When I was asked if I wanted to check out an audiobook for review, it was probably good that I was given the shorter of the two choices offered. Other Atrocities is a horror collection from author William F. Grey, wonderfully performed for the audiobook version by Martin Wurst. This collection features nine short stories that play out over around a four hour runtime. As always, I have a fondness for anthologies and collections as there is usually at least one stand out bit of work.
It opens with 'Whatever It Takes'; an early highlight that had me convinced this was going to be a good audiobook. Ricky is a delivery driver who is lured out to a remote abandoned farmhouse. There he is ambushed by a masked madman who tells him that he is going to be hunted by a group of killers, and that his only path to freedom is to survive until daybreak. This 45 minute opening story was excellent, it felt like it would work just as well as a film - thrilling and fun in equal measure. 'Rot' was another example of Gray at his best. This Halloween III: Season of the Witch tinged situation in which a baseball wielding survivor tries to survive in a town where bad candy has transformed the townsfolk into rabid almost zombie like maniacs. I loved the mid-story rug pull here, not expecting the second half to be the same story shown from a different perspective. The third in my personal trilogy of the best stories was 'A Night of Horrors' that was influenced by Jumanji. Here, a teenage boy and his friends discover an old boardgame buried in woodland. Upon playing the game, four of the friends transform into a ghost, a vampire, a werewolf, and a witch respectively, with the sole unchanged friend being tasked with making his way to a safe point, being hunted by the monsters the whole way. Not the ending I would have gone for, but this was still a riveting story.
A good few of the shorts in the collection end in a way that didn't live up to the potential of the story being told. 'The Maze of Memories' (about a hoarder being chased by a monster through his maze of horded junk) was great aside from its ending. The emotional heart of the collection - 'Last Showing' also ended in a less than perfect way, but to its credit that was only because I had imagined a far more bleak end for a suicidal man who chooses a cinema in which to end his life. Rounding out the collection is predictable time loop road trip tale 'Highway Hypnosis', six minute pleasure 'Go Out and Play' which subverts expectations, and the slightly more grounded 'Something's Wrong with the Fish' and final story 'Bang For Ur Buck'. That final one was the most realistic, taking place in an all too believable near future where an elderly man is forced to resort to eating cat food to survive due to soaring prices.
Perfectly narrated by Wurst, William F. Gray's Other Atrocities was a delight to listen to. I had very minor issues with the direction some of these stories went in, but overall I had a blast with this audiobook collection.
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