Knockouts: Ten Tales of Fantasy and Noir

From the Introduction by Award-Winning Author Norman Partridge, “Jason Ridler is kind of like a bull rider who’s tossed a saddle on a Tiger tank, and he’s riding that bucking sucker for all he’s worth, because, hey, no one told him that he couldn’t do it, did they? Here’s a guy coming for you with two fistfuls of tales that are wild and energetic and not built to mess around. One other thing: I think you’ll enjoy them. I sure did. So here he is, the Man in the Barbed-Wire Straitjacket. Enter the Ridler.” An old vampire trains a young human to beat his kind in the ring. A young man tries to save his sister from the drug scene that almost killed him. A gang of kids start a backyard kung fu tournament that releases the worst and best in them. A career drunk takes one last stab at salvation. A tough girl takes on the challenge of training the local weakling, and finds monsters inside the squared circle. KNOCKOUTS collects ten tales of action, noir, and horror by Jason S. Ridler, the author of DEATH MATCH and over forty published short stories. A former punk rock musician and cemetery groundskeeper, he also holds a Ph.D. in War Studies from the Royal Military College of Canada. He currently lives in the East Bay region of San Francisco with his wife, two dogs, and two parrots.