Trailer Park Noir, by Ray Garton

Ray Garton has always been one of horror's finest writers, but he hasn't had the mainstream acceptance he has always deserved. Ray should be up there with King, F. Paul Wilson, John Farris, with mass market hardcovers coming out over the last forty years.

I missed out on Trailer Park Noir for over a decade. It came out in an undistinguished and frankly overpriced trade paperback edition in 2011. Macabre Ink, a division of Crossroads Press, has reissued the back Garton catalogue in much more handsome and affordable editions.

Ray always played rough with his fiction, but as far as I know he never went as far as he did with Trailer Park Noir. I'm pretty inured to shock, but this one was a bit much for me.

Pedophilia has been used in fiction by many gifted authors. There's generally a moral center in the stories. Even The Girl Next Door has a lot of guilt and redemption. Not so with Trailer Park Noir. I get it. Horror writers should reflect the atrocities of real life, but man, I'm still wincing.

There are numerous denizens of the decrepit Riverside Mobile Home Park. An alcoholic private detective in shaky recovery. A burgeoning junkie and her drug-dealing boyfriend. An internet pornographer working on a Trailer Park Girls feature for his website. And a stripper Mom with a mentally challenged teenage daughter.

Here's where things get hinky. The mentally challenged girl (and yes, the R-word is often used to describe her) is molested by two of the trailer park scumbags. She not only likes it, she can't get enough.

I know things like this go on in the world. I don't like it any more than you do. Reading Trailer Park Noir was like having my nose rubbed in a cat litter box. There's no hope, no dignity, and no redemptive characters. Just ugly, weak, predatory miscreants. The Mom is the most sympathetic person in the novel, but even she is unhinged.

And yet, yet, Ray's prose compelled me to read on. He's as good in Trailer Park Noir as he ever has been. I still felt like taking a bleach shower after the explosive final page.

I am against censorship, but I am a big believer in self-censorship. I don't need to read things as horrible as Trailer Park Noir. I know a lot of people advocate horror fiction without limits, but as a father and a grandfather this book disturbed me in a way I do not enjoy.

I'm not done with Ray Garton. I also bought a copy of 'Nids, which is his spider invasion novella. For one thing he needs some help. Ray is undergoing severe health challenges. Ones that threaten his life. I've contributed to his Go Fund Me drive and I'm buying a few of the books I missed out on. I hope you consider doing the same.

As for Trailer Park Noir, you've been warned.

Written by Mark Sieber