Echoes of Terror is an anthology containing 16 stories aiming to induce terror in all who read it... Is it successful in this? Well, as with almost all anthologies, it's a mixed bag. It begins with a weak story, "Looks Like a Rat to Me" by Nicholas Grabowsky, featuring a main character I found neither likeable nor sympathetic, so who cares if giant rats turn up to do terrible things (for unexplained reasons)? Not I. Ken Goldman is an author who can be relied upon to come up with something interesting and "With Love, Veronica" is certainly worth a read. Next is a story contributed by one of the editors, Garrett Peck, surely inspired by Hitchcock's "The Birds", and featuring a very determined murderous crow. This is followed up by another bird-themed story; this time it's trained ducks. Keith Gouveia's "Fowl Play" is basic, part comedy, but wasn't very appealing to me. "Bug Powder", by Meghan Jurado, is more intelligent fare, obviously influenced by Burroughs' drug-fuelled "Naked Lunch", which the author readily admits. Is the new drug in town more than it seems? A means to a subtle coup, perhaps? I'll skip over Andrea Dean Van Scoyoc's "When Black Fades to Grey" because a good edit would do it a lot of favours in trimming the uneven text, and it reads rather like a first draft.

I'm always suspicious when I see that editors of an anthology have contributed stories to it; it seems more like a means of self-promotion than an effort to create the best book possible. However, Katherine Smith's "November Girls" is one of the best stories in the book, so I'll happily forgive its inclusion. It's a sad tale of ghosts and nobodies that really makes you think. Ms Smith's second story, however, is a much more pedestrian tale of a tree whose evil nature leads people to terrible ends - or does it? J. Edward Tremlett's "Clown School" is another interesting story of the depressing nature of modern life and how to push yourself beyond it all and learn to laugh again. Tourist-fuelled Salem is the setting for the next story, Stephen C. Hallin's "Crushing Giles", where one of the condemned innocents has never given up his quest for righteous revenge. "Door Bitch", by Dave Field, is another good story with a plot that wouldn't go astray in a full scale thriller novel. After a freeway pile-up, there's something not quite right about the paramedic who 'rescues' the triage nurse heroine... "Tempest", by Matt Hults, deserves little mention. It's overlong, overwrought, unlikely (which removes any hint of scariness for me), and resorts to an extra-terrestrial explanation. Nancy Jackson's "A Baker's Dozen" is another story that could use the talents of a good editor to make something of a pretty standard revenge story. "Interludes", by Jodi Lee, is a slow, obscure sanatorium torture story which felt like the extract from a novel that it is. It left me unconvinced and unmoved. Editor Giovanna Lagana's "One Hell of a Deal" is another contribution in need of a good edit to improve its readability and bring out the story to its best effect.

The anthology concludes with "Ice Cold Shakes" by John Everson. Have you seen those films where the characters are warned not to do something and then do it anyway? That's the plot here. It does encompass a nice variation on the vampire theme, but I think it could have been written more effectively.

Echoes of Terror contains some stories to wallow in and others to skip lightly over. Terror-inducing? Not to my -- perhaps jaded -- mind. But there are certainly some entertaining and thought-provoking stories, well worth a read.

Echoes of Terror is available now from Lachesis Publishing.