Horror is everywhere, in the shadows and in the light. But most of all it’s right where you live.
Horror is everywhere…
It’s waiting behind a closed door, sitting in an ordinary chair, or following you on a country walk. Perhaps it’s washed up on a tranquil beach, hanging at a local skate park, recorded on an MP3 player hard drive, or even embedded somewhere deep within the design of something as simple and innocuous as a supermarket barcode.
Horror is everywhere, in the shadows and in the light.
It takes on every shape, comes in every conceivable size.
But most of all it’s right where you live.
"Gary McMahon is a spellbinding storyteller." – Graham Joyce
"Gary McMahon's horror is heartfelt, his characters flawed and desperate..." – Tim Lebbon
"Gary McMahon is one of the finest of a new breed of horror writers." – Steve Rasnic Tem
Professional Reviews
THOROUGHLY FRIGHTENING!
Thoroughly frightening, often surrealistic and with a great deal to think about, Where You Live takes the reader into the frightening world of pure horror and dark fantasy. A school trip gone horribly wrong, scary, mythical sea creatures and the monstrous nature of all consuming love are just some of the horrors you will encounter in this book.
Not only do these stories contain descriptions of hauntings, nightmarish apparitions and violently insane individuals, it also takes an in-depth look at the darkness in the minds of people. Most of these tales explore the extent to which the human mind can be warped by despair, disillusionment, depression and truly negative circumstances.
I liked the fact that most of the main characters were thoroughly, and often disgustingly flawed, thus making them scarily realistic. In some of the stories I had to wonder what was really happening to the character and what was simply horrors conjured up by the person's own fearful, desperate or vengeful psyche.
"I had nothing else to give, nothing left to offer up as a sacrifice. The best of me had withered long ago; all that remained was dust and shadows."
The author is a master at creating atmosphere; from sleazy to menacing to the suspense created by severe hatred and revenge; while the message remains:
"Beware the darkness. It is watching. It knows where you live..."
As the whole book is set in England, these stories are all so totally and uniquely British that it felt as though I was walking the streets and lanes of English towns and cities with the characters. The vivid descriptions of rainy weather and seedy circumstances added to the depressed tone of the book. Fortunately this collection contains one story with a happy ending. Which one? Read and find out.
Although sensitive readers and the faint-hearted may balk at some of the tales in this anthology, it is perfectly suitable for avid horror and dark fantasy fans.
Horror - but full of emotion and substance.
WHERE YOU LIVE is a horror collection that stirs emotions and provokes thought. These aren't simple riffs on overused horror motifs, rather they are tales examining this complex, confusing, often disturbing thing called "the human experience." McMahon's tight, precise prose cuts to the bone with surgical precision, laying out the common fears that plague all of us. Not to harp on the title overmuch, but these horrors don't live in dank caves or moldering, Gothic castles or moonlight cemeteries. These horrors hit close to home, sometimes too close.They hit us where we live.
