Zoopraxis - Richard Christian Matheson

Zoopraxis

By Richard Christian Matheson

  • Release Date: 2017-06-25
  • Genre: Horror

Description

In the addictive new collection, critically-acclaimed, #1 bestselling author Richard Christian Matheson gathers stories of dread, menace and the surreal.

The tales range from prisoners executed with a hi-tech twist, to the ravages of empathy, to an uncooperative parrot, to a shapeshifter’s carnal memoirs, to a man who can’t stop talking, to a murderer devoured by ice, to a soulful embalming machine, to a dog that reads minds.

As in his previous collections, SCARS And Other Distinguishing Marks and DYSTOPIA, Matheson’s distilled style is fierce and hypnotic. There are seventeen illustrations to accompany many of the short stories, all of them originals created by Harry O. Morris specifically for this collection.

The collection includes introductions from John Shirley and Chet Williamson, as well as afterwords from Harry O. Morris and R.C. Matheson.

SHORT STORIES IN THE COLLECTION:
How to Edit
133
Transfiguration
Infomercial!
Making Cabinets
Listen
Dead to Me
New Tricks
Bulimia
Venturi
Demise
Sea of Atlas
Kriss Kross Applesauce
The Embalming Machine
Pronoia
Slaves of Nowhere
Last Words
Ground Zero
Evil Twins, Temporary Blindness, Bikers and Amnesia
Bedtime Story
Interrogation
The Talking Man

***

“There are, occasionally, writers who are able to combine both story and style. They are, of course, the best. You get a spectacular view and you also get to look at it from the back of a chauffeur-driven Cadillac. In the field of fantasy, those writers able to combine story-as-narration with story-as-style are even rarer. Richard Christian Matheson is remarkable. A brilliant chip off the old block.” -- Stephen King

“If the reputation of writers were based on quality rather than quantity, Richard Christian Matheson would be the pre-eminent contemporary writer in the field of dark fiction.” -- Chet Williamson

“Richard Christian Matheson is one of a handful of resourceful, fear-minded authors helping to create a new sensibility in horror fiction that is as frightening and merciless as the modern world itself.” -- ROLLING STONE

“A beautiful and haunting collection. Complex, quintessentially contemporary. The love child of prose and poetry. A masterful vision.” -- Kerry Ehrin: Emmy Nominee/Writer and Executive Producer of BATES MOTEL

“A great horror writer.” -- THE NEW YORK TIMES

“Similes and metaphors so engaging and deeply descriptive it puts me to shame. I have been writing for over forty years and in my own opinion have never written anything as complex or darkly interesting. I stand in awe of Richard’s impressive talent; his unbelievable ability to slam a verb up against a noun, putting words and thoughts together in ways never intended. But somehow, every time he ends up with nuanced perfection and excels magnificently. I’m jealous.” -- Stephen J. Cannell: bestselling novelist, writer, producer and creator of THE ROCKFORD FILES, BARETTA, THE A-TEAM, WISEGUY and many others

“Devastating. Richard Christian Matheson is a master of compression. He knows how to catch a moment in words and convey it straight to the reader’s head or heart; often both.” -- Clive Barker

"Richard Christian Matheson refined (the short short)… elevating it to a rarified and impeccable level of artistry. ZOOPRAXIS is as fine and fierce a collection a collection of brain-melting literary bon-bons as you could possibly hope to devour. Matheson demonstrates how it’s done, over and over, again, with a staggering range of targets and tones. A remarkable amount of the stories are savage, grinning fun…are, in fact, actually funny. Richard Christian Matheson is his own thing, as always, and with ZOOPRAXIS, he re-stakes his claim as one of the best." -- John Skipp CEMETERY DANCE

“A man who writes stories like these is a dangerous man.” -- Dean Koontz

“Richard Christian Matheson is undoubtedly the master of the contemporary short story.” -- Ellen Datlow

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