Ascent Aspirations Magazine

Reviews

Man-Made Monsters

By Mad Marv

A Review by David Fraser

In his epitaph, Mad Marv tells us not to take this book too seriously even if we do believe in monsters. He points out that we need to believe in kindness since “an ounce of evil can contaminate a ton of good.”

Behind the scenes in many of his stories, there is the caveat of “be careful of what you wish for” since conjured up monsters somehow can take on lives of their own. In “Overtime”, the opening story, imagine waking up dead, your body sutured from an autopsy, your skin decaying and crawling with maggots but you are still cognizant. Would you have the courage to set out in search of the truth about your death and investigate deeper into the details that border on bizarre science fiction, Frankenstein imagery, and conspiracy plots?

Interspersed between Mad Marv’s plot-driven stories are shorter pieces titled “Recipes for Disaster”. These shorter stories revolve around the creation of creatures; a golem who is a mythical monster servant made of clay that inevitably runs amok in the modern day setting; Wanda, the college boy’s dream, beautiful but dangerous; the self-made monster who can be the full-time zombie, the part-time lycanthrope, the ultimate erotic vampire trapped in the pyramid scheme of creating its own brood of blood-sucking vampire slaves. These stories all play on the genre’s traditional characters. However “Extreme Make Over” shows  a darker more ironic side of trying to change appearances and “Vanity Scare” takes serial killing to a gruesome conclusion with the tale of the “face stealer” who according to the author may still be out there.

In many of the longer stories often these monsters are trapped in webs of conspiracy. They are victims of forces larger and more organized within our society.

If you are looking for fast-paced plot-driven narrative tales of archetypal monsters in a modern setting, spiced with, at times, tongue-in-cheek whimsical descriptions of how to create your own monsters, settle down a while into these pages. You may find some chilling tales that not only tell you a story, but hint at who the real monsters are that could plague our modern world.

Web Site

Contact Publisher

David Fraser lives in Nanoose Bay, on Vancouver Island. He is the founder and editor of Ascent Aspirations Magazine, www.ascentaspirations.ca, since 1997. His poetry and short fiction have appeared in 40 journals including Three Candles, Regina Weese, Ardent, and Ygdrasil. He has published a collection of his poetry, Going to the Well (2004), a collection of short fiction, The Dark Side of the Billboard (2006)and edited and published Ascent Aspirations Magazine Anthology One(Dec. 2005) and Anthology Two Windfire (Summer 2006).

A A Publishing

David Fraser has a BA in English from University of Toronto, and an MEd in adult education from OISE. In Ontario he taught English, Creative Writing Writer's Craft among other subjects at the secondary school level for 30 years. He was the ski school director for High Park Snow School for 8 years. Currently he is a full time writer who also teaches skiing at Mt Washington in the winter.

Email: David Fraser

Return to Table of Contents