This was how I was able to keep up with all of Richard Laymon's novels back then, when he didn't have a steady publisher for his work here in the States. I didn't always have to make a trip all the way up to the farthest reaches of New England in order to get my fix of 'British Nasties' though, as living in the Buffalo area I'm just minutes away from the Canadian border & some of the bookstores up there carry quite a bit of UK product. Each more over the top & lurid that the next. I was in my glory as they had a bunch of books by Harry Adam Knight & others. Such as the British import genre paperbacks in discussion. Paperback is a small local chain of stores in Maine that often carries stuff that other corporate stores would likely never bother with. Paperback store in the small town of Millinocket. When I made one of my ubiquitous visits to the local Mr. Which actually brings to mind a very fond memory of mine of one of my frequent trips to Maine back in the late '80s-early '90s. But, I can assure you as an unapologetic fan of those types of 'British Nasties' back in their heyday, I'd have surely grabbed them all had I found them. Never had the pleasure of finding any of Mr. So I must ask: Anybody read any of these?

But certainly that can't be as bad as all that. Years ago I had some copies of Halkin's stuff at the old bookstore I worked at but I'll tell you, there was so much sleaziness emanating from them I kinda didn't want to even touch them. Cover design looks like something Tor would've published, and those eyes of obsidian are appropriately unholy. Okay, one last one before I go: Bloodworm! Actually, this cover's more like it, that's some serious bad-assery going on there. All three in this 'series' - Slither, Slime, and Squelch - were published first in the UK by Hamlyn, and then reprinted in the mid-1980s in the States by some publisher called Critic's Choice. The titles were inspired by, I'm sure, the infamous '76 flick Squirm, while the plots seem to be sub- James Herbert style monster mayhem, with populations of innocents bedeviled by creepy-crawlies like mutant jellyfish, legless lizards, and ravenous caterpillars.

The art is on par with an eighth-grader creating his imaginary tattoos in art class. Were the titles Guts, Gore, and Gross already taken? Would you wanna be caught reading one of these monstrosities?! Ha. Fortunately before slipping into an utter and a completely deserved obscurity he bestowed upon us several British pulp-horror novels that were graced with some of the cheesiest and most ludicrous cover art of the day. None of the internets could help me find anything about him but that he was born in 1927. Who, you say, is John Halkin? Honestly, I have no idea.

Slime john halkin