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Memento Mori: The Fathomless Shadows!
The scariest director of underground horror films you’ve never heard of was a 19-year-old college student named Tina Mori. In the fall of 1978, Tina’s parents sent her to SUNY Red Stone to become a concert pianist, but almost immediately she dropped all eighty-eight keys for a stolen Super 8 camera. She began making dark and creepy short films that earned her a reputation for being in tune with more than just her artistic vision.
When a mysterious collector offers Tina a surprising amount of cash for her first film as well as a bus ticket to New York City, she pounces on the opportunity. That ticket sends her into the cellar-dark, post-punk world of the East Village, where she connects with other young filmmakers. Tina becomes single-minded, leaving school and family behind in order to pursue her new passion for film. Bodies pile up as she makes stranger and stranger films, and eventually she escapes the city back to Red Stone to produce her masterpiece, The Dragon’s Teeth, a film which has the power to blur the boundary between this world and the nightmare-haunted shores of Carcosa.
Reviews:
“Fans of the uncanny (and especially of Robert W. Chambers’s The King in Yellow, to which this work alludes ) will find much to love and laud.” — Publisher’s Weekly
“Brian Hauser has crafted a tense, readable ride down a rabbit-hole that goes straight to Carcosa.” —Carson Winter, Signal Horizon
“I didn’t want to read this book at night, but I didn’t want to put it down either. There is gore, but this book will work best for fans of weird, psychological horror rather than those who prefer slasher-style chills. For us, it sucks you in and holds you captive until the end.” —Marion Deeds, Fantasy Literature
“Brian Hauser’s Memento Mori is a mysterious deep dive into the dark waters connecting underground film, music and weird fiction. A fascinating blend of found footage, lost writings, and incantations, Memento Mori leaves its imprint on your psyche.” —John Palisano, Bram Stoker Award-Winning author of Ghost Heart, President of The Horror Writers Association
“I want to tell you about Brian Hauser’s Memento Mori. I want to tell you about the fanzine that reopened the door, and the memoir, and the lost films. I want to tell you about the medium being the message. How that message is transmitted, and how it can be transformed through translation into different—new media. How the message is corrupt and corrupting, infected and infectious. I want to tell you about Tina Mori, and C.C. Waite and the disappearance of Billie Jacobs. I want to tell you these things and how they all spiraled together into a coherent wave of madness. But I can’t. Brian Hauser won’t let me. It’s not my place. I have seen—but you must see—must read—for yourself. Come and see. Say that you will. Please. Will you come?” —Pete Rawlik, Editor of The Chromatic Court