"Rough Music" by Simon Kurt Unsworth

Rough Music

(Spectral Press Chapbook Series #5)

Simon Kurt Unsworth

Spectral Press (2012)

28 pages

I've had the good fortune to read and review the first four chapbooks from Spectral Press, so when I received a review copy of their fifth I was really looking forward to seeing what they were offering to readers this time around. As it turns out, Simon Kurt Unsworth brings a literary horror romp that acts almost like a prelude to his impending collection of stories that will be coming out through Spectral Press next year. The guy already has quite a few collections and anthology contributions to his credit, and after reading this story it's pretty clear that I need to find more of Simon's work.

This story, clocking in a little over twenty pages long, involves a married man named Cornish who wakes up in the middle of the night to sound of wood banging on metal somewhere outside his townhouse. He looks out his window to the street below and sees a man wearing a bulbous-shaped mask over his head, dancing a little jig, and banging a wooden spoon on a pot. The guy does this for a while then takes a bow and disappears into the darkness. Imagine seeing that outside your window. Strange shit, right? Well, it escalates.

As the nights press on and the racket outside becomes louder and louder, Cornish learns that his wife doesn't hear a thing, in fact it seems like he's the only guy on the block who can hear the cacophonous concert in the middle of the street. Each night, the strange man in the mask is joined by more and more masked performers until it winds up there is a play of sorts that is playing out each night, and Cornish realizes that it echoes facets of his own life, and the masks resemble those of his neighbors and friends. At the same time, his relationship with his wife is reinvigorated and more passionate after months of a wedge between them, in the wake of a transgression on his part. But the disturbing music and dancing outside his house, despite whatever influence it is having on his mood and relationship with his wife, it depriving him of his sleep--and maybe his sanity.

Yet again, Spectral Press finds a gem of subtlety and escalating strangeness to offer readers. I was really impressed with the way Simon used the mirroring of Cornish's life with the mummer performance outside his window. The ending was a bit abrupt, but it definitely achieved the kind of awkward terror I think he was aiming for. I'll definitely have to keep an eye out for more of his work in the future.

"Die, Lover, Die!" by the authors of the Top Suspense Group

The twelve Top Suspense authors came together to write a novelette. When I first read about this I thought it sounded like one of those "two many cooks spoil the broth" scenarios. I mean, how the heck can twelve people effectively write what amounts to something just outside the classification of a short story?

In actuality, Die, Lover, Die! is a bit of an experiment by the writers to see if they could create a cohesive thriller with each author writing two hundred and fifty words at a time, like a relay with each author passing off the story to the next. The twelve contributing authors were: Max Alan Collins, Bill Crider, Stephen Gallagher, Lee Goldberg, Joel Goldman, Ed Gorman, Libby Fischer Hellmann, Vicki Hendricks, Naomi Hirahara, Paul Levine, Harry Shannon, Dave Zeltserman. As a result, they managed to create an action-packed tale, even though the story's twists feel a bit like speed bumps.

The story begins with a beautiful woman, Lauren Blaine, speeding down a lonesome road with a quiet mystery man riding shotgun--and a carload of gunmen in pursuit. From that point on, it becomes clear the authors play a bit of one-upmanship by swerving both Lauren and the reader with an onslaught of plot twists. If the story itself feels a bit blocky, it is made palatable by an enjoyable femme fatale in Lauren Blaine and the slew of over-the-top characters with whom she crosses paths. It's an exciting story, but the constant gear-shifting gives it a bit of an incongruous feel. And when you reach the end of the story, and you look back at the beginning, you can't help but wonder: how the hell did she wind up there?