Darker Than Weird by John R. Fultz (Jackanapes Press, April 15, 2023). Cover art & interior illustrations by Dan Sauer

I devoured John R. Fultz’s 2021 Worlds Beyond Worlds collection (Black Gate review link). His action-fueled, weird short fiction has graced many venues like Weird Tales & Weirdbook, and his novel The Testament of Tall Eagle (and The Son of Tall Eagle) and the Books of the Shaper series have garnered praise from pillars in the field:

“A master of his craft.” —DON WEBB, Author of Building Strange Temples

“Fultz delivers the goods.” —HOWARD ANDREW JONES, Author of The Ring-Sworn Trilogy

“An author with an exceptional talent for characterization and world building.” —The Library Journal

Longtime Black Gate readers will recall John R. Fultz illustrated & published a series on this site called Skulls (Chapter One Link). I interviewed him back in 2017 for the Beauty in Weird Fiction series (right before that was picked up by Black Gate; keep an eye out for a re-interview in the coming year!).

With cover art & interior illustrations by Dan Sauer, John R. Fultz releases another dark & weird collection; well, specifically, it’s Darker than Weird – Fourteen Tales of Horror (Just released April 15th, 2023 by Jackanapes Press; available from the publisher and Amazon).

Here’s the back cover blurb:

From celebrated fantasist John R. Fultz comes a collection of dark and varied tales of horror. As did his 2021 fantasy collection, Worlds Beyond Worlds, Darker Than Weird showcases Fultz’s talent for creating compelling characters and stories in fantastic and inventively horrifying worlds. Dark science fiction, Lovecraft-inspired terrors, strange apocalypses and other dooms abound in these pages — a true delight for the horror devotee.

Behind the torn façade of the living world lurks a realm of vivid darkness. Strange currents ebb and flow in the stellar void, spawning monsters, ghosts, and abominations beyond human understanding. Darker Than Weird collects ten years of weird fiction that defies and sometimes utterly destroys the boundaries of genre. From dystopic nightmares to gruesome science fiction, modern terrors to ancient gods, horror is the common thread in this dark tapestry of tales. Fourteen unsettling explorations of the supernatural, the ghastly, and the existentially grotesque. Read them at your own risk.

CONTENTS

Foreword by Don Webb

A Need for Newer Boxes

THE WEIRDNESS

• The River Flows To Nowhere
• Behind the Eyes
• The Man Who Murders Happiness
• Love in the Time of Dracula
• I Do the Work of the Bone Queen
• The Taste of Starlight

WELCOME TO THE URBILLE

• The Key to Your Heart Is Made of Brass
• Flesh of the City, Bones of the World
• The Rude Mechanicals and the Highwayman

SHADES OF LOVECRAFT

• Anno Domini Azathoth
• The Thing in the Pond
• The Lord of Endings
• This Is How the World Ends
• The Embrace of Elder Things

 

John R. Fultz

John R. Fultz resides in the North Bay Area of California, but he grew up in Kentucky. His latest book is DARKER THAN WEIRD, which collects ten years’ worth of weird horror tales. Fultz’s WORLDS BEYOND WORLDS is an acclaimed dark fantasy collection released in 2021. His epic fantasy novels include SEVEN PRINCES, SEVEN KINGS, and SEVEN SORCERERS (2012/2013). His “Tall Eagle” duology includes the novels THE TESTAMENT OF TALL EAGLE (2015) and SON OF TALL EAGLE (2017). www.fultzauthor.com

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S.E. Lindberg is a Managing Editor at Black Gate, regularly reviewing books and interviewing authors on the topic of “Beauty & Art in Weird-Fantasy Fiction.” He is also the lead moderator of the Goodreads Sword & Sorcery Group and an intern for Tales from the Magician’s Skull magazine. As for crafting stories, he has contributed six entries across Perseid Press’s Heroes in Hell and Heroika series, has an entry in Weirdbook Annual #3: Zombies  He independently publishes novels under the banner Dyscrasia Fiction; short stories of Dyscrasia Fiction have appeared in Whetstone, Swords & Sorcery online magazine, Rogues In the House Podcast’s A Book of Blades, DMR’s Terra Incognita, and the 9th issue of Tales From the Magician’s Skull.