For your consideration: anthologies

The recommendation period for the 2010 Bram Stoker Awards is winding down. In fact, it ends on January 15th. I don’t campaign for my own work, as a rule, but I would like to advocate for a few anthologies. That category is currently a little sparse, in my opinion.

The first anthology that I think people should read is Stories: All New Tales, edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio. Too few mainstream publishers are releasing anthologies, but here’s one that has two highly esteemed editors and the HWA membership seems to be ignoring it. Granted, the stories aren’t all horror, but there are definitely some gems of horror stories included in it. I reviewed the book when it came out at Onyx Reviews.

Next up is Evolve: Vampire Stories of the New Undead, edited by Nancy Kilpatrick. Full disclosure: I have a story in this book, so I can’t recommend it for a Stoker. However, the anthology has been very well reviewed and it’s one of the stronger collections of short vampire fiction that I’ve ever read. Why didn’t the HWA membership take notice of it? I have no idea…but it’s not too late. (Although it’s almost too late).

Finally, there’s one that’s near and dear to my heart: When the Night Comes Down, edited by Bill Breedlove. Dark Arts Press has been doing readers a service over the past several years by producing these anthologies that feature several stories by four different authors. In most anthologies, you only get one story from a particular author, so you don’t get a good general feel for his or her work. In a Dark Arts sampler, you get four or five. Again, full disclosure, WtNCD has four of my stories in it, but it also has tales by Nate Kenyon, Joseph D’Lacey and Robert Weinberg. If you haven’t read any of these authors, here’s an excellent way to sample diverse works from them. In my case, you’ll find a werewolf story (Silvery Moon), a story about a haunted bookstore (Something in Store), a supernatural detective story (Purgatory Noir) and a story about a guy whose book tour is cursed (Knock ’em Dead).

Though I have something of a vested interest in two of these three recommendations, I’m not in it for myself. The editors get the acclaim and the statuettes if these books are nominated or win awards. It just seems to me that the HWA membership is more interested in single-author collections, perhaps because the respective authors are more vocal than editors tend to be. The top two collections have more recommendations than all of the anthologies combined. For a while, I wasn’t sure there were going to be enough anthologies with the requisite five recommendations for there to be an anthology category this year.

So, while there’s still time HWA members, show anthologies some love!