![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() That "Night of the Wendigo" is so good deserves special mention because an author's note at the end explains that it was the result of a contest in which Masterton wrote the beginning, a reader supplied the middle, and Masterton then furnished the ending despite being written by two authors, the tone is consistent throughout, and Masterton must be complimented for his ability to take someone else's idea and run with it.What prevented Figures of Fear from receiving 5 stars were the sub-average offerings: "The Battered Wife," which is a strange mash-up of ghost story and abused wife tale, and "Underbed," which tries to do too much with the trope of children who find their way into an alternate world, with predictably horrifying results. The strongest are "Night of the Wendigo," "Witch-Compass," "Resonant Evil," and "Beholder" together, these four stories address all of the main varieties of "horror," including supernatural threat, science gone terribly wrong, and the evils that human beings can visit on themselves and others. ![]() Overall, Figures of Fear is a strong collection, but it is very uneven. I have read several of Graham Masterton's novels, but this is the first time I have encountered his short stories. ![]()
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