Werewolf tales in New Chaosium fiction anthology "Mark of the Beast"
Posted by Michael O'Brien on 10th Dec 2015
Herein are gathered a number of tales portraying the glorious and bestial nature of the werewolf. There are horror, sci-fi, Gothic, cyber, fairy tale and fantasy stories and poems that embrace the essence of the beast, told by an assortment of scribes with diverse styles and voices.
Every civilization has some story or legend of creatures half man and half beast. Indigenous native peoples around the world held beliefs about shamans and witch doctors who could transform themselves into animals. The ancient Egyptians worshiped a whole pantheon of animal-headed gods. The superstitious folk of medieval Europe believed that a witch or a gypsy could curse a man to become a werewolf by night. Pacific islanders told tales of men changing into sharks. Certain African peoples feared leopard men.
Coming from all over the world and from every culture, werebeast legends naturally vary. Among the ways said to become a werewolf include being bitten by a werewolf, being bitten by a normal wolf, a potion or curse from a gypsy or a witch, a family curse, a genetic disorder, drinking rainwater from the paw print of a wolf, wearing an enchanted pelt made from wolfskin, through a pact with Satan or a demon, through the act of cannibalism, etc. Some werewolves have no memory or control over their change while others do. Some change only by the light of a full moon while others can change at any time. Some werewolves look like normal wolves, some look like giant wolves, and still others are mutant man-beasts. Some are solitary and some live and hunt in packs or clans.
Now the Full Harvest Moon is rising and the soft wail of the autumnal wind begins...
Now available in trade paperback: http://www.chaosium.com/mark-of-the-beast
And at DriveThruFiction: http://www.drivethrufiction.
Coming soon on Kindle at Amazon!
The contents of this anthology include:
- The Wolves Outside the Cage by Abraham Kawa
- Thirteen by Alyne de Winter
- Best Left Buried by Evan Dicken
- The Clothes Maketh by Juliet Boyd
- Over Exposure by Jonathan Templar
- Into the Moonlight by Donald R. Burleson
- Teenage Werewolf by Catharine Clark-Sayles
- The Bone Cruncher by Karen Gillard
- The Wolfgirl in the Cupboard by Gitte Christensen
- Werewolf Root Canal by Lois Gresh
- Wolf by Ernest Walwyn
- Adjustment by Paul L. Bates
- The Vestals by Ann K. Schwader
- Malediction of the Moon by T. Fox Dunham
- Arcadia by Donald Jacob Uitvlugt
- The Better to Type With, My Dear by Megan Engelhardt
- Lucy Still Eats Meat by Michael Penkas
- At Long Last by Mollie L. Burleson
- Happy? by Daryl Wayne
- WolfGang by Glynn Barrass
- The Hunting of Philip Ackroyd by Josh Reynolds
- Her Mother’s Fur by Rebecca L. Brown
- Moonburn by Robert M. Price
- Against a Sea of Brilliant White by Michael Matheson
- Hellhound by Aurelio Rico Lopez III
- The Blood of the Moon by Caitlin Walsh
- Last Night... by Eric J. Guignard
- The Shrieking Shack by Richard L. Tierney
- Mr. Lupus by T.E. Grau