About Spiked
Written by Mychael Black, Laney Cairo, Jourdan Lane, Willa Okati
189 pages / 83500 words
ISBN: 978-1-60370-250-8, 1-60370-250-4
Available file types - html, lit, pdf, prc, paperback
Tattoos. Piercings. Implants. If body modification is your thing, then Spiked is right up your alley. From the everyday guy to the cyberworld of a huge futuristic corporation, Spiked explores all the ways men change their bodies, and love each other's bodies, too.
In Tattoo You by Willa Okati Jacob Lee goes to get a tattoo to please his lover Donathan. Will it mean a new beginning for both of them? Possesion, by Jourdan Lane features Lucian and Saaban, from the Soul Mates series. What they do might just surprise the whole coven.
Laney Cairo's Marginalia pits cutter Bailey and his new love Quint against the government and the big corporations. Will they be able to save Quint? Finally, in Beneath the Mask, by Mychael Black, Lance thinks he's interviewing powerful vampire Triarius, but Triarius has other plans. Will Lance survive the night?
Explore a world of skin and ink, of metal and mayhem, where art is not hidden away in museums, but displayed in the gritty underworld of Spiked!
Review
Syd McGinley, author of the Dr. Fell stories, writes:
I’m not sure if my multiple tattoos and piercings are why I got to review this anthology, but damn, they found their audience. They’re all more than just stories about a bod mod--all have intriguing characters and stories that pull you in, yet they’re all quite different in tone and in modifications.
Willa Okati’s story, Tattoo You, is sweet and sensual with an intriguing twist of inspiration from the past. Jacob Lee hates needles and his beloved, Donathan, spends all his spare money on new tattoos. Jacob Lee wants to conquer his fear and get Donathan the perfect birthday present--a tattoo. There are not just his misgivings to face though--where can he find the perfect design? This story rang true for me with its affectionate portrayal of tattoo parlors and the people who love the art. Jacob Lee and Donathan are drawn so well that you can see why they love each other--flaws and all. A truly lovely story, and I’d like to visit these guys again and find out more about the tattoo inspiration source.
The pace changes for Possession set in Jourdan Lane’s Soul Mates universe. Sabaan is becoming tired of wrestling to hide his demon form--not to conceal it from humans but to avoid conflict with the vampires in Lucien’s stronghold. Vampires, demons, werewolves, and cast out angels try to figure out who to trust and who to love--and whether the two can go hand in hand. Some have had their bodies changed against their will, come contemplate changing to blend in, others just change, and there’s plenty of tattoos and piercings. Passion and jealousy run high as characters vie for power, affections, and loyalty. Possession stands alone successfully, but I want to go find more of the Soul Mates stories now
Marginalia, by Laney Cairo, is set in a near future dystopian Australia where corporations control lives, citizenship, and water. Bailey specializes in high-end body modifications, but is getting bored catering to the rich. He knows he’s lucky to have a secure job that lets him pursue his own interests out of work--unlike so many corporate employees. Quint patches together a living tending bar and repairing machines. Born in the country, he’s counted as an illegal because he doesn’t have a corporate or military record. Not only the rich have mods--Quint has some implants that are not just sexy, but are an important plot device. Laney has woven a story in which the bod mods are not just ornaments, but are at the heart of the story. This is a totally convincing portrait of a cyberpunk Australia and a story of trust and loyalty against huge odds.
Is it wrong to love a villain? Even if it is, I don’t care: I’ve been seduced by Triarius. Beneath the Mask by Mychael Black takes us into the world of the Romanorum and the even darker world of the Brotherhood. Vampires are an acknowledged part of society in this world, but the Brotherhood despises the compromises made by vampires to live among humans. Triarius explains to Lance, a human reporter, that they are gods and humans are cattle. Triarius is calm, calculating, quietly powerful, and--after two thousand years of life--lonely. Lance knows too much to be freed, and Triarius decides to keep him as a ghoul (a human dependent on his vampire master’s blood) and companion rather than kill him. Not everyone is happy about that decision, and Lance’s life is soon at risk. Triarius has some delicious twists on traditional vampire skills, and I found myself envying Lance. Where’s the body modifications in the story? You’ll have to read and find out.
Sample
SirenCare had a dedicated subway station, on the main line into the centre of Sydney, but Bailey didn’t join the throng of his fellow employees who were heading for the station, down endless white-tiled staircases. Instead, Bailey cut across the concourse at the front of SirenCare’s surgical facility, heading for the street access onto Oxford St.
The concourse opened through a double door that kept the noise and grit out, and Bailey plunged out into the sweltering heat of the outside world. Locked inside an air-conditioned and hermetically-sealed edifice all day, going into the heat always felt like being struck, driving the oxygen from his lungs by replacing it with steam.
Sunglasses were useless in the humidity, so Bailey pushed his up onto his head and blinked in the daylight.
He turned right, pushing his way past street vendors selling cosmetics and skewers of spiced meat, heading downhill and into the shadows cast by the SirenCare tower. It was cooler, out of the sunlight, because the light pipes that carried sunshine to the shadow around the tower didn’t bring heat to the area.
That would happen the next morning, when the sun rose over the tenements and bubbled the asphalt.
Tilly, the coffee vendor, called out, “Night, Bailey!” and Bailey lifted a hand in greeting as he edged around the crowd clustering around Tilly’s cart.
Bailey dodged a brawl spilling out of a pub, stepped around children playing on the paving, and paused on the curb, beside a pile of garbage bags, to wait for a break in the traffic.
Electric scooters and ordinary bikes poured down the street, away from SirenCare. Someone shouted, “Bailey!” from behind their helmet and mask, and Bailey waved a hand at their back as they were swallowed by the traffic.
A bus, packed with people, lumbered to a halt up the street, interrupting the traffic, and Bailey plunged across the street, stepping over oil slicks.
Around the corner he went, past what had once been a park until someone with some sense fenced the bare dirt and planted the dead ground with veggies, pouring precious waste water onto the plants.
The other train station, when Bailey pushed his way through the children begging at the entrance, lacked the electric lights and tiled floors of the SirenCare-sponsored station. A single globe swung overhead, augmenting the last of the triple-reflected sunlight coming through the pipes. Cool, dank air flowed up from the underground tunnel, smelling of mildew and fetid water, so Bailey found the filter mask dangling from his work clothes and draped it across his face as he dropped his coin into the turnstile.
The platform was crowded with workers from the clothing factories around the station: tall thin men, women with covered faces, their hands tucked out of sight and children hanging from their backs. Hookers leaned against the station’s pillars, resting their feet before a night of work, poor imitations of colorbursts painted onto their cheekbones.
The train rattled up to the station, and the passengers hauled the doors open and pushed into the carriages. Bailey let the surge of passengers carry him into the Standing Only carriage and up against one of the paint-spattered carriage windows. One of the passengers had a boom box, the music starting up as the carriage doors slammed shut.
This was why Bailey caught the local commuter train; because after eight or ten or twelve hours in a sterile operating suite, perched on a stool and encased in latex, he craved dirt and music and human contact. The other train, so white and tidy, would have squeaky clean vinyl seats, and every person on that train would be listening to the music playing on their wires, locked in their own bubbles of perfect aural input.
The train jolted and swayed, reorganizing the passengers, and Bailey closed his eyes and leaned his head against the filthy window. Inside his eyelids, the image of the inserter and the alabaster skin of the patient’s face persisted.
They arrived at another train station, more passengers embarking, so Bailey was squashed between two bodies, smelling of sweat, garlic and turmeric. Someone nearby had taken flare, the ketone-sting of their skin giving the drug away.
The train jolted into movement, and Bailey let his memory linger over the image of the scalpel sliding into the woman’s skin, cutting through her flesh so carefully.
The man pressing against Bailey’s back swayed closer as the train worked its way around a curve in the track, and he leaned forward a little, so his mouth was close to Bailey’s ear.
The rattle of the train and the boom of the music almost masked his voice as he said, “You smell hot.”