Preaching to the Perverted by James Bennett

I would like to thank the author for an advance copy of this collection in exchange for a fair and honest review

Published - Lethe Press

Published - out now

Price - £20 paperback £5 kindle ebook

Preaching to the Perverted features thirteen dark tales, each drawn from gay lived experience and given a twist of horror. In these pages, you'll find the erotic and the grotesque. A Kafkaesque alien comes out. Bigoted parents fall foul of fairies. A power-bottom Frankenstein wrestles with his conscience. A transgender thief throws a Pride parade in Lovecraftian Arkham. A bitter old queen makes a Faustian pact. And a dejected angel falls in love at the End of the World. Each story comes from the heart, throbbing with visceral gay energy. Save your prayers. And come inside.

Horror can be a source of release - our fears, our anger at the world’s injustices and also our hopes - to be seen, understood and accepted for who we are. In James Bennett’s great short fiction collection Preaching to the Perverted we have a fascinating and compelling selection of tales exploring horror, growing into adulthood and beyond but very much centring gay characters to the centre of the story. It’s an immensely travel and thoughtful collection.

The first section of tales very much feels an exploration of youth and being gay in a world that has still much to learn about tolerance. In the excellent ‘Morta’ that starts with the amazing line ‘Ever since the day I ate Frank, I knew I wasn’t like other boys’ is a great mix of cosmic horror and a young man coping with being gay in a small town. Bennett makes you feel Morta’s isolation, yearnings and confusion while we also get a tale of secret myths, monsters and dangerous societies. That by the end we are totally sure whose side we are on is a think the story making us consider who the monsters are.

With the eerie ‘Husk’ it’s a tale of internalised self loathing. A young gay man has unknowingly created out of the fear and hate a shadowy doppelgänger who feels they can act out towards all the people who helped created misery and self loathing. At the same time the original character is finally learning to embrace life and love as an openly gay man. Part on a take of revenge it also explores how internalised hatred can be sabotaging to your own life as well and it’s got an excellent finale where we see how poisonous that can be. The ending is rather beautiful.

Intolerance is again explored in the folk horror tale ‘Changeling’ where a mother and her priest have acted an unholy deal when her young son is found to be gay. It’s a disturbing spin on the changeling myth but intolerance and demonic bargains are a bad mix and while events are horrifying for those in the way there is a moral to the story and pointed criticism of the real world too that makes this a sharp barb of a tale to savour.

The issue of longing and unrequited love is at the heart of the inventive story ‘Frankenstein Uncut’ where this time Victor Frankenstein is creating the perfect physical man for himself after he is rebuffed by a friend. Bennett makes the story come alive with science, anatomy and also a sense of loneliness and desire but unlike the original tale there is a dash of hope for characters.

Historical tales await in the non supernatural but bloody ‘In Hades, He Lifted Up His Eyes’ this tale of dishonour amongst thieves and resurrection men starts boldly when we know our main character is lying awake in his coffin. It’s a sumptuous tale of death, greed and love in dark places where few will meet a good end but it’s an extremely well told tale.

We enter folk lore with a very different version of Red Riding Hood with ‘Of Gentle Wolves’ a dark lyrical tale of the Woodsman hunting the wild in the forest after finding a young girl and her grandmother eaten. But wolves are magnetic when approached. Is it a tale of dark truths or seductive lies? The reader can decide but I suspect nasty endings await more people by the end - a deliciously dark tale to savour.

Late in the book we enter more middle aged characters starting with a trip to the Spanish countryside and the haunting ‘Idolo’ where a fractured couple travel to a partner’s small town trying to fix their relationship. However strange folk customs should never be ignored and a wicked fate awaits. Love the build of tension and the final reveals are pretty harrowing as we see the future awaiting the characters.

Then ambition causes harm to a photographer in ‘Sulta’ where the desire for the photo to seal a deal means he enters a forbidden temple and unleashes something truly evil. The build up to this is really well played as we see the horrorinle results before the mystery is explained and then we wonder how bad things will get, answer reader is a LOT. Really good horror!

With ‘Queer Norm’ we have a beautiful mournful tale of a golem created by an artist in response to death threats from a hate group that sadly struck and killed before the golem was alive. Now our golem called Norm tried to find purpose. It’s a powerfully lyrical tale as Bennett paints a picture of a world that is full of hate and unkindness where good deeds are always punished. How Norm can help is a moral dilemma and we feel his anguish as we look back to the events that led to his creation. A powerful tale holding a mirror to our world and saying is this what we think it looks like as why we do little about it? One of my favourites in the collection.

Lovecraft is taken on by Bennett in ‘The Facts Concerning The First Annual Arkham Parade’ a tale of our main character arriving in Arkham to find a friend and former boyfriend who is missing. Bennett creates an action propelled mystery as Innamouth and many other Lovecraft eater eggs are mixed in with a tale full of queer characters and also the attempt to have Pride Match in Arkham. It’s a lot of fun, full of bravado and getting do and really entertains and likely annoys all the right people too!

Middle-age and loss are explored in the bittersweet ‘Vivisepulture’ where we meet Eric still lurking his dead husband but finding he can now see ghosts. The reason for this runs through the story but it’s also about rediscovering a hunger for life and love and that not everyone will get a happy ending. I really enjoyed this story and Bennett makes the themes come alive with characters who all feel wonderfully human even if they’re undead.

The final story I enjoyed was the defiant ‘End Times in Paris’ where a ruined version of the city is explored post Rapture and a gay teacher falls in love with Angel Uriel. Love in lost places, how some feel gay people cannot have happiness and sometimes that people have to choose their own lives whatever the final cost is a strong theme to close the collection and it’s a beautiful piece of fantasy.

In all Preaching to the Perverted a tremendously good read with stories to entice, make you think, make you look and offers scares and desires in equal measure it’s a wonderfully dark human set of tales I thoroughly recommend to fantasy and horror fans.