A host of disturbing and entrancing short stories.
Dark houses, ravenous creatures, and malevolent entities appear in this collection of unsettling tales.
The 18 short stories herein dabble in a variety of horror genres. In the story “Folded Into Shadows,” Agnes Tiller hosts the reality TV series Haunted Renovations. Her latest episode covers a Victorian home that some have entered but never exited, including her older brother. Unseen evils pop up in other stories as well, such as “Dark Inheritance,” in which a woman named Emeline learns that her feeling that something is incessantly following her may be a threat in itself. Other scary things in this book don’t always keep themselves hidden. “The Horror on Sycamore Lane,” for example, unfolds in a seemingly picture-perfect town. However, there are signs that Bob, one of its residents, is physically abusing his wife, Barbara, and something else in their Cape Cod–style home may prove deadly. While the stories’ ambiguous details steer clear of precisely defining creatures and entities, some seem familiar—not unlike werewolves, vampires, and ghosts. There’s also little doubt as to what these sinister things are doing, from hijacking bodies to enacting graphic, visceral assaults. As it turns out, not all these nonhuman characters are malignant; quite a few throughout this collection will garner readers’ sympathy, as they’re merely trying to survive or live in peace. The same is true for humans, as not every one of their horrific or bizarre deeds stems from malice. Even the terrible death that opens “Those Beneath, Devour,” is the result of a string of unfortunate choices.
Dalpe’s grim tales carry a strong tone of foreboding. Many characters find themselves drawn or led to things, as if they’re inescapable. Creepy homes call to them; strange people push them toward their apparent fate; and in the case of the woman in “The Drowned Siren,” a ghost of the sea becomes a relentless obsession. Although the author doesn’t shy away from violent imagery, most stories simply imply savage turns, even when they involve things that bite. In other instances, the visuals are simply unnerving, as in the knockout “Rig Rash.” This tale’s narrator aims to settle in Sanctuary, a town that’s just struck oil. All seems fine until a foul-smelling, oily substance oozes out of seemingly everything—including, most frighteningly, living things. The book’s sublime descriptions zap all kinds of sights to life: a long driveway like a “sloping serpent,” tree branches resembling “tentacles, or reaching arms, or a hundred snakes,” and a crowd of nameless faces “painted red and blue from [a police cruiser’s] flickering lights.” Other stories feature more familiar horrors; more than one deals with domestic abuse, and loyalty to friends or family drops several characters into harrowing circumstances. In “The Guest,” scenes of everyday life preface a simmering horror, as when a seemingly innocuous university professor’s prolonged stay at the narrator’s childhood home coincides with a harsh winter and an inexplicable sickness that pervades the household—much like the terror throughout this entire collection.
A host of disturbing and entrancing short stories.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-955904-23-0
Page Count: 274
Publisher: Clash Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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