Too Many Eyes by Patrick Loveland – Book Review
Patrick Loveland is not here to dispense universal truths. He’s not here to wax philosophical on the nature of humanity, our place in the cosmos and our responsibilities as a species. He’s not here to ponder the meaning of life.
Patrick Loveland is here to let things get Weird and to let the gore hit the fan.
Too Many Eyes is an anthology of sixteen cosmic horror stories that focus on frantic action, snarky heroes and buckets of blood, organs and gooey flesh speckled with eyes. They’re arranged chronologically by setting, ranging from the mountains of Wild West era California to a mysterious scientific outpost in the 23rd Century. This gives Loveland the chance to dip his toes (or other, less recognisable appendages) into war fiction, military scifi and cyberpunk. The stories are two-fisted, pulpy tales that are action-focused but don’t skimp on the cosmic dread and body-horror.
The collection starts strong with ‘Ekwiiyemak (The Place Where it Rains)’, as our first hero, a reformed and retired gunslinger, is drawn into a dangerous hunt by old friend Shiv, a dangerous woman who doesn’t seemed to have aged a day in twenty years. Though perhaps a little too over-concerned with describing the characters’ weaponry (a running issue throughout the stories), it’s an excellent old-fashioned tale of formerly-human monsters and the ingenuity and perseverance needed to take them down. I’ve recently finished Red Dead Redemption 2, so that helped me get in the mood!
‘Pizzapokalyps’ may not be the strongest tale of the bunch, but its tale of an 80’s metal-themed pizza place whose merchandise goes on rampage is extremely silly fun. ‘Ley Lines’ and ‘Whoever Fights Monsters’ are two of the most interesting present-day stories, following Special Agent Blakely Tan as she fights monsters that may or may not be real; it has a very True Detective vibe about it.
The book’s centrepiece is its longest story, the titular ‘Too Many Eyes’.
Set at first in a San Diego cinema, a mysterious film is screened that results in chaos as the cinema is converted into a death trap, with pulsing organic flesh and grasping many-eyed tentacles everywhere. The watching-a-film-where-a-character-watches-a-film mechanic is interesting, but tricky to pull off in prose, but Loveland really hits his stride when the characters are beset by the horrors of the once-familiar building. The story then hits a strange tonal shift with the introduction of a group of heavily-armoured mercenary types, almost as if Alien turned into Aliens halfway through. It remains entertaining until the end, though, despite the change in tone. It’s so visually driven, with its nightmarish transformations and ghoulish deaths, that it almost demands to be a movie itself. Just don’t say you weren’t warned when you screen it…
The power-armoured soldiers trope is present in full force in the last third of the book as the stories see a lot of elditch abominations taken on with bullets and missiles, with varying degrees of success. The most interesting of the future stories is the cyberpunk-tinged ‘PIE’, which sees a Yakuza enforcer in Hong Kong (there’s a good reason she’s there, it’s not weird) hunted by cybernetic abominations. There’s a strong anime influence here, and the lead character is tough and resourceful in her fight against the slavering monsters sent after her – and yet you can’t help but feel sorry for the creatures somehow, as they can’t help what they’ve become.
That anime influence is peppered throughout the fights in the book, with big swords and exo-skeletons and remote-controlled mechs popping up everywhere.
Loveland clearly loves the genre, as everything from Demons to Return of the Living Dead to Event Horizon is evoked in his stories. The gore is liberally applied throughout the early stories, with people being digested in alien sacs and limbs and offal flying everywhere. Loveland’s writing shines the most here, as I’m not squeamish but even I winced once or twice at the thought of what was happening to these poor people.
A couple of the stories don’t hit home as well the rest, but there’s plenty to satisfy even the most demanding gorehound. The occasional recurring character and technologies is a fun technique that keeps you interested, wondering if they’ll pop up in the next story. I do feel that more could have been made of this, as I wondered if they were building up to a larger story at the end that would have several protagonists meet and work together on a special mission, but it was sadly not not to be.
If you like your horror fast-paced, riddled with bullets and full of pulsing translucent flesh and things that should not be, then this collection is for you. It won’t keep you up at night jumping at shadows or pondering the sheer pointlessness of humankind’s existence on a cosmic scale, but it will serve up some deliciously twisted imagery and a bloody good time.
Too Many Eyes by Patrick Loveland
TOO MANY EYES IS A COLLECTION OF PULPY, VISCERAL SHORT STORIES THAT TAKE YOU FROM THE OLD WEIRD WEST ALL THE WAY TO THE DISTANT FUTURE AND IT’S SURE TO GIVE YOU THRILLS AND CHILLS!
EKWIIYEMAK: THE PLACE WHERE IT RAINS
In the late 1880s, a former outlaw helps an old friend hunt something near the mountain gold-mining town where he retired—but after what happened to the horses back in town, he’s pretty sure “rabid bears” aren’t what they’re really out in the rain for.
THE BALLAD OF CHIHUAHUA PUENTE
To escape a raging firefight, a tunnel rat support squad in the Vietnam War is forced deep into the tight tunnels it was supposed to be demolishing. But while trying to find them all a way out, the most talented tunneller finds a cave-in that leads to another tunnel—one that seems much older than human warfare…or humans existing at all.
TOO MANY EYES
In the titular novella, the staff of a small one-screen theater in San Diego receives a rare print of an old cult classic film they’ve never heard of. Once the film is started, reality and fiction start to blend, and Sylvie, her uncle, and friends are plunged into a fight for survival and swept along on a perilous mission into another realm entirely.
PIE
In the near future, a Yakuza fixer in Hong Kong for a special meeting is approached to help a local affiliate solve a gory, disturbing murder of one of their associates. But then the tables are turned and they are forced into a sadistic game of life and death by a shady local operative and his monstrous cyborg “children.”
APPLEWHITE AND ZORN: DELAMARRES ASCENDANT
In the distant future, two investigators question a combative heiress about the mysterious disappearance of a specialized starship she and her brother had made from the records of their mother’s earlier design—only to discover the purpose of both ships is far stranger than they could imagine.
THESE STORIES AND 11 MORE THRILLING TALES OF HORROR AND SCIENCE FICTION INSIDE!
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