PERHAPS A GIFT VOUCHER FOR MUM?: MOTHER'S DAY
Zachary Ashford is an Australian author, educator, and speaker. His dystopian horror novella When the Cicadas Stop Singing was nominated for the Aurealis Award. His other works include the Sole Survivor books, Autotomy Cocktail, and Encampment by the Gorge & Blood Memory. His short fiction has been published by various presses. His love of Ozploitation creature features has seen him called 'a master of bush horror'. When he's not writing stories about the human condition while surrounded by action figures and monstrous memorabilia, he's listening to death metal, hanging with his amazing wife, chilling with his son, or playing with his cat.
"This book is one hell of a ride. Ashford writes as easily about friendship, jamming, and obsession as he does about Faustian deals gone wrong and gore. His voice is assured and accessible, drawing you in; before you know it, you're three hours past midnight and two hundred pages in. Polyphemus is tragic, compulsive, and wonderfully laced with allusions to Greek myth and death metal. I swear you can hear the screaming vocals and thudding bass while you read. Highly recommended. -Geneve Flynn, Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson Award-winning author, editor, and poet. ""A blood-soaked tale of compulsion and agony.""-Aron Beauregard, Splatterpunk Award-winning author of Beyond Reform and Playground A dark foray into a blackened world where Ashford drags the reader in one direction, fully knowing the horrors that await in all directions. POLYPHEMUS is uncomfortable, compelling and perfectly depraved.-Steve Stred, Splatterpunk-Nominated author of Sacrament and Mastodon ""This book is a swirling maelstrom of culty, cosmic darkness, wrapped in a smokey haze of crushing death metal and I loved every bloody second of it.""-Kev Harrison, author of The Balance and Below ""Polyphemus is a robust tale of addiction, masculinity, demons, and heavy metal. A big and brutal horror novel. Read it.""-Mike Thorn, author of Shelter for the Damned and Darkest Hours ""I devoured this book in a matter of hours. I was hooked by the depiction of death metal so authentic that I could HEAR the riffs! The deeply psychological and unflinchingly bleak portrayal of demonic influence and avarice was a wonderful train wreck to behold. One of the best books of the year!""-Valkyrie Loughcrewe, author of Crom Cruach ""An unflinching odyssey into the abyss, where the seasons change but the ambitions, vices, and weaknesses of doomed humans don't. Zachary steps up his damnation game and impales decorum on the twinned horns of hallucinatory horror and heavy metal with the demented glee of a diehard fan. Crank Polyphemus to eleven and count yourself lucky if you make it out of the pit in one piece."" - Matthew R. Davis, Shirley Jackson Award-nominated author of Midnight in the Chapel of Love and The Dark Matter of Natasha ""Polyphemus is a dark deliverance into a world of death metal, Faustian deals and the cost of fame."" -Leanbh Pearson author of Bluebells ""Aggressive. Throaty. Distorted. Let the screaming begin. Zachary Ashford's POLYPHEMUS employs metal music as the very blood running through these pages. From the opening riffs to the twisted fade out on the last page. Every chapter hits harder than the last, the rhythm pounding in our ears, as we watch old friends come back togethe"
