Reading Rumble Round 16

The Future of Horror Clive Barker manifests in the ring.

Love Comes From the Grave by Wyatt Blassingame

Horror Stories, Feb/Mar 1936

The scorned lovers of an Alabama couple kill themselves in a suicide pact, then return to the couple in dreams, turning them into bestial killers. 

The Life of Death by Clive Barker

Books of Blood IV, 1985. Available from Amazon https://amzn.to/3VDJY0l

A woman sneaks into an uncovered plague pit and becomes an immune carrier. She recently had an hysterectomy and there's some kind of thematic connection. Can't tell if the prose is old fashioned or just very British.

Room 502 by Paul Ernst
Clues Detective Stories, May 1936

Detective solves the case of a long dead woman falling to her death. Needlessly convoluted, especially given that the copper overhears the murderers confess.

Meet Mr. Murder by Robert Bloch as Tarleton Fiske
Mammoth Detective, November 1943

The villains from an author's work in progress come to life.

Fish Night by Joe Lansdale
Specter!, 1982

The deserts of the southwest were once the ocean bottom, and some nights the ghosts of long dead fish swim above the sand.

The Monster from Mars by Richard Shaver as Alexander Blade
Amazing Stories, April 1948

Giant spiders from outer space attack in the South American jungle, concluding with the aliens blowing up all evidence, Predator style. Ray Palmer's introduction says that they had proof of the Shaver Mystery, but since a "respectable citizen" has offered proof in a different venue (?), Amazing Stories will revert back to 100% fiction, including some written by Shaver.

Barker gets tangled in the ropes trying to enter the ring. Blassingame goes to the well too many times and is knocked over the ropes, taking Ernst with him.