Shriek: an Afterword by Jeff VanderMeer

This novel marks a return to Ambergris, the setting of Jeff VanderMeer's story collection City Of Saints And Madmen (though you don't need to have read it to understand and enjoy Shriek). One of the novellas in that earlier book took the form of a historical pamphlet, The Hoegbotton Guide To The Early History Of Ambergris by Duncan Shriek. This volume is presented as a biographical afterword to the 'Early History', written by Duncan's sister Janice after he has disappeared - or so she thinks, because Duncan has found her manuscript and made his own annotations...

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Who Needs Cleopatra? by Steve Redwood

In the not-too-distant future, the inventor of time travel (known only as 'N') is visited by three beautiful, but dangerous-looking, women from the Time Police. They claim to be historians, wishing to record for posterity the story of N's journeys through time with his (now deceased) travelling companion, Bertie. N isn't fooled by this ("If these women worked in the records department, then I felt sorry for any filing cabinets which happened to get in their way"), but has no option other than to play along for the time being. What follows is the tale of a romp through history, with all the twists and turns you'd expect (and some you wouldn't). However...

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Strange Tales, ed. Rosalie Parker

I wouldn't normally dwell on a book's packaging and presentation in a review, but I must make an exception for this, because the hardback edition of Strange Tales has obviously been made with loving care and attention. This volume is a beautifully presented object, right down to the thickness and smell of its pages (not that I make a habit of smelling books, but it's something that I couldn't help noticing). What's more, I gather that all Tartarus Press books are like this (I can't say from personal experience, as I've only set eyes on one other title of theirs before). In any case, its production values certainly lead one to expect great things from the book's stories.

Strange Tales appears to be something of a mission statement for Tartarus Press, comprising as it does 'fourteen new stories that represent, in our view, the very best writing in the fields of supernatural, fantasy and horror fiction; (says Rosalie Parker in her introduction). As the book's title suggests - and as its introduction confirms - it's also an anthology of 'weird fiction'. And, although we can all probably agree broadly on what that means, it can be quite a slippery term - as evidenced by the best two stories on offer here.

'Mr Manpferdit' by Tina Rath takes us to 18th-century London, where Dr Johnson and James Boswell are setting out to meet one Mr Manpferdit, who claims to be a centaur. Now, generally speaking, I don't care for stories where modern-day authors adopt an 'archaic' writing style, as Rath does here; but she tells her tale with great verve and humour, which made the whole thing highly enjoyable. And that's not to mention the marvellous ending... but that would spoil the story for you.

Dale Nelson's 'Shelter Belt' is a very different proposition: a subtle and evocative story about a young boy in small-town America whose mother falls in love. There is barely a hint of anything supernatural here; but be that as it may, 'Shelter Belt' thoroughly deserves its place in the anthology. These two stories are not the only good ones in Strange Tales, but they are the pieces I enjoyed the most; and they illustrate the diversity of the range of stories on offer.

Several of the pieces in Strange Tales tend towards quite a florid use of language, which is one thing that can put me off this kind of fiction: it often seems to get in the way of the storytelling. And these stories span the full range of success: 'The Descent of the Fire' by Mark Valentine and John Howard, in which 'The Connoisseur' investigates mysterious goings-on in a Shropshire village, didn't engage me at all. Quentin S. Crisp's contribution, 'Cousin X', the dark story of young Sasha and her enigmatic cousin, is more effective, but suffers from being overwritten in places. 'The Itchy Skin of Creepy Aplomb' by Rhys Hughes is also somewhat over-done, but its bizarre combination of formal language and slang forces the reader to approach the story on its own terms - and the story succeeds admirably. But I won't attempt to synopsise it; it's a story that truly deserves to be described as 'weird'!

Of course, judgements like these are more personal than most: someone else might like the use of language in a story that I dislike, or vice versa. The same goes for levels of gore in a story. There is plenty in a few of the tales in this book; and, once again, some are more successful than others. 'The Maker of Fine Instruments' by Brendan Connell tells the story of Willi, the pupil of one Charles Martens, who does indeed make the finest instruments - out of animals, that is. Connell makes his story compelling as well as grotesque, which is no mean feat. In contrast, Adam Daly's 'The Self-Eater', in which a man does exactly what that title suggests, is just unpleasant.

So, do the stories in Strange Tales live up the promise of the volume's appearance? As is so often the case with anthologies, some do and others don't. The best stories here are very good indeed; the worst don't have much to recommend them at all. That said, there are many stories in this volume which have something good (or more than good) about them; so, yes: Strange Tales is worth investigating for yourself.

This review first appeared in The Alien Online.