Friday, November 12, 2021

RAFFAELE PEZZELLA'S CREEPY CURATION: THE STORY BEHIND MY FULCI TALE


Raffaele Pezzella/Eighth Tower Publishing's Dark Fiction #2 volume, The Beyond: Stories Inspired by the Lucio Fulci Doors of Death Trilogy, is hot off the press, available in hardcover and paperback. 

My contribution to the anthology is entitled "Summer Urges (A Gates of Hell Tendril)". It curdles from the Master of the Macabre's first film in his frightful trilogy, City of the Living Dead, aka The Gates of Hell, which caters to Father Thomas' blasphemous plan to populate the earth with maggot/worm-infested zombies. 

The tribute's deeper roots, however, emanate from a story I self-published decades ago, "Of Summer Urges and Sweet, Balmy Blood," which occupies the second volume of my ambitious but misdirected Wonderful, Magical, Literary Elixirs.

The Elixirs story holds an Herschell Gordon Lewis, seashore vibe (think along the lines of Color Me Blood Red, but with a thick brush of Blood Feast) and deals with the ghoulish impulses of a detached, young man and his strange, nomadic mentor. In recent years, the story has offended "woke" folks who've admonished its unapologetic, punk-ish exhalation of being different on the basis that it maligns a specific demographic, but in misreading its intent, my reproachful detractors only malign themselves. 

It's also worth noting that using this Elixirs concept in a Fulci context came three years prior when I visited Asbury Park with my brother, Freddy and his lady friend, Terry, to catch a rousing Adam Ant concert. Upon our departure from the event, the turbulent winds and gritty sky struck me as Fulci-esque, prompting me to re-consider "Summer Urges" as if it were integrated into the filmmaker's mythology. This notion, mind you, came quite some time before Pezzella reached out to me to add to his second Dark Fiction editionTalk about creepy kismet and fortuitous inspiration! (For the record, my fable for Dark Fiction #1: The Black Stone: Stories for Lovecraftian Summonings, features "Tentacled", a story lifted and modified from the same Elixirs edition, thus fortifying the fated flow.)

As it stands, the restyled short story/companion piece is better than the sappy original and follows the successful implementation used to turn Fredric Brown's "Arena" into Gene L. Coon's classic Star Trek episode of the same name. 

I'm happy to report that my redux is no less "offensive" for its bracketed metamorphosis. It warms my heart to think that the same donnish dummies who've condemned the Elixirs entry would no doubt condemn this Dark Fiction #2 one.

To verify how derogatory the new "Summer Urges" is, why not read it, as well as its accompanying "Doors of Death" tales? They're shaped by evocative raconteurs who spin their literary webs in the finest Fulci fashion.

The Beyond: Stories Inspired by the Lucio Fulci Death Trilogy can be exhumed at

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09JBQJ27R/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

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