The Order of the Bull
Jason Brannon
Corpulent Insanity Press
$10.00

I started writing seriously (or at least as seriously as a teenaged girl can) back in the 1990s, and that time period holds an amazing amount of nostalgia for me. In a way, I don’t think that decade’s ever completely left my system. I still listen to the same annoying oons-oons-oons techno music that I did back then (I found a stash of old CDs over the weekend that immediately went on my iPod), still laugh at Beavis and Butthead and return rather frequently to the books I read in my youth to see if they stand the test of time. Some do, some don’t, but all hold memories near and dear to me.

Anything horror-related that reminds me of the 1990s is an immediate must-read, from the garish “erotic horror” anthologies that grace the shelves at the local Half Price Books to the down and dirty, photocopied and folded zines that still circulate here and there. The decade was one of, at least for me, do-it-yourself sensibility and experimentalism that will probably never be replicated in my lifetime. I think that much of my fondness for the decade resides in my age back then, when I was at a point in my life when everything seemed fresh, new and cool. Now that I’m older and a bit more experienced, it’s hard to take in things the way I did before.

Chapbooks, like zines, were a somewhat big part of my life back then. When I went off to college in the waning years of the decade, I wanted to write my own. Unfortunately, I never did, but that didn’t stop me from buying other people’s when I saw them in record stores or found them listed on eBay. There was something almost magical about small press for me back then, and that kind of “screw big publishing, we’re doing this our own way” kind of thing still appeals to me now.

I snagged a signed copy of Jason Brannon’s The Order of the Bull a while back simply by chance, and I have to say that chapbooks have come a long, long way since I was an underaged fanatic reading smutty short story collections and bizarre horror tales well beyond bedtime. This slender volume, clocking in at only eighty-one pages, has the look and feel of a trade paperback, complete with glossy cover and perfectly formatted, novel-style pages. There’s none of the coarse, photocopier-produced aesthetic I remember from back in the day. That’s probably a good thing, as these days small presses need to be able to compete with the big guys as much as they can.

The plot for The Order of the Bull is rather simple. After his father ditches the family, Brian Martin and his mother Janet move into a run-down trailer his uncle owns in a mobile home park out in the middle of nowhere. Janet is oblivious, as most parents are, to the strange goings on of their neighbors, focusing mostly on salvaging her life and finding a job as quickly as she can. Brian, however, picks up on the odd behaviors of the hillbillies that surround them, spying on them and stumbling across an incredibly disturbing secret they’ve been hiding from outsiders. I’ll refrain from divulging anything further, but suffice it to say that the title of this slim volume is pretty much a synopsis of the plot boiled down as far as it can go.

As far as a satisfying plot is concerned, chapbooks are hard as hell to analyze. They’re longer than a short story but are often shorter than a novella, requiring an unusual amount of characters and a narrative that races along to the finish line without many bells or whistles. The Order of the Bull is no exception. The plot is amazingly tight, a little sparse in places, without room for much back story or character development. People appear, do their part and move the story along without much detail or flowery meanderings, which is what they’re supposed to do in this format. Still, there’s enough here left unsaid that Brannon could have easily written a novel without wearing the plot too thin. I found that when I was done reading it I felt strangely curious about the people within the story and why they had done the things they had. I didn’t feel cheated, as it’s very well-written story, but I wanted more. Such is probably always the case with stories of this length, especially those in the horror genre, where disturbing events are expected (and often demanded) and could almost always go on longer than they do.

All in all, though, The Order of the Bull is a tight, fast and fun read. You’ll tear through it in about an hour or so, and when you’re done, if you’re like me, you’ll wish there was more to dive into. The slick production and limited quantity makes for a great addition to anyone’s small press collection, and at its length it has excellent reread value. It’s great for before bed reading or devouring on the go in a few quick bites.

Copies are limited to a print run of twenty-six, and when they’re gone they’re more than likely gone for good. Grab yours here.

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