You say your book has a mummy in it? Consider it read! That goes for you, too, Douglas Clegg’s THE ATTRACTION!
In 1977, five perpetually horny/stoned/drunk college students embark on a road trip from Virginia to California. Because this is a horror novel, you know they don’t quite make it to California. But at least they get as far as Arizona. That’s where a flat forces them to stop at a near-deserted service station containing the titular touristy attraction: a child-sized Aztec mummy with sharp fingernails of obsidian and a history of scraping the flesh off humans. The boys accidentally reawaken Scratch (as he’s called), who immediately proceeds to make good on his reputation.
Though I’m a sucker for mummy tales, I was a bit reluctant to read it, having disliked Clegg’s recent novel AFTERLIFE. But it moves along at a quick clip and provides the necessary grisly scenarios. At just under 200 pages, it’s actually a novella, so Leisure gives you more for your money by also including THE NECROMANCER, which is almost as long though not quite as much fun.
But it’s of a totally different style, a quasi-fantasy (in more ways than one) told via the first-person diaries of one Justin Gravesend. His investigation into unraveling the mystery surrounding his twin’s death in infancy eventually leads him to an occultist group known as the Chimera Magick, an order known for rituals involving lots of sex and sacrifice. THE NECROMANCER has ties to a few of Clegg’s full-length novels, and is interesting enough to make me want to try those out. It may be kind of a one-trick pony, but hey, who doesn’t love ponies? And who doesn’t love getting two good horror tales for the price of one? –Rod Lott
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