Nightmare Magazine, Issue 80 (May 2019), page 1
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Issue 80, May 2019
FROM THE EDITOR
Editorial: May 2019
FICTION
Malotibala Printing Press
Mimi Mondal
The Deer Boy
Micah Dean Hicks
Ten Excerpts from an Annotated Bibliography on the Cannibal Women of Ratnabar Island
Nibedita Sen
Fail-Safe
Philip Fracassi
BOOK EXCERPTS
Inside the Asylum
Mary SanGiovanni
NONFICTION
The H Word: The Tragedy of La Llorona
Aaron Duran
Interview: Gabino Iglesias
Lisa Morton
AUTHOR SPOTLIGHTS
Mimi Mondal
Nibedita Sen
MISCELLANY
Coming Attractions
Stay Connected
Subscriptions and Ebooks
Support Us on Patreon or Drip, or How to Become a Dragonrider or Space Wizard
About the Nightmare Team
Also Edited by John Joseph Adams
© 2019 Nightmare Magazine
Cover by Chainat / Fotolio
www.nightmare-magazine.com
Editorial: May 2019
John Joseph Adams | 266 words
Welcome to issue eighty of Nightmare!
This month, Mimi Mondal plays with a classic Bengali trope about ghosts in her new short story “Malotibala Printing Press.” Remember being in school and writing bibliographies for your papers? Well, Nibedita Sen spins that academic exercise into true horror in her new short “Ten Excerpts from an Annotated Bibliography on the Cannibal Women of Ratnabar Island.” We also have some nightmarish reprints by Micah Dean Hick (“The Deer Boy”) and Philip Fracassi (“Fail-Safe”).
Writer, podcaster, and all-around geek Aaron Duran brings us the latest installment of our column on horror, “The H Word.” Of course we have author spotlights with our authors, and we also have a feature interview with Gabino Iglesias. Plus, our e-book readers will get a special e-book exclusive excerpt from Mary SanGiovanni’s new novel, Into the Asylum.
Awards News
As you may recall, back in March, we told you about how two of our sister-magazine Lightspeed’s authors, José Pablo Iriarte and Sarah Pinsker, were named 2018 Nebula finalists. Both José’s novelette, “The Substance of My Lives, the Accidents of Our Births” (lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/substance-lives-accidents-births) and Sarah’s short story, “The Court Magician” (lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/the-court-magician) were published in Lightspeed’s January 2018 issue.
Now we’re pleased to also announce that Sarah Pinsker’s story is also a finalist for the Hugo Award, as is frequent Lightspeed cover artist Galen Dara. Congrats to them both!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Joseph Adams, in addition to serving as publisher and editor-in-chief of Nightmare, is the editor of John Joseph Adams Books, an science fiction and fantasy imprint from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. He is also the series editor of Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, as well as the bestselling editor of many other anthologies, including The Mad Scientist’s Guide to World Domination, Robot Uprisings, Dead Man’s Hand, Armored, Brave New Worlds, Wastelands, and The Living Dead. Recent projects include: Cosmic Powers, What the #@&% Is That?, Operation Arcana, Loosed Upon the World, Wastelands 2, Press Start to Play, and The Apocalypse Triptych: The End is Nigh, The End is Now, and The End Has Come. Called “the reigning king of the anthology world” by Barnes & Noble, John is a two-time winner of the Hugo Award (for which he has been a finalist eleven times) and is a seven-time World Fantasy Award finalist. John is also the editor and publisher of Lightspeed Magazine and is a producer for Wired.com’s The Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy podcast. Find him on Twitter @johnjosephadams.
Malotibala Printing Press
Mimi Mondal | 6305 words
I cannot understand why, but the young men of this generation have developed a new sport—to go and spend a night in a haunted house. Every three months or four, I receive a group of guests.
It goes the same way each time. They arrive after sundown, bringing hurricane lamps, candles, sleeping mats, snacks and bottles of water lovingly packed from home. They come in groups of four or five, almost always the atheist, sceptical students of the Presidency College who remind me of my own youth. They sweep aside dirt and rabble from the floor, unfurl their mats, light a hurricane lamp at the centre of their circle, and settle down to tell ghost stories.
I love listening to those stories, though there is little truth in any of them.
Often, I find someone narrating how this very establishment—Malotibala Printing Press—came to be such an abandoned wreck. It is not an antique tale. Even so, the embellishments in the narrative are nothing less than dazzling.
“I have heard that, in its day, Malotibala Printing Press was the most prosperous business on Chitpur Road,” tells the young man to his companions. “Of the thirty-four printing presses along this road, Malotibala was the richest of all.” With a nod, I lean in closer to listen. “But then came its downfall—a heart-wrenching tale of unrequited love and rejection.”
. . . Oh?!
“Friends, all of us must have purchased books from Malotibala Printing Press in our schooldays. But I bet nobody remembers them,” says the storyteller. “There was nothing remarkable about the books from Malotibala in those days. Cheap prints of the Ramayana and the Mahabharat, some standard mythologicals, insipid romances—the same as every other press was churning out. We may have bought books that were printed in this very room, on that cobwebbed machine at the corner, or we may have bought the same books from another press.”
My pride somewhat injured, I continue to listen.
“But then came the big break for Malotibala Printing Press—it was approached by the immensely talented author known as Kojagori Debi!”
Sly grins of recognition appear on the listeners’ faces. The storyteller continues, “But of course, Kojagori Debi was a pseudonym. Behind it was a young lady from one of the wealthy households of the city, educated at home, not the kind of lady who can afford to be seen in mingling with the printers on Chitpur Road. Rumor is that this young lady was as beautiful as she was, hrrm, intriguing. And, as Secret Annals of the Queen by Kojagori Debi started flying off the peddlers’ boxes and booksellers’ stalls, as second and third and fourth reprints were set to run, the luckless owner of Malotibala Printing Press was falling in love.
“This chap, called Udayan Dhar, was the lowest of the low, no different from any other pulp-book printer, with little money and no pedigree. Hardly a match for the daughter of a wealthy, high-caste household, even in this age of scandal. He dared to ask her hand in marriage, and was duly despised. Heartbroken, Udayan Dhar returned to his press and committed suicide in that little compositor’s room at the back.
“Since that day, these premises have been haunted by the spirit of Udayan Dhar. His family—wanting to have nothing to do with the print business—sold off the press, but all the work started going wrong. Sheets of paper would come out blank, carefully composed pages would come out rudely misspelled, obscenities would creep into the text of respectable books. The worst assaults of the ‘printer’s devil’ were suffered by Secret Annals of the Queen by Kojagori Debi. Eventually the new owner, Bibhishon Bhattacharya, decided to shut down the press. And thus it has remained till this day.”
A collective sigh emerges as the story comes to an end. A couple of boys peer at the long shadows on the wall, trembling gently with the flame of the hurricane lamp. It is approaching midnight. I begin to talk.
“I don’t know where you heard this story,” I address the original storyteller, “but I know a different version—quite a scintillating one on its own. I will present it, if I may.”
The night is long and there’s no other entertainment in this house, so the young men consent.
“This is the story of Udayan Dhar,” I begin. “The former owner of Malotibala Printing Press was twenty-four years of age on the day he was murdered—murdered, yes! One can hardly commit suicide by clubbing himself at the back of the skull. Did not read that part in the newspaper, did you? None of the gossipmongers speak about it? Yet another miracle that money and connections can achieve.”
I relish the shock on their faces.
“Udayan Dhar was not born a pauper. His father had been a textile merchant, once quite prosperous. Udayan was the only son—stubborn, eccentric, hardly wise to the ways of the world. One of his obsessions was the printing press. As a schoolboy he had devoured those cheap romances and mythologicals. When he grew up, he wanted to print more of them.
“There is a false perception that books are a genteel business. No such thing in the murky alleyways that branch off Chitpur Road. Out here, authors steal each other’s material, turf wars between vendors turn bloody, henchmen walk about in broad daylight extorting money from the printers. Young Udayan plunged himself into this world, and unsurprisingly, he sank.
“While he struggled not to shut down his little press, one day Udayan was approached . . . not by any beautiful lady who populates these tales of romance, but a hard-knuckled hack writer whose name was Bibhishon Bhattacharya. This man had prowled these rough streets for many more years than young Udayan. ‘I have written many bestsellers with a wide variety of names,’ said the writer to Udayan, ‘but I bri
“It seemed like a viable project, though larger than any Udayan had handled before. He did not shy away from printing the occasional lascivious paperback—those were the books that kept any printer in profit, as much as they boasted of their mythologicals and chaste, didactic novels. But there was a catch to this particular project. In lieu of his brilliant plan and penmanship, Bibhishon Bhattacharya demanded ninety per cent of the book’s profits. He even brought his own compositor to set the pages of his book. All he wanted from Udayan were the name and the premises of Malotibala Printing Press.
“Under such unequal terms came about the publication of the now-infamous Secret Annals of the Queen. As Bibhishon Bhattacharya had predicted, the city was aflame with gossip as copies of the book flew off booksellers’ shelves before reprints could even be printed. Udayan Dhar found himself thrust to attention, maintaining the pretense of shielding the honor of his mysterious lady author, while in the shadows Bibhishon Bhattacharya was minting money. Udayan received his meagre share, but it was barely enough to keep his press running. Ceaseless reprints of Secret Annals had put a stop to his other titles. Many of his regular authors had migrated, disgruntled, to other presses. Finally, a year after Secret Annals was unleashed into the world, Bibhishon Bhattacharya approached him with another proposal.
“‘Malotibala has turned out to be my lucky press! It has made me so wealthy I may as well be Kojagori Debi myself,’ he said with one of his throaty chuckles. ‘I could buy any other press on this street—bigger, newer—but this is the one I must own.’
“To Udayan Dhar, his little press was dearer than life. He had resolved not to marry, often calling Malotibala his wife in jest. He declined the offer, but not only that. The look on Bibhishon’s face threw our young protagonist into a state of frenzy. The next day, Udayan brought in a mat and began to sleep within these walls. He no longer went home. He would’ve starved to death if not for the old lady who cooked at a nearby hotel he had patronized in his better days, who sent a boy running to Malotibala Printing Press each day with food wrapped in oily newspaper.
“His vigilance lasted a couple of weeks. Eventually, one evening, some of the other printers coerced Udayan into going with them for a concert at the akhara nearby. They had grown worried about him—he was disheveled, beginning to mumble and smell. Once the concert ended at midnight and the other men ambled on their ways home, Udayan rushed back in panic to his press.
“The night was pitch dark and all of Chitpur Road perfectly desolate; you could hear the cries of foxes wafting in from the salt marshes far along the eastern edges of the city. As Udayan approached his premises, he found the doors unlocked. He lit a candle and set it down by the door; darted to the letterpress to make sure it was unharmed. Right then, something heavy and metallic hit him hard at the back of his skull. (He would later learn it was a compositing stick.) As Udayan dropped to the ground, he could see in the candlelight the ink roller being wrenched out of the letterpress by a pair of muscular arms. In the pooling dark of the night, the scarlet of his blood ran into the crisp black of the printing ink . . .”
The listeners give off a collective shudder.
“How do you know all of this, anyway?” asks one of the young men, suspicious. “Who are you?”
The group is suddenly aware that they have one member more around the circle of light than they did when they arrived.
With a sigh, I give up my act. (Such a good act it was, too.) Someone raises the hurricane lamp to my face. I cannot help the translucent specter that’s cast on the wall behind me, unlike one of their solid shadows.
What happens next is always the same. The young men depart as quickly as their feet will carry them, screaming the names of suddenly remembered gods, always leaving their mats and water bottles behind.
The same people never come back, so I never make any friends.
• • • •
Daytime is difficult for a ghost. Stripped of its raiment of flesh and bone, the spirit scorches too fast in the sun. So I hold my curiosity for nearly a week after I notice that someone has taken up residence at Malotibala Printing Press during the hours of the day.
It is an uncanny presence. It sleeps in the furthest corner of the inner room, curled up under the letterpress, unbothered by cobwebs or dirt. It is not a dog or a cat—no stray animal, for I have reached out to its mind and sensed the contours of sapience. But its sapience is not like any human I’ve met so far. Visceral like an animal’s, but not quite. Older, vaster, oddly amorphous. What on earth is this thing?
I catch the creature on the evening of the eighth day. At dawn, it had brought back the half-eaten carcass of a goat kid. There is still meat left on it in the evening, so my lodger does not go out to hunt.
It is perfectly dark within the walls of Malotibala Printing Press when I make myself visible, but my lodger’s eyes are phosphorescent. He senses me immediately; raises his head to sniff. Then he emits a low, surprised growl. I can see the hairs on his upper body prick up. Over his lower body, somewhat awkwardly, he has managed to drape a dirty lungi.
“No need to be alarmed,” I speak, half to myself. “This is my house, but you are welcome to stay.”
The creature sniffs again, suspicious, and then, to my surprise, answers me in a gruff, awkward voice, trying out the words as he pronounces them. “You are not a man.”
“I was once,” I sigh, then shrug. “But neither are you.”
“I am now.” He pushes up on his hunches. “Or so I think.”
My curiosity knows no bounds. “Do you have a name? Who are your folks?”
“Naiwrit Ray.” The creature munches on a raw shank of goat. “My folks are tigers. But they are all dead.”
Dead . . . uh, tigers?
The creature that calls himself Naiwrit Ray lets it sink in before he says, “Ever heard of a goddess called Bon Bibi?”
Of course I had. Bon Bibi was the heroine of several mythologicals regularly printed from the Chitpur Road presses. “Patron goddess of loggers, fishermen, honey gatherers and other men who make their living off the mangrove forests of the Sundarbans. She protects them from the evil claws of Dakshin Ray, deity of the man-eating tigers that roam in those forests.”
“Dakshin Ray is not evil!” My guest flares up like the beast he is. “If the men who destroy the forests can claim for themselves a divine protector, may not the forests—the animals, the rivers, the mangrove—be granted a protector of their own? Is it evil for the forest to resist the greed of man?”
He spits. “Besides, no tiger worth his skin would touch human meat if he could choose. But the tigers of the Sundarbans are hunted and left injured by men; they can no longer hunt for anything stronger or faster. Do you know how many tigers are murdered in the forest by men? I lost my mother as a cub. There were four of us in the litter, of whom only I survived to adulthood. But by then, there was no deer or rabbit left to hunt in the forests. One night, after I had starved for days, I skulked close to a village by the forest, hoping to pick up a stray goat or calf. I had done it before, though not enough times to be always well fed.
“I did not know that, this time, the villagers had laid a trap for me. They spotted me, and up they sprang from the rice fields surrounding their village with torches, bamboo sticks and spears. I bolted back, but I took a spear to the hind leg, and the rice fields were flooded with water. Blind with pain, I kept sinking under my weight. I lost my sense of which way to escape—the men kept coming from every direction. Other sharp weapons pierced me in the dark, I couldn’t fathom what they were, just that they were bleeding out my life. I closed my eyes, let myself drown, knowing it was over—
