombie stories go, but I still couldn't get it out of my head just how tired I am of zombies. Hence the four. But of course, this unfortunate dalliance with zombies will in no way deter me from eagerly continuing to seek out the writings of the superb John Langan. ...more

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Oct 17, 2019 ☽¸¸.I am¸¸.•*¨ The ¸¸.•*¨*Phoenix¨*•♫♪ ☾ rated it liked it

Shelves: audiobooks

I found this collection of stories, both short and average length, very different and interesting; the reason being that the author chose to deliver traditional horror tropes in a very original, multimedia kind of way. Some of them felt like reading a script for an old pulp movie, some like a first-person interactive novel, some like a fantasy or a dream. Techniques like the use of the second person or certain stylistic choices, made to involve the reader on a deeper level, worked very well for ...more

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Nov 18, 2013 Adam Nevill rated it it was amazing

I spent two weeks reading John Langan's two short story collections - MR GAUNT AND OTHER UNEASY ENCOUNTERS & THE WIDE CARNIVOROUS SKY AND OTHER MONSTROUS GEOGRAPHIES - and they made the last hour of the day something to really look forward to. Always inventive and intelligent and both collections were a constant reminder of what can be done with a horror story. 'Technicolour', 'The Wide Carnivorous Sky' and 'June, 1987. Hitchhiking. Mr Norris' were my personal faves amongst the shorts, but ...more

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May 09, 2014 Sam rated it it was amazing

I loved this book. Lots of lengthy, meaty stories with exquisite sentences and paragraphs that stopped me in my tracks.

I had only read one story before ("The Shallows" in Ross Lockhart's BOOK OF CTHULHU) and while happy to read it again, it was a couple of other stories that really knocked my on my ass. "Technicolor" is an ingenious riff on/response to Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death," and originally appeared in Ellen Datlow's anthology of Poe-inspired stories. The final story is original to ...more

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Jul 13, 2013 C.M. Muller rated it it was amazing

These days I normally shy away from metafictional and overly stylistic works (granted, there was a time during college when that’s pretty much all I adored), but I must say that in the hands of John Langan the form has found a proponent of epic proportions. Langan co-edited an anthology a few years back entitled “Creatures”, and herein you will find a good many staples of monsterdom: zombies, vampires, werewolves. But Langan is not interested in rehashing familiar tropes; he seems to thrill at ...more

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Jan 02, 2014 Heidi Ward rated it it was amazing

Shelves: kindle, dark-fiction, 21st-century, reviewed, own, horror, short-stories, weird-fiction, great-covers, cosmic-horror

This book opens with one of the coolest stories I've read in awhile: the short, brutal, and kind of hilarious "Kids." Within just a few paragraphs, Langan had me both howling with uneasy laughter and wondering if he was plundering my mind for its deepest fears, and that's very much the way to my heart. (Other than through my chest, natch.)

The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies has been on my TBR list ever since it came out last spring. I can only say I wish I'd gotten to it ...more

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Nov 05, 2016 Ben Loory rated it it was amazing

really just loved this book so much. sank into it like a million dollar couch. great voice, just so masterful and certain, so sure. will read everything this guy writes forever.

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Aug 22, 2019 Michael Sorbello rated it it was ok

Every story in this book feels like an experiment, defying all of the expected rules and structures revolving around prose and narrative direction. I really appreciated the uniqueness and creativity of this approach, but I honestly can’t say that I actually enjoyed it all that much. It was all a bit too jarring.

Every story felt like it was lacking soul. I felt detached from the characters, the plot, the settings and the conclusion to each tale felt empty and unsatisfying. The ideas are there ...more

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Oct 20, 2013 M Griffin rated it it was amazing

I certainly knew Langan’s work before this, from many anthologies and “year’s best” lists, but this new collection demonstrates Langan deserves to be considered at the highest level of modern horror writers. “Technicolor” is the narrative of a teacher telling his class about Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death,” both clever and gripping. The collection ends with a new novella “Mother of Stone,” less experimental than some of Langan’s ‘other work here (though it’s told in second person ...more

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Sep 04, 2013 Seregil of Rhiminee rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

Originally published at Risingshadow.

Before I begin to analyze the contents of The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies, I'll mention that a lot has already been written about it and several critics and readers have praised it. That's why writing a review about this collection is a bit difficult, but I'll try to think of something new to say.

John Langan is an author who probably needs no introduction to horror readers. Just in case somebody doesn't know him, I can say that he's ...more

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Feb 15, 2015 Andy rated it really liked it

I often liked these stories, not always for the horror because the storytelling alone is very impressive. Langan was at his best when he was building characters, which isn't always my favorite part of writing, but I love it here. In stories like "The Shallows" and "City of the Dog" I liked the characterization most, but in a story like "Technicolor" he hits exactly the right balance between characterization and creating horror that's quite original.

I do have to say this collection is a bit I often liked these stories, not always for the horror because the storytelling alone is very impressive. Langan was at his best when he was building characters, which isn't always my favorite part of writing, but I love it here. In stories like "The Shallows" and "City of the Dog" I liked the characterization most, but in a story like "Technicolor" he hits exactly the right balance between characterization and creating horror that's quite original.

I do have to say this collection is a bit uneven in a few places. I read this alongside Simon Strantzas "Burnt Black Suns" and can't help comparing the two. There really wasn't a disappointment in Strantzas collection, it was very consistent, but here a couple stories didn't really hit the mark for me. I could appreciate what he was trying to do, and this collection still gets four stars because the great stories were really great. Also the stories were told from interesting perspectives, one in the form of a professor's lecture, another in the form of a play. The final novella is effective because it leaves us wondering -- but not too much. It's not like some weird fiction (i.e. Laird Barron's "Jaws of Saturn" comes to mind) where at the end I put my palms up and ask, "WTF?!" Also where Strantzas stayed in more traditional weird fiction territory, playing on themes of Lovecraft, Ligotti and Chambers, Langan has stories about more traditional horror themes, like werewolves, vampires, although he makes them his own.

Kids - A very brief story, well-told for what it is. A teacher is surprised when a dirty group of children enter his classroom -- and even more so when they start to bite.

How the Day Runs Down - This is a really cool zombie story told in the form of a play, very effective. Zombies aren't my thing at all, but this is about as good a zombie story as I've ever read. In a theater a man tells us how various people of a small town have dealt with their world being overrun by zombies.

Technicolor - Wonderful story, very philosophical, science-fiction feel to it, but most of all it's very creative historical horror fiction. It takes a lot of rather strange tangents to get where it's going, but draws them all together even though it can get a bit "outre" at times. A professor talking about the "The Masque of the Red Death" believes that Poe took his inspiration for the story from a man who transcended death and came up with a way to summon things from beyond using a series of colored images.

The Wide, Carnivorous Sky - Grim, violent, bloody, gory, very effective in it's slow-burn build up. It's a sort of adventure story as much as it's horror -- here we find a horror of Lovecraftian proportions, yet the characters confront it. A group of four Iraq war vets are scarred by their experience, not with the war, but with a flying horror which landed in the midst of a battle and started ravenously eating soldiers. They use a psychic connection they have formed with it to try and destroy it.

City of the Dog - Really great story here, Langan's variation on the Pickman/ghoul story. What impressed me here was more Langan's great writing style, the characters are truly interesting, real, the horror was a bit of a secondary concern to me at least. A man inspects a strange dog which appears to be wounded, while his back is turned, his girlfriend disappears. When he tells his roommate about the dog, and the strange man he encountered in a nightclub afterward he fears she was taken away by an underground clan of ghouls.

The Shallows - I liked this one although it was certainly one of the more bizarre entries here. A few details here and there were pretty creepy, but it's the emotional and humorous moments that were most memorable. I could see where the overly weird nature of this story and how it's told could turn some off because it can come off as a lot of random horror tidbits thrown together. After the coming of Cthulhu a man talks to his pet crab about his family as he goes about his daily rituals and tends to his garden. Meanwhile the world has changed immensely with visions of horror which appear in the air, plants transformed into horrific things, but he takes strength from his memories of family life.

The Revel - This story honestly pissed me off, I didn't like the beginning, then I got into it, the middle was great, but the ending...geez. The final "images" Langan tried to use were just hopelessly convoluted in their description, and once I finally understood what Langan was trying to do, it just didn't jive with the story as a whole and was an ineffective way to finish it. The familiar tropes of the werewolf story are trotted out and explored in a self-aware fashion as a werewolf attacks the inhabitants of a small town.

June, 1987. Hitchhiking. Mr. Norris. - Good story, brief, some interesting ideas, but just not developed into anything bigger. A hitchhiker is knocked out by the man he gets a ride with, who plans to use use his blood in a ritual.

Mother of Stone - This is a novella one wonders if it could have been a novel. I love this type of story, it reminded me a little of Ramsey Campbell's novel "Ancient Images" where, almost like a detective story, a person is traveling the countryside and trying to uncover something supernatural, following leads, getting hints and whispers from here and there. There's some questions left unanswered, however this is done effectively -- the story still makes sense and we are left with just enough vagueness to make us wonder. A woman investigates an urban legend about a headless statue of a pregnant woman who was found buried in the yard of a New England Inn, and the series of deaths and tragedies connected with it.
...more

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Aug 16, 2015 Charles Dee Mitchell rated it really liked it

Shelves: horror, weird-new-weird

I recommend starting Langan’s collection on page fifty-five. “Kids”, the opening story, is Langan’s amuse bouche: freshly zombified preteens eat their teacher in four pages. When a character bold-faced as STAGE MANAGER opens “How the Day Runs Down,” we are clearly in the world of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, only Grover’s Corners, and the rest of the world, has been taken over by zombies. Langan can excel with this sort of literary allusion and game-playing, but the long scenes that follow have I recommend starting Langan’s collection on page fifty-five. “Kids”, the opening story, is Langan’s amuse bouche: freshly zombified preteens eat their teacher in four pages. When a character bold-faced as STAGE MANAGER opens “How the Day Runs Down,” we are clearly in the world of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, only Grover’s Corners, and the rest of the world, has been taken over by zombies. Langan can excel with this sort of literary allusion and game-playing, but the long scenes that follow have none of the impressionistic grace of Wilder’s tale of small town life. Langan writes long stories, but this is the only one I have ever bailed on.

But on page fifty-five, things pick up, and Langan’s talent for horrific invention never flags again. He touches on most major horror tropes and plays them out with wit, strong characters, and a genuine relish for the scary bits. Some highlights:

In “Technicolor” an eager undergraduates in an American Lit class receive their professor’s close reading of Edgar Alan Poe’s “Masque of the Red Death.” It’s a lecture, with multi-media, that they will never forget and probably not survive.

The title story involves four veterans of the Iraq war who regroup to destroy the vampiric creature they encountered at Fullujah. Yes, it sounds like a movie on the Chiller Channel, but this is Langan showing that when called upon he can turn out a old-fashioned supernatural adventure story. (Scratch “supernatural,” but it’s too complicated to go into.)

Langan opens “Revel” with a chase through the woods because that’s the way these new-fangled werewolf movies start. Characters are introduced as just that, characters you would find in a werewolf movie. It’s all good, bloody fun until it gets weird.

I have never sought out books that extend the Lovecraftian mythos, but the one thing I have always wondered is just what is really supposed to happen once Chthulu and his unspeakably horrible buddies return. I know it’s bad news for humans, but what are the details? “The Shallows” takes place during this prolonged transformation from our world to theirs. We follow a man named Ransom, the last human in his neighborhood, as he goes about his daily routine. His only friend is crab he calls Gus.

I said I was going to mention the highlights, but I see I’ve written about almost every story in the book. Like I said, these tend to be long stories. Langan ranks high among the new horror writers I’ve read. His storytelling is excellent, his prose is literate, and his acknowledgement of the horror tradition is sophisticated and inventive. More like him, please.
...more

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May 31, 2014 Ctgt rated it really liked it

Shelves: weird

This collection started slowly for me, the first story did nothing and the second was a zombie tale which isn't on my personal favorite list. Langan did make it interesting by using the voice of the Stage Manager from Our Town. Then we start to pick up speed.

The title story is a very cool take on the vampire legend where the beast makes his presence known to soldiers in the middle of battle on the streets of Fallujah.

City of the Dog is a very good lycan story There was something about the way ...more

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Oct 16, 2014 Lauren rated it it was amazing

Shelves: short-stories, horror

I've been reading Langan in anthologies for some time now and have always counted seeing his name in the table of contents as a positive sign, so I was thrilled when my sister gave me this collection for All Hallow's Read. Taken together, the stories in The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies are unsurprisingly terrific, with muscular prose, high literary brio, stylistic experimentation, and strong evocation of dread. Langan likes to pick--or sometimes borrow--old monsters and I've been reading Langan in anthologies for some time now and have always counted seeing his name in the table of contents as a positive sign, so I was thrilled when my sister gave me this collection for All Hallow's Read. Taken together, the stories in The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies are unsurprisingly terrific, with muscular prose, high literary brio, stylistic experimentation, and strong evocation of dread. Langan likes to pick--or sometimes borrow--old monsters and concerns and reinvigorate them, which isn't unusual in horror, but the turn of his narrative playfulness (the deconstructed film of "The Revel," the play in "How the Day Runs Down," and the lecture in "Technicolor, in particular) is, and he's also excellent at playing it straight and evoking his sense of horror from old-fashioned good craftsmanship. He's at some suitably uncanny and amazing intersection with Stephen King, Laird Barron, and Mark Z. Danielewski.

"How the Day Runs Down" is that one of the rare zombie stories to achieve both evocative grue and pathos, and even a sense of quiet finality far beyond most apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction. Even if you're not the kind of person who would read something instantly at finding out that it's Our Town with zombies (and I am, obviously), you'll like this, because like I said above, Langan isn't just great at putting stories at interesting postmodern angles, he's also great at creating characters you care about and putting them in situations going horribly but interestingly wrong. It strikes me as thematically linked to the later "The Shallows," which is also about grief in the face of a slow apocalypse, and which is telling a personal story of loss which is inseparable from its Lovecraftian background.

"Technicolor" is told entirely as an increasingly strange lecture on Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death," and it's impossible to discuss properly without spoilers, except to note that it plays fair all the way through and that the slowly dawning sense of horror is amazingly well-done. Its companion is "The Revel," a werewolf story told as the dissection of a film about a werewolf, which is appropriately head-trippy and astonishing.

"The Wide, Carnivorous Sky" is a revitalized vampire story. You have to note that Langan is confident enough to present a zombie story and a vampire story in the same book, since both are generally considered so well-worn they're threadbare. And he should be confident: "Sky" is possibly even stronger than "How the Day Runs Down." It puts its twist on vampires not from its style but from its freshness--not just the vampire's new hunting ground of wide open spaces, but its science fictional cosmic power, the struggle of dealing with it on logical terms, and its link to carnage and death across the globe. And there are more great characters. Langan has a gift for writing stories with all the depth and impact of novels in a condensed, streamlined form, and this is maybe the best example of that.

The last set of twinned stories for me are "Kids" and "June, 1987. Hitchhiking. Mr. Norris," which were written as tribute to Jack Haringa and Laird Barron, respectively. My only note of non-praise for the collection is that "Kids," out of its original context, lacks Langan's strengths, and while it could be an interesting turn elsewhere in the collection, it's not a good way to open it, and I'd encourage people reading Langan for the first time with this book to skip it at least until they'd read "How the Day Runs Down." "Hitchhiking" is better, a great tribute to Barron, both tongue-in-cheek and genuinely unsettling. (Although Langan's best tribute to Barron can be found in The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron.)

Finally, "Mother of Stone," original to this collection, blew me away. I have a soft spot for academic horror, so this story of a struggling and detached professor researching a set of urban legends about the exorcism of a strange statue was intriguing to me from the start, but it kept getting better throughout. More great, subtle characterization here, and a deft evocation of cosmic forces. (And Langan's notes about it only make it more haunting.)

A necessary collection for horror short fiction readers, a great way to bridge any perceived gap between storytelling and postmodernism, and, for writers, an excellent reminder of the extent to which the forms and rules of fiction are up for grabs. I'm glad I've got Mr. Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters on the shelf as well.

...more

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Oct 05, 2013 C. Varn rated it it was amazing

John Langan’s collection, The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies, is a broader abyss than Ogawa’s Revenge (as the title suggest). Langan’s prose shifts and deliberately incorporates modernist twists and variations that do not allow one kind of voice to sink in. Langan does have a formula: take on a literary trope, be it some modernist style meta-fictive, overlaying of different genres, etc., and then add in a genre limitation such as the vampire story or the werewolf story or John Langan’s collection, The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies, is a broader abyss than Ogawa’s Revenge (as the title suggest). Langan’s prose shifts and deliberately incorporates modernist twists and variations that do not allow one kind of voice to sink in. Langan does have a formula: take on a literary trope, be it some modernist style meta-fictive, overlaying of different genres, etc., and then add in a genre limitation such as the vampire story or the werewolf story or the Lovecraft mythos tale. At first this sounds like a trite approach or an attempt at pastiche, but a considerate reading of his work reveals that it is not. Meta-fictive elements are used throughout the story although they are more in line with Langan’s set of limitations.

The first story, however, seems weak, and slightly knocked me back. It seems to be a more typical tonal horror piece involving at professor. Langan is a professor, and such a figure sits in more than one story. This, however, is a false lull. The next novella is “How the Day Runs Down” which is a zombie apocalypse story narrated as if it were Our Town. The existential dread of Thornton Wilder is often lost in the million trite performances, but it is encapsulated and expanded upon in a way that would be impulse in an episode of The Walking Dead. The core issue is even Our Town’s bleak afterlife is affected by the apocalypse so not even true death comes as an escape.

The next story “Technicolor” builds on the Masque of the Red Death, with a professor playing the role of main character. Indeed, the story starts as a lecture on the symbolism of Poe but takes a far grimmer turn. The intersection of real history, Poe’s biography, and fictive occultism is breath-taking. The laying of the history and myths of Prosper Vauglais, Poe’s Prince Prospero, the myth of Proserpina, and Poe’s wife alone is impressive. There are two stories inspired by Lovecraft, but one particularly sticks with me: “The Swallows.” This story pits the truly other-worldly with a narration of the end of a domestic disturbance. The linking between the completely human and the utterly alien leaving one with chills.

The meta-fictive, “The Revel,” and last novella, “Mother of Stone” both involve successful uses of the second person narration. “The Revel” being the more avant garde of the two, and depending on the formatting and ellipses created from screen writing conventions, but also being one of the only werewolf stories that ever chilled me: the overlaying of commentary on werewolf filmic genre as well as the psychology of the bestial. “Mother of Stone” picks up on the otherwise problematic theories of Marija Gimbutas, but develops through a female folklore professor’s exploration of something truly horrifying. There are also a few filmic cliches employed by Langan here, but they are used to undermine themselves and leave the reader lost.

The title story, found in the center of the book, is written in a style that reads a by like almost journalistic realism about war, and an vampire that inverts almost every stereotype or rule of the genre. It is the least meta-fictive of the story and is ridden in a more hardbitten style. Its straightforward narrative breaks the mold of the better stories in the collection, but the helplessness and humanness contrasted with the utterly outside and alien keeps the more developed theme of the book together. ...more

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Feb 21, 2015 Aksel Dadswell rated it really liked it

Reading Langan’s stories is like settling into an old comfortable armchair, and then realising that it only seemed like an armchair, only looked and felt like one. In fact, you realise, as the limbs of the thing that isn’t an armchair unfold to embrace you with a delicacy that belies the pants-soiling danger of your situation, you’re not in your comfort zone at all, and you can’t predict what’s going to happen next. You just know that you won’t get out of here, and whatever you experience will ...more

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Aug 11, 2013 Paul Roberts rated it it was amazing

Laird Barron’s arm wrestling partner is the master of reinventing overused horror tropes (zombies, werewolves and vampires). Langan’s tale, “The Revel” is IMHO the greatest werewolf story put to print. John is simply the most entertaining horror writer working today. One of my reading highlights of 2013, was to re-read Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death”, down a glass of Jameson and consume “Technicolor” in all its insidious glory. Langan is a true heavyweight. I ran out and bought his previous ...more

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May 25, 2018 Oftenevil rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Langan is absurdly talented and has more cards up his sleeve than you can begin to imagine. However, I do you a disservice to stop there with my praise of “Wide Carnivorous Sky,” because it’s not just that literary horror & a professor with his black belt in a few things including but not limited to writing the weird parts of fiction that don’t just scare you - they straight up shatter your innermost core, (he’s literally all of those things but here I conflated them into one amalgamation - Langan is absurdly talented and has more cards up his sleeve than you can begin to imagine. However, I do you a disservice to stop there with my praise of “Wide Carnivorous Sky,” because it’s not just that literary horror & a professor with his black belt in a few things including but not limited to writing the weird parts of fiction that don’t just scare you - they straight up shatter your innermost core, (he’s literally all of those things but here I conflated them into one amalgamation - no, I’m not joking, go look it up).

It would also be a fact to mention that with Langan’s stories, he doesn’t try to get “under your skin,” but rather his universe unfolds effortlessly in your imagination, gracefully & slyly crafting characters of two distinct archetypes: humans and monsters-that-used-to-be-human. This doesn’t mean the latter is referring to zombies, though he does offer some of the best post-apocalyptic tales in a world festering from the undead that may or may not be (thinly) disguised as a deconstruction or the stage play, “Our Town.” Some authors can & do “get under your skin” with their tales by more conventional approaches stylistically - and they are ones you usually see coming a country mile away. But that’s not the case here, and Langan’s tales don’t stop at “under your skin,” because they’re too potent to be satisfied with just getting under your figurative flesh. No, they advance into something more sinister and unplaceable, as if your entire being is forever changed; just like anything Laird Barron writes, John Langan’s work is so meticulous and calculated - the two authors are actually great friends in real life apparently - that you have waves of aftershock effects once done with a story/collection of stories, and such sensations are the intentionally disorienting, forcing you to recalibrate your grip on reality as Langan rattles your mind up like a snow globe before tossing it into an endless void.

Am I getting way too into these figures of speech? I’ll tone it down and get technical. I cannot get technicolor, though John Langan could, (and does here in this collection), for whatever that’s worth to you :)

There is an introduction inked by Jeffrey Ford in this collection, and unlike generic introductions by a fellow genre author of undeniably great talent in their own, Ford actually caught me off guard with how concisely and accurately he could explain the reasons these stories - and Langan’s writing as a whole - are so consistently great and horrifying - while always including moments of idiosyncratic style that say, “Written by John Langan,” (even though it quickly becomes obvious that no one else’s work could ever be mistaken for his). He’s verbose, (like me), but the reading experience is so frictionless and told with such unique conviction, (unlike me), that you never want his short stories to end. The last bit to mention that Ford discusses in his introduction to this volume is the way in which Langan masterfully manipulates Time and Gravity throughout the pacing of his stories - and the balance he sustains via tight rope walk is gorgeous from a purely literary perspective. We notice years go by in some cases, where long passages of time begin to wear down characters - until they’re prime candidates for obliteration either physically or mentally - and then without any kind of warning or signal, the long & effective descriptions of the events/characters remains as efficient as before though the pacing leaps into hyper speed - which all works to amplify the terror and magnify our involvement with the characters when they are at their most vulnerable, while also being in the crosshairs of each story’s specific antagonistic force of Other-ness.

To put it as simply as I can: John Langan is the closest thing you’ll find to the literary-horror-author-version of Stanley Kubrick. (I’m couldn’t be more serious about this, as you may think I’m speaking in hyperbole. That’s your loss, really. If you aren’t checking out Langan’s work, you are not worthy of it :P) ...more

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Oct 12, 2014 Gavin rated it really liked it

Shelves: horror, short-stories

The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies is (another) excellent collection of short horror stories written by someone of whom you have never heard. And compared to any "collection of best new horror 20xx" it's a very strong anthology indeed.

Langans interest seems to be in how the story is told, rather than what the story concerns. Which is pretty sensible; horror is horror, you'll always get a zombie one, a vampire one, a Cthulhu/cosmic one, a Poestiche and etc but what sets ...more

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Aug 31, 2017 Scott rated it it was ok

Shelves: short-stories, horror

Apparently John Langan is not an author for me. A few years back I read his novel House of Windows and was bored to tears, but when I came across the fabulous "Technicolor" in a Year's Best collection, I thought that maybe he was a better short story writer than novelist. (Many authors are.) I was wrong. Most of the stories here are in the same tiresome, rambling style that made his novel such a chore. They don't even have any payoff at the end that makes you feel that it was kind of worth ...more

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Jan 10, 2015 Claire rated it it was amazing

Shelves: read-em-and-loved-em

I read this book today, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. It makes an excellent complement to Gaiman and Aickman, particularly as the near apotheosis of the "strange story" one occasionally finds in some literary corner and quietly adds to one's personal library of puzzlements.

Others have detailed the contents, but for me the standouts were "City of the Dog" and his zombies-filtered-through-Thorton-Wilder tale, "How the Day Runs Down." Also great are "Technicolor" and, of course, the ...more

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Sep 25, 2017 Fredösphere rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: weird-gothic-numinous

I give this 5 stars on the strength of the best stories and my general John Langan fandom.

"Technicolor" is a fascinating faux-lecture on Poe's "Masque of the Red Death," so convincing that I assumed its fictional history was true (and I'm apparently not the only one). "How the Day Runs Down" is an utterly unique story told as a spoof on Wilder's "Our Town", but it's far from a joke. I didn't care so much for the too-long novella at the end, "Mother of Stone", which resorts to telling too much ...more

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Sep 02, 2016 Randy rated it it was amazing

After reading John Langan's novel THE FISHERMAN, I knew I had to read more of his work. So I literally mouth-wateringly devoured this collection of his shorter works. Not since I first read T.E.D Klein back when he was still in print have I been so affected by horror fiction. Truth is, Langan is even better, deeper, scarier--and scary in a way that makes you almost believe this stuff could really be true. This is horror fiction at its best, both literary and visceral. A dark joy to read.

I ...more

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May 15, 2014 Caroline rated it really liked it

This was an engaging, challenging read. I think the only disappointment I had was that many of the very best stories had already appeared in other anthologies... which only pays testament to the originality and quality of John Langan's writing. In fact, the book had a rather wide gamut of weird fiction - everything from a new take on the somewhat tired vampire trope to a really strange and beautiful ode to Poe.

Stories that I really enjoyed, in no particular order: City of the Dog, Technicolor, ...more

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Jul 31, 2014 Karl marked it as to-read

Shelves: 2014-07-books-bought

This edition is signed by Langan with a small drawing by him on the title page.

9 - Introduction - Jeffrey Ford
13 - Kids
17 - How The Day Runs Down
55 - Technicolor
85 - The Wide Carnivorous Sky
137 - City Of The Dog
173 - The Shallows
195 - The Revel
225 - June 1987, Hitchhiking. Mr. Noris
231 - Mother Of Stone
301 - Story Notes
315 - Afterword By Laird Barron
321 - Acknowledgements

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May 29, 2014 Mel rated it it was ok

Shelves: horror, read-in-2014, monsters, ghosts

I enjoyed the first story in this called Kids and the last story called Mother of Stone. The rest were kind of meh for me. The writing was good; but the style was just not my cup of tea.

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