Criminal Macabre: Cell Block 666

Cal McDonald faces his greatest challenge yet - hard time! Framed in the death of a cop, Cal finds himself at the mercy of a sadistic and corrupt police force. But now, in some of the bleakest moments of his life, the things that make him different from the rest of the world might be the only things capable of keeping his sorry butt out of deeper trouble. Because it turns out that the things that would make most people want to give up and die - the strange, inhuman voices coming from adjacent cells, the mysterious visitors, the unlikely saviors in demonic disguise - are the things that have kept Cal alive long enough to see a way out. And just when Cal begins to unravel the conspiracy behind his own downfall, he uncovers a nightmare world of murder and corruption at the prison that has dozens of former prisoners turning in their graves - and clawing their way out!

The latest in the Cal MacDonald series finds the drug-addicted paranormal investigator homeless and hiding from the police, who want to stick him with a false murder rap. Then things get really unpleasant. Cal has always protected ghouls (while fighting zombies, werewolves, and vampires), but a renegade ghoul turns him in to the law so that he's sent to a corrupt hellhole of a prison, badly beaten, and thrown into solitary confinement. Fortunately, Cal's undead buddy Mo'lock brings him pills and helps him get the information he needs to reanimate the corpses of murdered prisoners that the prison warden has been burying nearby. Creator Niles was responsible for 30 Days of Night and certainly knows how to do graphic horror. Stakal's art is appropriately choppy, but that roughness combines with Madsen's dark-toned coloring to make it difficult to recognize which body part is being shredded or whether a character is alive or dead. Nevertheless, the result will entertain nonsqueamish readers. (Jan.)
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On the heels of Criminal Macabre: The Complete Cal McDonald Stories (2008), scripter Niles proves he’s not quite finished with the grisly adventures of his drug-addicted, Chandleresque private eye. After being framed for the death of the D.A.’s wife, McDonald gets thrown in the slammer with the usual mob of cop-hating cons, and only a deliberate attack on a fellow inmate keeps him safe in solitary. Fortunately, the infamous monster hunter is savvy enough to have a few monsters on his side, including his wall-penetrating ghoul pal, Mo’lock, who clues McDonald into a dark secret about the prison’s corrupt warden, McClure. Interred beneath the prison grounds are the rotting remains of McClure’s many enemies, from hated prisoners to an unlucky trustee who stumbled on McClure’s transgressions. All it takes is a well-chosen incantation to unearth the corpses and turn them into zombie allies. As usual, the active ingredients here are gratuitous gore and undead mayhem, with smartly drawn panels and glib dialogue zipping by with delightful abandon. --Carl Hays