Stephen Jones - The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror. Volume 23

Grimscribe: His Lives and Work was a revised and “definitive” edition of Thomas Ligotti’s 1991 collection of fourteen stories, which was also available in a signed leatherbound edition.

Subterranean also reissued The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard , illustrated by Greg Staples, as both a limited slipcased edition ($150.00) and a fifty-copy leatherbound deluxe edition ($400.00).

With an Introduction by Norman Partridge, Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper contained Robert Bloch’s classic story along with the novel The Night of the Ripper , the Star Trek teleplay Wolf in the Fold , and Bloch’s Foreword to the anthology Ripper! .

The Juniper Tree and Other Blue Rose Stories contained four loosely connected stories by Peter Straub, plus an interview with the author by Bill Sheehan. It was available in a regular hardcover edition and as a 250-copy leatherbound, signed edition.

The Ballad of Ballard and Sandrine was a surreal novella from the same author, published in a deluxe hardcover edition by Subterranean Press at the very end of the year.

Cemetery Dance Publications re-issued Stephen King’s collection Full Dark, No Stars in a two-colour edition illustrated by Jill Bauman, Glenn Chadbourne, Vincent Chong and Alan M. Clark. It was published in a slipcased edition ($75.00), a leather-bound traycased edition signed by the author ($360.00) and a fifty-two copy traycased lettered edition signed by King and the artists ($1,500.00).

King and CD also teamed up for a special 25th anniversary edition of the author’s novel It . The exclusive oversized deluxe edition include the complete text, a new Afterword by the author, nearly thirty interior illustrations by Alan M. Clark and Erin Wells, and a wrap-around dust-jacket painting by Glem Orbik.

The author and publisher also issued The Secretary of Dreams (Volume Two) as an exclusive slipcased edition in a very limited print-run. Not available in stores, the hardcover collected more of King’s classic tales, illustrated by Glenn Chadbourne.

The Century’s Best Horror Fiction was published by Cemetery Dance in two huge volumes, covering the years 1901–1950 and 1951–2000 . Editor John Pelan selected one representative story for every year of the twentieth century.

As if Pelan’s volumes were not enough of a treat for horror fans, CD also brought out The Horror Hall of Fame: The Stoker Winners edited with an Introduction by Joe R. Lansdale. Covering the first decade of the HWA’s annual award, which began in 1988, the volume featured contributions from George R. R. Martin, Alan Rodgers, Elizabeth Massie, David B. Silva, Nancy Holder, David Morrell, Robert Bloch, Thomas Ligotti, Harlan Ellison and others, including the editor himself. Each story was illustrated by the busy Glenn Chadbourne.

Edited by Kelly Laymon, Steve Gerlach and Richard Chizmar, Laymon’s Terms was a large anthology of forty tribute stories and forty-five appreciations to the late Richard Laymon, along with various pieces by Laymon from his own files, including six stories and four poems. It was available in trade edition ($50.00), a 400-copy slipcased edition signed by most of the contributors ($150.00) and a fifty-two copy lettered and traycased edition ($400.00).

Illustrated by Vincent Chong, Jay Bonansinga’s futuristic Lovecraftian novelette The Miniaturist was the eighth volume in the “Cemetery Dance Signature” series, limited to a 550-copy signed edition and twenty-six traycased, leatherbound lettered copies.

Picking the Bones collected seventeen stories (three original) by Brian Hodge, while the long-delayed Stories from the Plague Years collected nine long stories (two original) by Michael Marano, illustrated by Gabrielle Faust. John Shirley supplied the Introduction.

Kin was a serial killer novel by Kealan Patrick Burke, available in an edition of 750 signed copies, and CD also reprinted Simon Clark’s 1997 novel King Blood and Edward Lee’s 2008 novel Bride of the Impaler in 1,000-copy signed editions and limited traycased, leatherbound editions.

Cemetery Dance also issued an omnibus of William Peter Blatty’s novels The Exorcist and Legion , illustrated by Keith Minnion and featuring an interview with the author by Brian Freeman. The book was available in a 750-copy signed edition and a lettered, traycased and leatherbound edition of fifty-two copies ($400.00).

Richard Matheson’s Nightmare at 20,000 Feet from Gauntlet Press collected the original story along with scripts for the Twilight Zone TV version and the movie adaptation, illustrated with storyboards and photos. Contributors included William Shatner, Richard Donner, Carol Serling and Richard Christian Matheson, amongst others, and the book was available in a bewildering number of different editions, ranging from $50.00 up to a signed deluxe version priced at $1,000.00.

Dawn to Dust included two unproduced screenplays, two drafts of a teleplay and a previously unpublished short story by Ray Bradbury, along with various ephemeral material and an Introduction by the author. Edited with a Preface by Donn Albright, the book was available in three states, with the lettered and traycased edition ($250.00) also containing unused sketches and fragments from The Illustrated Man .

Also from Gauntlet, J. N. Williamson’s Illustrated Masques , edited by Mort Castle and David Campiti, presented graphic adaptations of eight stories that originally appeared in the late Williamson’s Masques anthologies by Stephen King, Robert R. McCammon, Robert Weinberg, F. Paul Wilson, Paul Dale Anderson, Wayne Allen Sallee and two by co-editor Castle, who also supplied a Preface. A fifty-two copy lettered and signed edition cost $1,500.00.

Earthling Publications produced The Very Best of Best New Horror: A Twenty-Year Celebration edited by Stephen Jones in 300 numbered copies signed by the editor, and a 200-copy slip-cased edition ($250.00) signed by all the contributors, including Stephen King, Peter Straub, Harlan Ellison, Clive Barker, Neil Gaiman and Joe Hill.

Peter Crowther’s By Wizard Oak was a Halloween novel from Earthling with an Introduction by Rick Hautala.

From new imprint Flying Fox Publishers, Portents , edited with an Introduction by Al Sarrantonio, was inspired by the “quiet horror” of Charles L. Grant’s Shadows series. The anthology was limited to 1,000 numbered hardcovers and featured nineteen original stories by Joe R. Lansdale, Gene Wolfe, Kim Newman, Brian Keene, Elizabeth Massie, Ramsey Campbell, Steve Rasnic Tem, Joyce Carol Oates, Christopher Fowler and others, along with a Foreword by Stephen Jones.

John Hornor Jacobs’ debut novel Southern Gods , from Night Shade Books, involved the search for a legendary bluesman, Ramblin’ John Hastur, whose music reputedly sent men mad and caused the dead to rise.

Jonathan Wood’s No Hero was another debut novel, about an Oxford police detective recruited to battle tentacled Lovecraftian horrors.

On the same theme, editor Ross E. Lockhart’s The Book of Cthulhu collected twenty-seven tales (two original) by Ramsey Campbell, David Drake, Caitlín R. Kiernan, Thomas Ligotti, Joe R. Lansdale, Cherie Priest, Bruce Sterling, Gene Wolfe and other, more surprising, contributors to the Mythos.

The Panama Laugh was a zombie novel by Thomas S. Roche, while J. M. Lassen edited the YA anthology Z: Zombie Stories containing eleven stories (one original) by Kelly Link, Nina Kiriki Hoffman and Scott Nicholson, amongst others.