That said, splatterpunk is not about to take over horror fiction any time soon. This material has been around as a distinct subgenre for at least five years, and none of it has ascended to the best-seller lists. (Only Clive Barker, included in "Splatterpunks" as a thirtysomething granddaddy of the form, has enjoyed notable commercial success, with a parodic variation on this sort of thing.) The vast majority of splatterpunk books are published in paperback, and few of them ever reach your local chain bookstore, which tends to fill its horror section with Stephen King, Dean R. Koontz, V. C. Andrews and other reliable brand names. Splatterpunk is also sold in comic-book stores and science-fiction specialty shops, and has inspired its own little subculture of independent publishers and fan magazines -- Cemetery Dance and Iniquities ("The Magazine of Great Wickedness and Wonder") are two of the more professional-looking. Basically, splatterpunk bears the same relationship to horror fiction that punk rock did to rock-and-roll -- it is a radical gesture that shakes up the genre, that shifts the balance slightly but significantly. Splatterpunk does not have mass appeal, but it does inevitably influence other, more mainstream writers, who respond to its sheer gall, its refusal to be conventionally commercial even as it inspires to great commercial success.

Splatterpunk's extremes are defined not only in its depiction of violence and death, but also by an intense alienation from the body. In David J. Schow's short story "Jerry's Kids Meet Wormboy," the corpulent title character is described thus: "His surplus flesh quivered and swam, shoving around his clothing as though some subcutaneous revolution was aboil. Pasty and pocked, his belly depended earthward, a vast sandbag held at bay by a wide weight lifter's belt, notched low. The faintest motion caused his hectares of skin to bobble like mercury. Wormboy was more than fat. He was a crowd of fat people."

Mr. Schow's prose delivers an undeniable sick kick; it is a nauseating cheap thrill that succeeds in its desire to revolt. Much of splatterpunk fiction operates like pornography, seeking to provoke a strong, immediate response, unconcerned with literary effect. But does this genre aspire to anything more? Yes, occasionally. Along with Mr. Lansdale's best novels, "The Drive-In" (1988) and "Savage Season" (1990), there is "The Scream," a 1988 novel by John Skipp and Craig Spector that is a sustained satire that proceeds from a juicy, amusing premise: What if there really is a rock band out there that worships Satan, inserts hypnotic messages into the microchips of its recordings and uses its popularity to influence thousands, perhaps millions, of young people to commit mayhem?

In the novel, a hard-rock band called the Scream inspires rabid fans who call themselves Screamers; the climax of the book occurs during a concert in which the band sings its latest hit, "Stick It In," and a group of Screamers pull out knives and stick them into the backs of other audience members. Anyone who has ever attended a big, rowdy rock concert will be shaken by the novel's precise details and plot. It is paradoxical that perhaps the most effective anti-rock book ever written should have come from Mr. Skipp and Mr. Spector, enthusiastic rock fans whose nonfiction -- notably a defense of splatterpunk called "On Going Too Far" that appears as the introduction to the 1989 horror anthology "The Book of the Dead" -- goes to great lengths to condemn the sort of pop-culture censorship advocated by rock's enemies.

Splatterpunk may be a humanist's nightmare -- defending its prose is difficult if you want clearly stated morals or uplifting lessons in your fiction -- but it has many humane sentiments. Mr. Sammon maintains that splatterpunk first surfaced in the mid-80's, "erupting through . . . a period of social repression -- specifically, the vicious conservatism of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher." The works of Mr. Lansdale, as well as J. S. Russell in his story "City of Angels," offer appalling visions of the aftermath of nuclear war; by describing the effects of nuclear bombs in obscene detail, these writers hope to inspire outrage against such weapons.

ITS supporters also argue that most splatterpunk fiction does not share the salient trait of so many contemporary horror films -- misogyny. Frequently this means little more than the fact that in splatterpunk stories men are maimed and killed as frequently as women -- equal-opportunity pain -- but Mr. Sammon deplores "the emphasis on female stereotyping" that is "depressingly insistent" in a lot of mainstream horror fiction, and the better writers in the genre create strong female characters who defeat their evil foes. In John Skipp's "Film at Eleven," a man who beats his wife is offered up as the monster he is, while the woman is portrayed as a sympathetic, complex character who is shown to have a sad history of abusive relationships.

Edward Bryant's "While She Was Out" presents its central character, Della, as a female version of Charles Bronson in "Death Wish" -- an ordinary citizen who fights back when attacked. Della takes on a thug who jumps her in a shopping-mall parking lot: "There was no question of asking him nicely to let go, of giving warning, of simply aiming to disable. Her self-defense teacher had drilled into all the students the basic dictum of do what you can, do what you have to do. . . . With all her strength, Della drove the screwdriver up into the base of his skull. She thrust and twisted the tool until she felt her knuckles dig into his stiff hair."