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Simon Strantzas reinforces the opinion that the horror tale is best told in the short story form. The stories that make up his collection BENEATH THE SURFACE are rich with atmosphere -- bleak, gloomy, hopeless, depressing atmosphere, in a wintry or rainy environment that will make you feel its chill in your bones, and deeper. You will be reminded, in a good way, of two of horror's greatest masters: Thomas Ligotti and Ramsey Campbell. But in this oppressive landscape Strantzas hasn't forgotten to...
Beneath the Surface is a collection of short stories that are all firmly set in the weird fiction sub-genre of horror: darkness and despair abound, supernatural creatures arise from the depths to terrorize the innocent and the guilty alike, and somebody always, always dies in the end, leaving the living to wish that they would, too. Some of Strantzas’ stories are better than others. The first submission, “A Shadow in God’s Eye,” is the story of a man who attends a religious meeting in an abandon...
My first foray into the world of Strantzas. Echoes of Ligotti and Mark Samuels emanate throughout. Themes include isolation, urban decay and a little bit of cosmic horror, all lovingly wrapped in a big ol' blanket of despair.Highly recommended.
Simply incredible! Simon Strantzas' right up there on my bookshelf with Thomas Ligotti, T.E.D. Klein, Laird Barron...
Humdrumming Press edition… this remarkable story is both an up-beat & down-beat ending to a great book, a lasting image floating through the sky in my head. An arrhythmic threnody. The detailed review of this book posted elsewhere under my name is too long or impractical to post here.Above is one of its observations at the time of the review.
A very good collection from an author whose prose continues to shine...but darkly.This book is best read as a single piece of work, giving a glimpse into the philosophy behind the author's entire body of fiction.
The problem with anthologies or short story collections is you tend to like only some of the stories. This collection had a very good hit rate for me, there were only one or two that didn't grab me. Some psychological horror, some physical horror. Most of the characters are from the fringes of society, homeless, geek, outcast at work or already walking the edge of sanity. If you read this collection make sure you read the afterword......really, don't skip it. I'll be checking out more of his wor...
I wrote a longer review but got tired of writing it 5 minutes in so here's my quick thoughts.This my first experience with Strantzas. I bought the deluxe edition of his fourth collection Burnt Black Suns from Dark Region Press, but, since it was delayed I decided to start from the beginning.Even with all the hype surrounding Strantzas his first collection definitely lived up to what I've heard about even his more, assumingly, mature collections. The writing itself is pretty good for a first coll...
Simon Strantzas projects a smothering bleak outlook in this revised and expanded edition of his first collection. In many (or most) of these stories the cities are ugly and stench-ridden, humanity is a faceless teeming mass, and the individual characters are sickened by proximity to their fellow humans. Parasites repeatedly invade the populace on a small or large scale. It was interesting to read this following Christopher Slatsky’s collection, Alectryomancer and Other Weird Tales. While there i...
This the third Strantzas collection I've read, he has quickly become one of my favorite modern weird fiction authors. This being his first collection I was, consciously or unconsciously, expecting these stories not to be as developed as later ones, but I wouldn't say that's the case.These stories are *different* from some of his later work, and there's less variety. Generally the characters aren't people we get to know like in his later work, so in that sense the story feels more at arms length
Simon Strantzas has become one of the leading writers of weird horror, and along with Richard Gavin, Ian Rogers, and a few others he is proof that Canada has much to offer in this genre.Beneath The Surface is Simon's first collection, and the fourteen stories found within each stand strong as an example of his dark talent. Several of Simon's influences can be seen throughout the stories, and include such famous names as Lovecraft, Ligotti, Aickman, and Cronenberg. His love for the numinous is al...
Strantzas's debut collection marks the arrival of a refreshingly different voice in the horror field. But make no mistake, these are tone pieces, more concerned with atmosphere than plot cohesion. You won't find any Twilight Zone twists or monster mashes here. Instead, you'll find stories of encroaching darkness, physical and emotional corruption, and cosmic futility. However, the tone remains too consistent throughout the collection, resulting in an unfortunate sameness to the stories and too m...
Notwithstanding the deluge of five-star reviews from his esteemed peers, Simon Strantzas' debut collection Beneath the Surface is an uneven one to me. The high points are solid cosmic horror and weird fiction. I'd say they're in the major leagues, though missing the playoffs. Others misfired for me, though. 'The Constant Encroaching of a Tumultuous Sea' for instance feels like an assault of darkly surreal imagery more than a story, and utterly lacking the subtlety and gradual development of his
Before I finally cracked open Simon Strantzas' first collection of short stories, Beneath the Surface, I was worried it wouldn't live up to what had almost certainly become unrealistic expectations heavily influenced by the sheer difficulty encountered in acquiring this book (which should no longer be a problem starting later this year as Dark Regions Press will be releasing an updated version). Thankfully, my worries turned out to be without merit; Strantzas' freshman collection reads more like...
