bookloversboudoir's review
5.0
(copy provided by the publisher and voluntarily reviewed)
New Fears is a cracking collection of horror stories.
I’m a huge fan of horror fiction and it takes a lot to impress me. The authors in this fantastic collection really pulled it off.
I loved every story but there are a few that spoke to me just a little louder than the others:
Shepherd’s Business by Stephen Gallagher, the really chills don’t come until the very end and my flesh crawled off my bones and scuttled away.
Four Abstracts by Nina Allan is an astounding story, my absolute favourite in the collection, there is something so sad and haunting about it.
The Salter Collection by Brian Little is terrifying and sinister and utterly enthralling.
Every story in this collection is great but the above ones are a little bit more special.
New Fears is a cracking collection of horror stories.
I’m a huge fan of horror fiction and it takes a lot to impress me. The authors in this fantastic collection really pulled it off.
I loved every story but there are a few that spoke to me just a little louder than the others:
Shepherd’s Business by Stephen Gallagher, the really chills don’t come until the very end and my flesh crawled off my bones and scuttled away.
Four Abstracts by Nina Allan is an astounding story, my absolute favourite in the collection, there is something so sad and haunting about it.
The Salter Collection by Brian Little is terrifying and sinister and utterly enthralling.
Every story in this collection is great but the above ones are a little bit more special.
triptych_turning's review
dark
tense
medium-paced
4.0
This was a fun collection. I enjoyed a lot of the stories, and would recommend this book to any fan of modern horror.
stevemozza's review
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
1.0
livcoyy's review
4.0
Trying out a new system of ratings this year! Boiling books overall down to 1-5 stars always felt hard and not right to me, so I’ll be using this new system to hopefully create more nuanced ratings:
Characters 1-5
(Are they multifaceted and complex? Compelling? Do I enjoy reading through their view? Do they inspire reactions in me?)
Plot 1-5
(Exciting? Does it make me want to keep reading? Is it structured well? Does it flow logically? Does it seem inventive?)
Prose 1-5
(Beautiful? Skillful? Distinct voice?)
Impact 1-5
(Does this make me think about the world? Does this make me want to do something/change something? Am I thinking about it days after reading it? )
Originality 1-5
(Pretty self explanatory, applies to all the above categories! I realized as I was creating this system that originality has a big impact on my enjoyment of a book.)
.. and then I’ll convert those scores to this star rating! This is definitely subject to change as the year goes on but I’m excited to use it and force myself to rate books thoughtfully.
Using this rating system on a collection of stories by different authors is actually a little tough haha but I did my best.
Characters:3.5/5
Plot: 4.5/5
Prose: 4/5
Impact: 3/5
Originality:4/5
So that adds up to 3.8/5 stars!
Characters 1-5
(Are they multifaceted and complex? Compelling? Do I enjoy reading through their view? Do they inspire reactions in me?)
Plot 1-5
(Exciting? Does it make me want to keep reading? Is it structured well? Does it flow logically? Does it seem inventive?)
Prose 1-5
(Beautiful? Skillful? Distinct voice?)
Impact 1-5
(Does this make me think about the world? Does this make me want to do something/change something? Am I thinking about it days after reading it? )
Originality 1-5
(Pretty self explanatory, applies to all the above categories! I realized as I was creating this system that originality has a big impact on my enjoyment of a book.)
.. and then I’ll convert those scores to this star rating! This is definitely subject to change as the year goes on but I’m excited to use it and force myself to rate books thoughtfully.
Using this rating system on a collection of stories by different authors is actually a little tough haha but I did my best.
Characters:3.5/5
Plot: 4.5/5
Prose: 4/5
Impact: 3/5
Originality:4/5
So that adds up to 3.8/5 stars!
brennanlafaro's review
3.0
I picked this collection up at the beginning of this summer, looking to read a few stories from modern horror voices I knew and hoping to discover some new authors. Like a lot of collections this size and this diverse, there are stories that stand out and stay with you, stories that are fine but you likely won’t revisit, and stories that don’t quite hold your attention. The good ones, and the big names, are spread out enough to carry a reader through the entire book.
I’d like to start by highlighting a few authors I wasn’t familiar with before. The opening story, The Boggle Hole by Alison Littlewood was one of my favorites in the book. It’s a spin-on a creature story that features significantly more characterization than creature and put Littlewood on my radar. Departures by A.K. Benedict was another terrific read, and mixes horror with something like fantasy. It’s much easier to recommend than to describe. The Embarrassment of Dead Grandmothers by Sarah Lotz offers us something different, an excellent black humor story. The Abduction Door by Christopher Golden is one of those stories that gives us some new every day object to fear, elevators here, and a surprisingly poignant ending.
The big names also have some excellent stories sprinkled throughout. Josh Malerman’s House of the Head, which is now getting rave reviews on the return of creepshow, was originally written for this anthology and is every bit as good as you hope. It’s a great spin on haunted house fiction. Brian Keene delivers Sheltered in Place, a pretty engaging story with a fantastic ending. Adam Nevill’s Eumenides (The Benevolent Ladies) goes to the kind of deep, dark place we might expect from this author, but we’re here for the ride as per usual.
Being relatively new to the not-featured-at-Barnes & Noble horror community, this collection served as a nice introduction to some of these authors. If it peaks your interest, Mark Morris has also edited and released a second volume. It currently resides on my bookshelf and is waiting to introduce me to some new voices.
I’d like to start by highlighting a few authors I wasn’t familiar with before. The opening story, The Boggle Hole by Alison Littlewood was one of my favorites in the book. It’s a spin-on a creature story that features significantly more characterization than creature and put Littlewood on my radar. Departures by A.K. Benedict was another terrific read, and mixes horror with something like fantasy. It’s much easier to recommend than to describe. The Embarrassment of Dead Grandmothers by Sarah Lotz offers us something different, an excellent black humor story. The Abduction Door by Christopher Golden is one of those stories that gives us some new every day object to fear, elevators here, and a surprisingly poignant ending.
The big names also have some excellent stories sprinkled throughout. Josh Malerman’s House of the Head, which is now getting rave reviews on the return of creepshow, was originally written for this anthology and is every bit as good as you hope. It’s a great spin on haunted house fiction. Brian Keene delivers Sheltered in Place, a pretty engaging story with a fantastic ending. Adam Nevill’s Eumenides (The Benevolent Ladies) goes to the kind of deep, dark place we might expect from this author, but we’re here for the ride as per usual.
Being relatively new to the not-featured-at-Barnes & Noble horror community, this collection served as a nice introduction to some of these authors. If it peaks your interest, Mark Morris has also edited and released a second volume. It currently resides on my bookshelf and is waiting to introduce me to some new voices.
camerontrost's review
3.0
"New Fears" is a big anthology, clocking in at exactly four hundred pages, and it claims to feature "new horror stories by masters of the genre". These two points considered, I expected at least one or two stories to be real corkers, but none of the tales in the anthology impressed me greatly. Let's focus on the positives though. There were enough decent stories to warrant a three-star rating...but only just. My favourites were "The Boogle Hole" for the sentimentality of it, "Eumenides" for the dystopian atmosphere and creepiness, "The Embarrassment of Dead Grandmothers" because it's realistic horror, "Shepherds' Business" and "Dollies" for the ending, perhaps the only truly shocking endings of the anthology. "Four Abstracts" is also worth a quick mention, because it's original, well-written, and a bit weird.
kendallreviews's review
5.0
Brand new horror stories by masters of the genre
The horror genre's leading living practitioners drag our darkest fears kicking and screaming into the light in this collection of nineteen brand-new stories.
The impressive line-up includes stories from:
Ramsey Campbell, Adam Nevill, Sarah Lotz, Stephen Gallagher, Angela Slatter, A.K. Benedict, Josh Malerman, Muriel Gray, Christopher Golden, Nina Allen, Stephen Laws, Carole Johnstone, Brian Keene, Kathryn Ptacek, Conrad Williams, Alison Littlewood, Brady Golden, Chaz Brenchley, and Brian Lillie.
New Fears invites readers on a ride through a world of human fears in a vibrant collection of numinous, surreal, gut wrenching and terrifying stories that showcase the very best that modern horror fiction has to offer. Curated by leading horror author and editor Mark Morris, the collection proves that fear truly does come in many forms...
Fear comes in many forms
The moment I saw the remarkable list of contributors Mark Morris had gathered, expectations were raised, this was an immediate 'must read', so I was delighted that Titan Books sent me this anthology in advance of its September 19th release date to review. I've already been lucky enough to of read some superb collections this year, so how will New Fears stand up to some very stiff competition?
I'm not going to write a story by story review of New Fears, what I'd prefer to do is cherry pick a few of my favourites. Now that's not as easy a task as you may think. Near Fears is an incredibly well written collection of stories. Hardly a surprise due to the authors involved, but it's the sheer variety and diversity of each tale that makes things difficult. These are not gory filled, violent tales of monsters on the rampage, I was pleasantly surprised how a lot of these tales were so cerebral, they didn't hold the readers hand and mollycoddle. Out of the 19 stories in New Fears, I can safely say that 11 of them were outstanding to read, easily falling into the best shorts I've read this year. Of the remaining 8 the standard was very high, with only a couple of the tales dipping in quality, I'm already looking forward to rereading this collection later in the year and re-evaluating my review.
So, onto my favourites, and in no particular order I'll start with Kathryn Ptacek's Dollies. Ptacek manages to pull shock after shock in this incredibly dark and heart wrenching tale about a girl and a secret harboured by her parents. I was unaware of Kathryn Ptacek prior to reading Dollies, I'll certainly be looking for more of her work in the future. Next would be Shepherds' Business by Stephen Gallagher, this had a distinct Hammer Horror vibe going on with a new Doctor taking over the rounds on a remote island. I loved how alive the island felt with its close-knit community and their obvious distrust of this stranger among them. I was utterly engrossed in this tale and it's decidedly dark conclusion. The last story I'm going to mention will be Eumenides (The Benevolant Ladies) by Adam Nevill. Adam has a writing style that just embraces you, words flow and the horrors he unleashes are truly terrifying. I was in this story, I was standing alongside protagonist Jason as he made his steady climb to complete insanity at the summit of Pentree Zoological Gardens. OK, maybe this was my favourite story in the collection. In my opinion, nobody is writing as consistently as Adam Nevill, who along with Josh Malerman (who also features in this collection with an incredibly effective haunted dolls house story) have the future of modern horror sewn up.
New Fears is a stunning collection of 19 tales that will both terrify and delight you. The quality of writing is brilliant with every contributor, and the editor, Mark Morris, deserving congratulations. This is a special anthology that I hope to see run and run. The bar has been set very high.
The horror genre's leading living practitioners drag our darkest fears kicking and screaming into the light in this collection of nineteen brand-new stories.
The impressive line-up includes stories from:
Ramsey Campbell, Adam Nevill, Sarah Lotz, Stephen Gallagher, Angela Slatter, A.K. Benedict, Josh Malerman, Muriel Gray, Christopher Golden, Nina Allen, Stephen Laws, Carole Johnstone, Brian Keene, Kathryn Ptacek, Conrad Williams, Alison Littlewood, Brady Golden, Chaz Brenchley, and Brian Lillie.
New Fears invites readers on a ride through a world of human fears in a vibrant collection of numinous, surreal, gut wrenching and terrifying stories that showcase the very best that modern horror fiction has to offer. Curated by leading horror author and editor Mark Morris, the collection proves that fear truly does come in many forms...
Fear comes in many forms
The moment I saw the remarkable list of contributors Mark Morris had gathered, expectations were raised, this was an immediate 'must read', so I was delighted that Titan Books sent me this anthology in advance of its September 19th release date to review. I've already been lucky enough to of read some superb collections this year, so how will New Fears stand up to some very stiff competition?
I'm not going to write a story by story review of New Fears, what I'd prefer to do is cherry pick a few of my favourites. Now that's not as easy a task as you may think. Near Fears is an incredibly well written collection of stories. Hardly a surprise due to the authors involved, but it's the sheer variety and diversity of each tale that makes things difficult. These are not gory filled, violent tales of monsters on the rampage, I was pleasantly surprised how a lot of these tales were so cerebral, they didn't hold the readers hand and mollycoddle. Out of the 19 stories in New Fears, I can safely say that 11 of them were outstanding to read, easily falling into the best shorts I've read this year. Of the remaining 8 the standard was very high, with only a couple of the tales dipping in quality, I'm already looking forward to rereading this collection later in the year and re-evaluating my review.
So, onto my favourites, and in no particular order I'll start with Kathryn Ptacek's Dollies. Ptacek manages to pull shock after shock in this incredibly dark and heart wrenching tale about a girl and a secret harboured by her parents. I was unaware of Kathryn Ptacek prior to reading Dollies, I'll certainly be looking for more of her work in the future. Next would be Shepherds' Business by Stephen Gallagher, this had a distinct Hammer Horror vibe going on with a new Doctor taking over the rounds on a remote island. I loved how alive the island felt with its close-knit community and their obvious distrust of this stranger among them. I was utterly engrossed in this tale and it's decidedly dark conclusion. The last story I'm going to mention will be Eumenides (The Benevolant Ladies) by Adam Nevill. Adam has a writing style that just embraces you, words flow and the horrors he unleashes are truly terrifying. I was in this story, I was standing alongside protagonist Jason as he made his steady climb to complete insanity at the summit of Pentree Zoological Gardens. OK, maybe this was my favourite story in the collection. In my opinion, nobody is writing as consistently as Adam Nevill, who along with Josh Malerman (who also features in this collection with an incredibly effective haunted dolls house story) have the future of modern horror sewn up.
New Fears is a stunning collection of 19 tales that will both terrify and delight you. The quality of writing is brilliant with every contributor, and the editor, Mark Morris, deserving congratulations. This is a special anthology that I hope to see run and run. The bar has been set very high.
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