HAUNTED AIR Ossian Brown
Jonathan Cape It’s tough to explain how com- pelling yet creepy this book of vintage Halloween costume photos is – you need to hold its gorgeous binding in your hands to properly grasp its haunting power. Skeletons, devils, witches, ghosts and an assortment of unintentionally disturbing masks stare back from the past to deeply uncanny effect. All this and an intro by David Lynch makes Haunted Air a macabre must-have.
DAVE ALEXANDER
WEIRDO HALLOWEEN R.L. Stine Scholastic This latest special edition of Goosebumps Horrorland is longer than a typical install- ment, but its twisted, seg- mented plot confuses rather than enriches the story. When twins Chris and Meg return home from a trip to Horrorland, they discover they are being stalked by an annoying, destructive alien that won’t leave them alone – and he demands backrubs(!). Awkward pacing and a vacuous, forget- table plot make this feel more like a Halloween trick than a treat.
GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND: JESSA SOBCZUK
UNDEAD John Austin Chicago Review Press From the first instruction of “Don’t eat this book,” this guide for the freshly zombified is the flipside to the litany of survival manuals available for weathering a zed- head apocalypse. At 146 pages, the one-joke ap- proach flogs a dead horse pretty hard but proper lurching techniques, a nutrition guide and an anno- tated history would sure be handy if you ever found yourself a member of the Brainy Bunch. TREVOR TUMINSKI
SO NOW YOU’RE A ZOMBIE: A HANDBOOK FOR THE NEWLY
Night of the Living Dead: Behind the Scenes of the Most Terrifying Zombie Movie Ever
A. Romero’s zombie films, but Joe Kane’s Night of the Living Dead: Behind the Scenes of the Most Ter- rifying Zombie Movie Ever is one of only a couple of tomes to hone in specifically on the auteur’s debut feature. That said, the parts of the book that focus on Night of the Living Dead itself are fascinating and provide
a wealth of information. The standout first chapter, for instance, explores the precedents to Night, then gives the film cinematic context, examining why the appearance of flesh-eating zombies onscreen was revolutionary, and how it drove the social consciousness of horror culture forward. In the chapters that follow, all of the principal cast members, as well as many of the secondary players, are profiled and in- terviewed, and the technical and artistic challenges of making a creepy movie with so little money are outlined. After reading about how co-writer John Russo volunteered to be set on fire without safety gear for the Molotov cocktail sequence, it is even easier to appreciate the passion and dedication of the cast and crew. It was an excitement that spilled over to the local community, as well, as illustrated in an an- ecdote that describes how more than residents from Evans County answered the casting call for extras. Many ended up as zombies. Others were cast as posse members, who provided their own weapons for the shoot. However, despite its title and impressive start, the book ends up being less about the iconic film than
about Romero, his cohorts and the culture Night of the Living Dead created in its wake, with a large chunk of the proceedings dedicated to Night’s sequels, knock-offs and redos. Whether you find much worth in these latter chapters largely depends on how much of an obsessed fan you are, but even if your fandom begins and ends with Night it is still interesting to see how much subsequent creative out- put, both good and bad, was inspired by a single film.
JASON DICKSON THE FALL The Fall, Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan’s follow-up to The Strain, not only changes everything
we’ve come to know in this stellar vampire series, it dazzles the reader with a kinetic narrative that sacrifices none of the vivid character development that was established in the first book. The new novel picks up immediately following the events of The Strain as a geometric vampiric wave
spreads outward from New York City, with only a small resistance movement, led by CDC scientist Eph Goodweather and Holocaust survivor Abraham Setrakian, that knows the truth. Making matters worse for the newly ordained vampire hunters is the inexplicable complicity of key officials in the upper tiers
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