‘Midnight Pleasures’ – Robert Bloch (Valancourt Books)

 

Page Count: 164 Pages

I wouldn’t recognise the people behind Valancourt Books if I bumped into them in the street but I still owe them a hell of a lot. There’s a lot of horror from the seventies and eighties that I never saw (being too young to read for a chunk of it) and a whole load, before then, that I wasn’t aware of at all. Thanks to Valancourt Books, I’ve been able to revisit some of it without having to trawl through second-hand bookshops (not exactly a chore but you never know what, if anything you’ll find) or resign myself to being fleeced on eBay. Which brings me round to Robert Bloch.

I’ve read a couple of Bloch’s short stories (and I posted about them, Here & Here) but even though I’ve always meant to read more, I’ve never really known where to start. Thanks (again) to Valancourt Books, I got to do just that with Robert Bloch’s collection, ‘Midnight Pleasures’. And…

Midnight Dreams (1987) collects some of Robert Bloch's best tales from later in his career, featuring his trademark blend of spine-chilling terror and gallows humor and an eclectic mix that includes three Halloween-themed stories, a Christmas horror story, and a previously uncollected tale first published in Weird Tales in 1939.

In "Pumpkin," a boy wanting to carve a Halloween jack-o'-lantern finds the perfect pumpkin in an unkempt garden, not suspecting whose garden it is or the horror that will follow. In "The Night Before Christmas," an adulterous couple looks forward to a quiet evening decorating the tree, but the woman's sadistic husband has other plans. And in "Pranks," trick-or-treaters get more than they bargained for when they visit the house of a kindly old couple with a dark and deadly secret. These and eleven other stories represent some of the best of the prolific Bloch's later work.

Prior to reading ‘Midnight Pleasures’, I was aware of Robert Bloch more by reputation than what I’d read of his. With ‘Midnight Pleasures’ now under my belt, I’ll happily say that Bloch’s reputation is well deserved. I’ve got a few more of his books and I’m looking forward to getting into them.

In a way, ‘Midnight Pleasures’ is much like any other collection of short stories. I know I’ve said this about other collections, not every story here worked for me but the key thing is, every story worked. They all did the job they set out to, all with a little dash of humour in the closing paragraph that either had me chuckling or thinking ‘damn…’ It’s a dark and violent world that Bloch takes us to, where terror and death can found in the most ordinary of places or in those shadowy spots right on the edge of what is normal. The beauty of a well placed, and timed, last sentence is that it can really bring that terror right home to the reader. And sometimes, that terror lies in man himself, his ability to just bounce back and carry on like nothing has happened, maybe even learn a thing or two on the way. I’m looking at you ‘The Spoiled Wife’, you know what I’m talking about...

‘Midnight Pleasures’ is a collection of Bloch’s later work and perhaps this becomes clear in how smoothly these tales run. Bloch knows his trade and is well versed, here, at timing everything to perfection and while sometimes things are a little too perfect, I’d get to the finale and be blown away too much to be that be that bothered. I think things come across as a little more ‘real’ when they don’t gel perfectly, that’s a small quibble though when set against the reading experience as a whole.

Not every story grabbed me (I’m looking at you ‘But First These Words’, I’m not sure what you were trying to tell me…) but every single one engaged me on one level for another. And the ones that did grab me (‘Oh Say Can You See’ and ‘Die Nasty’) were just superb.

If you haven’t read anything by Robert Bloch, ‘Midnight Pleasures’ is a great place to start. I guarantee that there are at least a couple of stories that will blow you away, probably more. I might just have to bump ‘Pleasant Dreams’ up the pile now.

(And funnily enough, I actually found an original 'Midnight Pleasures' paperback, on Greenwich Market, the other day. Whoever picks it up is in for a treat).