Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
* AbusiveParents:
** Marnie's father in "Kittens", a SinisterMinister who frequently beats his daughter and kills her kittens.
** "Chase":
*** Michael Karne's parents [[spoiler:pimped him out to a pedophile]] for money.
*** Glenda implies she was raped daily by her father as a child.
** Marnie's father in "Kittens", a SinisterMinister who frequently beats his daughter and kills her kittens.
** "Chase":
*** Michael Karne's parents [[spoiler:pimped him out to a pedophile]] for money.
*** Glenda implies she was raped daily by her father as a child.
Changed line(s) 42 (click to see context) from:
* TheAssimilator: The anatagoinst of "Miss Attila the Hun" is an alien being that takes over humans and uses them as puppets to spread itself, hoping to take over the world. [[spoiler: It doesn't succeed.]]
to:
* TheAssimilator: The anatagoinst antagonist of "Miss Attila the Hun" is an alien being that takes over humans and uses them as puppets to spread itself, hoping to take over the world. [[spoiler: It doesn't succeed.]]
* EvenEvilHasStandards: The Aryan Alliance would have no hesitation in taking a [[spoiler:pedophile]] into the woods and shooting him.
Changed line(s) 60 (click to see context) from:
* GhostCity: "Strange Highways" has Coal Valley, Pennsylvania, which is being abandoned due to underground fires. It was inspired by the RealLife example of Centralia, Pennsylvania.
to:
* GhostCity: GhostCity:
** "Strange Highways" has Coal Valley, Pennsylvania, which is being abandoned due to underground fires. It was inspired by the RealLife example of Centralia, Pennsylvania.
** "Strange Highways" has Coal Valley, Pennsylvania, which is being abandoned due to underground fires. It was inspired by the RealLife example of Centralia, Pennsylvania.
Changed line(s) 64 (click to see context) from:
* HumanDisguise: The antagonist of "Hardshell" is a shapeshifting EldritchAbomination serial killer that masquerades as a human so he can kill his victims without trouble. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, the cop pursuing him is one, also.]]
to:
* HumanDisguise: The antagonist of "Hardshell" is a [[spoiler:a shapeshifting EldritchAbomination EldritchAbomination]] serial killer that masquerades as a human so he can kill his victims without trouble. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, [[spoiler:so is the cop pursuing him is one, also.]]him.]]
* IfICantHaveYou: The killer in "Chase" goes after Michael and his girlfriend because [[spoiler:he molested Michael as a child]] and couldn't bear the idea of [[spoiler:his having sex]].
* IfICantHaveYou: The killer in "Chase" goes after Michael and his girlfriend because [[spoiler:he molested Michael as a child]] and couldn't bear the idea of [[spoiler:his having sex]].
* MundaneGhostStory: The only stories not featuring supernatural elements are "Trapped", "Kittens", "Twilight of the Dawn" and "Chase".
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: Michael Karne's parents live in religious fanatism, filled with scriptures about retribution. Considering that [[spoiler:they let a pedophile have his way with their child]]for money, it's not hard to see why.
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: Michael Karne's parents live in religious fanatism, filled with scriptures about retribution. Considering that [[spoiler:they let a pedophile have his way with their child]]for money, it's not hard to see why.
* OlderHeroVsYoungerVillain: While no precise ages are given, Frank Shaw estimates that he's [[spoiler:three hundred years]] older than Karl Skagg.
Deleted line(s) 76,77 (click to see context) :
* MundaneGhostStory: The only stories not featuring supernatural elements are "Trapped", "Kittens", 'Twilight of the Dawn" and "Chase".
* OlderHeroVsYoungerVillain: While no precise ages are given, Frank Shaw estimates that he's [[spoiler:three hundred years]] older than Karl Skagg.
* OlderHeroVsYoungerVillain: While no precise ages are given, Frank Shaw estimates that he's [[spoiler:three hundred years]] older than Karl Skagg.
Changed line(s) 80 (click to see context) from:
* SiblingMurder: [[spoiler:The punchline for "Kittens" is that Marnie, enraged to discover her father has been drowning her cat's kittens, sneaks upstairs whilst nobody is watching and drowns her baby twin siblings in the bathtub.]]
to:
* SiblingMurder: [[spoiler:The The punchline for "Kittens" [[spoiler:"Kittens"]] is that Marnie, [[spoiler:Marnie, enraged to discover her father has been drowning her cat's kittens, kittens]], sneaks upstairs whilst nobody is watching and drowns [[spoiler:drowns her baby twin siblings in the bathtub.]]]]
* SubParSupremacist: The Aryan Alliance consists of out-of-shape white men fantasizing about the day that will let them use their guns on minorities in a GuiltFreeExterminationWar.
** And one of them is a [[spoiler:pedophile]], a skinny weakling who quickly folds in a fight.
** While not part of said group, Louise shares their views, and is shown to be a self-centered, immature womanchild with no plan in life but get by on her looks.
* ThereAreNoTherapists: While Chase ''does'' see a psychiatrist for his PTSD, the man is arrogant and useless.
* SubParSupremacist: The Aryan Alliance consists of out-of-shape white men fantasizing about the day that will let them use their guns on minorities in a GuiltFreeExterminationWar.
** And one of them is a [[spoiler:pedophile]], a skinny weakling who quickly folds in a fight.
** While not part of said group, Louise shares their views, and is shown to be a self-centered, immature womanchild with no plan in life but get by on her looks.
* ThereAreNoTherapists: While Chase ''does'' see a psychiatrist for his PTSD, the man is arrogant and useless.
Changed line(s) 84 (click to see context) from:
to:
* WillfullyWeak: The robots who go hunting in "The Night of the Storm" have their vision reduced, their flight systems turned off and their radar deactivated when they go on a hunting expedition, because NoChallengeEqualsNoSatisfaction.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 54 (click to see context) from:
* EnfantTerrible: Marnie in "Kittens". [[spoiler: She drowns her infant siblings as some form of poetic justice for her father drowning her cat's kittens.]]
to:
* EnfantTerrible: EnfantTerrible:
** Marnie in "Kittens". [[spoiler: She drowns her infant siblings as some form of poetic justice for her father drowning her cat's kittens.]]
** Marnie in "Kittens". [[spoiler: She drowns her infant siblings as some form of poetic justice for her father drowning her cat's kittens.]]
Changed line(s) 63 (click to see context) from:
* HumanDisguise: The antagonist of "Hardshell" is a shapeshifting EldritchAbomination serial killer that masquerades as a human so he can kill his victims without trouble. [[spoiler: Unfortunately, the cop pursuing him is one, also.]]
to:
* HumanDisguise: The antagonist of "Hardshell" is a shapeshifting EldritchAbomination serial killer that masquerades as a human so he can kill his victims without trouble. [[spoiler: Unfortunately, Unfortunately for him, the cop pursuing him is one, also.]]
* IronicNickname: "Hardshell", literally and figuratively. While the very last line of the story reveals that [[spoiler:"[Frank's] heart is as soft as any]]", it's also being applied to [[spoiler:an amoebic shapeshifter who flows around damage rather than block it.]]
Changed line(s) 69 (click to see context) from:
* NotSoAboveItAll: One of the male triplets in "We Three" muses on how much his sister and brother resemble their parents when they argue.
to:
* NotSoAboveItAll: NotSoAboveItAll:
** One of the male triplets in "We Three" muses on how much his sister and brother resemble their parents when theyargue.argue.
** Frank Shaw doesn't encourage people to use "Hardshell" as a nickname for him... but secretly enjoys it when they do.
** One of the male triplets in "We Three" muses on how much his sister and brother resemble their parents when they
** Frank Shaw doesn't encourage people to use "Hardshell" as a nickname for him... but secretly enjoys it when they do.
* OlderHeroVsYoungerVillain: While no precise ages are given, Frank Shaw estimates that he's [[spoiler:three hundred years]] older than Karl Skagg.
Changed line(s) 77 (click to see context) from:
* TheVietnamVet: The protagonists of "Chase" and "Down in the Darkness".
to:
* TheVietnamVet: The protagonists of "Chase" and "Down in the Darkness". Frank Shaw in "Hardshell" is mentioned as having served as well.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
This is just a rogue paragraph that doesn't seem to relate to a specific trope.
Changed line(s) 66 (click to see context) from:
* After Jonathan, Jerry and Jessica kill literally everybody else on earth in "We Three," they begin to [[spoiler: have sex numerous times at Jessica's urging in order to get a head start on repopulating the planet with their "superior" offspring.]] However, [[spoiler: once Jessica gets pregnant, the triplets realize that whatever she is carrying in her womb is much more self aware and powerful than all of them put together, cannot be killed or controlled and somehow carries both genders, so it does not need any of them for reproduction. The fetus begins to torment them by jolting them awake at night with psychic bursts, and the siblings slowly come to realize that their days are numbered. The story ends with the siblings in bed at night, Jessica wincing at the fetus kicking her intentionally and vainly trying to assure her brothers that the child will not kill them.]]
to:
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 53 (click to see context) from:
* EldritchAbomination: The antagonist of "Hardhsell" is one of these of the [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifter]] variety. He goes through many nightmarish, unnatural forms while trying to kill the cop that's pursuing him. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, the cop is one also. And he's ''much'' more experienced.]]
to:
* EldritchAbomination: The antagonist of "Hardhsell" "Hardshell" is one of these of the [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifter]] variety. He goes through many nightmarish, unnatural forms while trying to kill the cop that's pursuing him. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, the cop is one also. And he's ''much'' more experienced.]]
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 78,79 (click to see context) from:
* WellIntentionedExtremist: The antagonist of "The Black Pumpkin". He's a pumpkin demon that kills the Billy's entire family because they were all terrible people, but he can't kill Billy himself because he is generally a good person. However, he says he'll come back if Billy ever starts becoming evil, and it's shown the demon has a ''very'' lose definition of what "evil" is.
to:
* WellIntentionedExtremist: The antagonist of "The Black Pumpkin". He's a pumpkin demon that kills the Billy's entire family because they were all terrible people, but he can't kill Billy himself because he is generally a good person. However, he says he'll come back if Billy ever starts becoming evil, and it's shown the demon has a ''very'' lose definition of what "evil" is.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 39 (click to see context) from:
* AmbiguousEnding: After dispatching the man who tortured and murdered his friends in Vietnam, the narrator of "Down in the Darkness" tries to convince himself that it's wrong to kill people (in his basement room full of demons) even if they deserve it. However, when he sits down to write a list of deservers, he can't seem to stop writing...
to:
* AmbiguousEnding: AmbiguousEnding:
** After dispatching the man who tortured and murdered his friends in Vietnam, the narrator of "Down in the Darkness" tries to convince himself that it's wrong to kill people (in his basement room full of demons) even if they deserve it. However, when he sits down to write a list of deservers, he can't seem to stop writing...
** After dispatching the man who tortured and murdered his friends in Vietnam, the narrator of "Down in the Darkness" tries to convince himself that it's wrong to kill people (in his basement room full of demons) even if they deserve it. However, when he sits down to write a list of deservers, he can't seem to stop writing...
Added DiffLines:
* DrowningUnwantedPets: The trigger of Marnie's murderous rage in "Kittens" is learning that this is what has happened to all the kittens her cat has birthed.
Added DiffLines:
* SiblingMurder: [[spoiler:The punchline for "Kittens" is that Marnie, enraged to discover her father has been drowning her cat's kittens, sneaks upstairs whilst nobody is watching and drowns her baby twin siblings in the bathtub.]]
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 53 (click to see context) from:
** The triplets in "We Three" are only ten years old but they [[spoiler: kill every human being on earth with a thought, including their parents (whom they callously drag out of the house and burn in the yard), engage in incestuous sex and overall show no real remorse for anything they have done .]]
to:
** The triplets in "We Three" are only ten years old but they [[spoiler: kill every human being on earth with a thought, including their parents (whom they callously drag out of the house and burn in the yard), engage in incestuous sex and overall show no real remorse for anything they have done .done.]]
Added DiffLines:
* IHaveBoobsYouMustObey: Jonathan and Jerry usually end up doing whatever Jessica tells them to do in "We Three," because she is beautiful and bossy and they are quite taken with her. It crosses over into major {{Squick}} territory because [[spoiler: they are only ten years old and she is their sister. The casual way in which they both have sex with her during a beach trip suggests that they had been doing that for a while.]]
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Added DiffLines:
** As a result of the triplets in "We Three" killing everybody else on the planet, every city on earth has become this.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Added DiffLines:
** The triplets in "We Three" are only ten years old but they [[spoiler: kill every human being on earth with a thought, including their parents (whom they callously drag out of the house and burn in the yard), engage in incestuous sex and overall show no real remorse for anything they have done .]]
Added DiffLines:
* EvilutionaryBiologist: Young Jessica in "We Three." She thinks the extermination of the human race is a good thing, views herself and her brothers as members of a new, superior race and takes a disturbingly active role in [[BrotherSisterIncest repopulating]] the planet with her offspring. It ends up working [[GoneHorriblyRight horribly right]], as [[spoiler: her hermaphroditic child jumps a step up on the evolution ladder, becomes self aware in her womb and, much like its mother, sees its parents as inferior and unnecessary. The story ends with the implication that the fetus will exterminate the triplets once it is born.]]
Added DiffLines:
* After Jonathan, Jerry and Jessica kill literally everybody else on earth in "We Three," they begin to [[spoiler: have sex numerous times at Jessica's urging in order to get a head start on repopulating the planet with their "superior" offspring.]] However, [[spoiler: once Jessica gets pregnant, the triplets realize that whatever she is carrying in her womb is much more self aware and powerful than all of them put together, cannot be killed or controlled and somehow carries both genders, so it does not need any of them for reproduction. The fetus begins to torment them by jolting them awake at night with psychic bursts, and the siblings slowly come to realize that their days are numbered. The story ends with the siblings in bed at night, Jessica wincing at the fetus kicking her intentionally and vainly trying to assure her brothers that the child will not kill them.]]
* MadnessMantra: What Jessica's litany of "We are a new race with new rules and new emotions" ends up sounding like. Initially declared triumphantly, it ends up being something she repeats to her siblings (and mostly to herself) in a weak attempt to convince and soothe them that the fetus she is carrying won't kill them the second it is born.
* MadnessMantra: What Jessica's litany of "We are a new race with new rules and new emotions" ends up sounding like. Initially declared triumphantly, it ends up being something she repeats to her siblings (and mostly to herself) in a weak attempt to convince and soothe them that the fetus she is carrying won't kill them the second it is born.
Added DiffLines:
* NotSoAboveItAll: One of the male triplets in "We Three" muses on how much his sister and brother resemble their parents when they argue.
Added DiffLines:
* SelfMadeOrphan: The triplets in "We Three" kill their mother and father, together with every single human being on earth. [[spoiler: Their malicious unborn child is implied to intend to become one once it is born, as it is hermaphroditic or can breed asexually, and therefore does not need its ''inferior'' parents.]]
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Added DiffLines:
* TroublingUnchildlikeBehavior: Jerry, Jonathan and Jessica, the incredibly creepy ten year old triplets in "We Three" qualify through their lack of empathy and incestuous relationship.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 4,5 (click to see context) from:
''Strange Highways'' is the first (and so far only) collection written by {{Creator/Dean Koontz}} (mainly dealing with the horror, thriller, and science fiction genres), containing one novel, one novella, and twelve short stories. Although published in 1995, only one story was specifically written for the collection. The others were published sporadically in literary magazines and anthologies between 1966 and 1989.
to:
''Strange Highways'' is the first (and so far only) collection written by {{Creator/Dean Koontz}} (mainly dealing with the horror, thriller, and science fiction genres), Koontz}}, containing one novel, one novella, and twelve short stories. Although published in 1995, only one story was specifically written for the collection. The others were published sporadically in literary magazines and anthologies between 1966 and 1989.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 34,35 (click to see context) from:
14: '''"Chase"''' (1972): A Vietnam vet is stalked by a deranged killer after he saves an intended victims from his clutches.
to:
14: '''"Chase"''' (1972): A Vietnam vet solider is stalked by a deranged killer after he saves an intended victims victim from his clutches.
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 32,35 (click to see context) from:
13: '''"Twilight of the Dawn"''' (1987): An atheist is forced to watch his young son die of cancer.
14: '''"Chase"''' (1972): A Vietnam vet is stalked by a deranged killer after he saves one of his victims from his clutches.
14: '''"Chase"''' (1972): A Vietnam vet is stalked by a deranged killer after he saves one of his victims from his clutches.
to:
13: '''"Twilight of the Dawn"''' (1987): An atheist is forced to watch questions his faith as his young son die dies of cancer.
14: '''"Chase"''' (1972): A Vietnam vet is stalked by a deranged killer after he savesone of his an intended victims from his clutches.
14: '''"Chase"''' (1972): A Vietnam vet is stalked by a deranged killer after he saves
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Added DiffLines:
* AssholeVictim: [[spoiler: Billy's family]] in "The Black Pumpkin", [[spoiler: the Vietnamese torturer]] in "Down in the Darkness", [[spoiler: the purse snatcher]] in "Snatcher", and [[spoiler: the serial killer]] in "Hardshell".
Is there an issue? Send a MessageReason:
None
Changed line(s) 50 (click to see context) from:
* EldritchAbomination: The antagonist of "Hardhsell" is one of these of the [[{{Shapeshifting}} shapeshifter]] variety. He goes through many nightmarish, unnatural forms while trying to kill the cop that's pursuing him. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, the cop is one also. And he's ''much'' more experienced.]]
to:
* EldritchAbomination: The antagonist of "Hardhsell" is one of these of the [[{{Shapeshifting}} [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifter]] variety. He goes through many nightmarish, unnatural forms while trying to kill the cop that's pursuing him. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, the cop is one also. And he's ''much'' more experienced.]]
Changed line(s) 63 (click to see context) from:
* ShapeshiftingSwanSong: When [[spoiler: the shapeshifting cop]] in "Hardshell" liquefies and wraps himself around the antagonist to suffocate him, the antagonist goes through many forms trying to break out. [[spoiler: It doesn't work.]]
to:
* ShapeshiftingSwanSong: ShapeshifterSwanSong: When [[spoiler: the shapeshifting cop]] in "Hardshell" liquefies and wraps himself around the antagonist to suffocate him, the antagonist goes through many forms trying to break out. [[spoiler: It doesn't work.]]
