Short Fiction: My Favorite!

While I have always loved to read, my favorite has always been short fiction. I have been drawn to anthologies ever since I can remember and I usually prefer them to novels. On this page I'm going to cite some of the latest ones that I have read along with others that are my favorites. I will also list the stories that I consider to be the best from each.

The Howling Man

This collection of stories was written by one of the most talented men to ever break into the field, Charles Beaumont. Beaumont was one of the main contributors to the series "The Twilight Zone" among working on other television shows and movies. Unfortunately, he died at the age of thirty-eight in 1967 after being diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease. His collection, The Howling Man, contains thirty of the best short stories that I have ever read that are a mixture of horror, fantasy, science-fiction, and many other things. My favorites from the book are "The Devil, You Say?", "Last Rites", "The Howling Man" (probably my favorite in the book), "The New People", "Perchance To Dream", "The Crooked Man", "Blood Brother", and "To Hell With Claude".

Snow White, Blood Red

This is a collection of fairy tales intended for an adult audience. It contains a great introduction that informs the reader to what fairy tales really used to be. Some of the best stories in it are "Like a Red, Red Rose", "The Frog Prince", "Stalking Beans", "Little Red", "The Root of the Matter", "The Princess in the Tower", "Persimmon", "Little Poucet", "The Springfield Swans", "A Sound, Like Angels Singing", and "Puss".

Killing Me Softly

This book is has some of the coolest stories that I've read. It's subtitled "Erotic Tales of Unearthly Love", so it may not be to everyone tastes, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. The best ones out of this book are "The Gardener", "She's Not There", "The Affair", "Hard Drive", "Relationships", "In the Air", "North of Diddy-Wah-Diddy", "Chihuahua Flats", "The Two-Headed Man", and "The Joy of Hats".

Dark Love

This is a wonderful book, once again dealing with love and all of its aspects. I got a real kick out of the introduction by T. E. D. Klein, another great author. This book is one of my favorites since it has Stephen King's excellent story "Lunch at the Gotham Cafe". Great story. Other personal favorites are "The Psycho" (can't wait for the short film!), "Hanson's Radio", "Refrigerator Heaven", "Ro Erg", "Hidden", "The Maiden", "Barbara", "The End of It All", "Thin Walls", "Locked Away", and "Loop".

The Twelve Frights of Christmas

This is a delightful little book dealing with lots of people's favorite holiday, Christmas. It's got classic stories from some of the best in the business including Robert Bloch, H. P. Lovecraft, Arthur C. Clarke, and Ramsey Campbell. The stories that stand out among the rest as the best are "The Night Before Christmas", "Glamr", "The Hellhound Project", "The Planet of Fakers", "Life Sentence", and "The Star".

Language of Fear

Another book that I really enjoyed was Del James' Language of Fear. For those of you who saw Guns 'N Roses magnificent video for "November Rain", you might have noticed that the plot line was based on one of his stories, "Without You", that can be found in this book. It's his only novel to date, but it's delightfully wicked and a good read. I would probably call it splatterpunk and would think that it would be a little much for most, but I got a real kick out of it. The stories that really stood out as my favorites were "A Tale of Two Heroines", "Adult Nature Material", "Date Rape", "High School Memoirs", "Mindwarp", "Skin Deep", "The Atheist Prayer", "The Fumes of Friendship", "The Nerve", and "Without You". Check it out; you may be surprised at what you find.

Strange Highways

This book, written by Dean R. Koontz, has some of my favorite stories by that particular author. These range from quirky little sci-fi tales to novel-length stories dealing with the supernatural. It's really a joy to read. My favorites included in this book are "Strange Highways", "Miss Atilla the Hun", "Down In the Darkness", "Ollie's Hands", "Snatcher", "Bruno", "We Three", "Hardshell", "Twilight of the Dawn", and "Chase".

The Books of Blood

This is one of the most excellent short story collections that I have ever read. Written by the wonderful Clive Barker, it was released in the States as three separate books, but was released as one in the United Kingdom. In Volume One, the best are "The Yattering and Jack", "Sex, Death, and Starshine", and "In the Hills, the Cities". Volume Two's are "Dread", "Hell's Event", "The Skins of the Fathers", and "New Murders in the Rue Morgue". Volume Three's best consist of "Son of Celluloid", "Rawhead Rex", and "Human Remains". Also, both the story that opens the book and the one that closes it are great.

Skeleton Crew

This just happens to be the very first Stephen King book that I ever read at the tender age of ten. King has a variety of different stories included in it including "The Mist", one of his truly terrifying stories about man's trangression in the natural order of things. Favorites in this work include "Here There Be Tygers", "Mrs. Todd's Shortcut", "Word Processor of the Gods", "The Reaper's Image", "Nona", "Gramma", and "The Ballad of the Flexible Bullet".

The Inhuman Condition

More great stories by one of the best horror writters around, Clive Barker. This one contains, "The Body Politic" (did anyone else see "Quicksilver Highway"?) which is a story in which a man's hands decide to rebel against the oppression of the body. It's delightfully wicked. I absolutely love this story. I would also suggest the other stories in this book as well, especially if you're a Barker fan.

Sorry this is so short right now! I will be adding more very shortly, so please come back again!

I would like to ask a favor of everyone that comes to this page. I read a story my senior year in high school that was either titled Resurrection or something very similar. It is an extremely short story, about a page and a half, and is about the figure of Jesus Christ coming to life on the crucifixes in churches around the world. I cannot for the life of me remember what book it was out of, but it would have been a horror anthology that would have been new to paperback in either 1992 or 1993. If anyone know what I'm talking about, please e-mail me so that I can try to find it again. Thanks.