178 pages, Black Hill Books
Review
by Pat Black
The
lights are out, the candles are lit… and out comes the cheese board. What a
moment. Whether guest or host, no matter how full up you feel from your meal,
you can’t stay away from that cheese. And why should you? A little bit of what
you fancy, and all that. Go on, just a little corner. That’s it.
I
shouldn’t say we’re fans of Guy N Smith on Booksquawk, exactly, but we’ve given
him a fair crack of the whip. Mr Proops has very kindly gone through the British
pulp horror stalwart’s Crabs series for you lucky people. That’s right – actual
giant crabs, which can click you in half with their claws before sucking up
your guts like chow mein.
Night of the Werewolf is my intro to the world of Smith’s novels, and to be fair, I
had been warned. Although my esteemed colleague can’t seem to stay away from Smith’s
work, he is entirely up-front that it’s crap. I was expecting a bit of fun, a
bloody romp – no harm in a bit of cheese, is there? And it is that. But there’s
an added bit of interest owing to the fact that this book is a “lost” novel of
Smith’s. Originally published in Germany in 1976, it’s only now coming to
light, as Smith’s titles are given a new lease of death on Kindle.
The
first couple of pages are one in the eye for “show, not tell” bores. We meet
Odell, a Van Helsing-esque monster hunter keeping a lookout for our titular
lycanthrope in the middle of a forest, on the first night of the full moon. We
are told that this guy has 20 years’ experience in the monster-hunting
business, and is in south-west Scotland to take out a werewolf who has killed a
few sheep before tomatoing a luckless shepherd.
You
could see how other writers might have weaved this info into a more
gently-unfolding plot, like good little novelists are supposed to. But I admire
Smith’s braggadocio. Here’s the story, here’s what Odell’s up to, this is where
he is and what he’s after - and stuff your subtlety. No time is wasted: this is
the essence of economy.
Now
that I’ve placed that feather in Smith’s cap, I have the unpleasant duty of
telling you that Night of the Werewolf is astoundingly crap. It doesn’t fail
because it’s cheese, or because its subject matter is low and its thrills come
cheap – there’s nothing wrong with any of these things now and again
(especially the cheese). But when you seek to unlace all frilliness and complexity,
leaving the story completely bare, and that story defies logic and common
sense, then your book is in big trouble and may in fact be crap.
First
of all, the tale robs us of suspense, because Odell knows exactly who the town
werewolf is. Everyone knows who the
town werewolf is, in fact. There’s not even a hunt involved, or any detective
work. The wolfman is an obnoxious, Bluto-esque town bully called Angus Broon.
No-one thinks to phone the police or even the local dog-catcher about the fact
that a blood-crazed beast lives on their doorstep, because they are all frightened
of this mouth-breathing lummox. So everyone – including our monster-hunter -
knows where this guy lives. Odell should knock the guy’s door and stick a
silver bullet or two into his hirsute ass – but he doesn’t, because there would
be no protection under law. Only when Broon’s in beast form can Odell carry out
his work without any interference or comeback from the police.
Which
is fair enough, but… Why not stake the house out? Maybe trail him until the
moon rises, then wait for Mr Wolf to leave? While the creature double-checks
he’s locked the door with his hairy, clawed hands, BOOM. “What time is it now,
Mr Wolf? It’s banishment-from-whence-you-came time.” Job done, off to the pub,
curtains, applause, roses.
But
no, Odell packs up and goes to his room, puts his feet up, has a cup of tea. He
puts himself at great risk by waiting in a forest in the middle of the night
for the beast to show, keeping his gleaming, custom-made firearms to hand. I
began to wonder if Odell is not very good, or just plain crap. His shooters may
be custom but his aim is strictly jumble sale. He misses his shot on the first
night and lets the wolf get away, after which it will presumably return to Angus
Broon’s house to detransmogrify. Remember, Odell knows where he lives. Bad
luck, eh? Try again tomorrow, maybe?
Odell
further demonstrates his crapnicity when the other major characters enter the
scene – freelance journalist Ron Hamilton and his German fiancée, Ingrid.
They’re enjoying a short break back in the town where Ingrid grew up. The
werewolf in the title remembers Ingrid full well, as she spurned his advances
when they were younger. And so, in a strange colloid of King Kong and Grosse
Point Blank, Angus the werewolf decides he is going to have the lovely Ingrid,
whether she wants him or not. Odell and Hamilton seek to protect this damsel in
distress from… What? Rape? Ingestion? A pleasing blend of both? You get the
idea.
Odell
gets his crap on several more times, missing his shot at the hotel where the
couple are staying after Broon gets in a fist-fight with Ron. Later, in a
supposed safe house, he literally falls asleep on the job, allowing Ingrid to
get up and wander out to the shops, alone – as you would, when a gore-guzzling
supernatural lustmonster is after you - whereupon she is captured. The two men
search the woods for Broon, but the canny shape-shifter doubles back to the
house they’re staying in before stealing and sabotaging the weapons Odell has left behind.
It
struck me that the entire situation could have been avoided had Odell not been
involved. Broon might have carried on molesting sheep. On nights of the full
moon, people could have stayed in, locked their doors, shut the curtains,
listened to Foster and Allen. Or, you know, called the cops. But the situation
could be manageable. As any reporter who has worked that patch will tell you,
sheep rustling is big business in the Scottish Borders – so what’s one or two wee
lambie-lambs per month as a bit of run-off?
And
as for the tourist couple sucked into the plot… There’s always the option of
leaving. Even though the bold Broon wrecks their car, and presumably every
mechanic in the area has a Krypton factor of fuck all, they could always book a
taxi. Or catch a bus. “Hunting a werewolf are you, Mr Odell? A ferocious
man-eating beast? Well, why don’t we leave you to it?”
I
think this sense of plausibility – quite separate from verisimilitude – is the
key test for any piece of fiction or drama. If the story makes sense on its own
terms and follows its own rules (unless you are wilfully breaking them for
aesthetic reasons, you old rogue), then you’ve nothing to worry about. We’ll
buy it. But break that covenant between plausibility, structure and technique,
and the result is almost always crap.
The
thing which bothers me here is that you can see how a far better novel would
have resulted with a quick redraft. Do away with the character of Broon altogether;
maybe Odell is the only one who knows a werewolf is on the prowl, being a
hunter of these creatures. Make him track the wolfman or woman down. And
instead of making Odell crap, you could make him cool. Sort of like Quint in
Jaws, but less bonkers, or like Stephen Sommers’ movie version of Van Helsing,
but without the whole enterprise seeming like an ADHD teenager’s acid
nightmare.
But
Smith somehow makes a balls of it. It’s sloppy plotting. Wrong from the start,
like that last Batman movie. You wonder if this was a first draft, written in a
week, rattled off to the printers and pinged out to hit a deadline.
There
is blood and death, surprisingly horrible stuff. It’s curious to note the first
few killings aren’t at the claws of a wolfman, but are carried out at
knifepoint by Broon in his nine-five guise. Two killings in particular are
extremely nasty. Night of the Werewolf is a daft affair with histrionic Hammer
horror film dialogue, but when the death comes down, it’s grim. You have to
credit Smith for that.
Another
tip of the hat for setting.
His fictional town of Glencaple is supposed to be in south-west Scotland, and
although the wild places around there are less hilly than you might expect,
they are heavily forested. And it's one of the best spots in Britain to enjoy a
night sky free from light pollution. Werewolves I don't know about, but you can
see sparrows flocking there in their hypnotic patterns, especially around this
time of year. Add a big bright moon to those diamond-speckled skies over the
head of the soughing pines, and that's a wonderful setting.
Although his villagers are thicker than
wolfshit, Smith also avoids taking us a wee trip down Brigadoon with bonnie
Morag and the misty blue hills. There are no caricature Scots speaking Jocklish
– a stumbling block for many far superior writers who try to write in the Scots
vernacular without the slightest idea or experience of what they’re talking
about.
Looking forward to the dirty bits? Bad
luck. No sex please, we're wolfish. There's no naughtiness in this one, but I
understand Smith's novels are usually quite racy. This was par for the course
for such tomes back in the 1970s and 1980s. There was certainly an appetite for
blood, sex and death, given sales figures for horror writing. This fertile
period for authors of dark fiction is called the "horror boom". There
are theories that the genre's popularity in these times owed something to
economic strife, political upheavals and the ever-present threat of nuclear
warfare. The thinking goes that there was some societal need for horror,
perhaps to blind us to the more banal evils stalking the corridors of
Westminster and Washington.
There's a bit of truth in that - but if so, where are the great horror novels of the 2010s? We're in an absolute mess in the west, domestically, economically and geopolitically. Going by the "horror boom" theory, there should be an avalanche of scary books on the bestseller lists. But I can't think of any groundbreaking novels or breakout writers in recent years - certainly no-one to compare to King or Herbert (RIP). Sure, Twilight is a monster, but I consider those to be primarily romance novels.
There's a bit of truth in that - but if so, where are the great horror novels of the 2010s? We're in an absolute mess in the west, domestically, economically and geopolitically. Going by the "horror boom" theory, there should be an avalanche of scary books on the bestseller lists. But I can't think of any groundbreaking novels or breakout writers in recent years - certainly no-one to compare to King or Herbert (RIP). Sure, Twilight is a monster, but I consider those to be primarily romance novels.
A more prosaic explanation is that
people's thirst for horror, the macabre and the plain disgusting is being
slaked by the internet. Think about the first thing you ever saw online that
truly shocked or nauseated you. How can Guy N Smith's tale of Dick Dastardly wolfmen
running around rooftops compare with the reality of warzones, snuff videos and
the increasingly Lovecraftian world of extreme pornography? Night of the
Werewolf is Scooby Doo in comparison.
Like the early Hammer films, Smith's werewolf is toothless in the modern world. But although our aged horrors may not quite be so scary or shocking any more, we are affectionate about them. Faces are ripped off, severed heads bounce down the road like coconuts and skulls are smashed like Easter eggs, but this book seems cute. Reading it is an escape from the real world of chaos, carnage, death and grief, not an embrace of it.
Like the early Hammer films, Smith's werewolf is toothless in the modern world. But although our aged horrors may not quite be so scary or shocking any more, we are affectionate about them. Faces are ripped off, severed heads bounce down the road like coconuts and skulls are smashed like Easter eggs, but this book seems cute. Reading it is an escape from the real world of chaos, carnage, death and grief, not an embrace of it.
Many of Guy N Smith's books are available
on Kindle at very low prices. They are mostly horror novels, but he had a good
pop at other insalubrious genres - dirty truckers, crime, straight-up-and-down
pornography. It must be heartening for the guy to have his books out there and
available for people again. He was, and is, prolific. All that you can ask as
an artist is for your work to survive.
I’ve
given Smith a kicking here, but at the end of the day he’s a published,
professional author with an extensive back catalogue, and I am not. For all my
snark, if you’re looking for a bit of fun and a bloody romp, then this ticks the
boxes. It’s a cheap thrill. Smith’s precedent is in the pages of the penny
dreadfuls, in Varney the Vampyre, or any number of killer titles from
yesteryear.
His
books are, above all, not meant to be taken seriously, so I guess this review
was a failure from the start. Guy N Smith’s novels are not pretentious. They
are not abstruse. And they are not, praise Cthulhu, ironic. They are an honest
enterprise. This one in particular happens to be crap, but I had a fair idea
this would be the case.
Will
I be back?
‘Course
I will.
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