Black Candies - See Through

Black Candies

by Ryan Craig Bradford (Editor), Jay Wertzler (Editor), Jim Ruland

Available for purchase at Big Cartel.

Black Candies is a place where “genre” is not a dirty word. It’s a place where respectable and serious writers can indulge their darkest and weirdest tendencies. It’s a platform for authors to create serious, intelligent terror.

For this issue, 17 writers offer their own disturbing interpretations of the the theme "See Through." With more than half of the stories written by women, Black Candies aims to correct the trajectory of the male-dominated literary journals, as well as provide a home for notoriously underrepresented women horror writers.

Genres: Short Stories, Horror

141 pages, Paperback

First published November 15, 2013

Reviews

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

There's no way to be objective here. To paraphrase The Ramones: "I'm friends with the publisher, I'm friends with the dopes." The dopes being the writers, of course, but I'm dope #1 since I have a story (and artwork) in the premier anthology/themed annual of literary horror that is Black Candies. Since I am acquainted with so many of the writers, I'll tout one of my favorites by a writer I don't know: a story called "Fanny in Development" by Adrian Van Young. It's an excerpt from a yet-to-be-published novel called Shadows in Summerland. The writing is dark, elegant and deeply mysterious, and if it's anything like the rest of the book, won't be unpublished for long.

[Matt Lewis · Rating 5 out of 5]

The second edition of a literary horror anthology, Black Candies: See Through really stepped up their game on this one. The stories included, from small novellas to mini vingettes, are truly quality. Such intelligent writing really changes what 'horror fiction' can be and puts it on a plane with any heavyweight short story collection. I could go on and on, but I suggest you check it out for yourself. And read it alone.

[Molly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a book of very creative short stories. The authors were incredibly creative, but some of the stories I just didn't get or didn't particularly care for. I do admire the creativity of the authors though and thought the stories were very original. My favorite was "Welcome Back".