One of the many joys of reading is the experience of coming
across an author for the first time and connecting immediately with the
writing. There may be a brief moment of self-flagellation for not discovering
the writer sooner but this is soon overwhelmed by the enjoyment of the reading
itself and also by the realisation that a back catalogue is already there,
waiting to be devoured.
Such was the case when I read The Nameless Dark, a collection of stories from T E Grau. This is
his first collection and I have to say it’s an extremely impressive showcase
for his undoubted talent.
There are fourteen stories in the book, employing a variety
of locations and set in a range of time periods. Here you’ll find stories set
in the Wild West, during the Beat Generation and Colonial era America amongst
others. Three of the stories have children as their main character but the
writing in each (and all of the other stories) is assured, authentic and of the
highest quality with each story – and the characters therein – having their own
distinctive voices.
It’s a collection of horror stories but there’s wit here
too, a dark humour that threads its way through the stories, raising smiles
amidst the shudders. It’s there in the dialogue, in the descriptions of the
characters populating these tales – a description of someone being “the shape
and consistency of a potato” made me laugh out loud.
The spirit of HP Lovecraft informs many of the stories here,
his mythology looming above the narrative like a shadow over Innsmouth. Anyone
who thinks the Cosmic Horrors conjured up in the Cthulhu mythos have been done
to death need look no further than this collection to see that new life can be
breathed into it with nine of the fourteen tales referencing it directly and
placing it in new contexts and environments to brilliant effect. The stories
here are set pre-, post- and during the moment at which the stars become “right”
and the two most effective for me fall into the latter category – The Screamer, with its banshee-like
eponymous creature heralding the apocalypse in a beautifully written
slow-burner of a tale that builds to a truly horrifying climax and Twinkle, Twinkle – one of the shorter stories
in the collection but which brilliantly frames the end of the world in a
poignant and moving tale.
It’s testament to Ted’s skills as a writer that the tropes
never become worn out or repetitive, filtered as they are through the variety
of narrative styles he employs. The other five “non-Lovecraftian” stories
provide entertaining interludes and here you’ll find riffs on Kafka, Fairy
Tales and Werewolves, Jack the Ripper and a novel way of fishing…
I feel I can’t recommend The
Nameless Dark highly enough. The stories and characters created here are
worthy of the highest critical acclaim and the writing itself is a joy to read.
You can (and should) buy it here.
