Whether read as potent dark fantasy or a modern coming-of-age parable, this is contemporary American writing at its finest.' - Publishers Weekly (starred review of Dark Harvest) 'Partridge has always had a knack for sifting deeper significance from period pop culture, but here he brilliantly distills a convincing male identity myth from teen rebel drive-in flicks, garish comic book horrors, hard-boiled crime pulps and other bits of lowbrow Americana. Let Norman Partridge lead you on seven journeys through the most dangerous night of the year, where no one is safeŠand everyone is suspect. Join a master storyteller as he explores the layers of darkness that separate all-too-human evil from the supernatural. In an introduction that explores monsters both fictional and real, Partridge recalls what it was like to live in a community menaced by a serial killer and examines how the Zodiac's reign of terror shaped him as a writer. 'The Man Who Killed Halloween' is an extensive essay about growing up during the late sixties in the town where the Zodiac Killer began his murderous spree. In 'Three Doors,' a scarred war hero hunts his past with the help of a magic prosthetic hand, while 'Satan's Army' is a real Partridge rarity previously available only in a long sold-out lettered edition from another press.īut there's more to this holiday celebration besides fiction. 'Johnny Halloween' features a sheriff battling both a walking ghost and his own haunted conscience.

In 'The Jack o' Lantern,' a brand new Dark Harvest novelette, the October Boy races against a remorseless döppelganger bent on carving a deadly path through the town's annual ritual of death and rebirth. Now Partridge revisits Halloween with a collection featuring a half-dozen stories celebrating frights both past and present. A Bram Stoker Award winner and World Fantasy nominee, Partridge's rapid-fire tale of a small town trapped by its own shadows welcomed a wholly original creation, the October Boy, earning the author comparisons to Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, and Shirley Jackson. This is the first appearance of Stephen King's Chattery Teath which was later collected in Nightmares & Dreamscapes.Norman Partridge's Halloween novel, Dark Harvest, was chosen as one of Publishers Weekly's 100 Best Books of 2006. The pages are bound in separate signatures. What we have here is the First State Proof referred to as 'Blue Lines' with the original Cover Proof. MonteleoneĪ Horror Without Limits by Douglas E. Mothers and Fathers Italian Association by Thomas F. Needful Kings & Other Things by Tyson Blue Spotlight On Publishing (Featuring Charnel House) by Bob Morrish Profiles in Terror (Featuring Rick Hautala) by T. 'Hitchin' Through the Wall' by Augustine Funnell Interior art by Allen Koszowski, Alfred Klosterman, Alan Jude Summa, Keith Minnion

Johnny Halloween by Norman Partridge