No Sharks in the Med and Other Stories

By: Brian Lumley

Narrated by: Joshua Saxon

Length: 12 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's summary

Prior to the first American publication of Brian Lumley's ground-breaking, dead waking, best-selling Necroscope in 1988 - the first novel in a long-lived, much-loved series - this British author had for 20 years been earning an envious reputation writing short stories, novellas, and a series of novels set against H. P. Lovecraft's cosmic Cthulhu Mythos backdrop. In addition, and for a further 20 years, Lumley's non-Mythos fantasy, SF, and horror stories have been appearing on a regular basis in some of the world's most famous publications; for example The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Weird Tales, along with anthologies such as Karl Edward Wagner's Year's Best Horror Stories, Charles L. Grant's Final Shadows, and Kirby McCauley's Frights, among others.

With his multiple-award-winning literary career now spanning over four decades, Lumley continues to write his superior fictions, examples of which from each of those decades can be found in this current collection, where weird tales itself is represented by no less than five stories!

And so, to complete a trilogy of volumes begun with the Lovecraft-inspired The Taint and Other Novellas, and followed by Haggopian and Other Stories, Subterranean Press is now proud to offer No Sharks in the Med and Other Stories, a handpicked collection of Brian Lumley s best macabre tales.

©2012 Brian Lumley (P)2019 David N. Wilson

A must have horror shirt for any fan of the genre

I love Lumley. Been reading his stuff for years and I must say that since I’ve started listening to the audio books that when I pick up one of the stories to read it is the voice of Joshua Saxon that I hear in my head as I read. He has brought Lumleys work to life in a way that simply reading it myself never did. I live that this collection has a few of my old favorites as
Well as some I hadn’t yet read or heard. Fruiting bodies was always one of my favorites as was the whisperer. The kind of Lumley can be a truly dark and twisted place. Come in and enjoy it, must bring your own lightsourse. Don’t advise listening to on a dark stormy night unless you like nightmares. I was voluntarily provided this free review copy audiobook by the author, narrator or publisher

Interesting and not a little disturbing

Here is a collection of the macabre that runs the gamut of horror, from supernatural to psychological to Sci-fi to dark fantasy.

The two things they all have in common is brilliant characterization and a high creep-out factor.

Joshua Saxon offers brilliant audio narration that sets the tone of each story wonderfully. As with his previous work, his one weakness is that the female voices are left somewhat wanting, though to be fair that is a fairly common problem.

Elsewise, his voices are varied and distinct and brilliantly crafted. His accents are damned impressive. So much so that, in the one story where he drops the British accent in favor of the American, I almost wondered if it had switched to a different narrator!

His vocal inflections are excellent and his tempo shifts, while subtle, are very effective.

As is my wont, I'll forgo a discussion of what each story is about. I'm sure you can find other reviews that do this.

First, as was the standard at the time these were written, most of these stories start off rather slowly while providing a lot of excellent characterization to help get to know the characters.

There are a couple of exceptions, but most of the stories are told in first person POV, which I'm not normally fond of. But here it works exceptionally well with the subject matter.

Each character throughout the stories has a unique personality and view of the world that makes their voice compelling and interesting to read.

Similarly, each of the stories deals with its macabre subject in a different way that keeps them fun and engaging.

Although most occur in a world that feels much like the real world, there are a couple of exceptions, such as in "My Thing Friday" which takes place on an alien world.

The world building in these instances is every bit as intricate as the character building and I couldn't help but be fascinated by them.

Apart from things you have to expect in stories that were written in decades past, my only real complaint is there are one or two stories that were a touch predictable.

Most of the stories end in a twist, or at least a shock. And in the main, those shocks and twists are pulled off very well.

If you enjoy Lumley's style, or are simply a fan of short horror fiction in general, you can't go wrong with this collection.

Loved this collection!

Where to start? I loved the stories! I loved the narrator! He definitely added to the overall suspense factor of these creepy stories. This is the second audiobook I’ve listened to by Joshua Saxon (in combo with the Brain Lumley) and wow! They are great together! Mr. Saxon does such an amazing job! I swear he is the best male narrator I’ve come across. And for me, my top male narrators consisted of RC Bray, Travis Baldree, and James Anderson Foster. Move over RC Bray! When he read the second to the last story using his American accent, it just slays me with how natural he sounds (not that he doesn’t sound natural with the other accents he uses, because he does)! His voice was made for narrating.

Fruiting Bodies 4/5 This was a very interesting story; I just had a hard time getting into the beginning of it.

The Sun, the Sea, and the Screaming 5/5 This was a very disturbing and made-you-feel-itchy kind of story. Question: why would they kill the fish when they were told not to eat them?

The Picnickers 5/5 I’ve listened to this one in “Cover of Vampires” and still loved it!

The Viaduct 5/5 There was so much tension in this story!

The Last Stone 5/5 The love stone part sounded familiar to me. I might have read or listened to another story that had similarities to the love stone idea, but… I don’t know what it was about the following line, but the fact Mr. Saxon said it so nonchalantly, yeah… it just went really well with how Mr. Lumley wrote the character: “Betting on the races was one of his hobbies, another of his hobbies was rape.”

The Whisperer 4/5 This was a good story until the final few minutes when the main character had the realization or whatever you want to call it and knew who the stinky, little man was. It went over my head! I couldn’t figure out who he was. AHHH!!!

No Sharks in the Med 5/5 Overall, I loved this story but didn’t understand why the main characters would have gone anywhere with Spiros(?) after all the red flags and weirdness that surrounded him. There were also some lines in this story that stood out to me in a negative way. It really made me want to see the actual writing because I swear there were tense issues (past/present) and just questionable phrasing. For example: “Spiros must release Gwen to keep his balance.” Or “Breathing heavily, Jeff and Gwen tried to catch up. Failed miserable.”

The Pit Raker 3/5 I just couldn’t get into this story.

The Place of Waiting 5/5

The Man Who Killed Hugh Gardens 5/5 This was such an easy to imagine, yet very creepy story!

My Thing Friday 5/5, American accent A+ The way Mr. Saxon narrated this was different but went so well with what the character was going through. It reminded me of Matt Damon and his recordings from The Martian.

The Disapproval of Jeremy Cleve 5/5

I received a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Chilling and creative with a funny twist

Out of the collections of Lumley's short stories this is my second favorite next to his Cthulhu Mythos stories. There's a really wide variety of stories in this one. It comes to a conclusion with a really surprising and funny short story that I honestly wasn't expecting from the author, but just as he does horror Lumley delivers it to perfection. As always Joshua Saxon gets all the gold stars. I have yet to be disappointed by one of his performances. His voice and inflection adapt to every scenario. I was given this book in exchange for an honest review.

A perfect fit of stories and narration

I like this guy Lumley. I dig the narrator Joshua Saxon too. These guys are a perfect fit together.

The peeping eyeball, androgynous Friday, the walleyed rapey bros, bar hopping hunchbacks, Wiley Smiley’s rock throwing contest, geriatric farmer fruiting bodies and nasty Grecian water worms.

Yep. Quite a collection of stories and themes. Well done. Solid 4 Amazon/Audible Stars

*Thanks to Joshua, btw, for the complimentary audio copy. The honest review I have left voluntarily.

Short stories for horror fans

I quite liked this book. There was only maybe one or two that were kind of just so so, but for the most part I really liked them. If you’re a fan of short stories I’d recommend giving it a try. My personal favorites were the beach stories and my thing Friday which was about being isolated on a distant planet. There is variety of different stories from just spooky ghost to creepy alien and of course you can’t have horror without the phychopath. The narrator was pleasant to listen to not one that was hard to hear or harsh to understand. I think he did excellent job portraying characters in each and would definitely give a listen to more books that he has narrated. Also before I finish I was given this audiobook for free in exchange for honest review. Which I always strive to do regardless if I was given or paid for a title. Hope you enjoy as much as I did.

another outstanding collection & great narrator

i am so, so, so thankful to the narrator, Joshua Saxton, for the copy of this audio book . If it had not been for him, i doubt i would have ever gave Brian Lumley another chance and that would have been one of the worst mistakes i could make.
This is another great collection of Lumley's short stories. He continues to impress me with his superb writing and imagination. My favorite was the one about the waiting places. sorry, i tried to go back to find the name of it but i got aggravated before i discovered it.
Joshua Saxton narrates this and he is quickly becoming one of my top 5 favorite readers. He does a wide range of accents and each one is flawless. I enjoying listening to him very much.

* i requested this audio book and have left this review voluntarily.*

Good, but not great, but a narrator to die for

I loved Brian Lumley's Necroscope series back when I read it 25 years ago. Like most books we read when younger, I wonder if I'd still enjoy it today, but I'll probably never put that to the test. That being said, when I got a chance to listen to the audio of a collection of his short stories, I happily jumped at it, and I liked it, but certainly didn't love it. Why? Well, the stories, apart from maybe half of them, didn't really grab me. This can be a problem with short story collections though, especially when they span many years like this one. But don't be totally put off. This is, of course, my subjective opinion, and there are some "fun" stories (it's horror) in there. Also, I've learned (re-learned?) that the BL is a terrific writer, and his ability to evoke imagery or describe human behaviour is worth the price of admission alone. The absolute best thing abut the audiobook was the narrator, who seemed to be custom made for this genre.

Diverse Group of Well Written and Narrated Stories

There is a wide variety of good writing here. Mostly some class of scary stuff, but all well written and entertaining.
This isn't his Vampire or Lovecraft stuff although there is a reference to Lovecraft in one of the stories. Give it a shot if you like well written scary stuff.
I particularly liked the narration by Joshua Saxon. He handled a variety of accents well and narrated with style and in a non distracting way. I'll be looking for more books that he's narrated.
I was given this free audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Creepy Stuff

Joshua Saxon's voice is powerful and resonating and perfect to describe the slugs and parasites to make your skin crawl. I would give him five stars, but he didn't seem to adjust for subsequent stories in the book. This is a collection of stories, and well done at that. But I needed to listen to it in intervals, which for short stories is convenient. I enjoyed the work of Brian and Joshua.