HNT - Died And Gone To Book Heaven

My contributor copy of BOUND FOR EVIL: Curious Tales of Books Gone Bad arrived in the mail yesterday. It's absolutely gorgeous. All 800 pages of it dripping with speculative tales about books.


My story "Browsers" (a Twilight Zone style tale about a trip through a haunted bookstore), is reprinted in BOUND FOR EVIL. And while it is a reprint, it's also a slightly original version, because I tweaked a few parts of the tale (which originally appeared in Challenging Destiny magazine and was reprinted in my collection ONE HAND SCREAMING) in order for it to match the guidelines for the anthology -- in the original version of "Browsers" it is the bookstore itself that is evil -- in the tweaked version, I changed it so that it is the books themselves. A slight tweak, and the story still works nicely.

I can't get over how beautiful this book is -- how wonderfully Editor/Publisher Tom English compiled everything, divided the stories into 6 thematically grouped sets of tales: IN THE BEGINNING, SCRATCH PAPER, A NOT-TOO GENTLE MADNESS, THE ROMANCE OF CERTAIN OLD BOOKS, REFERENCE WORK and MISADVENTURES IN READING (this is the section where "Browsers" appears, along with a stories by Ramsey Campbell, Kurt Newton, Jeff Ryan, Rhys Hughes and fellow Canuck Barbara Roden)

There are actually too many fantastic authors in this collection to mention them all, but you can check out the table of contents here.

I still can't get over how for years I have dreamed of being able to read a book that contains nothing but spooky tales about books. It would appear that I share a passion similar to editor Tom English in having wanted to see something like this. And now, not only does such a book exist, but I'm also honoured to be a part of it.

If you're a book nerd like me and you like creepy tales, then this is a book you should seek out. And I'm not just saying that as a pushy author that wants you to read his story. The printing has been limited to 500 copies, and I can't imagine them lasting long. (The publisher does distribute through book stores, so you can ask for it at your favourite neighbourhood bookstore and any book retailer with a decent ability to special order books should be able to seek it out and order in a copy for you. And if you're in the Hamilton area, I'm delighted to point out that it can be special ordered at the McMaster University bookstore. I mean, after all, what academic can resist such a beautiful collection?)

And I think the book looks quite nice sitting with the dozens of other horror anthologies I own, on the shelf immediately beside Yorick.


Yorick seems rather pleased about it, doesn't he? Almost as pleased as I am.