The genre-jumping collection High Cotton is subtitled Selected Stories of Joe R. Lansdale, but could more rightly be called The Best of Joe R. Lansdale. If you haven't read Lansdale, this is the place to start. If you like Lansdale, you already know you want this collection, even if you already own By Bizarre Hands, which contains 7 of these 21 stories. If, however, you are of a delicate constitution or a sensitive nature, you might want to steer clear. Lansdale can be blunt, or gross, or grim, sometimes all at once.

Most of the stories in High Cotton are excellent, and some are already classics. "Night They Missed the Horror Show," a tale of bored young hell-raisers who discover dreadful new depths of trouble, is one of the great horror stories of the 20th century. The alternate-history Western "Letter from the South, Two Moons West of Nacogdoches" packs a lot of big (and shocking) changes into four pages. In the crime story "The Steel Valentine," a fading athlete finds himself the captive of his lover's merciless, criminal husband. In "The Phone Woman," a man discovers his horrifying true nature in a violent act. And in the screwball "Mister Weed-Eater," a man's life is turned upside-down and inside-out by his innocent attempt to help a blind groundskeeper.

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of over 20 books, including the Hap Collins and Leonard Pine mystery series. He has won the American Mystery Award, the Booklist Editor's Award, five Bram Stoker Awards, the British Fantasy Award, and the International Crime Writers Award. --Cynthia Ward

Product Description
This collection of Joe R Lansdale stories represents the best of the 'Lansdale' genre -- a strange mixture of dark crime, even darker humour, and adventure tales. The stories are varied in setting and theme, but they are all pure Lansdale -- eerie, amusing, and occasionally horrific. In 'The Pit', modern gladiators square off against one another using Roman methods. An alternate-history tale called 'Trains Not Taken' shows Buffalo Bill as an ambassador and Wild Bill Hickok as a clerk. Lansdale's love of large lizards and humour are evident in the stories 'Godzilla's Twelve Step Program' and 'Bob the Dinosaur Goes to Disneyland'.

Short stories are always a good way to experiment with a new writer. Luckily, that's how Lansdale started out making his living. There are several short story collections available of his early work but, the way he puts it in the introduction to High Cotton--and in reference to the southern-fried title--"this is the best cotton I've grown in the short form." When an author thinks the book you're holding contains his best stuff, that's the one you ought to try.

Each story has a short introduction written by Lansdale, explaining its inspiration, history, or lack thereof. I always find it fascinating for an author to write about their works; another favorite of mine, F. Paul Wilson, follows the same tack in his collection, The Barrens and Others.

High Cotton is certainly not bound to be a mainstream success, but for people who like the sort of gruesomely funny tales with a southern mentality that Joe Lansdale comes up with, it will be just your cup of sweet tea. It contains many stories that are as disturbing as they are funny: the basic premise is horrifying, but Lansdale manages to find the humor underneath it which, in turn, often enhances the horror of the situation. The one I think epitomizes this best is "The Drive-In Date" (also published in play format in The Best of Cemetery Dance, Volume Two), which concerns a couple of "good ole boys" and their rather unconventional date at the drive-in. The usual amount of laughter, food, and sex is contained within, with one important difference. This one still gives me the creeps -- while making me laugh. Stories like this require that you reexamine your own comfort threshold.

"The Pit" starts off the collection. This combination of dogfighting, boxing, and crazy backwoods snake handlers is one that he feels deserves more attention, and it certainly packs a punch. You'll think twice about making that wrong turn onto a back road when you finish with this one. Following "The Pit" is a simple little story that shows Lansdale's sentimental side. In "Not from Detroit," a man fights Death so that neither he nor his wife has to be alone. This story is so surprisingly sweet, that it is the first I've read of his that almost made me cry. But things return to normal, Lansdalewise, in "Booty and the Beast," which includes fire ants, a plastic syrup bear, and a "[pubic] hair from the Virgin Mary."

Sometimes, the humor is the main aspect of the story, as in "Godzilla's Twelve-Step Program," which follows our hero, Godzilla, as he goes through the daily grind of fighting his addiction to burning down buildings with his fiery breath. Even his job as an ingot melter doesn't seem to do the trick. What could have been a one-joke premise leading to a punchline is fleshed out by the author's imagination into a character study.

As you can see, Lansdale has many talents, but he is at his absolute best when he follows the exploits of a bunch of useless good-for-nothings who get themselves into a heap of trouble just by being stupid. This occurs first (and funniest) in High Cotton in the form of "Steppin' Out, Summer, '68" as Buddy, Wilson, and Jake go out in pursuit of a little horizontal recreation and--through a seeming innocuous, if increasingly ignorant, series of events--one of them ends up in the mouth of an alligator. It is one of the author's personal favorites, and any story that can make me laugh out loud in public instantly becomes one of mine.

Ending the collection is the story that Lansdale calls his "signature story" and the first one to really get him noticed (winning the Bram Stoker award in the process), "The Night They Missed the Horror Show." After skipping the night's showing of Night of the Living Dead (after discovering that a black man is the hero), Leonard and Farto do a couple of stupid--if generally harmless--things in the name of fighting boredom. But when they run into the wrong people, these events spiral into a night of pure terror. Lansdale is in particularly good form here, making the characters sympathetic by having their "punishment" be far above and beyond anything that would have suited their "crimes" of ignorance. It is really an ideal closer for High Cotton.

But all the stories in here are worth reading and Golden Gryphon Press has done a wonderful job packaging the collection. The cover illustration by J.K. Potter is very effective at getting across the contents--even though it appears that Potter himself didn't get past the first page of the first story. High Cotton is bound to become the definitive collection of Joe R. Lansdale's short fiction by itself, and it makes an excellent companion piece to the more recent Bumper Crop, which includes some of his and his fans' personal favorites, if not his most memorable work. Together, Lansdale ("hisownself") calls these two "the definitive volumes of my short work." As a fellow reviewer once said about Lansdale's work, "Read it and vomit. It's brilliant."


Best Short Story Collection I've ever read   November 6, 2000
 6 out of 6 found this review helpful

It's incredibly rare when you read a collection of stories and every single one of them is great. I own a large collection of short story books and I tend to skip around and read a story here and there, but with this collection I found myself reading them all one after the other. Lansdale's description of "High Cotton" being his best work is quite true here. If you remember reading Stephen King's Night Shift and loving the style (which King seems to have abandoned), you'll love this collection. I've found myself looking for more of Lansdale's books and short story collections, and there are a few (some of which are hard to come by). If you like this book, I highly recommend his Drive In Double Feature. Again, it's very early King-ish and quite a fun read.


Dark Stories Humorously Told   May 22, 2001
 4 out of 4 found this review helpful

Generally, I don't like short stories. They do not offer enough time to develop character and plot. I usually find that, just as I'm falling into the rhythm of a short story, it's over. The experience is unsatisfying. Having discovered Joe Lansdale about a year ago and having read every novel of his on which I could get my hands, I picked up his short story collection, "High Cotton". To my surprise, I thoroughly enjoyed it. These stories all grabbed my interest in the first few pages. There's no getting your feet wet while try you acclimate and get your bearings. Lansdale throws you right into the pool. I didn't often like where I was or whom I was with. There are few redeeming characters in this collection. The stories are populated with ignorant, cowardly, ugly, racist, stupid and evil people. Some are scarier that the monsters in more classic "horror" stories. If it wasn't for the humor and insight with which Lansdale portrays these people, his work would be too bleak for me. As dark as these stories are, they are also laugh-out-loud funny.


Good Stuff   October 1, 2000
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

These are some of Lansdale's best.As a huge fan of his, I had already read some of them in earlier anthologies. These are the ones he feels best describe him as a short story writer. It's an excellent addition to your Lansdale collection.


Lansdale's Best-Of Collection   April 9, 2006
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

So, "High Cotton" reprints several of Lansdale's personally selected best stories. These stories, all of them except for one are also featured in his original collections "By Bizarre Hands", "Bestsellers Guaranteed", and "Writer of the Purple Rage", and are arguably the best of the stories featured in the original (and out of print) books.

Lansdale's follow-up, "Bumper Crop" collects many of the rest, but not very many stories from "Writer of the Purple Rage." If you can get a copy of "Purple Rage" get it. It has the original "Bubba Ho-Tep" novella, which is one of Lansdale's best stories and was made into the wonderful movie starring Bruce Campbell, which may be one of the most faithful adaptations of a writer's work ever put on film.

Anyway, "Booty and the Beast" is the newest (to me) story in this collection, which centers around a specific item associated with the Virgin Mary that brings doom to those who possess it. It is an entertaining story. The best stories here, however, are the ones his true fans have read before: "The Night They Missed the Horror Show" (his signature story), "The Phone Woman", and "Tight Little Stitches in a Dead Man's Back", "Not From Detroit", and many others. The stories also have introductions by Lansdale telling how they were conceived. There is also an introduction at the front of the book explaining how he came to write short stories and why he deosn't write as many anymore.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading the stories again and I hope this one stays in print for a long time, so that readers don't have to track down out of print collections to see what a fabulous writer this man is. These are the stories that made him famous, using his unique blend of humor, horror, and gritty realism to form a truly effective story. Highly Recommended!