Tag Archives: horror

Retro Review: French Writer Maurice Renard’s Campy, Derivative B-Novel Is Hilarious And Horrifying

Review by: KEN KORCZAK

I’m not giving anything away by telling you that the premise of this book centers around a mad scientist who is slicing open the skulls of people and animals so he can interchange their brains. The subsequent results are macabre and horrifying.

Original of New Bodies for Old: Le Docteur Lerne (1908)

But the real news flash is that this author has produced his own kind of horrific miracle. He manages to slice open the plot of an A-List classic novel and implant it with his own B-List pulp yarn. The result is an unholy, hybrid specimen of literature.

French writer MAURICE RENARD makes no bones about this being a derivative work inspired by his slavish – almost slobbering – admiration of H.G. Wells. New Bodies for Old is a kind of homage to the great British author’s 1896 masterpiece, The Island of Dr. Moreau.

Renard includes a dedication in which he speaks directly to Wells. He offers up his book to him like a ghoulish sacrifice from a man who eagerly wants to be his No. 1 toady.

Okay! So, Monsieur Renard is an unapologetic fanboy! There’s nothing wrong with that. His hero is the great H.G. Wells, after all. It’s also something of a miracle that a Frenchman can display humble admiration for an Englishman. If we had more of that in the 14th Century, maybe the 100 Years’ War could have been avoided.

Anyway …

Maurice Renard (1875-1939)

I don’t mind reading an unabashed B-Novel if the author can pull it off with decent-enough writing, some of his own innovation, a few clever twists of plot – and whatever else he can bring to the game.

I’m happy to report that M. Renard was equal to the challenge. This is a surprisingly entertaining piece of second-tier literature. It overcomes a fundamental lack of originality with a snappy narrative laid out in clever fashion through the eyes of its viewpoint character, a young Frenchman by the name of Nicolas Vermont.

From the very start, Renard keeps us off balance with an unrelenting series of oddities.

For example, the book begins with a group of young Parisian rakes attending a “house unwarming” party. On a whim, they decide to hold a séance using what was a popular occult fad in early 20th Century Europe – table tipping. This is a method in which hands are placed around a small table to invoke a spirit of the undead. The deceased then taps out messages based on verbally called-out letters of the alphabet.

That’s how this tale came to be written. It was dictated by a member of the undead.

And so …

Nicolas Vermont receives a mysterious invitation to visit his uncle. He lives several hours outside of Paris in a secluded chateau nestled against a narrow alcove naturally carved out from a rocky mountainside. The surrounding area is wild and wooded. Vermont spent his childhood there but has not been back for years. His uncle is a renowned physiologist and surgeon – Dr. Frédéric Lerne — who gained wide fame as a life-saving doctor.

But now Dr. Lerne has retreated to the remote chateau which is called Fonval. Here the doctor no longer receives patients. Rather, he’s involved in some manner of super-secret medical research. Vermont has not seen his uncle in years. When he arrives at the chateau, he finds a drastically changed man, far different from the graceful and brilliant professor of physiology Vermont once knew.

Dr. Lerne is now a dangerous weirdo. He’s overtly cruel, paranoid and neurotic. Bizarrely, he speaks French with a heavy German accent. He seems caught off guard by his nephew’s visit, even though he had issued him an invitation. Whatever the doctor is working on, it’s obviously pure evil. But what is it? The plot plays out with the attempts of Nicolas Vermont to discover the dark and sinister machinations lurking behind the many locked doors of the sprawling Fonval complex.

Despite the fact that Maurice Renard leans on scenes of gratuitous gore and regales us with fantastically absurd spectacle – such as when a man’s brain is transplanted into a cow – I give him great credit for springing upon the reader some marvelously clever twists of plot. I didn’t see them coming. I bet you won’t either.

NEW BODIES FOR OLD Was originally published in 1908 with the title, Le Docteur Lerne – Sous-Dieu. (Dr. Lerne – Undergod). I read the English translation published in 1923. Translator unknown.

Edgar Allan Poe

I’ve probably given the impression that Maurice Renard was a pulp artist who cranked out florid prose for fast bucks and cheap thrills. However, and to be fair, one must consider that the translation I read was extremely poorly handled.

Thus, I hasten to add that, in his day, Renard was highly admired and respected, even within elite literary circles. He is sometimes compared to Edgar Allen Poe. Renard himself was a devoted fan of the American genius of Gothic horror. It was reading Poe that inspired Renard to take up a career in writing.

In his Encylopédie de l’utopie, des voyages extraordinaires, et de la science fiction, French critic Pierre Versins called Renard, “the best French science fiction writer of the years 1900-1930.” And Jean-Jacques Bridenne called the short stories of Renard, “the most gripping in French literature.”

Furthermore, Maurice Renard, who died in 1939, left a significant legacy of lasting influence. Just one example is the fact that his 1920 novel, The Hands of Orloc, has been adapted to film three times. A 1935 version starred the great Peter Lorre. A 1960 British adaptation of The Hands of Orlac is a cult classic and stars Mel Ferrer and Christopher Lee.

Another of his works, A Man Amongst the Microbes: Scherzo, (1928) inspired Richard Matheson’s novel, The Shrinking Man. This, in turn, led to the SF classic film, The Incredible Shrinking Man. Maurice Renard is also credited with innovating one of the most intriguing SF concepts of all time – “slow glass.” This was a type of glass that absorbed light in such a way as to condense time. Bob Shaw wrote a groundbreaking short story based on the slow glass concept. This was the Hugo-nominated Light of Other Days. He later reworked the story into the novel, Other Days, Other Eyes. (1972)

The slow glass conception is becoming a reality today. In 2005, IBM introduced a chip, called the photonic silicon waveguide, which can slow down the speed of light.

You can download a free e-book copy of New Bodies For Old at Project Gutenberg HERE.

PLEASE CHECK OUT MY REVIEWS OF OTHER CLASSIC BOOKS, LINKED BELOW:

PHARAOH By Boleslaw Prus

SAURUS By Eden Phillpotts

HOLOGRAM DREAMS by R.G. Knighton



Ken Korczak is a former newspaper reporter, government information officer, served as an advocate for homeless people as a VISTA Volunteer, and taught journalism at the University of North Dakota for five years. He is the author of: BIRD BRAIN GENIUS

All NEW: KEN’S BOOK REVIEW SITE ON FACEBOOK: REMOTE BOOK REVIEWING

 

Hologram Dreams by British author R.G. Knighton is about as much fun as you can have reading science fiction

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Review by: KEN KORCZAK

This is the second novel I have read by indie British indie writer R.G. Knighton, and it just happens to be his second book.

After being outrageously entertained by his debut offering, TIMELOCK, I was eager to get my hands on Knighton’s follow-up effort, HOLOGRAM DREAMS. I am delighted to report the second is even better than the first.

In this novel Knighton gravitates away from horror and toward science fiction, but the result is the same – bloody, but energetic and wacky fun featuring wonderfully conceived characters embroiled in a well-designed plot. There’s also surprisingly rich descriptions of scenery, action and background.

I have no idea how hard this author works, or how much he sweats over writing and rewriting, but the final effect is prose that flows so effortlessly that all you have to do is sit back and just enjoy the ride.

And what a ride it is!

The premise is a setting 50 years in the future. Think of a massive multinational corporation like Disney, except the Hologram Dream Corporation provides more than mere theme park escapism. Technology has advanced to allow full-immersion experiences in virtual reality scenarios generated by a massive computer-generated infrastructure that can create any “dream” anyone might want to experience as if it were real.

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R.G. Knighton

The holograms are supported by brick-and-mortar Hollywood set building – the result is that the filthy rich (drug lords and movie stars) can be transported to a thrilling adventure in ancient Egypt, a big-game hunting safari, a bloody gladiator match in a Roman amphitheater – anything.

But where there are greedy and powerful corporate creeps, and hedonistic millionaires willing to pay unlimited cash to have their deepest desires brought to life, you’ll find the wretched folly of human nature — people who will stop at nothing to live out the darkest lusts lurking in the basements of their diseased psyches.

The tone oscillates between dark humor and light-hearted wit. Knighton’s bent is often wry, dry, and biting, perhaps almost cynical. He’s a writer who does not flinch from brutality and violence –- blood and gore, described in sweaty detail –- and he pulls no punches in creating characters of absolute lowest-common-denominator morality.

But Knighton also gives us pure-of-heart heroes who display enormous courage, along with an immense capacity for self-sacrifice to help others.

Yes, it’s basic pure and sweet good guys versus scummy bad guys – and for that matter – the entire premise is not strikingly original, having been explored by many authors over the years (and decades old movies, such as West World, and TV shows, such as Star Trek’s “Holodeck”).

However, what matters is the execution. On this count, R.G. Knighton really delivers. I said it in my review of his first book and I’ll say it again, Mr. Knighton is a writer of natural talent.

He takes standard science fiction conventions, breathes new life into it all, innovates a little, adds a few new “plot gimmick attachments” — and comes away with a book that does not pretend to be anything but fantastic entertainment.




Ken Korczak is a former newspaper reporter, government information officer, served as an advocate for homeless people as a VISTA Volunteer, and taught journalism at the University of North Dakota for five years. He is the author of: BIRD BRAIN GENIUS

All NEW: KEN’S BOOK REVIEW SITE ON FACEBOOK: REMOTE BOOK REVIEWING

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Free horror short story “Rot” by author Michelle Barclay should frazzle the brain of even the hardened horror reader

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Review by: KEN KORCZAK

In The Exorcist there is a scene where Father Merrin and Father Karras are preparing for battle with a demon-possessed little girl, and the elderly Father Merrin tells his young assistant:

“The demon’s attack will be psychological – and powerful.”

Those two words are perfect to describe ROT, an enormously disturbing and frightening short story penned by writer MICHELLE BARCLAY. Psychological, powerful – and oh so demonically dark.

It’s a marvelous piece of fiction. You might think there’s little original today about demon-possession stories within the horror genre, but in the hands of a fiercely talented writer such as Barclay, demon lore is made fresh again … er, I mean rotten … in that Edgar Allan Poe sort of way a disturbing tale should be rotten.

What’s terrific about this piece is that the author does not rely on gratuitous blood and gore, the downfall of so many horror-scribe wannabes. Barclay spends the first three-quarters of the story establishing a punishing sense of psychological terror – and when you get sufficiently unnerved and off balance – she hits you with some spurting-of-the-blood and tearing-of-the-flesh.

Best of all, there’s a depth of intelligence crafted into this story – it makes insightful sociological observations about why people believe what they do, how inept we all are in understanding our own views of subject like God, religion, believe and disbelief. This is not boring, it’s gripping.

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Michelle Barclay

Just as there is nowhere to run and nowhere to hide from a fear which is actually right there – inside yourself – anyway one who dares to read Rot will be unsettled (to say the least) while being darkly entertained.

Be warned: this is not for the faint of heart, or those who like their reality straight. Barclay is not interested in making you feel good about yourself or society; she weaves a fabric spun from a poisonous black web of words – if you decide to read this at bedtime, I’m betting you’ll choose to sleep with your lights on.

On second thought – don’t read this story at night – or while you’re alone.

Don’t cyber-walk, cyber-run to get your free copy of ROT right now, click here: ROT




Ken Korczak is a former newspaper reporter, government information officer, served as an advocate for homeless people as a VISTA Volunteer, and taught journalism at the University of North Dakota for five years. He is the author of: BIRD BRAIN GENIUS

All NEW: KEN’S BOOK REVIEW SITE ON FACEBOOK: REMOTE BOOK REVIEWING

Follow @KenKorczak