Conan - Lord of the Mount

British publisher Titan Books began licensing Robert E. Howard's Conan character from Heroic Signatures in 2022. The publisher has been very active in printing a new series of Conan the Barbarian comics and The Savage Sword of Conan magazine. In addition, the publisher has thrust the character into novels and novellas like S.M. Stirling's Blood of the Serpent. In 2023 the publisher launched a series of ebook short stories dedicated to Conan and other characters like Solomon Kane and Belit titled Heroic Legends. The first of the stories was Conan: Lord of the Mount, published in September 2023 as an ebook and authored by Stephen Graham Jones (Night of the Mannequins, I Was a Teenage Slasher).

In this 23-page story, Conan awakens as a cow is licking his face. He has no clear memory of what has happened to him other than he was engaged in battle with the Two Kings' army. A cattle farmer named Jen Ro is nearby and he explains that he thought Conan was another sacrifice to something called Lord of the Mount. Jen Ro then uses some sort of magical black lotus to cut a piece of steak from a live cow. Weird. Just weird.

Jen Ro advises Conan that if he will ride with him and the cattle through a mountain pass then he will bring him to the fabled village of Trinnecerl where “your cup will never run dry”. The catch is that Conan will kill this aggravating creature deemed Lord of the Mount. 

The duo venture through the pass and Conan fights the creature(s). He learns that Jen Ro had a reason for leading him to the creature and the reader is left with this very forgettable story. 

Needless to say, this may be one of the worst Conan stories I've read this far. It was shocking to me considering that Stephen Graham Jones, a quality writer, wrote this kind of uninspired drivel. While I've read some mixed reviews of these new Titan shorts, I had no idea that it would be this underwhelming. Or, how someone like Jones became involved in this. He clearly has no understanding of the Conan character. An example would be in this scene when the creature claws Conan's stomach: “Conan screamed, rolled away, and when he came down it was to nearly impale himself on the faint purple horns of a long-dead cow or bull.” Two words - “Conan screamed”. That doesn't happen. 

Conan's dialogue and mannerisms fail to match what fans have come to expect from the mighty Cimmerian. Granted, every author has a unique perspective on the characteristics and traits, but they should still have a uniform scope to preserve the integrity of the character and series. Despite the identification issues, the story just isn't that interesting. 

Conan: Lord of the Mount is nothing short of abysmal. Even at the $2 price point it isn't worth the pixels it possesses.

Night of the Mannequins

Texas-born Stephen Graham Jones (b. 1972) contributes to horror, crime, and science-fiction genres. He has earned critical praise for his novels The Only Good Indians and My Heart is a Chainsaw. He is also a multiple winner of the Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson literary awards. Reading the praise, I jumped into his novella Night of the Mannequins not only to experience Jones for the first time, but also because mannequins are downright terrifying.

There isn't a lot to this little story. The plot is fairly simple and straight-forward. A kid named Sawyer is killing off his friends to protect their families from being killed by a mannequin. But, to jump to that extremity, there are events leading up to this.

Sawyer and his friends find a discarded dummy in the forest. “Manny” becomes the group mascot and gets hauled around from place to place kinda like Pete the Pup in The Little Rascals – only Pete was real and this mannequin isn't. However, for Sawyer that all changes. 

The group play a joke on their friend at the theater and place Manny in a seat, then they go complain to management that somebody in the crowd is being too loud. But, the joke is on Sawyer when he witnesses Manny getting out of his seat and walking out of the theater. Is Manny real? Is IT alive? 

Sawyer believes that one of his friends, and their family members, is run over in the street by Manny. He also believes Manny is stealing food from the neighborhood and eating in some hunkered-down locale in the woods. It's really out there man. But, to protect all of the innocent family members from being murdered, Sawyer decides he will just take a less violent approach and kill his friends before Manny can. If his friends can't be slashed to death by the slasher, then innocent lives will be spared.

Night of the Mannequins is a goofy serial-killer-slasher novel that is told from Sawyer's perspective. I have a minor beef with these types of stories because I don't want to be trapped in the mind of a lunatic. Some readers, and horror fans, love this sort of thing. I'm borderline with it. I like that Jones knows how to get into the story and get out quickly, leaving a short space here to do his thing. At 144 pages, this book is a real breeze that's enjoyable and fun without any excess baggage. Recommended.

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Burnt Offerings

Horror luminaries Stephen King and Bentley Little have both acknowledged Burnt Offerings as an influence on their writing. The novel, authored by Robert Marasco, was originally published in 1973 and adapted into an MGM film in 1976. The book is available now as a reprint through Valancourt Books with an introduction by Stephen Graham Jones. 

In the book, Ben and Marian Rolfe live in the crowded city of Queens, New York and are barely surviving the day to day hustle and bustle of work, marriage, and parenthood. The city is consuming them, eating away their existence and crushing their dreams and aspirations. Ben realizes this isn't a place to raise their young son David. In hopes of a fantastic family summer, Marian begins searching the classified ads for a summer place they can rent with their meager budget. Ben works as a professor, so Memorial Day through Labor Day affords them the opportunity to get away from it all. 

Marian locates an advertisement for a summer house in upstate New York. It's an appealing invitation of private beach, pool, dock, magnificent views, and the price, while not disclosed, suggests it might be affordable. The three drive up for the weekend to visit the place and negotiate with the owners. Their arrival proves to be disappointing. 

The house, which is a 30-room mansion, is in disarray. The once lush landscape is now dead, the exterior is crumbling, and the inside is dusty, ancient, and clearly neglected. But, it has potential and could be a great way to spend a summer vacation. The house is owned by Mrs. Allardyce and her elderly son and daughter. The deal works out to just $900 for the whole summer - a bargain if there ever was one. The only catch is that the Rolfes will be sharing the house with Mrs. Allardyce, a frail, sickly woman that lives in the west wing of the house. Her children explain that she doesn't leave her room and rarely makes an appearance. The Rolfes just need to leave a tray of food for her three times per day. This burden isn't that heavy.

Once the Rolfes settle into the house for the summer, their family ties begin to deteriorate. Marian begins to spend more and more time on the west wing cleaning. Ben begins a descent into madness, peaking as he attempts to drown David in the pool. Marian and Ben's relationship unravels, but oddly, the house begins to come alive with new paint and landscaping. The house is growing as the Rolfes sacrifice their happiness and love. Who's the master and servant? Is the house haunted? Is Mrs. Allardyce even real? These are the questions that arise throughout the book's haunting narrative.

American Nightmares: The Haunted House Formula in American Popular Fiction, by Dale Bailey, compares Burnt Offerings with a later novel, Anne River's Siddon's The House Next Door and of course, the staple of 1970s haunted house fiction, Jay Anson's The Amityville Horror. I've now read all three, and while I still prefer Anson's dark and twisted narrative, Marasco's work is much grimmer and intelligent, dwelling on a biblical emphasis of sacrifice and loyalty. There's a deep social subtext to Marasco's storytelling – the price of happiness, humanity's lust for material things, the financial burdens of average Americans, the limits of sacrifice, and the strains of the family dynamic in modern culture. 

The family's descent into despair is a heart-wrenching spectacle for readers, especially considering these characters are so easily likable in the book's opening chapters. The mystery involving the west wing was captivating, leading me to question whether some of the events happening were real or just a malevolent facade. Mrs. Allardyce's identity was like a dangling carrot, suspended for readers to finally uncover in the book's closing pages. The house, a character unto itself, was remarkably detailed to enhance the transformation from ruin to prosperity. 

Stephen King, as he acknowledged, probably owes a great deal to Marasco for the success of his 1977 novel The Shining, published just four years after Burnt Offerings. Like Marasco's plot, King replaces the Rolfes with the Torrance family, equally introduced as a strained married couple raising their young son. King transfers the location of a 30-room mansion in upstate New York to the empty Overlook Hotel in Colorado. Ben Rolfe is struggling with a text, like Jack Torrance's frustrated efforts to finish writing a manuscript. Marasco utilizes a deep swimming pool as an eventful place where young David faces death. King uses the mysterious hotel room 217 to captivate Danny Torrance (and a bathtub to be technical). Alternatively, Marian's fascination with the door to Mrs. Allardyce's room is similar to Danny often approaching 217's door. In other words, I hope King cut Marasco a check. 

Burnt Offerings is an abstract horror novel, working on a psychological level that is crafted with expertise. As an entry in the overpopulated “haunted dwelling” sub-genre, it is easily in the upper echelon of mandatory reads along with the aforementioned The Amityville Horror, The House Next Door and pioneering efforts like Richard Matheson's Hell House, Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, and Henry James' The Turn of the Screw. Unfortunately, Marasco didn't pursue another horror novel that I'm aware of. To quote John Carpenter, “I guess everyone's entitled to one good scare.” 

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