Andy Love, $4.78, ISBN 978-1-4092-7131-4
Horror, 2009

I’ve looked and I couldn’t seem to find any follow-up to Andy Love’s Short Shocks Volume I. I think I know why, after having read this one. It’s easy to say that this one needs to be edited more judiciously, but the problem goes deeper – things often don’t make sense here.

This one is actually a collection of two short stories, and we start off with Minion, in which we have some nincompoop getting to stay in some old, smelly, derelict building just to explore the family history of some lord. Set in the 19th century, the protagonist narrates the story in a decidedly contemporary manner, which is jarring enough, but worse, he breaks the fourth wall and addresses the reader directly. Considering his fate at the end of the story, how is this possible?

Then, there are passages that don’t make sense, such as this one:

The goblin withdrew its finger and protruded a long, thin grey tongue, which it dragged the bloody nail across, to leave a residue of my blood for it to taste. I found sanctuary; the beast seemed to lurch into convulsions, my blood obviously didn’t agree with the inferior slurry the beast used to stay alive. I was wrong.

It lunged toward my face, tearing pieces off with its teeth. Chewing a part then spitting it out as its claws ripped another section of flesh from my carcass, in preparation of the feast. Alas, I awoke to sweat-sodden night cloths. My heart pumping blood around so fast, I shook with terror – or was it excitement?

So, the whole thing is a nightmare? Fair enough, although the revelation warrants its own paragraph, surely. My issue is the protagonist getting excited by this nightmare. Why? Is he some kind of sadist? Nothing up to that point suggests that he has a thing for being eaten by goblins… wait, how does he even know that it’s a goblin anyway? Oh right, because he has studied fairy tales. That makes sense, I guess.

Mind you, the next paragraph has him cheerfully telling the reader that he can’t wait to explore the creepy place. It is as if the dream didn’t faze him at all. Nothing does, actually. Throughout the story, the main character is like a marionette controlled by the author. He never behaves like a human being with survival instincts or common sense, he’s just a stick figure that does things to bring on the scares. The whole thing feels contrived and, frankly, dumb.

 A Night with Frost has severe issues as well. A story about a daughter tormented by an evil snowman, this one also suffers from headache-inducing head-hopping, things being told from a point of view of a character who actually shouldn’t be aware of those things, and worst of all, two adult characters so wrapped up in being hateful things that their daughter has to endure pure hell due to their negligence. Perhaps this story is a statement about how parents can be the devil, but it is written in such a way that the technical issues make it almost impossible to read without wincing at least twice at every page.

Short Shocks Volume 1 is scary in all the wrong ways – it’s a shining example of how technical issues marring a story can sink it regardless of how brilliant the premise might have been. A few more rounds at the hands of a more ruthless editor might have worked wonders for this baby.