Dive into fourteen tales of non-themed horror, with short stories and dark poems by some of the best horror writers in the world, including a story by the master himself, Graham Masterton.
Dive into fourteen tales of non-themed horror, with short stories and dark poems by some of the best horror writers in the world, including a story by the master himself, Graham Masterton.
Allow the very first instalment of Tales From the Lake to transport you to lakeside terror in Lover, Come Back to Me, Lady of Lost Lake, and Game On; journey to the basement of your local pet store in Dead Pull and your neighbourhood pub in O’Halloran’s; visit the apocalypse in Devil’s Night; travel to Africa in Witch-Compass and The Reunion; spend time with talking dolls in Don’t Look at Me; experience the horrors of drug addiction from close up in Junksick; and climb a ladder to the heavens in Perrollo’s Ladder.
Tales From the Lake Vol.1 includes the winning stories from the 2013 Tales From the Lake Horror Writing Competition: a nautical tale in Jenn Loring’s The Art of Wrecking; a bizarre story of strange addictions in J. Daniel Stone’s Alternative Muses; and a cult horror story in the jungles of South America in William Ritchey’s Las Maquinas.
Welcome to Crystal Lake.
Professional Reviews
A MAGNIFICENT COMPILATION OF HORROR SHORT STORIES!
This first volume of Tales from the Lake is a horror and dark fantasy reading feast that will thrill and satisfy all followers of these genres. An outing on Greywater Lake gone horribly wrong, some thoroughly scary dolls and statues, a group of violent ghosts, and a vengeful Xbox are just a few of the horrors you will encounter in this book.
With water as the central theme of several of these stories; lakes, rivers and the sea play a major, if thoroughly frightening, role. For ultimate variety add to this a pet shop manager who kills what he can't control, a sexual deviant who hates her own pregnancy, a horrific drug production secret, and a charm with an extremely high price for its services.
The stories take a look at concepts of hatred, fear, greed, absolute control, and the desire to remain forever young. On the positive side, in the story O'Halloran's, it is clear that redemption is always possible. The poem, Saint Patty's Night at the Crown, brings an old-world atmosphere to this book.
The imagination and inventiveness in this anthology display a creativity and diversity of talent seldom found in such collections. Contributions by well-known, award winning authors such as Elizabeth Massie, Taylor Grant, Graham Masterton, and several others, make Tales from the Lake Vol.1 a book with a very high standard of storytelling.
The three finalist stories from the 2013 Tales from the Lake Horror Writing Competition, Las Maquinas, Alternative Muses, and The Fine Art of Wrecking more than deserve their places in this anthology. My personal favorites, however, were Dead Pull and Witch Compass, and my favorite character was the concrete garden gnome in Don't Look at Me.
This extremely neat, thoroughly edited anthology of carefully selected tales is another proud feather in the cap of Crystal Lake Publishing. For a collection of tales that will thrill, horrify, and generally captivate all readers of horror and dark fantasy, I highly recommend Tales from the Lake Vol.1 as a must-read! (Ellen Fritz)
Don't Miss This Horror Gem!
Horror anthologies come out at lightning speed these days; and some, sadly, seem as if they were edited and put together in just about the same amount of time. Tales From the Lake Vol. 1 rises above many of the others. Excellent variety of stories, each unique enough to appeal to those who love more quiet horror and those who like to be whacked in the face with it. Recommended!
Spellbindingly eerie to the Bizarro
Joe Mynhardt owns and operates Crystal Lake Publishing out of Bloemfontein, Free State in South Africa. Crystal Lake Publishing specializes in bringing horror fiction writers together from all over the world and simultaneously spreading their work globally. One of Crystal Lake’s most recent projects is the Tales from the Lake Horror Writing Competition. Winners of the competition receive, amongst other awards, the publication of their story in the upcoming volume of the Tales from the Lake anthology of short horror fiction.
Tales from the Lake Vol. 1 (2014) shares the best of last year’s competition. The anthology contains mostly works of prose, but also includes two pieces of poetry. The pieces in Tales from the Lake Vol. 1 range from the spellbindingly eerie to the Bizarro. Tim Waggoner’s Lover, Come Back to Me tells of a man who has spent his life fearing the irresistible beckoning of his aquatic lover. In the poem Saint Patty’s Night at The Crown, Blaze McRob recounts the events of said night when an axe-wielding leprechaun makes the holiday’s debaucheries his own. My favorite narrative in this collection is Devil’s Night by Tim Curran. In this one, Curran introduces two escaped cons on the run from a sulfuric demon that is purging the streets one by one devouring its victims with a fiery hunger. The cons, Mick and Bones, learn to survive by offering women and children up as sacrificial lambs to the hellish fire-eater. Unfortunately, for the two men, their sins multiply as they continue to offer up the innocent, making them irresistible treats for their horrifying tormentor.
Mynhardt has done well choosing the stories to include in this first volume. The stories feature a wide spectrum of settings and tones. The influence of various cultures is ever-present. Most of the tales are satisfyingly haunting. Honestly, a few left me hungering for more closure, which is something I consider acceptable in the world of horror fiction. I found a couple of the works to be simply okay in a relative sense; however, on a more positive note, I’ve grown particularly fond of these types of anthologies for one important reason. If you come across one of these short stories that just does not do the trick for you, the experience will be short lived, and you’ll be on to the next title. I say, good work Mynhardt in your effort to shorten the gap between the world’s horror fiction writers. I’m looking forward to reading Tales from the Lake Vol. 2.
