Andrea
is, in her day-to-day routine of life, in essence, a simple Tampa, Florida
girl with a loving husband and an average domestic lifestyle. Talking to
her on the phone, you get the feeling of having a casual conversation with
someone carrying both the self-confidence of a United States Senator and the
timid honesty of that one housewife in your neighborhood who actually has a
good head on her shoulders but few neighbors take the time to find out,
though nevertheless is a hit at Halloween. But dig deeper than
conversation, and you’ll discover a woman who had found herself, her role in
this universe (at least in this lifetime), and, consequently, throughout the
course of time, has found a way to express her persona and ambition tapped
deep within herself that explodes upon the horror landscape with raw
unbridled gusto both through her writing and an impressive years-long
untiring promotion campaign that’s brought her name out into the forefront
of gothic horror writers.
Her books, contrary to what you’d
gather merely talking to her on the phone, are extremely explicit and
unapologetic, the kind of material that the entire U.S. population of
religious fundamentalists would do everything in their power to ban should
Andy become a commercial success, an endeavor that would make Harry Potter
books seem like Barney to the right-wing-inclined.
Man of Two Worlds is
comprised of a central story containing many delightful sub-stories of the
ghoulish supernatural characters who comprise a “skeleton crew” for a film
director embattled with rumors his movie set’s haunted, which frightened
away a previous crew who had more “life” in them. The film director
eventually learns what it’s like to be one of the new crew, one of their
kind, in a tale very well told and exhibits one of Andrea’s shining
accomplishments as a story teller.
Michael deals with Taylor,
a timid, troubled young man who happens upon one Michael Paxton while
spending one of many quiet times in his town’s isolated cemetery. As it
turns out, Michael has been a spirit roaming the cemetery who decided to
possess the body of a freshly-buried corpse of a young man who dug himself
from the ground to become human enough to claim Taylor as his lover
forever. Taylor, a devote heterosexual male, finds his life turned upside
down in ways he never imagined. Is Michael a vampire? Well, no. He eats
people. Is he a zombie? Well, no, because zombies don’t have anal
intercourse, and if they did, and they came inside you, you don’t become one
of them.
Yes, Andy’s works are that
raw. Who’d have thought, just by talking to her.
She writes quite skillfully,
which is very dangerous when it comes to expressing stories like Michael,
particularly, because what she has to say is vivid, the characters pull you
in, the violence is enough in itself to satisfy even the pickiest of
hardcore gorehounds, and the gay sex and graphic nature steps on your skull
and scrapes your teeth against the cement curb like an angry rapist having his
way with you on a suburban side street in the dead of night when the
countless people in the surrounding homes are all fast asleep and haven't
the faintest notion of your violent plight to stay alive, where you could cry out but no one would
hear you except the restless ones in the graveyard nearby, waiting for you
to join them.
But I’ve said enough already.
On a small note, in regards to
Michael, I would have loved to have seen the Danny character (the
ex-cop) appear way earlier on, because he appeared too abruptly with not
enough time to digest, and he would have been more convincing as being
connected with a police investigation sub-plot as the whole story went from
almost the beginning....but that's just me......
