A Dirge for the Temporal
Darren Speegle Raw Dog Screaming
Press/ 208 pages / $14.95
ISBN: 0974503134
I plowed through a dozen small press collections from as many
less-than-well-established writers before finding this dark gem. There's
a good chance I might have missed it altogether -- as I'm sure other
reviewers may have -- due to its cover. The cover -- sort of a reddish
x-ray of a brooding demonic being -- is not without artistry, but
combine it with a publisher that has dubbed itself Raw Dog Screaming
Press, an unfamiliar writer, and the first impression is, at worst, "Oh
yuck. Another one of those." At best, you would assume it is "extreme
horror." Once past mistaken impressions, however, you'll find
atmospheric and hallucinatory stories from a writer of considerable
poetic power. Speegle's stories are eerie rather than extreme and more
subtle than splat-filled. A theme running through many is that of past
sins and forgotten transgressions that return to haunt, but even within
this category there is considerable variety. The intensity of the
entries usually compensate for their brevity, but occasionally Speegle
produces a vignette where a complete story would have better displayed
his skill and intent. (He could also learn a great deal from studying
the meticulous structure underlying masterwriter Thomas Ligotti's work.)
The author is relatively new to the field and his evidently prolific
output -- this is a second collection and the 34 (!) short selections
here have all been published in the last there years - has been
primarily published, so far, in fairly obscure publications. There's a
good chance you'll be hearing more about and from him in the future.
I plowed through a dozen small press collections from as many
less-than-well-established writers before finding this dark gem. There's
a good chance I might have missed it altogether -- as I'm sure other
reviewers may have -- due to its cover. The cover -- sort of a reddish
x-ray of a brooding demonic being -- is not without artistry, but
combine it with a publisher that has dubbed itself Raw Dog Screaming
Press, an unfamiliar writer, and the first impression is, at worst, "Oh
yuck. Another one of those." At best, you would assume it is "extreme
horror." Once past mistaken impressions, however, you'll find
atmospheric and hallucinatory stories from a writer of considerable
poetic power. Speegle's stories are eerie rather than extreme and more
subtle than splat-filled. A theme running through many is that of past
sins and forgotten transgressions that return to haunt, but even within
this category there is considerable variety. The intensity of the
entries usually compensate for their brevity, but occasionally Speegle
produces a vignette where a complete story would have better displayed
his skill and intent. (He could also learn a great deal from studying
the meticulous structure underlying masterwriter Thomas Ligotti's work.)
The author is relatively new to the field and his evidently prolific
output -- this is a second collection and the 34 (!) short selections
here have all been published in the last there years - has been
primarily published, so far, in fairly obscure publications. There's a
good chance you'll be hearing more about and from him in the future.