Full disclosure: I’ve known Larry Blamire for a long time, I’ve acted in four of his movies, and I like his work, whether it’s as a visual artist, writer or director. So, if you think I might be biased in favor of his new collection of short stories, you may be right. But, the fact is, the guy is pretty darn good at the creative endeavors he sets his hand to.

I had the opportunity to read many of these stories in manuscript, and while some are stronger than others, as a whole they build an evocative and original portrait of a fictional location that is – well, “haunted” is too feeble a word – let’s just say that if I owned real estate in the Callamo Mountains, I would be an absentee landlord in self defense. Several of these stories literally sent chills down the back of my neck, despite the 72-degree heat coming through my open window as I read.

I’ll give you one example in detail, trying not to give anything away.

In “The Line Shack”, two cowboys settle in for a long stay at a remote cabin. Sidrow wants to be left alone to read his books, while the rambunctious Hauley enjoys a good conversation. Tension builds between them until one day, after Hauley returns from a mysterious wooded spot called The Tangle, he clams up. His entire personality has changed; something happened to him out there. Something bad...

All of Larry Blamire’s ”Tales of the Callamo Mountains” stories have strong atmosphere and sense of place, and “The Line Shack” is no exception. What’s unique about this two-handed piece is the way in which the dynamics of the two characters are essential to the story: Sidrow, the man who just wants to read in peace versus Hauley, the man who can't shut up, and the neat way that dynamic is used once Hauley is taken over by the thing in The Tangle, with Sidrow now too distracted and nervous to read, missing his partner’s chatter. The tenderness with which Sidrow cares for the possessed Hauley is unexpected, and a nice character touch, just as much as what later happens to Hauley's blue eyes is a chilling revelation.

Such nicely evocative phrases as "Many a boudoir door had been propped open by a well-placed tome," and "If he'd only gotten cabin fever on the drive, he'd probably have more friends by now" delineate the two cowboys’ inner thoughts with humorous succinctness, and the quietly frustrated Sidrow’s list of Hauley's chatter, in which he endlessly describes "meals he'd eaten, kettles he'd heated," and on and on, is funny and accurately observed. People like Hauley really do talk about exactly this kind of minutiae.

The sequence describing The Tangle -- "It sounded like a beehive..." is chilling, using imagistic variants on words from nature: beehive, crackle, embers, orange, dawn, flame, dust, parchment, watery blue, predawn light.

Not only are these stories captivating yarns, they’re also humorous, evocatively written, sometimes surprising and often downright scary. I enjoyed them a lot, and recommend them to anyone who wants to read something that, like Algernon Blackwood’s “The Wendigo”, for example, chills you with atmosphere and detail, rather than violence and gore.
-- Bob Deveau