While at this year's iHeartHorror event, I had the pleasure of meeting Daemon Manx. He is holding the book I purchased that day in the photo above. Published last year in Pompton Plains, New Jersey, "The Ojanox Book 1: Scream In The Dark" was a masterclass in character development, which brought back my fondest memories of reading Stephen King novels. I knew upon purchasing this book that the story wasn't going to end here. You could say the fact that "Book 1" was in the title was a dead giveaway. However, I wanted to get a taste of the story first. Needless to say, I now have to track down "Ashes To Ashes," "All Fall Down" and "Lonesome Mountain."
While I never had a surprise like Troy and Rob had in Troy's garage at his Halloween Party for his friends, the story did bring me to fond memories of my childhood in the Bronx during Halloween. Now Garrett Grove is not the Bronx, but maybe it should have been with all the creepiness that was going around. I don't want to give away any of the story because I believe any horror fan would love this story (or at least "Scream In The Dark" anyway). Manx makes the story easy to follow even though it is compounded with many twists and storylines.
My previous mention of the King of horror tales holds true especially in the way Manx constructs his chapters, with some chapters devoted to filling in a timeline and allowing the reader to really appreciate why a certain character's personality is the way it is. There is a lot going on in this story and just when I thought I had things figured out, my thoughts had to take another direction. Definitely check out his catalogue at www.lastwaltzpublishing.com.
