GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE February 28, 2003

eveningsout

A new meaning of 'gay panic'

Books that will horrify readers in a good way

Coldheart Canyoff"

A Hollywood Ghost Story by Clive Barker

HarperCollins, $27.95 hardcover

Queer Fear 2

edited by Michael Rowe

Arsenal Pulp, $17.95 trade paper

Bend Sinister

The Gay Times Book of Disturbing Stories

edited by Peter Burton

Gay Men's Press, $14.95 trade paper

Reviewed by Anthony Glassman

The world that the LGBT community inhabits is often built on fear. Some gay people fear coming out, some fall prey to homophobia. "Gay panic" is used as an excuse to murder gay men and lesbians, while the religious right uses society's fear of stereotypes in an attempt to undo thirty years of progress.

Given all this fear, it's really only fitting that queer folk should be so good at writing horror stories. Clive Barker, one of the most / successful horror writers today, is proudly, openly gay and living in California with his husband David Armstrong, a noted photographer.

It is the fantasy world of Hollywood, a world already conquered by Barker through his Hellraiser movies as well as Nightbreed and other works, into which he delves in his latest opus, Coldheart Canyon.

Todd Pickett, a stunningly handsome but

swiftly aging action film star, goes in for some routine plastic surgery. He is trying to cling to his youthful good looks for another few years. The surgery goes awry, and Pickett must find someplace out of the public's sight to recuperate.

Unfortunately, the place he chooses is the mansion of Katya Lupi, a silent film star long forgotten. The house rests in Lupi's own canyon, named for her legendary lack of compassion. Although she should be long since dead, she is living in the guest house, as lovely and alluring as the day her last film was released 75 years ago.

There are other things in the canyon as well, ghosts of the golden age of Hollywood and their spawn. Pickett must decide whether to give in to the lure of the darkness at the center of the canyon, or let himself be saved by the far less appealing but more compassionate Tammy, the president of his fan club.

Barker again turns in a fascinating story, though far from a flawless one. His narrative style is impeccable, but there are a few glaring errors in continuity, as if neither Barker nor his editor remembered at the end of the chapter what had been said at the beginning. Overall, though, the book is well worth the time to read.

The other two ghoulish selections are anthologies. Interestingly enough, both were released by publishing houses in the British Commonwealth and both books have been nominated for Lambda Literary Awards. Arsenal Pulp Press is located in Vancouver, B.C., the Canadian version of Seattle. Gay Men's Press, an imprint of the Millivres Prowler Group in London, has been gaining widespread accolades for bringing the best

British fiction

to the United States.

Queer Fear 2 includes work

by noted gay authors like William J. Mann, Michael Thomas Ford and Warren Dunford, as well as rabidly homophiliac vampire writer Poppy Z. Brite and comic book scribe David Quinn.

Some of the stories are actually frightening, writhing their way into a small, dark place inside the reader's psyche, a place perhaps better left unexplored, while others are disturbing, curious, amusing or bemusing.

MICHAEL ROWE

For instance, Michael Thomas Ford's "Werepuss" is a humorous look at a lesbian woman whose genitalia have a mind of their own, while Steve Duffy's "Numbers" is a fascinating, albeit deadly serious, view of AIDS through the eyes of a handful of different people.

Quinn's "Oh Yes, My Eyes," on the other hand, is just plain unnerving. At a page and a half, it's the shortest story in the book, but easily the most disturbing.

Another nice thing about the book is that there are at least a few female voices. A couple stories are written by men but center on women, while two male-oriented stories are written by women. Curiouser and

<E 2* ** 209908

SIMSTER

curiouser.

Bend Sinister doesn't claim to be straight-out horror. For the most part, it is not. It occasionally

delves into the

horror realm, sometimes makes forays into crime fiction and other genres. The best-known writer in this anthology (on this side of the Atlantic, anyway) is Christopher Bram, whose novel Father of Frankenstein was made into the film Gods and Monsters.

Some of the stories are far more disturbing than others. "Killing Time," for instance, about two strangers waiting for a bus that might never come, recalls Rod Serling's work on the original Twilight Zone, while "The Pink Tower" is an almost classic tale of longing and desire that will remain forever unfulfilled.

Other stories, however, simply make one scratch one's head and say, "Hm-m" Still others did not seem disturbing at all.

Despite its very slight inferiority to Queer Fear 2, however, it is definitely worthy of the Lambda nomination.

Both anthologies would make great latenight reading, sitting in front of the flickering fire, shadows dancing on the walls. What's that sound, like something scratching on the door? It's entertainment, baby.

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