Mark McLaughlin's Blog: Revenge of the B-Movie Monster - Posts Tagged "hideous-faces-beautiful-skulls"

Above you will see the cover art of my new story collection, HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS, from Wildside Press. The 214-page trade paperback is now available on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Hideous-Faces-Beautiful-Skulls-McLaughlin/dp/1479401889/

Here is a link to the GoodReads page for the book: Hideous Faces, Beautiful Skulls

In HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS, a collection of thirty stories of horror and the bizarre, you shall enter a boundless realm of dark magic, evil glamour, and strange love. As with any collection of my work, you will encounter monsters aplenty: magic zombies, evil cats, alien lovers, aquatic humanoids, a vicious Egyptian monstrosity, Internet witches, ghouls and others that defy description.

The best of my darkest stories have been compiled in HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS.

Above you will see the cover art of my new story collection, HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS, from Wildside Press.

Here is a link to the GoodReads page for the book: Hideous Faces, Beautiful Skulls. Visit the book's page and enter a Goodreads contest, via the notice posted there, for a chance to win a FREE trade paperback copy of the book!

News Update (3/8/14): HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS is now available for Kindle, via the following links:

US: http://www.amazon.com/Hideous-Faces-B...

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hideous-Faces...

In HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS, a collection of thirty stories of horror and the bizarre, you shall enter a boundless realm of dark magic and twisted love. In this collection, you will encounter monsters aplenty: magic zombies, evil cats, alien lovers, aquatic humanoids, a vicious Egyptian monstrosity, Internet witches, ghouls and others that defy description. Below you will find some excerpts from some of the stories:

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An excerpt from "Hungry For Faces"...

Michael walked up to the door and looked inside.

The blue light came from a tinted bulb in a shadeless lamp. Thin copper wires were strung across the room at various levels; every piece of furniture seemed to be caught up in the tangle. The breeze from a fan on high-power made the wires hum. On a brass bed in the center of the room reclined a pale man, bundled in quilts and pillows. His long black hair was thick and coarse, like a horse's mane. He wore a tattered bathrobe over a gray sweatsuit. Michael decided the pale man was probably twenty-five, just a few years younger than himself.

Michael brushed a hand over the lump in his pants pocket. He had a roll of bills totalling three-hundred dollars, in case the pale man had a price. "I met somebody in a bar – a mechanic. He’d told me you made his wife go away." It dawned on Michael that the mechanic might have violated a trust. "You can't really blame him for talking. He'd had a lot to drink and ... well, I bought him a few drinks, too. He seemed pretty miserable."

The pale man shrugged. "No worry. I appreciate references, if discretion is observed. I'm sure Mr. Curtis has selected well. My name is Card."

"I'm Michael. I guess you don't really want to know who I am, though, since you told me to cover my face." He twanged at one of the copper wires. "What's with the spiderweb?"

"Be careful, will you?" Card nodded as Michael stilled the vibrating wire with a fingertip. "Yes, it is like a spiderweb, isn't it? Except there's no pattern. Still, do you see the appeal? Everything connected to everything. Beautiful, like a work of art."

"Can I get through?"

A brief, worried look crossed Card's face. "I suppose so." The pale man watched intently as Michael threaded his way across the room. "Careful there, a wire is snagged on your coat. And your handkerchief is coming loose. Don't let it fall off. If you should ever show me your face, I would want it to be a conscious choice."

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An excerpt from "The Voice of the Pangyricon"....

Something horrible stepped off the platform.

It was a corpse. A walking corpse with blue skin, streaked with dust and what looked like thick strands of yellowish-green cobwebs. Its eyes were tightly squinted shut. Its face was smeared with blood and strings of fresh meat hung from its broken teeth.

“Attention, Daniel!” I screamed to the Pangyricon's computer system. “Daniel, help us! Activate security alert!” None of us had any weapons. There had never been any need for them.

“Interesting!” the computer said in its higher voice of excitement. “I’ve completed a brain-scan on this being and though the organ is profoundly altered, I can detect familiar patterns. That is my original body.”

“Don’t just scan that thing!” Remson said as he came out of the chamber. “Activate security alert!”

“Yes! Look what it did to the calf!” Quinn cried.

“I detect animal blood, but no animal,” the computer said. “I cannot activate a security alert based on an external occurrence.”

The creature’s eyes slowly opened, revealing twin milky-white orbs. Apparently it had needed some time to get used to the light. It rushed to the door, which slid open, like all work area doors when somebody stepped up to them. The thing then raced down the hall....

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Need ordering information on the trade paperback? Here's the Amazon.com link:

http://www.amazon.com/Hideous-Faces-B...

Thanks! :-)

I've always wanted to write a set of story collections addressing my three great loves: zombie stories, Lovecraftian stories, and seriously weird, dark horror tales. And here are those collections, released by Wildside Press:

HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS: http://www.amazon.com/Hideous-Faces-Beautiful-Skulls-McLaughlin/dp/1479401889/

GoodReads page: Hideous Faces, Beautiful Skulls

BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM: http://www.amazon.com/Best-Little-Witch-House-Arkham-McLaughlin/dp/143444208X/

GoodReads page: Best Little Witch-House in Arkham

BEACH BLANKET ZOMBIE: http://www.amazon.com/Beach-Blanket-Zombie-Humanoid-Horrors/dp/1434440990/

GoodReads page: Beach Blanket Zombie: Weird Tales of the Undead and Other Humanoid Horrors

I also did the covers (I worked as a professional graphic designer for many years). Each book has a staring abomination on the cover: a one-eyed zombie, a two-eyed witch-creature, and a three-eyed cosmic beast. Each monster has a different source of celestial fire: sunlight, moonlight, and lightning. You'll also find plenty of additional monsters inside all of the books, too....

Below you will find three chilling excerpts from my latest story collection, HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS, which is available on Amazon as a trade paperback or Kindle download. Here's the Kindle link:
http://www.amazon.com/Hideous-Faces-B...

GOODREADS:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...


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1. An excerpt from the horror story, "Drool Tool: The Meltdown Mix"....

What? You’ve never been to the Black Box?

It’s delicious, my dear. Black walls, black carpeting and a black marble dance floor. I’d be there tonight if it weren’t for – Well, they’re going to be closed for a week or so.

This club is interesting enough, but the music? Absolutely dreadful. They don’t even play the Psychonauts.

You’ve never heard of them? Do you live in a cave? On a farm? I have all their CDs: Monkey Boy, Slurp It Up, Robot with a Whip... Surely you’ve heard their latest single, Drool Tool?

You have some lipstick on your teeth. Right there. You’re quite pretty. You shouldn’t bleach your hair, though. You should dye it black, like mine. Then we could pass for sisters.

Yes, I know I’m a bit older than you. Your older sister. Older but wiser.

The lead singer for the Psychonauts is Tarot Mandrago – an absolute god. I met him a few months ago. I’m an account executive at Raw Hits magazine and–

Hmm? Didn’t hear you.

Oh, that just means I sell ad space. The magazine threw a huge party and that’s where I met Tarot, with his long black hair and big black eyes. He rambled on and on about Haitian music, aborigine music, even dream music. I had no idea anyone in a dance band could be so erudite. Unfortunately he was standing to my left and I’m practically deaf in that ear. The other one’s a bit weak, too. If the party got too loud I couldn’t catch everything he said.

Soon Tarot’s backup singers came to whisk him away and I was whisked right along. We all piled into a stretch limo. We drove for the longest time before we pulled up in front of a gorgeous mansion with stone gryphons on each side of the door. And inside–!

The walls were draped with blood-red velvet curtains. There was sound equipment everywhere. Some sleepy young things were lounging about on huge pillows in the main hall. An absolute Adonis wearing nothing but a leather mask was leading a monkey on a leash.

Tarot explained that the mansion belonged to an elderly millionairess who desperately needed a hobby. He pointed to a metal booth hanging by gold chains about twenty feet above the floor. The old girl was in there, watching. The masked Adonis whistled and a rope ladder shot down from the booth. He and his monkey shimmied right up.

The Psychonauts began to rehearse, so I went over to the pillow people. They were smoking the most obnoxious substance: ground-up African beetles mixed with dried seaweed. I sat with them, smoking and talking to a strange young thing from Cat’s Ass, Illinois. I asked her what was on the agenda and she gave me an odd little smile....


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2. An excerpt from the horror story, "It Isn't What You Gnaw, It's Who You Gnaw" -- a tale of artists and zombies.... 

Wilma Website: Yeah, I was a Deathquaker. I suppose I still am, but I really can’t call myself one, since Dandy Voorhees isn’t around anymore.

The Deathquakers without Dandy? Unthinkable! That would be like the Youthquakers from the Sixties without Andy Warhol. Everybody knows that Dandy modeled his every movement, every utterance, every moment of his existence after Andy Warhol. Andy was an artist and a genius, and so was Dandy. But Dandy gave everything a dark twist – a Goth sensibility – so he could take it one step beyond and call it his own.

Andy had a hangout called The Factory, with everything spray-painted silver. Dandy had The Funeral Parlor, with everything draped in black velvet. Andy had his paintings of Campbell Soup cans and his Brillo box sculptures. Dandy did the same thing with formaldehyde bottles and clove cigarette packs. Andy looked like a pathetic corpse – and Dandy...?

Like I said. He had to take everything one step beyond.

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Koko Fantastic: I was Dandy’s first friend in his town without pity, make no mistake! I was actually at the bus station when he arrived. But I wasn’t there to see Dandy. I didn’t even know who he was. No one did.

No, I was arguing with my boyfriend at the time, whose name I will not even allow to cross my lips, because he was leaving town and he still owed me at least three or four thousand dollars. I was just yelling and yelling at him, telling him I was going to hunt him down like a dog, when out of the corner of my eye I saw this scrawny little white-haired man-child with sunglasses and skin three shades whiter than an onion. He was wearing some kind of tattered black-velvet suit that was falling apart at the seams.

I looked at that little piece of ghost-meat and said, “Freak, what’s your story?”

He just pointed behind me and said, “Gee! That guy’s getting away.”

I turned around and sure enough, the bus was pulling away from the curb. I just sank to the ground and started crying, and damned if that skinny-assed albino shrimp didn’t sit himself down next to me and start crying, too.

“Oh, now don’t you start,” I said. “You’re so skinny, you’ll leak out all your water and turn to dust. Why are you crying anyway? You don’t know me. ”

“I can’t help it,” he said in that soft ghost-voice of this. “Gee, you’re just so beautiful I can’t stand to see you so sad. What’s your name?”

I told him my name. My real name, that is. He shook his head. “That’s all wrong for you. Your name should be Koko Fantastic. A beautiful lady should have a beautiful name.”

Well now, of course I know I’m beautiful. But sadly, most folks don’t appreciate that fact. They think a woman over three-hundred pounds has just gotta be – shall we say, less than pleasing to the eye. I thought little ghosty-boy was really sweet ... and very observant ... so I told him he could stay at my place for a few weeks. I took that name he gave me, and it turned my life around. His stay turned from weeks into years, but that was no problem, because by then, he was a force to be reckoned with, and I was high and mighty among his Chosen Ones – the Deathquakers....


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3. Finally, here's an excerpt from "Agatha Says" -- a tale of the ageless evil that lurks in a retirement home....

Dear Irene,

Merry (belated) Christmas, and thank you, thank you, thank you for the new gloves! Sorry I haven’t written for so long, but so much has been going on.

Bart got out of the hospital just in time to make the Christmas party. Did I mention that the nurse who hit him had to go to the hospital, too? For stitches in her hand and her scalp. Carl opened her head up with that cane. No charges were pressed against him. What are they going to do – send a 78-year-old man to prison? Needless to say, the nurse is not returning to Fern Hill.

For the party, the music teacher from Sloane High School brought down some kids to sing carols in the rec room. While they were singing I looked around and realized that Agatha wasn’t there, so I snuck back to her room to fetch her.

When I got to her door I forgot to knock. I simply walked right in and there she was, stark naked and wearing that cat mask. She was standing in the middle of the room, mumbling some made-up song and moving her hands around, like she was conducting an orchestra or something. She’d drawn all kinds of funny little pictures on the floor in chalk, too. Of course she had to be drunk – her and that rum. What else could it be? I was about to say something – what, I don’t know! – when I saw there were no eyeholes in the mask. She didn’t even know I was there, so I backed out and shut the door. I’m sure she’d die of embarrassment if she knew I saw her carrying on like that.

I’ll tell you this: for a woman in her late sixties, Agatha has some body on her. None of the chicken skin you see around here. She must have had it lifted. You know that fat they suck out of liposuction patients? I wonder why they can’t pump it into skinny people. Bernice’s bony old butt sure could use some extra padding. Yours, too – those snapshots you sent have me worried. You’re still the prettiest gal I know, but you could stand to pack on a few pounds. Joseph looks like he’s picking up weight again (he must be eating off your plate too!). I wish they could take some of Joseph’s spare tire and give it to you.

Agatha never did come to the party. I told everyone she was sick. After the students left there was a problem – Celeste slapped the supervisor on duty for telling her not to eat so many cookies. Agatha had given Celeste a whole box of cookies that morning, which was a little irresponsible, since Celeste is on a restricted diet (cancer everywhere, the poor dear). After that slap, the supervisor simply stood there, utterly shocked. Then his nose started bleeding. Celeste just shuffled off with her cookies.

Then – I don’t know what got into us! – we were all laughing and laughing while the supervisor stuffed tissues up his nose. He must have quit since that was the last we saw of him.

A few days later, Agatha announced that negotiations were final. Fern Hill was now Stone Manor. After that, everything started to change, just like Agatha said.

New carpeting, a big-screen TV in the rec room – this week Bernice and I are having our room completely redone. And it’s not costing us extra! I hope there isn’t a catch. Still, Agatha hasn’t made us sign anything, and she is rich. Didn’t Elvis used to give away Cadillacs to complete strangers?

Agatha also brought down that nutritionist of hers. He’s going to be working here full-time, fixing our meals. Some health expert – he’s as white as a fish-belly. There’s something wrong with his eyes, too. They look like blue glass marbles. Agatha swears by him, but I have my doubts.

For one thing, he’s always asking us for urine samples and little clips of our hair. He says he’s checking us for vitamin deficiencies. I just hope he washes his hands before he starts dinner.....


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You can also find out more about the story collection HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS at:
FACEBOOK
http://www.facebook.com/HideousFacesB...


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Here for your reading pleasure is HER HORRIBLE APARTMENT, a complete story from my story collection, HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS. Here’s a link to the collection’s page on Amazon.com, in case you’d like to learn more about the book:

http://www.amazon.com/Hideous-Faces-B...


Her Horrible Apartment
by Mark McLaughlin

As soon as she came through the door, she told us she'd found an apartment at the mall. This didn't seem to make any sense, but everybody smiled and said how lucky she was, and so we made plans to see the place after work. We even decided to make a little party of the occasion.

I liked my job – computer graphics – but the workload was very boring that day: plopping copy into the same old newsletter formats. She walked by my desk on her way to the copying machine, and I thought: she's so skinny. She's starving herself like one of those scrawny fashion models. She was a pretty girl, and a very nice person, but I didn't find her attractive. Her skinny neck and nervous eye movements were too birdlike.

At break time, I went down to the vending machine area and there she was, sipping steaming black coffee from a styrofoam cup.

"So. The mall." I gave her the most encouraging grin I could muster. "You'll be shopping like crazy."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm right next to my favorite store, The Bracelet Hut. It's like heaven."

I looked at her wrists. She was wearing dozens of thin bracelets – plastic, copper, gold, beaded. Had she always worn so many? Probably so.

"Lot of food places at the mall... Hope you don't have a pest problem." I meant rats, of course, but I didn't want to scare her.

"There are some bugs, but that's okay." She shrugged. "Nothing's perfect. Only stupid people expect things to be perfect."

After work, I drove to a discount liquor store for some wine, then headed for the mall. I was pretty proud of myself: the wine I'd bought was a dirt-cheap German vintage with a long name. Everyone at the party would think it was so chic.

The shoppers were out in full force, and I had to park a long way from the mall entrance. As I walked across the lot, a heavyset blonde woman sneered at me, and I suddenly realized that I probably looked like some kind of bum, carrying around a bottle in a paper bag.

Inside, I located The Bracelet Hut on a directory display (it was practically at the other end of the mall) and began walking again. After a while, I noticed that people were staring at me. Staring with looks of disgust. Of pity. I slipped into a menswear store and found a mirror.

My suit was all dirty and torn. My face was covered with dark stubble. There were dark circles around my eyes. I thought to myself, Oh, this must be a dream, and tried to wake up. And–

Nothing happened.

I left the menswear store and said "Damn!" – because men swear. Well, I was dirty and a little scary, but no matter: I was only dreaming. Probably. I hurried along to the party, the silly little party for her silly little apartment at the mall.

I passed Doughnut Heaven and Makeup Madness and and Love Them Computers and a lot of other stupid stores. I stopped for a moment to look through the door of a store called Measure Your Pleasure: inside, naked men were gauging their privates with golden rulers.

I just laughed. Oh, I HAD to be dreaming!

Finally, I found The Bracelet Hut – and next to it, a dusky-pink door with the words Her Apartment on it. I knocked and she let me in.

The apartment was nothing more than a converted men's room, complete with urinals (she'd planted flowers in them). A dozen or so middle-aged men in blue coveralls were standing about, laughing, drinking, gobbling hors d'oeuvres, pretending they were going to pee on the flowers. Each man was holding a blue lawn rake.

I turned to her and said, "Who are these guys? Where are the folks from work?"

Her eyes were very sad. "These are the exterminators. I had to cancel the party because of the bug problem. But please, don't let the snacks go to waste." She crossed to a side table and returned with a trayful of cocktail weenies. "So why aren't you wearing any clothes?"

I looked down in utter shock: I was naked, caked with dirt, and my toenails needed trimming. Everyone in the room turned toward me and laughed. Except her: she simply sighed.

Suddenly, fat, moist-looking iridescent bugs began to scurry around the room. They had way too many legs and bulging compound eyes. They seemed to be talking to each other in a shrill little buggy language. As I watched them, I realized that a form of nausea very close to car-sickness was building inside of me.

One of the exterminators, a tall man with red hair and a redder face, handed me a rake. "Make yourself useful, ya bum," he said.

I looked around and saw that all the other men were chasing the bugs, slicing them to bits by passing the rake-teeth over them. I sliced up a few of the slower bugs, and hated doing it. Sure, the slimy freaks were utterly loathsome, but they were still living beings. My nausea became so intense that finally, I had to crouch in a corner and breathe deeply to keep from vomiting.

"Don't do that," said the red-haired man, pulling me to my feet. "Are you crazy, letting your butt drag so close to the floor? One of those bugs could have crawled up there, and then..." He made a face – a disgusted yet smirkingly knowing face – and returned to the task of bug-raking. More and more of the creatures were crawling about. Soon they were joined by frogs, scorpions and lizards, all multi-colored, all dewy with slime. Thin rivulets of steaming ichor flowed across the floor as more of the little horrors were sliced up. A hot, farty smell filled the air.

My skinny hostess took my hand. "Let's go," she said. "We don't want to get in their way."

As we were heading out the door, I looked back for a second, just in time to see an iguana force its way down the red-haired man's throat. The look in his eyes was – well, I suppose it was one of pleasure. There are so many different kinds of pleasure, and oddly enough, some of them aren't all that pleasant.

She led me next door to the Bracelet Hut, where the clerks were fighting off glistening Komodo dragons. She loaded down her wrists with gold and platinum, pearls and diamonds. Then we zipped across the corridor to Chick-Chick-Chicken, where we helped ourselves to some tasty hot wings. The fry-boys were too busy to stop us: they had their hands full, smacking rainbow-hued crocodiles with brooms.

We sat by the fountain in the middle of the mall's Food Court, licking wing-sauce off each other's fingers.

"I can't believe we're doing this," I said. "It's not like we love each other or anything like that."

"Well, we are friends, aren't we?" The tone of her voice was borderline frantic. "Everything's going to hell and it would be nice to face the end with a friend."

I looked – really looked at her. Sure, she resembled a sad, skinny little bird, but this particular bird needed me. Needed my support. My understanding.

I cradled her face in my hands. "For a while now, I've been thinking that this whole day has been one big bad dream. Not mine, not yours... Maybe the God of Slimy Things is taking a nap. Why don't we just wait and see what happens? It sure can't get any worse."

She flashed a cheery smile, revealing hundreds of thin, sharp iridescent teeth. "Okay."

-

A link to HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS on GoodReads:
Hideous Faces, Beautiful Skulls

When I was growing up and my family visited my grandmother, who lived in the city, she would give me money for buying books at a bookstore a few blocks down from her building. I bought a lot of wonderful old books, including horror anthologies with classic stories by H.P. Lovecraft, August Derleth, Donald Wandrei and others.

Also, on other occasions, my parents would leave me at a library when they went shopping (looking back, not very responsible parenting), and when they did, I would always read short horror stories at that library, since I never had time to read anything longer.

Short tales of horror were a big part of my boring rural childhood -- they allowed me to escape into exciting realms of the imagination. That's probably why I've written so many hundreds of short horror stories over the years for various magazines, anthologies, and of course, my own story collections.

If I had to say which of my stories was my favorite ... well, that would be like asking a parent with many kids to name their best child. But I suppose I could name my favorite story in each of my three most recent collections.

Hideous Faces, Beautiful Skulls

In HIDEOUS FACES, BEAUTIFUL SKULLS, my favorite story is "Adroitly Wrapped," which had previously been reprinted in YEAR'S BEST HORROR XXII. It's my favorite because I enjoyed writing about Athena Moth, the shape-shifting witch in the story.


Best Little Witch-House in Arkham

In BEST LITTLE WITCH-HOUSE IN ARKHAM, my favorite story is "When We Was Flab," a Lovecraftian tale of a pop group called The Vittles. It's my favorite because I enjoyed writing about the tale's villain, Hekuuna, who brings the band closer together than ever before -- in a truly unexpected way.


Beach Blanket Zombie: Weird Tales of the Undead and Other Humanoid Horrors

In BEACH BLANKET ZOMBIE, my favorite story is a science-fiction horror story called "Tell Your Secrets to the Slime," about a planet inhabited by a shapeless horror that can bring about a bizarre change in other life-forms. It's my favorite because that vile change, hideous though it may seem, proves beneficial to one of the more unsavory characters.

Of course, my favorite horror story *of all time* would have to be H.P. Lovecraft's "The Dunwich Horror," since it was in one of those early anthologies I read as a child, and it creeped me out in the best possible way. When I read it today, I do realize it's dated and a bit clunky in its dispersal of exposition, but who cares?! It's still a wonderfully weird tale, and Wilbur Whateley is a marvelous monster-man. Hey, ya gotta love a creature with rudimentary eyes deepset in its hips! The works of H.P. Lovecraft have provided me with so many hours of quality entertainment, and I will always be in awe of his feverishly bizarre imagination.