Riding the Omnibus

I bought some books by my favourite author, Graham Masterton, recently. One particularly difficult one called "Innocent Blood" I had to order from Amazon.com. I waited and then they cancelled it, can't get it in paperback. That sent me looking for used copies. Oh, I can get used copies, but the prices start at $100 US for a paperback. Man oh man, I love his books, but that's crazy. Why exactly do people think they can get that price? I then did what any fan of Masterton would do, I went to Amazon.co.uk. Same deal there. No new paperbacks, used copies, same pricey range. Okay, fine then, I thought to myself. How about hard cover? Amazon.com had 1 copy left. I'm expecting it any day now.

Now as to other books of his. Some browsing at Amazon.co.uk awarded me with some of the old books—out of the fiction ones, as opposed to his huge selection of horror novels. These old books have been given new life in Omnibus editions. What's an omnibus you ask? It's more than one novel printed as a single book. There is only one front cover, one spine, and one back cover. Most omnibus (the word is plural in Latin already) books, or omnibuses (in English anyway) in my experience contain three books/novels. Sometimes they are two like my new, obviously recently printed copy of "Corroboree" and "Empress" together. Other times they are large four like my used, but perfect, new condition copy of "Tengu", "The Devils of D-Day", "The Mirror", and "Charnel House" together. Just to be showy I'll add that I scored a new recent printing stand-alone copy of Famine too.

Some omnibuses have their stories collected on a thematic basis, whether or not they are all stories written by the same author, or different authors. On a tangential note those movies which are more than one self-contained or semi-related stories can also be called omnibuses though they typically go by the more common name of anthologies. Of course some books are called anthologies as well, though I believe those are collections of only short stories. A prime example would be the Hot Blood anthologies (Hot Blood, Hotter Blood, Hottest Blood, each with more than one volume). Other than Graham Masterton in the UK (the omnibuses anyway) the only other author I've seen omnibus books for is Dean Koontz, but that was a while ago and in hard cover.

Mood: lethargic.
Music: Innocent Exile by Iron Maiden and All By Myself by Green Day.

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The Fear Relegated to Thrillers

Sorry about the last two times. I was sick and then I was trying to get over the after affects of being so sick. I thought it was only fitting that coming back I should talk about illness as one of the fears used in horror stories. For some reason, as frightening as real illness is and the fact that there are some really horrific diseases and medical conditions out there, illness is generally relegated to thrillers instead of more mainstream horror.

Some illnesses certainly lend themselves to thrillers, such as those spread on purpose as a biological weapon. Others like mysterious plagues could go either way depending upon on the nature of the plague. Certainly supernatural plagues or diseases lend themselves to horror stories better. A stand out in that arena would be a book like Graham Masterton's Night Plague. Of course we cannot forget the absolute biggest disease in horror, though only select stories refer to it as such. That disease is called vampirism.

Diseases of the mind crop up in horror stories now and then. The most famous of these toes the line between mental disease and actual supernatural phenomenon. That illness of the mind is called possession. The best thing about the novel over the story for The Exorcist is that novel never really settles on whether or not Regan is actually possessed or if it's all in her head. Certainly the telekinetic goings on do not prove anything given that in the framework of the story it could be either the demon or just a case of RSPK (recurrent spontaneous psycho-kinesis) presenting itself as just another symptom.

It is apparent that sickness can go either way, so we are left with the question, just why is it that it doesn't appear in horror more often? Does the audience—readership or viewership—prefer to avoid it because it's too real (excepting when it isn't) or do the writers—authors or screenwriters—just not want to craft such stories? What do you think?

Mood: animated.
Music: A Tyranny of Souls by Bruce Dickinson and Fright Night by Stratovarius.

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