Book Review: "Dancing With Tombstones" by Michael Aronovitz (2022)
Dancing With Tombstones Book Review
Written by Stuart D. Monroe
Published by Cemetery Dance
Written by Michael Aronovitz
2022, 362 pages, Fiction
Published on February 7th, 2022
Review:
I’ve never read anything by Michael Aronovitz until I got my hands on Dancing With Tombstones. I can’t say I knew a single thing about him going into this short story collection, but I can tell you what I did know before going into this: Cemetery Dance Publications is the cream of the crop for horror publishing. In particular, the short story collections they put out just don’t miss- the collections of Al Sarrantonio, Dark Screams, and Borderlands are some of the most revisited titles on my bookshelves. And of course, their yearly magazine is THE destination for new short fiction from the biggest names. Simply put, Cemetery Dance and short stories go together like boiled peanuts and a tall glass of cold sweet tea. In light of all that, I felt quite comfortable taking the plunge and reviewing this Michael Aronovitz fella that I’d never heard of.
I’m damn glad I did. I always say that an author’s short stories are the best way to be introduced to their, and I’ll die on that hill.
Dancing With Tombstones is hodge-podge of short stories old and new from Aronovitz, spanning a period of three decades and one previous collection, Seven Deadly Pleasures. There are old stories rewritten and rebirthed as well as newer stuff, and the variety and range is impressive. Stories like “Cross-Currents” and “The Girl Between the Slats” that spend nearly all their time in what the King of the Barrio Noir, Gabino Iglesias, calls “the voice of the other” (in this case a pair of elementary age girls). Some are fast, nasty, and close out stronger than they open; that’s the case with the serial killer’s inner monologue in “The Sculptor” or the blasphemy that leaves your mouth agape in “Quest for Sadness”. The collection’s lone novella, “Toll Booth” is a sort of reverse “Dolan’s Cadillac”. In a perfect world, “The Echo” would have been adapted and filmed as an episode of Tales From the Darkside. “Soldier” is nightmare fuel for those who have a hard time with the kind of horror that’s grounded in real life anguish; empaths beware of the anxiety and heartbreak here.
Dancing With Tombstones also contains a pair of tales that both belong in every “Best of the Year” collection out there. “Puddles” is the best short story I’ve read in my six years as a professional, regularly published reviewer; I’ve not been that stressed reading a short story since “The Jaunt”. It absolutely makes the book, and I read the damn thing twice (with a few minutes and a fat bowl in between to settle my nerves). If you’ve ever questioned your own sanity, just know that “Puddles” should come with a trigger warning. Holy shit! Then there’s “Soul Text”, a story that is to the dangers of technological control what Mike Judge’s utter classic, Idiocracy, is to the dumbing down of society at large. Both feel prophetic and settle in the psyche for a good while after you’re done.
Even the stories that didn’t wow me with something outside the box, like “The Tool Shed”, “The Grave Keeper”, and “The Falcon” are still a lot of fun in that pulpy and tongue-in-cheek kind of way you get from a classic Tales From the Crypt episode. And fun never goes out of style, folks.
Michael Aronovitz has an instinctual knack for killer imagery, like the hands coming out of the toilet in “How Bria Died” or the dream sequence in “Toll Booth”. He’s a brave writer who isn’t afraid of some unusual narrative choices (“The Grave Keeper”), a writer that knows how to modulate his own voice. That’s not a taught skill; it’s a gift that is developed over time (and often the hard way). When you combine that with a habit of going to the darker places that force real emotion, you get a collection with honest to goodness range and a little something for everyone.
That’s what a proper short story collection is supposed to be, isn’t it?
Grade:
4.0 out of 5.0 stars
Amazon Link:
https://www.amazon.com/Dancing-Tombstones-Michael-Aronovitz-ebook/dp/B09QXRSZ94/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3HFKAXN01IVCM&keywords=Dancing+with+Tombstones&qid=1646606861&sprefix=dancing+with+tombstones%2Caps%2C105&sr=8-1
