Review: Australian Dark Fantasy & Horror #3

Ed. Angela Challis, 2009, Brimstone Press

I found it difficult to review Australian Dark Fantasy & Horror Volume 3 without simply regurgitating most of what I’d said about its predecessor, ADF&H 2007, because the latest instalment of this anthology series is every bit as wonderful as (if not better than) the last, and for virtually the same reasons. If you want to know what those reasons are, you can read that review of the earlier publication here. Yes, I’m a lazy bastard. Deal with it.

While it’s virtually impossible for any ‘Year’s Best’ anthology to include every piece of short fiction deserving of that description, ADF&H#3 at least includes a marvellous cross-section of the very best of all the varied types of horror fiction produced by Australian writers in 2008: here, you’ll find tales of zombies, giant monsters and ghosts, of alien invasion, scientific experiments gone wrong (or – more disturbingly – right), and an assortment of religious nutters, cannibals, and other people you wouldn’t want living next door to you. Style and tone also varies tremendously, ranging from quietly unsettling psychological pieces, to full-blown blockbuster-style apocalypses, to surrealist nightmares, and other, less definable terrors. The range of this anthology speaks volumes not only of the current high standard of dark writing in this country, but also of the continuing professionalism of editor Angela Challis and the good folk at Brimstone Press, who have put aside personal preferences in order to deliver an anthology that literally has something for everyone.

Of course, I ain’t that professional, and will thus mention a few personal favourites:

Rick Kennett’s ‘The Dark and What It Said’ (a tremendously frightening ghost tale that draws as much terror from the Australian bush setting as from the supernatural content); ‘The Wildflowers’ by Marty Young (ditto, and sometimes I wonder if Australian writers are doing our tourist industry any favours whatsoever); Martin Livings’ ‘There Was Darkness’ (a brutal tale of life long after the Triffids); and Miranda Siemienowicz’s ‘Lion’s Breath’ (a grotesque tale of hidden suburbia). Special mentions also go to Gary Kemble’s ‘Dead Air’ (which was really just a big, fun, Hollywood-style zombie flick in prose format), Matthew Chrulew's 'Between the Memories' (about a disturbingly erotic dysfunctional relationship), and Jason Nahrung’s ‘Kadimakara and Curlew’ (again with the scary Australian bush, and a smattering of scary indigenous folklore – plus one hell of a scary big beastie), but truly, it was difficult to rate even those I’ve mentioned here above any of the other tales in this anthology, such was the quality of all entries.

Suffice to say, this is a volume that demands space upon the bookshelf of any serious reader of horror fiction, providing as it does a terrific historical snapshot of Australian genre fiction in absolute top form.