The Horror Library - The Best in Horror Fiction

Review of "Unholy Dimensions" by Jeffrey Thomas
By Chris Perridas

Chrispy has just cracked open the cover of an exciting new Mythos book and o.m.g. the horrors that have crept out of it - Ia!

Jeffrey Thomas is no stranger to horror, nor it to he.
His newest book Unholy Dimensions is enough to make you tremble and bolt the door against nocturnal predators, but the illustrations by Peter Worthy will make you want to crawl under the covers and hold your Teddy Bear - assuming it does not come to life ... with fangs ... and ... ```shudder```... aiiiee.

I'll start this review with Red Glass. Thomas proves that brevity is not a prerequisite or restriction of deep terror - and I dare say Peter Crowther or James Herbert could not have done so well as Mr. Thomas has in this fine and creepy tale. I won't reveal what is found in the red glass, but take these pericopes ... "...a knife to scrape off some of the paint on his wall..."; "...more chilling than the sudden, barking sound itself..."; "...silhouette in the second floor windows was..."; .. .jagged, swirling paisley designs like an orgy of psychedelic tadpoles...". These show you that this is the real deal.
Like Lovecraft, windows are an essential factor in Thomas' exposition of horror And appears in several titles of stories. He includes the first known Yog-Sothery in a corporate newsletter - honestly - he sneaked it in to his business paper. Elsewhere, in Corpse Candles a detective encounters Lovecraftian legend and Fortean myth, '...his charred body on the floor ... with a hand like a blackened bird's claw ... {was it} spontaneous human combustion{?}"
Terror is admixed with satire in these 27 tales from the '90's and earlier this millennia. In Yoo-Hoo Cthulhu Thomas is sly with poetry as he begins, "Up from the Stygian depths - whatever that means // An inky-black dark murk devoid of sun beams // Looms a monolithic creature trailing gelatinous foam // If Cthulhu calls tell him that I'm not home."

And as to Peter's worthy illustrations, the one for Red Glass has a supposedly tranquil sunrise scene - but the dark shadows close in on the reflecting alien sun and glow ... like ... an eye watching ... or a maelstrom about to unleash. There is a vortex forming below the surface which summons the hint of lightning on the horizon. Oh, that water may be seemingly calm, but so too was the day before tomorrow at Hiroshima. The poet said, "the sea is cold, but it holds the hottest life." And it holds the most frightening death. Worthy's many illustrations will suck your breath away - and perhaps your soul.
The fresh cover art by Jamie Oberschlake is eye-grabbing and heart-searing.
My read of Unholy Dimensions asks this - are we afraid? or are we afraid because the 'other' is fleeing a terror beyond our understanding? - and will the 'other' simply trample over us to get away from the terror THEY behold and is INVISIBLE to us?

This Lovecraftian grimoire is nihilistic, apocalyptic, cosmic, horrific ... and ick! These stories rock with the stench of brimstone! Run! Not for your life, but for the bookstore, and buy this book.