Guises

GUISES is a reprint of a classic Charlee Jacob collection featuring 21 short stories, and novelettes. Charlee is one of the most respected authors in modern literary horror. This collection showcases her unique talents as one of the premier storytellers of the genre.

GUISES is a masterful example of Jacob’s beautifully brutal and grotesque style of dark fiction. Within GUISES, Jacob explores endless variations of the masks — literal and figurative — that hide human frailties and reveal the true nature of the wearer. From the works of art in the titular story to the seemingly surface attraction of the weary hero of “The Piper,” the nature of the camouflage ranges from the breathtakingly beautiful to heart-stopping horror. And sometimes, the extremes are indistinguishable from each other. Such is the makeup of appearances.

In GUISES, all parties are in disguise; it is recognizing that truth that is essential to drawing every nuance from the stories.

Make no mistake; seen from the outside, there is little within these dark stories and poems that could be genuinely classified as love. Within Jacob’s lush prose there is an excess of emotion, but few would put it down to such tender feelings. In GUISES, as in virtually all of her work, Jacob returns again and again to the explicit dissection of all things sexual. She handles it deftly, disturbingly, never more than a twist of phrase from another excursion into her peculiar take on sex at its most repulsive.