Grant - Fear the Reaper

FEAR THE REAPER

edited by

Joe Mynhardt

Kobo edition

Published by Crystal Lake Publishing

www.CrystallakePub.com

www.facebook.com/Crystallakepublishing

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Contents

A WORD FROM THE EDITOR

Let me start out by thanking you, the reader, for spending your hard earned cash on this book. I know how hard it can be at the end of each month to decide which book to buy next, so I tried to make it as affordable as possible.

Id also like to thank all the writers and artists who spent days and weeks of their valuable time to bring this book to life; not to mention all the hours spent guest blogging and promoting the book. A special thanks to Rena Mason, for her hard work in spreading the word about Fear the Reaper amongst members of the HWA, and for the wonderful bookmarks she made.

Thanks to Adam Lowe for donating his wonderfully creepy poem and Will Jacques for his amazing interior artwork.

A very special thanks to Christopher Golden and Holly Newstein Hautala, who ensured the inclusion of Rick Hautalas story after his untimely death.

These are all people Ive met online and would love to meet in person, before our inevitable demise, which of course is the theme of this book youre currently holding. Yes, one day well flip through the pages of this book and see that it truly was history in the making, as, in time, the writers (myself included) will pass away, leaving others behind.

Its with that thought that I pay tribute to Rick Hautala, who I only had a few brief conversations with about this project. Sadly, it was only in his death and in the words of those who knew him, that I grew to know and truly respect the man.

So whether youre one of the very first readers to buy this book, or buying it second-hand decades later, know that the men and women in this book tapped into their deepest emotion, which is not just fear but fear of dying, when they wrote these wonderful tales. Make an effort to read more of their books and stories.

One last thought: like me, you might not be as scared of death as others. I certainly believe that I have a say in where I go after I die, but what scares me is the lack of control I have in the process of dying, the amount of pain and humiliation that goes with it, and when it will place its cold grip on my shoulder.

I hope you enjoy Fear the Reaper.

Joe Mynhardt

Bloemfontein, South Africa

26 November 2013

(DONT) FEAR THE REAPER: A BRIEF INTRODUCTION

Remember That You Will Die

I have a personal fascination with the concept of the memento mori in art and literature. Its a Latin term, of course, meaning remember that you will die, but in broader terms the memento mori is an artistic or symbolic reminder that were all destined for death. Whoever we are, whatever we do, no matter how rich or famous we might be, were all going the same way, and theres no such thing as a happy ending.

The origin of the phrase is possibly anecdotal: according to the early Christian author Tertullian in his Apologeticus, in ancient Rome a Roman general was parading through the streets celebrating victory in battle. His servant stood behind him chanting the phrase Respice post te! Hominem te esse memento! Memento mori!: Look behind you! Remember that you are a man! Remember that youll die!

It was the servants task to remind the general that although he had won on this day, tomorrowor any dayhe could just as easily be brought down. Nice work if you can get it.

The momento mori became increasingly popular in Medieval Europe, especially when it was adopted by Christianity, with its emphasis on divine judgment. Heaven, Hell, the salvation (or damnation) of the soul pushed these thoughts to the forefront, and many works of religious art were produced to reflect this theme.

To the Christian, the prospect of death serves to focus upon the emptiness and fleetingness of earthly trappings, and also as an invitation to think about the appealing prospect of the afterlife. Thus there are a lot of examples of this kind of thing in funeral art and architecture: decaying corpses carved onto tombs, representations of winged skulls, skeletons, angels snuffing out candles... and scattered around Europe there are also great ossuarieschapels made of bones; in music, we have the danse macabre, with its accompanying image of a boogying grim reaper; and countless ancient clocks and public timepieces portraying the fleetingness of life and the inevitability of death.

Cheery stuff. But to a miserable bastard like me, this kind of thing is golden.

Memento mori was also an important literary theme. Famous meditations on death in English prose include Sir Thomas Brownes Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial and Jeremy Taylors Holy Living and Holy Dying. These works were part of a Jacobean cult of melancholia (my kind of club) that marked the end of the Elizabethan era. In the late eighteenth century, literary elegies were a common genre; Thomas Grays Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard and Edward Youngs Night Thoughts are typical examples.

It could be arguedif one were inclinedthat the entire canon of work comprising the horror fiction genre is simply a huge, complex memento mori. This idea certainly fits in with my own thinking on the matter. But Ill leave it to greater minds than mine to labour that point.

We Bones, Lying Here Bare, Await for Yours

The Grim Reaperthe image of death in sentient human formhas existed in many societies since the beginning of recorded history. From the 15th Century onwards, he was depicted as a skeleton with a scythe in a black cloak and hoodsurely the most well-known representation as we know it. Even the bible refers to the Angel of Death when he reaps Egypts firstborns.

In modern popular culture, there is the classic depiction of a melancholy, chess-playing Death in Ingmar Bergmans The Seventh Sealthe film also features a gleeful danse macabre near the end. My own strongest and earliest recollection of the Reaper was the classic Ray Bradbury story The Scythe. More recently, theres been another twist on the theme of death-as-sentient-being in the much-better-than-expected Final Destination films. I havent even mentioned the Blue Oyster Cult song from which this book takes, and inverts, its title... There are hundreds of other examples, but Im sure you get my point, that the notion of the Grim Reaper has saturated popular culture.