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WORK TITLE: The Garden of Delight
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 12/16/1968
WEBSITE: http://www.battiago.com/homeenglish.html
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY: Italian
http://www.independentlegions.com/english-version—editor.html * http://www.battiago.com/biography.html * http://horror.org/in-january/
RESEARCHER NOTES: N/A
PERSONAL
Born December 16, 1968.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and editor. Editor-in-chief and owner of Independent Legions Publishing, Trieste, Italy.
MEMBER:Horror Writers Association (member of board of trustees).
AWARDS:Sinister Poetry Award, 2014, for “Interiora;” Bram Stoker Award, 2015, for Eden Underground.
WRITINGS
Also, author of works in Italian. Translator of works by writers, including Lisa Morton, Ramsey Campbell, Graham Masterton, and Gary Braunbeck. Contributor to publications, including Dark Moon Digest, Recompose, Disturbed Digest, Devolution Z, and Illumen. Contributor to anthologies, including Bones III and multiple editions of Rhysling Anthology. Editor of The Beauty of Death anthology; writer, with Corrine de Winter, of Venus Intervention poetry collection; writer of the short story collections, The Massacre of the Mermaids, Dark Gates (with Paolo Di Orazio), and Stockholm Syndrome (with Stefano Fantelli).
SIDELIGHTS
Alessandro Manzetti is an Italian writer working in the horror genre. He is also the editor-in-chief and owner of the Trieste-based publishing company, Independent Legions. He is a member of the board of trustees for the Horror Writers Association. Manzetti has written works in both Italian and English. He has translated the works of writers, including Lisa Morton, Ramsey Campbell, Graham Masterton, and Gary Braunbeck. Manzetti has written short stories and poems that have appeared in publications, including Dark Moon Digest, Recompose, Disturbed Digest, Devolution Z, and Illumen, as well as in anthologies, including Bones III and multiple editions of Rhysling Anthology.
Eden Underground and Sacrificial Nights
Eden Underground: Poetry of Darkness, is a 2015 collection by Manzetti. It won a Bram Stoker Award. Among the titles of the poems in the collection are “Dead Circus,” “Green Apples,” “A Modern Berserker,” and “The Rime of the Mad Mariner.” In an interview with a contributor to the Horror Writers Association website, Manzetti compared poetry in the horror genre with other types of poetry and discussed the future of dark poetry. He stated: “It’s more focused on revealing our dark side. A dark poet must be a tireless ‘shadows hunter’. I imagine that these shadows in future will have more life and energy, replicating and multiplying themselves more easily inside the body of our increasingly virtual social world. A communication without face, without flesh, a world with placeless and timeless relations, will give wings to our hungry shadows.” Manzetti continued: “We’ll need ‘shadows specialists’, poets who can tell all this, recognizing the bodies from the shadows, who will be able to do an honest and fierce autopsy on themselves and on others, taking out and showing everything.”
Referring to Manzetti, Paula Limbaugh, critic on the Horror Novel Reviews website, commented: “His dark verses bring poetry to an entirely different level.” Limbaugh also stated: “Alessandro Manzetti is mesmerizing.”
Manzetti collaborated with Bruce Boston on the 2016 poetry collection, Sacrificial Nights. A fictional place called Sacrificial City is the setting for the works. Wesley D. Gray, reviewer on the Marrowroot website, suggested: “Boston-Manzetti realize this concept to an astonishing effect, creating … a truly exquisite work of art.”
No Mercy
No Mercy: Dark Poems was released in 2017. The poems featured in this work have themes, including revenge, the apocalypse, and suicide. Manzetti also includes mentions of the music of Miles Davis and Janis Joplin.
Comparing the book to Manzetti’s previous works, a critic on the Beavis the Bookhead website asserted: “No Mercy is equally impressive.” Of Manzetti, the same critic stated: “His style is accessible, vivid and at times disturbing. He leaves you dirty feeling, like you could do with a hot shower when you finish reading.” Limbaugh, the same writer on the Horror Novel Reviews website, commented: “No Mercy is what you’ll find here. Alessandro Manzetti assaults us with his verses and fills us with the music of his words.” “Manzetti fills every line with haunting, morbid and lurid narratives,” suggested a contributor to the Always Trust in Books website. The same contributor added: “Manzetti is true to his word; these poems are incredibly dark! No Mercy is a remarkable read. … The imagery that AM conjures up with his expertly written pieces was superb. Superbly disturbing. This poetry is not for the faint hearted, it is hair raising, filled with stories of death, cannibalism, suicide and damnation.” Brian J. Lewis, critic on the Horror Review website, remarked: “This is dark horror poetry at its most intense and elaborate. … No Mercy truly offers no mercy.” Lewis concluded: “Alessandro Manzetti is a writer with extensive publication credits who really knows how to grab you and not let go. Recommended!”
The Garden of Delight
The Garden of Delight is a collection of twenty stories, most of which were published previously. Members of the Aztec tribe prevail in a brutal battle against the Spanish invaders in “Mictlan.” In “The Man Who Ate Flowers,” a person discusses his impending death by electric chair. A few of the stories that appear in the collection are set in the same location, a dystopian version of a Paris neighborhood, called Paris Sud 5, in which murder and torture occur frequently.
Reviews of The Garden of Delight were mixed. A writer in Publishers Weekly remarked: “Only a few stories stand out.” The same writer concluded: “They are more memorable for their gore than for their substance.” However, Frank Michaels Errington, contributor to the Cemetery Dance Publication website, commented: “If you’re looking for something completely different, you might want to give this offering a try.” Reviewing the work on the Unnerving Magazine website, Emma Whitehall suggested: “Sometimes, the prose can wind itself into confusing patterns, or become outright impenetrable.” Of the stories, Whitehall noted: “They are meant to be gorgeous and awful, and full of amazing imagery. And, in that way, Manzetti definitely delivers.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, February 6, 2017, review of The Garden of Delight, p. 51.
ONLINE
Always Trust in Books, https://alwaystrustinbooks.wordpress.com/ (June 28, 2017), review of No Mercy: Dark Poems.
Beavis The Bookhead, https://beavisthebookhead.com/ (June 10, 2017), review of No Mercy.
Cemetery Dance Publications, http://www.cemeterydance.com/ (March 24, 2017), Frank Michaels Errington, review of The Garden of Delights.
Comet Press Website, http://cometpress.us/ (November 1, 2017), author profile.
Herb Kauderer Website, http://www.herbkauderer.com/ (November 1, 2017), review of Sacrificial Nights.
Horror Novel Reviews, https://horrornovelreviews.com/ (July 8, 2015), Paula Limbaugh, review of Eden Underground: Poetry of Darkness; (June 8, 2017), Paula Limbaugh, review of No Mercy.
Horror Review, http://www.horrorreview.com/ (June 9, 2017), Brian J. Lewis, review of No Mercy.
Horror Writers Association Website, http://horror.org/ (November 1, 2017), author interview.
Independent Legions Website, http://www.independentlegions.com/ (November 1, 2017), author profile.
Marrowroot, https://marrowroot.wordpress.com/ (June 18, 2016), Wesley D. Gray, review of Sacrificial Nights.
Unnerving Magazine, http://www.unnervingmagazine.com/ (March 28, 2017), Emma Whitehall, review of The Garden of Delights.*
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Editor-in-Chief
Alessandro Manzetti is a Bram Stoker Award-winning author, editor, and translator of horror fiction and dark poetry whose work has been published extensively in Italian, including novels, short and long fiction, poetry, essays, and collections. English publications include his collections The Garden of Delight, The Massacre of the Mermaids, The Monster, the Bad and the Ugly (with Paolo Di Orazio), Dark Gates (with Paolo Di Orazio), Stockholm Syndrome (with Stefano Fantelli), and the poetry collections Eden Underground (Bram Stoker Award 2015 winner), Sacrificial Nights (with Bruce Boston, Bram Stoker Award 2016 nominee), and Venus Intervention (with Corrine de Winter, Bram Stoker Award 2014 nominee). He edited the anthology The Beauty of Death (Bram Stoker Award 2016 nominee)
His stories and poems have appeared in Italian, USA, and UK magazines, such as Dark Moon Digest, The Horror Zine, Disturbed Digest, Illumen, Devolution Z, Recompose, Polu Texni, and anthologies, such as Bones III, Rhysling Anthology (2015, 2016, 2017), HWA Poetry Showcase vol. 3, The Beauty of Death, Best Hardcore Horror of the Year vol. 2, Mar Dulce, I Sogni del Diavolo, Danze Eretiche vol. 2, Il Buio Dentro, and many others.
Awards and Nomination:
• Bram Stoker Awards 2015 winner
• Bram Stoker Awards 2016 two-time nominee
• Bram Stoker Awards 2014 nominee
• Rhysling Award 2015, 2016, 2017 nominee
• Elgin Award 2015, 2016, 2017 nominee
He has translated works by Ramsey Campbell, Richard Laymon, Poppy Z. Brite, Edward Lee, Graham Masterton, Gary Braunbeck, Gene O’Neill, Lisa Morton, and Lucy Snyder. He is the owner and editor-in-chief of Independent Legions Publishing and is on the Horror Writers Assocation Board of Trustees.
Website: www.battiago.com
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Awards
• Bram Stoker Awards 2015 Winner
• Bram Stoker Awards 2016 two time Nominee
• Bram Stoker Awards 2014 Nominee
• Rhysling Award 2015, 2016, 2017 Nominee
• Elgin Award 2015, 2016, 2017 Nominee
Pubblications
• Check it out his website: www.battiago.com
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QUOTED: "it’s more focused on revealing our dark side. A dark poet must be a tireless ‘shadows hunter’. I imagine that these shadows in future will have more life and energy, replicating and multiplying themselves more easily inside the body of our increasingly virtual social world. A communication without face, without flesh, a world with placeless and timeless relations, will give wings to our hungry shadows."
"We’ll need ‘shadows specialists’, poets who can tell all this, recognizing the bodies from the shadows, who will be able to do an honest and fierce autopsy on themselves and on others, taking out and showing everything."
Horror Writers Association Blog
ABOUT USBLOGMEMBERS’ BOOKSLIBRARIESYOUNG ADULTPOETRYHALLOWEENMEMBERS ONLY
In January, “Bram Stoker Award Nominee Alessandro Manzetti”
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☢
Horror, science fiction, weird fiction, and dark poetry writer Alessandro Manzetti’s work has been published extensively in Italian, including novels, short and long fiction, poetry, essays, and collections.
Many of his shorter works have been published in magazines and anthologies. English publications include his collections The Massacre of the Mermaids, The Shaman and Other Shadows, Dark Gates (co-written by Paolo Di Orazio), Stockholm Syndrome (co-written by Stefano Fantelli), and his poetry collection Eden Underground and Venus Intervention. His stories and poems have appeared in USA and UK magazines and anthologies, such as Dark Moon Digest, The Horror Zine, Disturbed Digest, Illumen Magazine, Devolution Z Magazine, Bones III, Rhysling Anthology 2015, and others. His dark poetry collection Venus Intervention (co-written by Corrine de Winter) was nominated for the 2014 Bram Stoker Award® and the 2015 Elgin Award. His poem “The Man Who Saw the World” was nominated for the 2015 Rhysling Award and his poem “Interiora” received the 2014 Sinister Poetry Award. Six of his stories were recommended by Ellen Datlow for the Best Horror of the Year 2014.
He has translated works by Ramsey Campbell, Richard Laymon, Poppy Z. Brite, Graham Masterton, Gary Braunbeck, Gene O’Neill, and Lucy Snyder. He is the owner and editor in chief of Independent Legions Publishing, HWA Italy Representative, Editor of K-Noir Series of Kipple Officina Libraria and Foreign Rights Manager of Cut Up Publishing. He lives in Rome, Italy.
AM Eden Underground
To celebrate 2016, Alessandro was gracious enough to join us here on the HWA Poetry Page for an interview:
HWA: Where do you see the state of poetry in the horror genre today? Where do you see it going in the future?
AM: Currently, poetry lives a great transformation; many new talented authors are trying to expand the boundaries. I believe that the future scenarios of poetry will be characterized by a stronger connection with the virtualization of the modern world. Poetry is one of the most direct and effective ways of communication, and communication is changing.
Poetry will have to find new forms and media to spread its voice. Anyhow, poetry will continue its mission to inspire awareness and reflections on life, and will act as an antidote to the mechanized and standardized thinking, as a good venom for the ‘binary intelligentsia’ who is devouring souls more than the creatures of Hell.
Horror Poetry has the same mission, but it’s more focused on revealing our dark side. A dark poet must be a tireless ‘shadows hunter’. I imagine that these shadows in future will have more life and energy, replicating and multiplying themselves more easily inside the body of our increasingly virtual social world. A communication without face, without flesh, a world with placeless and timeless relations, will give wings to our hungry shadows.
We’ll need ‘shadows specialists’, poets who can tell all this, recognizing the bodies from the shadows, who will be able to do an honest and fierce autopsy on themselves and on others, taking out and showing everything.
HWA: Do you have a particular poem you’d be willing to share?
AM: I would like to share the poem ‘The Dead Circus’, from the poetry collection ‘Eden Underground’, published by Crystal lake Publishing in July, 2015:
‘The Dead Circus’
Around the circus,
the ground is black.
There is no life for miles.
The tiger without a tail, without teeth,
growls at the shadows
that lick its nose.
It has a lock around its neck
and a ghost as a master.
The fat lady
exploded two years ago,
eating her husband
and the bronze diamonds
of her stage python,
its radioactive skin
green, like the mud from the Apocalypse
fucking the city.
The dwarf, the tightrope walker,
who has never been afraid of anything,
married a young sow
and now goes to the slaughterhouse every morning
with his sons still alive on a leash.
The owner of the circus,
the great Hector,
the magician who could make
the faces of the audience
and their wallets disappear,
now continues to dig,
finding pieces of his daughter
trampled by the elephant’s feet
beneath the dirt of the center ring.
The bearded lady
is chained
to her throne of thorns.
At her feet is a long line
of petrified lovers,
carved from the curse of Medusa
by the acid rain of the Apocalypse
frying everything.
The knife thrower, Modì,
still wears his mask of death.
He is the only one to continue the show.
Ghosts applaud from the stands
while he launches his blades
toward the wooden wheel that spins,
empty, without its flesh target.
That squeaky wheel is the only noise
of the dead circus,
of that show you bought the ticket for
when you were born.
—Alessandro Manzetti 2015
HWA: What are you working on now?
AM: As for poetry, I’m working on a collaborative collection with Bruce Boston, titled ‘Sacrificial Nights’ which will be published in June 2016. I’m honored to be working with Bruce, a real ‘shaman’ of dark and surreal modern poetry. It’s an interesting and very challenging project, characterized by an alternation of pieces of poetry and flash fiction, some collaborative, with recurring characters and a unique location, a modern city and its night creatures.
As for English fiction, I’m working on a new horror story collection with Paolo Di Orazio, entitled ‘The Monster, the Bad and the Ugly‘, including a graphic novel, which will be presented in May 2016 at StokerCon, in Las Vegas. Furthermore, I’m working on many new projects in Italian language (stories, collections and anthologies) among which I would like to mention a collection, entitled ‘Carne Cruda’, (Raw Flesh) which will include a zombie novella by Richard Laymon (Mop Up) together with a novella written by me, to be published in March 2016, in Italian, in paperback edition.
Too much to do in a short time!
HWA: How vital do you find organizations like HWA to horror poetry? Is there anything you’d like to see HWA do to promote horror poetry?
AM: HWA gives plenty of space to poetry, fully understanding the mission of it: that of a magnet that can attract and inspire the rest. I think the Association is doing a lot to promote dark poetry and to help the comparison and collaboration between authors. I couldn’t ask for more.
For more on Allesandro, visit his website: www.alessandromanzetti.net
☢
January 8, 2016Poetry AdminBlog, Poetry
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Alessandro Manzetti
Author photo by Seth Scranton-Morgan
Bram Stoker Award winning author of horror fiction and dark poetry, editor and translator, Alessandro’s work has been published extensively in Italian, including novels, short and long fiction, poetry, essays, and collections. English publications include his collections The Monster, the Bad and the Ugly (co-written by Paolo Di Orazio),The Massacre of the Mermaids, The Shaman and Other Shadows, Dark Gates (co-written by Paolo Di Orazio), Stockholm Syndrome (co-written by Stefano Fantelli), and the poetry collections Eden Underground, Venus Intervention and Sacrificial Nights (co-written with Bruce Boston). His stories and poems have appeared in Italian, USA and UK magazines and anthologies, such as Dark Moon Digest, The Horror Zine, Disturbed Digest, Illumen Magazine, Devolution Z Magazine, Recompose Magazine, Polu Texni Magazine, Bones III Anthology, Rhysling Anthology (2015 and 2016), HWA Poetry Showcase Vol. III, The Beauty of Death, Mar Dulce, I Sogni del Diavolo, Danze Eretiche Vol. 2, Il Buio Dentro and many others.
His dark poetry collection Eden Underground won the Bram Stoker Award 2015 and was nominated for the Elgin Award 2016. His dark poetry collection Venus Intervention (co-written by Corrine de Winter) was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award 2014 and the Elgin Award 2015. Some of his poems were nominated for the Rhysling Award 2015 and 2016. Six of his stories were recommended by Ellen Datlow for the Best Horror of the Year Vol. 7, and two of his poems made the long list of the Honorable Mentions for The Best Horror of the Year Vol. 8.
He has translated works by Ramsey Campbell, Richard Laymon, Poppy Z. Brite, Edward Lee, Graham Masterton, Gary Braunbeck, Gene O’Neill, Lisa Morton and Lucy Snyder. He is the owner and editor-in-chief of Independent Legions Publishing, HWA Active Member, Italy Representative and member of the Board of Trustees.
More about Alessandro at his website: http://www.battiago.com/biography.html
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alessandro.manzetti.5
Books by Alessandro Manzetti
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QUOTED: "Only a few stories stand out."
"They are more memorable for their gore than for their substance."
10/8/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
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The Garden of Delight
Publishers Weekly.
264.6 (Feb. 6, 2017): p51.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
The Garden of Delight
Alessandro Manzetti. Comet, $14.95 trade
paper (250p) ISBN 978-1-936964-69-7
The 20 stories (including four that were previously unpublished) in this collection of hard-core horror fiction
are slim on plot but engorged with gruesome incidents. "Mictlan" chronicles the grisly fate of defeated
conquistadors at the hands of cannibal Aztecs. "Regnum Congo" riffs on H.R Lovecraft's "The Picture in the
House" and its account of unsavory appetites nurtured in a remote rural household. A cluster of tales is set
in the futuristic Paris Sud 5, "one of the ghettos of high apocalyptic impact, the new France, the new world,"
whose residents regularly indulge in torture, murder, dismemberment, and other depravities. Manzetti labors
to conjure vivid images but winds up with awkward prose, as in "The Man Who Ate Flowers," whose
narrator cheerily anticipates death in the electric chair as "the pinnacle of my flesh garden, the black navel of
my wild ride, the continuous hunt, and the final shock." Only a few stories stand out, and they are more
memorable for their gore than for their substance. (Mar.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"The Garden of Delight." Publishers Weekly, 6 Feb. 2017, p. 51. General OneFile,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA480593852&it=r&asid=75f8cbf15769c974db9fbc5d0b7140f2.
Accessed 8 Oct. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A480593852
QUOTED: "if you’re looking for something completely different, you might want to give this offering a try."
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Home / Blog / Reviews / Review: ‘The Garden of DelightR...
Review: ‘The Garden of Delight’ by Alessandro Manzetti
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on March 24, 2017Categories ReviewsTags - Frank Michaels Errington, Alessandro Manzetti, Reviews, The Garden of Delight
The Garden of Delight by Alessandro Manzetti
Comet Press (March 2017)
250 pages; $14.95 paperback; $4.99 e-book
Reviewed by Frank Michaels Errington
The Garden of Delight is a sexually charged compilation of stories from Alessandro Manzetti. Most have been previously published, but a few of the tales are new to this collection. All the stories share a similar tone and spirit as they explore human decadance through the centuries. When it comes to sexual relations, nothing is off limits.
Another familiar theme in these works is cannibalism; several stories are set in an apocalyptic future where the She-Pope organizes exhibitions that would embarrass the leaders of ancient Rome. And then there’s the future ultra-violent district Paris Sud 5.
To give you an idea of what you’re in for in Garden of Delights here’s a taste of the cannibalism…
His passion, to reach the attic of the grand palace of the senses, soon became mine. I tried it out on myself, the first time, tasting a small piece of my right thigh, dug out with difficulty using a prison soup spoon. Walter lit a small fire in the laundry, and we roasted those few bleeding ounces on a skewer made for the occasion. We tasted my flesh as two connoisseurs who had just landed in the best restaurant on Mars, sitting in front of a succulent, phosphorescent, alien steak. I had the impression of chewing pork cooked with almonds. Walter said that I had a really good flavor, and to watch my back from now on, because killing and eating me was going to become an obsession for him. I was really delicious.
There were stories in this collection which I really enjoyed and others which seemed to fall flat for me. But, if you’re looking for something completely different, you might want to give this offering a try.
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QUOTED: "Sometimes, the prose can wind itself into confusing patterns, or become outright impenetrable."
"They are meant to be gorgeous and awful, and full of amazing imagery. And, in that way, Manzetti definitely delivers."
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Review of The Garden of Delight by Alessandro Manzetti
March 28, 2017
|
Emma Whitehall
Alessandro Manzetti’s “The Garden of Delight” is a strange blend of horror and sci-fi, of the gruesome and the beautiful. Scenes are described in prose that just shies away from purple, depicting bizarre moments filled with rats, cockroaches, women and religious iconography. Yet, I found myself really drawn into the world of Manzetti’s work. The stories, for the most part, take the form of dreamlike (or nightmarish) vignettes, such as “Regnum Congo” or “By the Sea”, where stories finish on their most vivid imagery (steeped in its own meaning and metaphor), rather than with what one might call a conclusion. Once I got used to the abrupt feeling of the stories, though, I really enjoyed them - especially the ones set in Manzetti’s post-apocalyptic city, Paris Sud 5. “The Shaman” and “Der Brüter” are the best of these stories, taking us on a whirlwind tour of a place devoid of sanity, stuck somewhere between technology and primitive cruelty.Manzetti’s work reminds me a lot of Poppy Z Brite - both authors share a love of blending gore and beauty, and Manzetti’s story “The Man Who Ate Flowers” makes me think of Brite’s novel “Exquisite Corpse”. I loved Poppy Z Brite’s books - especially when I was a teenager making her first forays into horror - so Manzetti is highly recommendable to that demographic. Sometimes, the prose can wind itself into confusing patterns, or become outright impenetrable - this is definitely not a book you can only skim-read - but these stories aren’t meant to give a narrative in the strictly conventional sense. They are meant to be gorgeous and awful, and full of amazing imagery. And, in that way, Manzetti definitely delivers. One to read just before bed, if you want to have some Lovecraft-esque lucid dreams...
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QUOTED: "No Mercy is equally impressive."
"His style is accessible, vivid and at times disturbing. He leaves you dirty feeling, like you could do with a hot shower when you finish reading."
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POSTED ON 10 JUN 2017 BY THE GRIM READER
BOOK REVIEW: NO MERCY – ALESSANDRO MANZETTI
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I feel a little un-equipped to truly write a good, detailed review for this collection of dark poetry from Alessandro Manzetti. I don’t read much in the way of poetry at all. In fact, this is only the second collection I have ever read. The other was Eden Underground, released by Crystal Lake Publishing and written by…yep, Alessandro Manzetti. I really enjoyed that collection. It was darker than Hell, and Manzetti’s style is easy to read, it has a narrative flow to it and so I thought I’d give this his collection a whirl.
Suffice to say, No Mercy is equally impressive. Manzetti’s work isn’t for the faint of heart. It is bleak, grim, but often beautiful reading. With this, his latest collection, Manzetti often incorporates a musical theme that weaves its way through some of the collection’s best poems. Janis Joplin and Miles Davis both featured in verses that contain strong imagery. It is at times confronting and others much more subtle. Manzetti tells of the world’s end, of suicide and revenge! It’s great stuff, though this probably isn’t the sort of collection one would use to woo a member of the opposite (or same) sex on date night…unless of course you enjoy the darker things in life, such as I.
I do enjoy the poetry of Alessandro Manzetti. So much so, that I picked up another of his collections for reading at a later date. His style is accessible, vivid and at times disturbing. He leaves you dirty feeling, like you could do with a hot shower when you finish reading. I didn’t think it was quite as complete as Eden Underground, though it is still a mighty impressive piece of work. Great cover art from Daniele Serra, too!
4/5 licks from the Grim Reader.
Pick up a copy from here.
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2 COMMENTS
alwaystrustinbooks
10 Jun 2017 at 8:22 pm
That cover art is just outstanding! I have requested this for review as well. Great review!
Liked by 1 person
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adishotbolt
11 Jun 2017 at 7:50 am
Great! Hope you enjoy!
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QUOTED: "Boston-Manzetti realize this concept to an astonishing effect, creating ... a truly exquisite work of art."
Wesley D. Gray
The writing team of Boston-Manzetti is a poetic tour de force that cannot be denied. Sacrificial Nights is a testament to this, grabbing you from page one, dragging you into its dark and seedy world woven with twisted characters, horrific happenings, and powerful, memorable imagery. When these two masters, each themselves Bram Stoker Award Winners, blend their voices together, the result is utterly fantastic!
Sacrificial Nights is a great concept that is not only a collection of poems, but creates a poetic novella when read from start to finish as it is meant to be read. I absolutely love this concept and was more than pleased when reading Sacrificial Nights to discover that Boston-Manzetti realize this concept to an astonishing effect, creating not just a superb collection of collaborative poems, but a truly exquisite work of art.
If you are a fan of Bruce Boston or Alessandro Manzetti then you have likely already bought this or are going to. But if you are new to either of these great writers, buy this, read it, but don’t stop there. Go forth and explore the individual works of both of these fantastic, award-winning authors.
Cheers for Boston-Manzetti’s Sacrificial Nights!
Sacrificial Nights is available now in ebook and Paperback editions.
Sacrificial Nights by Bruce Boston & Alessandro Manzetti 2016 Kipple Officina Libraria (Italy). 123 pages. www.kipple.it
Sacrificial Nights contains poems by each of the authors separately and some in collaboration. Most of the poems are long, and they are set in Sacrificial City, a hardcore lawless urban district. The poems build, and some characters reappear from poem to poem. The poems are meant to be read in order, but I would recommend not in one sitting so that the darkness doesn’t overwhelm. There will come a point somewhere after the middle of the book where it will be hard to stop reading. Make sure you have your breath when you get there.
While I expect this book to be nominated for the Stoker and some of the poems to receive consideration for the Rhysling, it is, more than anything, noir, right down to the detective who fears his doom. There are places where fantastical things are implied, but they are generally not nailed down leaving this in the liminal spaces of speculative poetry. I am sure the whole book qualifies as horror. I leave the question of how much of the book qualifies as speculative to those who care to tease out the subtle differences.
I consider this a book of poetry noir, and nothing could be more natural. Noir is an unusual literary movement in that it came from cinema rather than the written word, and this book certainly relates back to that origin. Sacrificial Nights would make a helluva noir film full of strong images and actions. But the funny thing is, one of the hallmarks of noir film and noir fiction is its inherent poetry, the poetry of the mean streets, and a dark poetry of fatalism, betrayal, and a morality far more brutal than anything discussed in clean suburban sermons. Perhaps books such as this are its final destination.
Some of the poetry is straightforward such as this from “Requiem in a Taxi”:
The driver turns to her,
his face like that of her father,
lord of whiskey and punches,
buried now three years
in a loose blue suit.
Some is more figurative such as this excerpt from “Deep in His Coma”:
the head of the future
hissing from a manhole
with the language of a snake,
This book is really one story of dangerous streets with many characters: hookers, serial killers, arsonists, hookers, pimps, strippers, hookers, thieves, and psychopaths. There are some graphically violent moments, but the poetry doesn’t dwell on the horrific scenes. It expresses then and steps away leaving the reader to fill in as much or as little detail as she wishes.
There has been much critical discussion through the years of the difference between horror and terror with the first being a physical threat and the latter psychological. I believe there needs to be a similar division in noir between that which dwells in the physical pain and darkness, and that which dwells in the psychological darkness and fear. In the first the worst happens, and then is exceeded. In the second the anticipation of evil, corruption, and betrayal is worse, and the awful reality is almost a relief. Call the first the ‘blacker outside’ school and the key component is that the reality is worse than you ever dreamed. Call the second the ‘blacker inside’ school and its essence is that stewing while waiting for evil to triumph is worse than the arrival of evil.
If Frank Miller had told this story there would have been more pages full of dramatic lighting and devoted to showing the physical pain and real dangers. Boston and Manzetti take it in a different direction sometimes merely implying the real loss and blackness, worrying about the subjective anticipation more than the excesses of some modern noir. This is not to say that the poets avoid the darkest shadows of humanity. Make no mistake: people will die in these poems and you will see it and smell it and feel it.
Noir is always about those who embrace evil, those who succumb to evil, those who attempt to sidestep it, and those lucky few that manage to survive it and find their own space. It celebrates the imperfection of what is wrong in humanity; that the darkness is awful but unable to sweep everyone into its shadow. In “Awakening” the authors write:
He visions the city in flames
and knows he must leave
before it incinerates in the
furnace of its own corruption.
The book is designed to introduce the characters and events that will lead up to “Conflagration” which can be seen as eighteen pages of transcendent crescendo in which darkness reaches its event horizon and bursts into flame consuming most of itself, but leaving enough behind for the evil to take root again.
By and large, those readers who like this sort of thing (and I’m one) have a clear idea of what this book is about by now. I consider it exceptional. I could pick a few nits. For example, one early poem and one late stanza are in a different and conflicting verb tense. I eventually just converted them in my head into the verb tense of the rest of the book. But does that really matter?
In the end, as I drive to work I’ll be thinking of Sandoval the detective, and China and Jean-Paul, and maybe visiting them again in the evening. The poem “The Great Unknown” was brilliant end to end over seven full pages. The sustained tension, interest, and fascination of this book amazes to me. Coincidentally, my collection of genre poetry books sits across the tops of two bookcases that hold my noir books. Sacrificial Nights will reside in the bookcase, not on top.
-Herb Kauderer
QUOTED: "His dark verses bring poetry to an entirely different level."
"Alessandro Manzetti is mesmerizing."
Written by: Paula Limbaugh
Lucifer, the Beast,
shows the man the rooms of Hell;
the swollen corridors,
the chandeliers made of bone and onyx,
the black bulbs,
screwed cancers,
ten per group,
ten per room.
The metastases of the bottom of the Earth
lit by darkness.
-Excerpted from The Tenth Circle
Poetry, it’s an odd genre. When you mention the word to someone, some think of rhyming words or fluffy verses; to others it may be that stuff you had to sit through in English class. And then there are those who have read Edgar Allan Poe and know it can be so much more. Alessandro Manzetti dispels those thoughts of the uninitiated; his dark verses bring poetry to an entirely different level. The title, Eden Underground, says it all; it is not at all the garden you thought you knew.
As you begin to read, you’ll find that the words flow like magic; a dark sensuous musicality intertwining with the visions in your head. Deceptive titles like Green Apples, Eastern Heaven, Lacrimosa, and The Garden, hide the reality of the prose. These poems allow one to glimpse the desolate underbelly of humanity without dirtying themselves.
When I was first given this book I thought “Okay, I’ll read a few poems now and perhaps a few more later.” Instead I found I couldn’t put it down. So intense is the writing that I had to keep reading. If you have never read a book of poetry before or if you never thought you could be a fan of poetry let this book be the one to introduce you to the words of verse. Alessandro Manzetti is mesmerizing, so much in fact that I just bought Venus Intervention, an earlier book of his poetry co-authored with Corrine De Winter. I am not disappointed!
It would be remiss of me to not address the eye-catching cover; it’s brilliantly done by Vincent Chong. It evokes visions of despair, I want to look inside and see what is being kept within. Oh, and I am pleasantly surprised! There are striking illustrations scattered
throughout the pages by Paolo Di Orazio. And of course, I must mention the back cover work is done by none other than Ben Baldwin.
Truly this is not a book to miss, you can get it here!
Rating: 5/5
QUOTED: "No Mercy is what you’ll find here. Alessandro Manzetti assaults us with his verses and fills us with the music of his words."
Written by Paula Limbaugh
No Mercy is what you’ll find here. Alessandro Manzetti assaults us with his verses and fills us with the music of his words. There is no escape, you can’t avoid being caught up in what he writes. A raw sometimes angry, sometimes sad voice with a mellowed lilt playing in the background will give you pause as you take in the music playing out on the pages of this book.
Daniele Serra’s artwork graces the cover and inside you will find illustrations from Giampaolo Frizzi. Alessandro says that he dedicates this latest book of poetry to Janis Joplin, although he was listening to Miles Davis while writing. That may seem like a bit of at odds with the styles, yet, that is how I see his work. The complexity of his subjects meshed with their small slivers of hope. There is an underlying current of despair running through these works that tie together the feelings of the used and abused.
Janis
With references to Janis Joplin and her music along with Miles Davis, John Coltrane and other ghosts of the past a story unfolds. Taking us in and out of reality, Manzetti’s verses are powerful in the feelings they convey.
Janis looks up at the ceiling.
She sees a porthole that leads somewhere else,
to another dirty hotel room,
where there is a girl on the bed,
with bloody knees and a lot of bruises
all over her just preyed-upon body,
who’s breastfeeding a knife, a steel lover;
the girl’s red lips are moving, whispering something.
Is she praying or singing with me? Janis wonders.
Maybe the music changes again in that place up there
which shows that cheap hotel.
Janis comes back to the crapper and
throws in all that shit she was going to send
straight to her eager veins.
Bye-bye Paradise. Music must come first, right?
Excerpted from The Resurrection of the Pearl
As with past books of Manzetti’s, this is another that I was compelled to read straight through, his mesmerizing verses get under your skin there is No Mercy!
Available in both e-book and paperback, you can pick up your copy HERE!!
5/5
QUOTED: "Manzetti fills every line with haunting, morbid and lurid narratives."
"Manzetti is true to his word; these poems are incredibly dark! No Mercy is a remarkable read. ... The imagery that AM conjures up with his expertly written pieces was superb. Superbly disturbing. This poetry is not for the faint hearted, it is hair raising, filled with stories of death, cannibalism, suicide and damnation."
Sent to me by Crystal Lake Publishing in exchange for an honest review.
Release Date: 09/06/17
Publisher: Crystal Lake Publishing
ISBN: 978-1640074767
Format: E-Book, 70pp
Genre: Poetry
Rating: 5/5
Summed up in a word: Surrealistic
First Impressions
I don’t often pick up poetry, especially for review, but when I saw No Mercy I thought it would be a brilliant opportunity to attempt my first poetry review here on Always Trust In Books. Crystal Lake Publishing are an amazing indie publisher focused on the darker side of writing. They generously sent me several books to review and I went straight for No Mercy… Look at that cover! This is a very short read, I read it twice in about half an hour but Manzetti fills every line with haunting, morbid and lurid narratives. The imagery that AM conjured in his poetry will stay with me for a long time. Pick up No Mercy and see for yourself.
Book Synopsis
The Lady in Black shows no mercy to anyone; she has cold skin, a job to do, and many lovers on Earth: Despair, Loneliness, Madness, and their soldiers and killers of daily life, armed with blades, hammers, teeth, and illusions. There are strange and bloody stories that tell all about it, if you want to hear them…
Are you sure? Well, you’ve found the right place, but consider that in turning these pages you’ll be thrown forward through time, until you reach the Apocalypse—the last stop.
So, like the Lady in Black, show yourself no mercy—sit down and read these stories, listening to Janis Joplin with a bottle of Southern Comfort cradled in your arm.
Don’t worry, you’ll find both of them inside this book, along with so many other dark pleasures.
My Review
Manzetti is true to his word; these poems are incredibly dark! No Mercy is a remarkable read. Inspired by Janis Joplin, her life and death, as well as a collection of varied and haunting stories. I was taken aback by the emotions that AM invokes with these twisted tales. The imagery that AM conjures up with his expertly written pieces was superb. Superbly disturbing. This poetry is not for the faint hearted, it is hair raising, filled with stories of death, cannibalism, suicide and damnation. AM’s work appeals to the darker, more macabre side of our psyches. No Mercy distorts tragedies of everyday life and AM’s delivery ensures that they stay with you for a long time.
“I can walk hand in hand with Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, or my unborn son in a radioactive future, with museums full of skeletons of books, skulls of writers and tyrannosaurus teeth”
I could quote this book all day. The above quote is from Blue Grace (inspired by another poem from the same name). The narrator is high on LSD and it makes for a strange but captivating read. All of AM’s works strike similar cords but over a vast spectrum of subjects and suffering. The Janis Joplin influences are certainly moving, seeing her struggling with and succumbing to her addiction. The poem that amazed me the most was definitely the title poem. I had to read No Mercy quite a few times to grasp the true nature of the poem and I was freaked out by the aberration that the story is centred around. Hunger and cannibalism; alongside beauty and appreciation. Intense!
“Looks like his luck just ran out, as long as he sees something shimmering in a green plastic dumpster, its toothless mouth wide open all night long. If that sparkling light is an illusion of starvation, of death in slow-motion, dragging you into its blue house one millimeter per day, there is no more mercy for him, the man thinks.”
Overall I have given No Mercy 5/5 stars as it was a scary, heart racing read that reminded me of the power of poetry. Stripping down the narrative and focusing on visceral and irrational moments of humanity. I recommend No Mercy to all those readers who want to experience a darker shade of fiction.
Pick up a copy of No Mercy here: Crystal Lake / Amazon UK / Goodreads
.01About Alessandro Manzetti
Alessandro Manzetti is a Bram Stoker Award-winning author, editor, and translator of horror fiction and dark poetry whose work has been published extensively in Italian, including novels, short and long fiction, poetry, essays, and collections. English publications include his collections The Garden of Delight, The Massacre of the Mermaids, The Monster, the Bad and the Ugly (with Paolo Di Orazio), Dark Gates (with Paolo Di Orazio), Stockholm Syndrome (with Stefano Fantelli), and the poetry collections No Mercy, Eden Underground (Bram Stoker Award 2015 winner), Sacrificial Nights (with Bruce Boston, Bram Stoker Award 2016 nominee), and Venus Intervention (with Corrine de Winter, Bram Stoker Award 2014 nominee). He edited the anthology The Beauty of Death (Bram Stoker Award 2016 nominee). This bio was found at: www.battiago.com/biography
QUOTED: "This is dark horror poetry at its most intense and elaborate. ... No Mercy truly offers no mercy."
"Alessandro Manzetti is a writer with extensive publication credits who really knows how to grab you and not let go. Recommended!"
Brian J. Lewis
NO MERCY
Alessandro Manzetti
June 8, 2017
Crystal Lake Publishing
Reviewed by Brian James Lewis
This is dark horror poetry at its most intense and elaborate! Taking this poetic journey with Alessandro Mazetti, readers will surely recognize some names, things, and activities. But you will not know it all and that is good. NO MERCY truly offers no mercy! It is an unstoppable flood of images flickering past the readers’ startled eyes at warp speed. A frightening intensity set upon you like an attack of piranhas. I urge you to plunge your head into this waterfall and see what terrifying wonders await you! A magical technicolor nightmare, if you will.
Perhaps my words be too flowery, but I am struck dumb for mere words to explain what I saw in this collection of poems. NO MERCY brings to mind the first time that I read William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch. It’s like taking an acid trip without actually dropping any acid! I don’t know about you, but I really like that feeling of being both frightened and yet laughing at the depravity. When you are done reading, the “real” world will seem so terribly normal and boring.
I like that Manzetti dedicated the book to Janis Joplin, aka Pearl, the ugly duckling who turned out to be royalty. The poems about her are beautiful and crammed with detail. But for writing, he chose Miles Davis’ Kind Of Blue because the melty tones and textures of jazz are perfect for writing poetry. Jack Kerouac even wrote his poetry to fit how a horn player would blow. This poetry has that Beat quality. You want to read it fast and feel the riffs. Don’t overanalyze because you’ll just ruin it. Great poetry is stuff that you can read multiple times and get something different. NO MERCY is a book that definitely deserves multiple reads!
Some of my favorites in the book are, No Mercy, The Ghost Subway, and one of the longer selections A Dream Of Milk and Blood. The imagery in the last poem is so detailed, yet constantly changing. A coin is required for many of the changes of scene and is inserted in many different receptacles. One of them is even the main character’s forehead. I dig the nod to Gregory Corso for Morning Suicide. I like a lot of things in this collection, especially the beautifying of terrible things. Sometimes the things you need will find you and not the other way around. Instead of eating, you may be satisfied by being eaten and becoming part of something greater.
A little aside about the book publisher: I really like it when you can see how much heart has gone into putting a publication together. Crystal Lake obviously really cares what we readers think. Not only that, but they invite us to get involved. Sharing the good word with friends can mean the life or death of an independent publishing company. It also makes you part of an extended family of sorts, which is cool.
Do I think you should get a copy of this book ASAP? Yes, I do! Unless you are a squeamish uptight person. If that’s the case, this book might not make you happy. However, rest assured that if you just take a look around on the Crystal Lake and Journal Stone sites, you will find a great read that fits you! Alessandro Manzetti is a writer with extensive publication credits who really knows how to grab you and not let go. Recommended!