The Earth Strikes Back, edited by Richard Chizmar

They say horror was dead in the mid-nineties, but you could have fooled me. There was no lack of great things to read. The heavy-hitters, King, Rice, Straub, Barker, were going at it in full force. The acclaimed Dell/Abyss line of cutting edge horror was publishing bold new works. Jeff Gelb and Michael Garrett were editing erotic anthologies.

Just about the only thing really missing were the cheesy paperback original potboilers from Zebra and Leisure, and despite a few notable exceptions such as Ronald Kelly and Rick Hautala, I didn't miss them a bit.

In Baltimore, of all places, something new was brewing. Richard Chizmar launched Cemetery Dance Publications in 1988. It started with a humble little magazine, and then he began to publish deluxe hardcover books. It's a venture still in bloom today.

In addition to the magazine and book line, Chizmar was editing anthologies. He did Cold Blood in 1991 and Thrillers in 1993. In 1994 Chizmar edited an environmental horror anthology called The Earth Strikes Back. I think it's the best and most important anthology he has ever done.

Ecology wasn't new in the early nineties, but it wasn't as prominent as it is today. Leave it to horror writers to be ahead of the curve.

The Earth Strikes Back features a veritable who's who of genre names of the time. You have longtime veterans Hugh B. Cave and Chelsea Quinn Yarbro side by side with hot new talents such as Poppy Z. Brite and Gary Braunbeck.

Dan Simmons leads off the anthology with a powerful cautionary tale about the destructive path we are in which we are headed. A meta story, "My Copsa Micas" is startlingly potent and is possibly the best piece in the book. It's also oddly incongruous with some of the later activities of the author.

Poppy Z. Brite was arguably the hottest talent in the field at the time. "Toxic Wastrels" is a decadent look at how people pollute their own bodies for pleasure.

Ed Gorman's "Cages" provides an icy futuristic story of body deformation that could be the basis of a David Cronenberg feature.

"The Fur Coat" is slightly restrained by Richard Laymon standards. It's a sad and haunting tale of violent environmental extremism.

An anthology should begin with a real grabber of a story, and it should end with one to stay in your head. Hugh B. Cave's "Genesis II" caps off the book and it is a beautifully told tale that demonstrates how much we are our own enemies. Here's a line from the story:

I've decided it's silly for us to be praying to God to stop what's happening. He isn't the one who's poisoning this poor planet. He gave us a world that was pure. We're the ones who have loused it up--with the way we behave and think, and even the way some of us talk.

I've singled out a few stories from The Earth Strikes Back, but the entire anthology is excellent. There isn't bad piece in the book.

The Earth Strikes Back is sadly out of print. Right when we need it the most. Used copies are readily available and I urge fans to seek one out.

I'm not sure what to believe in the news these days, but it's painfully obvious we have severely damaged the Earth, our ecosystem, and our own collective health. There are extremists in every movement, but too many have been gaslighted into complete dismissal of any environmental cause. We are all paying the price.

Written by Mark Sieber