A few days ago, I read the novelette Turn Right for Terror by James Cooper on Reactor, which is a magazine I intend to read much more than I do. And I liked it a lot.
While visiting her mother at a nursing home, Ellen sees an actress from her childhood comfort show. So she says hi.
Turn Right at Terror was an episodic weird horror show from the 60s. At some point it’s described as Boschian. Rose Ward played a character named Bird Dog, whose role is to stand as the Grand Sentinel and point at whoever was unlucky enough to turn right during the episode.
Rose is a 90-something bitch, and after some bitching, she tells Ellen how horrible it was to work on the show. She says: “Sometimes, dearie, the world tosses you a bone and you think you’re the luckiest son of a bitch in the universe. Then that bone gets stuck in your throat, and suddenly you’re struggling to breathe.”
This is clearly something she’s been waiting to talk about. Or, maybe she talks about it a lot because her speech/tale is well told.
Actors vanished from the set. Others died. Rose was harassed and abused by the show runner. It was awful. And maybe there’s something else going on, with both Rose and Ellen.
The story is short and fast and I would like to read more from the author. I also found that it’s hard to find things written by someone named James Cooper when there’s a much more famous author with the same name. I still wrote down a few titles.
