April 2025

Summary

Five high school friends are bonded by an oath to protect one another no matter what.

Then, on a camping trip in the middle of the forest, they find something extraordinary: a mysterious staircase to nowhere.

One friend walks up—and never comes back down. Then the staircase disappears.

Twenty years later, the staircase has reappeared. Now the group returns to find the lost boy—and what lies beyond the staircase in the woods.

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Review

I went in expecting to hate this book. Staircase? In the fucking woods? Hi stale ancient internet plot point from fucking 2015 or whatever. And unfortunately my hate was improperly placed. It's a ok story. Mediocre. The gimmick of a staircase in the woods was entirely unnecessary and frankly just a marketing gimmick. It could have taken place in any haunted house, in any fashion to get to the spooky Bad Place. But honestly it's very in line with the author. To call dibs on a shitty stale gimmick somebody else came up with just to get all the acclaim and SEO. Not to mention expanding upon it just ruins the allure. It's like explaining Nyarlothep's entire life history and motivation. You take away the mystery of the eldritch. See also that godawful backrooms creepypasta.

Anyways. Horror as a metaphor for trauma isn't anything new. Unfortunately the book is incredibly white. Both the characters, the settings, the perspective on mental illness, the author himself inserting godawful politics. Real eye rollingly hilarious to have gender politics coming from a white author. It almost feels like 2015 sjw stereotypes. AuDHD spectrum? Someone listing out their tumblr bio in real life? What is this, 2012 sjw tumblr? Does the author watch fox news or what? Not that I want this author to write Black characters or characters of color after reading all that. Shut the fuck up wendig.

Anyways, again. The horror as a metaphor for trauma starts off as a white man traumatized by WW2 murdering his entire family. This causes the house to be haunted. For some reason it's super duper haunted and starts going full House of Leaves with its architecture, expanding with every victim that dies inside a house. White victim(s), mind you, because Black people and people of color have never been murdered in a house???? I guess you can say it's a haunted HOA or something but I didn't get that impression. I got the impression that most authors offer: they completely forgot people who aren't white exist.

There's some neat things in the book. The crawlspace being a safe location within the haunted house. The random mashed up of haunted houses. The physical appearance of the house itself infecting people. The concept of anglerfish-esque lures, even though apparently it doesn't need them if it can just absorb murder houses??

This book feels like it's written for those who would enjoy Ready Player One but pretend they've never read it. The redditor who proudly displays pins about reddit and other video game shit on their messenger bag, who loitered in their younger years at GameStop to flirt with the one woman cashier who had no choice but to stay there til her shift was over and pray they didn't follow her out to her car or the bus stop.

I do question why the fuck there was a single woman character. It's one thing to have a limited population in small towns, esp of children one's own age, but seriously? One woman. You couldn't have brought along a wife or girlfriend or partner of some kind? Even to get killed off. See that just reminds me of the lack of Black characters and characters of color. They just don't exist to the author. And for women, one woman out of 4 characters is an even amount. Any more and then it's just too many FEMALES. /strongly rolls eyes

It was ok. It was decently written, a decent plot beside the gimmick, and had a good sense of themes.

▪ Friendship, like a house, can go bad, too. That air you share? Goes sour. Dry rot here, black mold there, and if you don’t remediate, it just grows and grows. Gets bad enough, one or all of you have to move out. And then the place just fucking sits there, abandoned. Empty and gutted. Another ruin left to that force in the world that wants everything to fall apart. You can move back into a place like that, sometimes. But only if you tear it all down and start again.”

Yes, I too watched that Jacob geller videssay.

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Content Warnings

Major ableist r slur, alcohol use, aleism, amputation, antiblack racism, arson, bullying, cancer, child abuse, confinement, csa, drug use, drugs lsd, ear trauma, emotional abuse, family annihilation, hand trauma, house fires, incest, injuries, insects, kidnapping, male on male rape, pedophilia, police, racism, self harm, sexual abuse, sexual content, suicide, violence

Medium antisemitism, child death, holocaust, parent death, suicide

Minor antiblack racism, car crashes, lesbophobic d slur, vomit, waterboarding

Summary

Simon and Priya's young daughter has died in a tragic accident. Determined to heal their fracturing marriage, the couple move to the North Yorkshire Moors to renovate a dilapidated rural cottage. However, they just can't process their grief as increasingly eerie events unfold. A child's ghostly figure appears on the moors, doors lock themselves, and a mysterious stain grows from the loft. Is it their daughter haunting them or something else? Starve Acre meets Linghun in this story of grief, marriage and haunting.

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Review

Kinda reminds me of an entry into one of those horror movie anthology. Just enough in the budget to make a creepy flesh house, but clearly not enough to rent something besides a very isolated country cottage for filming. Not necessarily in a bad way. The relationship is interesting enough to fill in the gaps and it's a soundly rounded out plot. It's also varied enough from the standard haunted house that it isn't a cliched retread. I can see the Starve Acre implications but I don't think it measured up equally in terms of the dire relationship. Maybe if it weren't a novella and had more time to develop? But I don't think it needs it. It suits being a novella. You don't always need 80 chapters to expound on a theme.

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Content Warnings

Major crushing, death

Medium n/a

Minor drug use, drugs smoking tobacco

Summary

Olivia Becente was never supposed to have the gift. The ability to commune with the dead was the specialty of her sister, Naiche. But when Naiche dies unexpectedly and under strange circumstances, somehow Olivia suddenly can’t stop seeing and hearing from spirits.

A few years later, she’s the most in-demand paranormal investigator in Denver. She’s good at her job, but the loss of Naiche haunts her. That’s when she hears from the Brown Palace, a landmark Denver hotel. The owner can’t explain it, but every few years, a girl is found dead in room 904, no matter what room she checked into the night before. As Olivia tries to understand these disturbing deaths, the past and the present collide as Olivia’s investigation forces her to confront a mysterious and possibly dangerous cult, a vindictive journalist, betrayal by her friends, and shocking revelations about her sister’s secret life.

The Haunting of Room 904 is a paranormal thriller that is as edgy as it is heartfelt and simmers with intensity and longing. Erika T. Wurth lives up to her reputation as “a gritty new punkish outsider voice in American horror.”

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Review

Remember those urban fantasy supernatural paranormal tv shows back in the 90s / 00s? More like Charmed than Xena. The 'magic is real but not many people know about it' shows. The soap operas except for the hot younger crowd, whatever that is. That's what this book felt like. A very fun, but touching, emotionally charged but not Too Heavy story. I thought it hit a perfect balance and modernized that sort of entertainment. I loved the main characters were realistically diverse--meaning they weren't bland tokens that show up for a few scenes so the publisher can slap a 'diverse rep' hashtag on it. I loved the main character's relationship with her sister and mother were the forefront. It's a joy to see women centered in horror stories. Though I feel those relationships were part of a larger theme, that of connection through generations despite the genocides they've survived as indigenous women from multiple Nations.

I think the foreshadowing was very well done. Both with the romantic interest(s) and the collective hauntings. Despite appearing so separate, everything had an influence on what had happened to present day Naiche and MC. That's absolutely what racism is like.

The depiction of domestic violence and the dangers indigenous women face when dating, esp those outside their race, was present but not over the top. It didn't feel preachy like an after school special. I liked that it was present, both thematically and realistically. I think that helps go against stereotypes of indigenous women in media, that they're the dangerous 'uncivilized' partner that needs the [usually white] man to tame her.

The horror was both supernatural and paranormal. You got the cosmic monster gods and the ghosts of murdered people. It was kind of cheesy but fitting with the tone of the book. Not comedy horror, more urban fantasy but make it horror genre.

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Content Warnings

Major anti indigenous racism, child death, colonization, genocide, gun violence, racism, stalking, violence

Medium drug abuse, gun violence, parent death

Minor incest, vomit

Summary

Halley is on the run from an interplanetary political scandal that has put a huge target on her back. She heads for what seems like the perfect place to lay low: a gigantic space barge storing the cryogenically frozen bodies of Earth’s most fortunate citizens from more than a century ago… The cryo program, created by trillionaire tech genius Zale Winfeld, is long defunct, and the AI hologram "hosts," ghoulishly created in the likeness of Winfeld’s three adult children, are glitchy. The ship feels like a crypt, and the isolation gets to Halley almost immediately. She starts to see figures crawling in the hallways, and there’s a constant scraping, slithering, and rattling echoing in the vents. It’s not long before Halley realizes she may have gotten herself trapped in an even more dangerous situation than the one she was running from.

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Review

Competently written, I guess. A good blend of scifi and horror, specifically occult horror. The mystery was pretty good, the mythos was bland and uninspired. Honestly the whole thing did feel like a very generic capitalist hell hole universe. I wasn't sold on the tension. No disregard or hate to the author, but it's not an especially original plot. The setting was very cool but felt wasted. There really could have been more ambiguous, almost gaslighting terror of paranoia in such an isolated place. I guess if you like the plot you'd enjoy this as a beach read. Otherwise it's ok.

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Content Warnings

Major body horror, confinement, gun violence, kidnapping, murder, torture, violence

Medium n/a

Minor sexual content

Summary

fuck off

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Review

Turns out the town is / was a sundown town and the house eas built on the place where a lynching tree used to grow. The writing is acceptable, but it's largely shallow splatter punk stuff. Also a magical negro woman was lynched there which is why it's cursed.

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Content Warnings

Major none because I didn't even finish it

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

On the penal colony of Hibiscus Station, no positions are as key as the Pomps, who direct the dangerous mining operations to remove highly valuable—and volatile—crystal from the moon’s crust. Young was previously in training to be a Pomp until a depressive episode, mental break, and a suicide attempt. She doesn’t need the other convicts on her work team to suspect she’s unraveling again, so when she suddenly hallucinates visions of the unstable crystals in the tunnel walls around her—along with the potential danger they hold—she keeps her mouth shut. And then their newly dug tunnel explodes, killing her crew.

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Review

It takes a while to get to the mystery. In the mean time it's a whole lot of interpersonal relationships and anxiety and workplace drama. Which is interesting in a psychological suspense way but didn't really do it for me. I think I liked the author's previous book better in regards to mentally ill characters. Still it was a solid mystery, I loved the worker's of the world unite plot twist, and that it had a happy ending. It's a shame the author isn't more prolific as she absolutely can write a damn good story.

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Content Warnings

Major burns, drugging, hand trauma, manipulation, medical abuse, medical content, rape by deception

Medium prisons, solitary confinement, torture

Minor n/a

Summary

Cora Zeng is a crime scene cleaner. But the bloody messes don’t bother her, not when she’s already witnessed the most horrific thing possible: her sister being pushed in front of a train.

But the killer was never caught, and Cora is still haunted by his last words: bat eater.

These days, nobody can reach Cora: not her aunt who wants her to prepare for the Hungry Ghost Festival, not her weird colleagues, and especially not the slack-jawed shadow lurking around her doorframe. After all, it can’t be real – can it?

After a series of unexplained killings in Chinatown, Cora believes that someone might be targeting East Asian women, and something might be targeting Cora herself. Soon, she will learn... you can’t just ignore hungry ghosts.

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Review

It's not often I read a story with a character who is genuinely of color, but has a near complete disconnect to their culture. As in, a character of color written with all the knowledge of what being from that culture entails, but has not been raised in it. Usually by immigrant parents who want their children to be american and or upper class. And yet this disconnect does not save them from all the racism and oppression being from that culture entails. The MC is targeted, victimized, othered by racists and her own family.

And yet its her people that saves her. Her friends, also Chinese, do their best to show the MC her culture and how to live within it. It does not save them from a cruel fate, but that's simply how living in a racist world is like. It's a very Chinese, very Own Voices novel and must be read by anyone who enjoyed contemporary paranormal horror. And, dare I say with a lot of eye rolling, high concept literary horror. Whatever the fuck that means. That is to say, it tackles race, diaspora, family, and survival. It's very well written and paces out the plot twists and mystery incredibly well.

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Content Warnings

Major alcohol use, animal cruelty, animal death, child abuse, confinement, death, femicide, gore, murder, physical abuse, racism, sexual assault, sinophobia, unsanitary

Medium infidelity, victim blaming

Minor n/a

Summary

Mare of Easttown meets The Outsider in this spine-tingling and twisty debut about a series of disappearances in a small, fundamentalist town and what one broken family must do to remain together as dark forces close in.

After losing her young son in an accident, Rachel Kennan throws herself into her career as police chief of a small Virginia town to avoid focusing on her grief. Meanwhile, her husband, Finn, a washed-up writer whose alcoholism led to the devastating tragedy that changed everything, struggles to redeem himself before his family completely falls apart. Their two daughters are the only things keeping Rachel and Finn together, but the girls have demons of their own.

At the same time, a disturbing crime rocks their tightknit, religious community, sending Rachel chasing leads in a place that does not take kindly to outsiders. When an ominous force in the forest starts calling to the children, fear spawns hate among the townspeople, placing the Kennan family directly in the line of fire. Left with no choice but to rely on each other, Rachel and Finn must come together to face threats inside and out.

A haunting family saga and a disquieting horror debut, Nowhere draws from Appalachian folklore to caution us that true terror is what we bury in our own hearts.

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Review

A sad miserable read. Don't get me wrong, it's well written, the plot was interesting. But it's a dreadful tale of everything going wrong, people being horrible to each other, and children suffering the consequences. I can appreciate the lack of copaganda. The cops are all incompetent and in it for the pawcheck, or power abusing assholes. Or in the case of the MC, a child abusing power misusing hardheaded asshole who constantly makes everything worse.

What was the book? The Watchers? Which was turned into a movie and had a book sequel. That did the whole supernatural otherworld ghost-like monsters in the woods a lot better. The mythos could've had more to it. All we get, really, is one girl info dumping the lore to us. I wish there was more build up, more little details about the town like plaques or warding charms littered around town that are in need of repair. [fake edit, it's A. M. Shine's 'The Watchers']

I guess I'd recommend this if you want a emotionally sad, traumatic story to read. It's certainly a horror story, but mediocre folk horror. The emphasis is more mystery / psychological suspense with horror flavor.

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Content Warnings

Major child abuse, grief, misogyny, physical abuse, police abuse, sexism, violence

Medium child death, drowning, immolation, self harm, suicide

Minor lesbophobia, lesbophobic d slur, rape

Summary

What do you see...?

When the mutilated body of a young woman is discovered in the desert on the outskirts of Los Angeles, the detective assigned to the case can't deny the similarities between this murder and one that occurred a year prior. Media outlets are quick to surmise this is the work of a budding serial killer, but Detective Bill Renney is struggling with an altogether different scenario: a secret that keeps him tethered to the husband of the first victim.

What do you hear...?

Maureen Park, newly engaged to Hollywood producer Greg Dawson, finds her engagement party crashed by the arrival of Landon, Greg's son. A darkly unsettling young man, Landon invades Maureen's new existence, and the longer he stays, the more convinced she becomes that he may have something to do with the recent murder in the high desert.

What do you feel...?

Toby Kampen, the self-proclaimed Human Fly, begins an obsession over a woman who is unlike anyone he has ever met. A woman with rattlesnake teeth and a penchant for biting. A woman who has trapped him in her spell. A woman who may or may not be completely human.

In Ronald Malfi's brand-new thriller, these three storylines converge to create a tapestry of deceit, distrust, and unapologetic horror. A brand-new novel of dark suspense set in the City of Angels, as only "horror's Faulkner" can tell it.

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Review

Supernatural, vampire themed crime mystery. Notsomuch horror at all, unlike the previous(?) novel which was a small town horror about a very fucked up vampire parasite monster. The crime portions do make up for it, and while there's some fairy tale about the competence of policework, it's not verly copaganda. Just enough to keep the plot moving forward, but not some pseudo competence porn, deux ex polica nonsense.

The mystery was very well done. There was plenty of ambiguity to maintain my interest, and I liked the rotating POV. The characters felt individual and realistic, not empty stereotypes of junkie or crazy wacko meant to fill a plot beat. I appreciate that Maureen, the fiance, continued to exist past when the two men characters her story was involved with were finished. She wasn't just a prop to be dramatic around or be harmed by men for the sake of the story. That was a nice balance to the murder victims, both women.

I'd recommend this, but only for those who was horror / supernatural themed crime mysteries, not horror with crime.

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Content Warnings

Major animal attacks, corpse desecration, death, kidnapping, poison, police, sexual assault, snakes, vigilantism

Medium asphyxiation, medical content

Minor n/a

Summary

Readers are invited to The Pink Agave Motel, where brutality and intimacy ooze across the pages, exploring the depths of the unhinged imagination and how human desire unlocks the impulse to bite. Castro’s voice, influenced by Mexican folklore and a feminist perspective, illuminates a deeper view of how unrequited love affects every type of being alike.

The titular story focuses on Valentina, the proclaimed leader of a creature cohort, who manages hotel guests, until she is enlightened to a carnivorous death on the property. To avoid exposure that threatens her existence, she partners with (the hauntingly handsome) grieving friend of the dearly departed to solve the murder. Further within these tales, discover a woman who is a fish out of water drinking at a seaside honky tonk, the trapped guests who undergo sexual liberation, and aliens who find the sexiest of disguises.

These short stories evoke an alluring voice, sure to make the reader shiver in arousal and horror, never quite knowing what could happen next. Castro pushes past the limits of gothic terror and fantasy to carve a dangerous path of lust and violence, all throughout the reader’s charming stay at The Pink Agave Motel.

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Review

An excellent display of unabashed femme sexuality combined with gratuitous body horror, violence, murder, and Mexican culture. The horror genre has gotten far too stale with white authors, often white cishet men authors, and their tedious attempts at shocking or generic sex scenes that always gratify the men characters [and thus the author] and give very little consideration to the women characters [or the women audience].

Now don't get me wrong. I'm no prude. I enjoy a sex scene or ten in a novel and can appreciate what themes and characterizations they can offer. Intimacy or the lack of can strengthen a novel. But when it's the same old stale cishet male gaze, my eyes start rolling and my moon reader starts skipping pages.

The mythos and folk lore was amazing. It had a wonderful variety of lore and characters, and watching them interact with each other and the human world was fantastic. While we only get one POV, it felt like watching a group of very old friends love and support each other.

While I'm not a huge romance genre reader, this romance felt a little... unsupported. There's notsomuch a courtship as things simply falling into place. Not a bad thing, I suppose, the MC is lustfully alluring and anyone would have a hard time resisting. I imagine much of the love interest's impulsion developed off scene and so it's noticeably jarring to see the sudden change of mind. However, there's a happy ending and I can't be too annoyed.

There's a sideplot of sorcerers and past 'not quite exes, not quite child grooming pedos' popping up to harsh the MC's current love interest. The sorcerer plot felt shaky and I kinda thought there could be more to it. Maybe getting pissed off they're sacrificing fellow monster kin to get their monster powers. But this novella isn't about that, it's a love story.

[ok ok there's no actual pedophilia. The author neatly side steps this stating a character isn't interested in that, just to force a betrothal in order to ensure he marries the monster child he kidnapped. There's no on screen grooming either. I assume the author isn't going for that grimdark plot point in this novel.]

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Content Warnings

Major majorbody horror, child abuse, confinement, death, gore, grooming, murder, sexual content, sexual harassment, suicide, violencecws

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

A group of motorists become stranded on a lonely stretch of highway during a Christmas Eve blizzard and fight for survival against an unnatural force in the storm. The gathered survivors realize a tenuous connection among them means it may not be a coincidence that they all ended up on this highway.

An attempt to seek help leads a few of the travelers to a house in the woods where a twisted toymaker with a mystical snow globe is hell bent on playing deadly games with a group of people just trying to get home for the holidays.

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Review

A meandering purgatory tale of revenge that's, imo, lackluster. Call it a b movie you'd only find on the scifi channel on a sunday when most people aren't going to be watching tv [back in 1999 tbh]. Tries a little too hard to be grimdark and horrifying with personal tales scary occurrences. I often found myself skimming, wishing they'd get to the point. There's a rotating third person POV which didn't help nor particular hinder tension. It did make the pacing drag on. No character was interesting enough that I wanted to linger on them, or immediately go to the next part of their POV. I couldn't recommend this unless you really need something mediocre, shallow plot, and a long winding mystery with an... acceptable payout.

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Content Warnings

Major domestic violence, gore, misogyny

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

Fifteen years ago, six college housemates accidentally opened a dimensional threshold, unleashing monsters into their world. Charlie was the only one who dared to touch the portal, gaining the secret language to close it—at a terrible cost. His wife died, and his friends' memories of the trauma were erased, leaving him to carry the burden alone. Now, Charlie and his estranged friends are worn down by adulthood, battling burnout, divorce, and deep personal demons. When the monsters return Charlie tries to walk away—until his conscience drags him back. To stop the Nowhere Men for good, Charlie teaches his found family the secret language that saved them once before. Together, they must confront their past, their lost friend, and the monsters threatening reality itself. What happens when the saviors of the world are falling apart at the seams?

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Review

Superficial, fast paced, indie movie but it's nothing inspired. Very shallow in a children's cartoon series. As in 'the power of friendship will save the day!' The monsters are Alone In The Dark video game series levels of scary. They're named after the blandest band in the world--the beatles. It's a rather forgettable novel. I'm finding it hard to write about it even mere days after finishing it. I don't recommend it unless you hate the denser kind of prose [Fisherman, Langan], and want a easy read with minimal gore and good action scenes. I'd even say this was young adult audience oriented, or at least, oriented to those who read nothing but easy peasy YA genre books.

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Content Warnings

Major body horror, death, murder, violence

Medium hand trauma, injuries

Minor n/a

Summary

What happens when a haunted house story starts in the third act and you walk into everything at its worst? This book. This book happens.

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Review

Superficial splatter punk. The funniest part was them being disney adults. I can appreciate the novelty of immediately going into the action. The mythos is negligent and vague but that's fine, the point was the tortureporn. I did like the variety of characters, they felt like they had good, realistic connections to each other. Despite the shallowness of the genre and story, their actions were reasonable and empathetic. But due to the gimmick of abrupt introduction I didn't particularly care about any of them. The pacing was decent and we managed to get a good variety of torture scenes. However they were pretty standard violence for the slasher genre. I wasn't particularly shocked or unsettled.

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Content Warnings

Major alcohol use, confinement, death, gore, hand trauma, immolation, injuries, suicide, torture

Medium car crashes

Minor n/a

Summary

In this chilling supernatural horror novel set in a mysterious hotel, a woman fleeing her abusive ex finds herself running from more than just her past.

A historic hotel long past its prime and huddled along The Cut, a questionable Lake Erie beach, isn’t Sadie Miles’ ideal place to raise a toddler while also navigating her second pregnancy. After finally fleeing her abusive ex-fiancé, though, Sadie’s new housekeeping position and free room at L’Arpin Hotel are the best she can manage.

On her first night, Sadie runs to help a guest struggling in the hotel’s pool only to find the water calm and empty when she gets there, leaving her with a lingering unease. When a guest then goes missing and her manager insists they simply left without checking out, Sadie suspects he’s covering up darker goings-on in the hotel.

After her ex, Sadie won't let anyone convince her that what she’s experiencing isn’t real again. So, she keeps digging, quickly uncovering suspicious interactions with the staff, mysteriously vanishing security cameras, more missing guests, and things that go bump in the night...and drip in the walls, slither in the tub, and squirm in the halls. Everything isn't as it seems within the dim hallways of L’Arpin. Sadie has nowhere to go and nowhere to hide; she'll need to keep her wits about her to survive and keep her toddler and unborn child safe from whatever lurks nearby.

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Review

A supernatural, cosmic horror story that's neither good nor bad. A beach read, if you will. I'd call it 3 stars, were I ever inclined to use stars as a rating system. The characters are heartfelt and endearing in their plights, but rather one note and shallow. The antagonist is a slight plot twist, but not one that would shock you. The monsters are interesting and, to the credit, on screen. I confess I don't care for stories about domestic abuse. Rarely are the interesting beyond 'man hurt women' retreads of the same old abuse cycle. It feels like a well tread story written by a competent author. I don't feel compelled to seek out other works from this author.

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Content Warnings

Major dogs, domestic abuse, pregnancy, victim blaming, vomit

Medium n/a

Minor anti vaccine sentiment, child abuse

Summary

New York fashion editor Anya St. Clair is on the verge of greatness. Her wardrobe is to die for. Her social media is killer. And her career path is littered with the bodies of anyone who got in her way. She’s worked hard to get where she is, but she doesn’t have everything.

Not like Sarah Taft. Anya’s obsession sits one desk away. Beautiful, stylish, and rich, she was born to be a fashion world icon. From her beach-wave blonde hair to her on-trend nail art, she’s a walking editorial spread. And Anya wants to be her friend. Her best friend. Her only friend.

But when Sarah becomes her top competition for a promotion, Anya’s plan to win her friendship goes into overdrive. In order to beat Sarah…she’ll have to become her. Friendly competition may turn fatal, but as they say in fashion: One day you’re in, and the next day you’re dead.

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Review

This bitch crazy! YEET! [throws this book into my 'Watch This Author' pile] No horror but a very fun crime, semi mystery, sort of domestic psychological story of a mentally ill woman who serial kills her way to the top. Is she an ableist character? Probably. Is the gay character a token stereotype? Yah. But the story is very fun, the characters cut throat in more ways than one, and who doesn't enjoy seeing rich racist white women get fucked over? Very well written, excellent plot twists [albeit probably obvious], good paced and enjoyable to read. What more do you want out of a book?

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Content Warnings

Major gore, hand trauma, murder, police, self harm

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

CAN KILLING BE PASSED ON FROM FATHER TO SON?

Like high cholesterol, male pattern baldness, or a career in confections?

It’s something Bobby Blessing worries about a lot. He’s not just the owner of an ice cream parlor. Bobby is also the son of the Brittle Butcher—a serial killer marking time on Florida’s Death Row.

For years, Bobby has kept to himself, leaving his nightmares and his hometown far behind, while working hard to keep his family’s disturbing past at bay. (Yeah, his mom is quite the treat, too.)

Then, one snowy night, the enigmatic Cori Widdoes turns up with a craving for ice cream, and Bobby’s life takes an abrupt turn. For the better. Love and marriage soon follow. Bobby is happier than he has ever been.

Problem is, nothing good in his life lasts for long. Ignoring history is one thing, forgetting it another.

When rumor, hearsay, and mistaken identity target his life, his wife, and their livelihoods, ultimately escalating into violence, Bobby chooses to confront his demons head-on—both the real and the imagined.

He and Cori return to the town that had shunned him years earlier. And, almost immediately, idyllic Hillsdale degenerates into batshit crazy Hellsdale with a body count to match.

Watch your back. Lock your doors. Be courteous to everyone, no matter who, no matter what. Yes, everyone. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

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Review

Not horror. Crime mystery contemporary,, Comedic, witty, domestic, semi-unfiction but not really. Dare I say romance. It'd make a decent movie. No particular complaints.

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Content Warnings

Major majamputation, arm trauma, confinement, injuries, kidnapping, murder, parent death, suicide, torture, violenceorcws

Medium n/a

Minor homophobia

Summary

She’ll do anything to save her child. Even join a cult. When single mom Dalice learns her toddler, Cash, needs a heart transplant, she gets desperate. There are no guarantees he’ll receive a donor heart in time. And even if he does, she can’t afford the expensive procedure. Then Dalice meets Shane. He’s part of a mysterious group whose leader claims to be able to heal any disease or injury. Dalice is skeptical at first, and the ritual she witnesses makes her uneasy. But when a broken arm gets healed before her eyes, she can’t deny the truth, and she wants the same miracle for Cash.

As her son’s life hangs in the balance, Dalice must decide how far she’s willing to go to save him. Because the miracles in the secret group come at a steep price. A price that might be too high for even the most devoted mother.

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Review

Supernatural thriller not horror. Mildly cult horror. Superficial characters decent action OK romance. Rather shallow characters, with shallow romance. Nothing special. Tries to be capital D DEEP with references to the bible but feels like a poor attempt at truly horrifying christian cult practices.

The villain was a bit comical. Sad, but funny. A child groomed into cult behavior, having semi covert incestuous feelings for her brother as a teen then adult. The funny part comes from how shallow her character is. I guess you could say that's thematic of her abuse. But considering how shallow the rest of the book is, I'm not sure that was on purpose.

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Content Warnings

Major animal death, cult abuse, diseases, dogs, sexual abuse

Medium n/a

Minor parent death, suicide

Summary

For readers of Megan Collins with the taut character study of Angie Kim comes a searing mystery that follows three siblings as they reckon with the darkness hidden within their family after multiple graves are discovered behind their childhood home.

All families are complicated. But not all families have bodies buried in their backyard.

One put there just that week…

When the Rawlins family matriarch unexpectedly passes, all three adult children rush home. What they find is a house bursting with grief, dark memories surfacing around each corner, and multiple bodies buried deep in the woods. The Rawlins want to believe the discovery points to a crime long past.

But one of the graves behind Teague House is fresh, the earth disturbed just that week—and its inhabitant a local woman they all knew.

Is the youngest Rawlins sibling with something to hide somehow involved in her murder? Is his sister experiencing false memories of her late father digging near the graves? And why is the Rawlins aunt in such a rush to leave town after her sister’s funeral?

Enter private detective Maddie Reed, who has her own reasons for being curious about the bodies buried behind Teague House. Maddie sets out to unmask a killer. One she may have been hunting all her life.

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Review

Not horror. At all. Not even cult horror. Standard suspense horror, decent mystery. Slow paced. Plot twist kinda very telegraphed at the start. Not quite copaganda but still present enough to be irritating. I'd like it more if this wasn't sold to me as horror genre.

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Content Warnings

Major ableism, bullying, infidelity, medical content, police, pregnancy, suicide, suicide attempts

Medium hunting

Minor alcohol, drug use, suicide

Summary

Cessy returns home to search for her missing sister.

She finds a half-abandoned town under siege by unexplainable threats: Attics and crawlspaces stretch into endless tunnels. Corpses turn up riddled with holes—holes that slither through flesh like insectile parasites. It all leads deep into the abandoned coal mine.

Cessy’s sister disappeared while investigating the vengeful voice on the radio. To find her, Cessy will have to unravel the dark mystery wriggling up from the coal mine.

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Review

Many people have written variations of the Pied Piper folk tale. Either beat by beat historical plots, or homages [Children of Chicago, Cynthia Pelayo]. This is very much a modern take on the Pied Piper. It's not a physical manifestation that can be betrayed and steals children in revenge. It's modern media, specifically small towns take in by radio hosts spewing vitriol that turns even the kindest heart against their neighbor. It's decently realistic, but horror readers will not be disappointed by a bait and switch. While the method is a modern form of propaganda, the 'Pied Piper' is very much a real, supernatural entity. Minor genre spoilers, but this would fall under cosmic horror in addition to supernatural horror. Unfortunately it's unceasingly copaganda which made it hard to read the book between all my eye rolling.

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Content Warnings

Major ableism towards drug users, addiction, bullying, grief, gun violence, suicide

Medium animal cruelty, animal death, gore, suicide attempts, suicide ideation

Minor n/a

Summary

Jerry Campbell just wants to be left alone. Grief-stricken over the death of his wife Abigail, the elderly widower and recent retiree is desperate for a change of scenery. When his realtor suggests a new home in Fairview Acres, a retirement community in the Poconos, Jerry figures it will be a nice place to spend the rest of his days in solitude.

Until he moves in.

Weird neighbors. Nightly block parties. Strange noises across his rooftop at all hours. Worst of all is Arthur Peterson, chairman of the Fairview Acres Community Association, who seems obsessed with coaxing Jerry into participating in these neighborhood activities.

At first, Jerry shrugs off the incidents and eccentricities, telling himself he doesn’t want to be the guy who complains about everything—but that all changes one evening when Katherine Dunnally appears on his doorstep with an ominous warning: ‘You need to leave. The worms…they dance at nightfall…’

His neighbors all say Katherine suffers from a form of dementia called Sundowner’s Syndrome, but as the weeks progress and the strangeness mounts, Jerry begins to suspect there is something else going on in his neighborhood. Something that has to do with the huge stone in the community park…

Heartfelt and unsettling, Todd Keisling’s latest novel, The Sundowner’s Dance, propels readers through a terrifying exploration of grief, dementia, and perhaps the greatest horror of all: growing old.

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Review

No especial complaints. It's a satisfactory cosmic horror novel with more unique monsters / eldritch entity than the usual pseudo lovecraft tentacle retreads. I liked the locale. The character(s) felt realistically within their age range, so it's not a forgotten detail. The pacing is good, romance was endearing, and antagonists very cool.

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Content Warnings

Major alcohol use, animal death, body horror, confinement, death, dogs, drug use, drugging, elder abuse, gaslighting, grief, injuries, insects, kidnapping, medical content, parasites

Medium n/a

Minor sexual content

Summary

Ruined by scandal, Dennis Lange is hoping for a comeback. Selling the story of a cursed tree could make his future—if it doesn’t kill him. Dennis awakens something evil when he removes a decades-old jackknife from the trunk of a gnarled old sycamore. Once pinned in place—now thoughtlessly freed—the tree returns to its roots. An act of vigilante justice took place under its boughs long ago. But its taste for blood has only grown stronger.

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Review

Ah, unlikeable protags. It's a fine balance between enjoyably unredeemable asshole villain and 'god, why am I reading about this moron? onto the next book'. This one leans more towards general asshole who makes poor decisions and can't quite accept responsibility. The supernatural aspect is incredibly fascinating and I honestly wonder why I've never seen such a thing in stories so far. Maybe I'm reading all the wrong ones. Anyways, a tree that's accursed by bloodshed and violence, that has become sentient and perhaps.... vengeful? I think that's what it's going for. It's punishing those who had abused children. Or taken advantage of those in their care? Still, a great read, gets to the point and has plenty of detective work to follow along with.

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Content Warnings

Major animal death, classism, death, demolition, gore unsanitary, harassment, infidelity teacher student relationship, injuries

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

In the gloom of her hotel, a mother readies to rejoin her past. Feverish nightmares meet the chilling light of day in this haunting short story.

Room 17 was the last stop on her husband and son’s journey. Eight years after their deaths, Stella books the same room, hoping to commune with their memories. But as she tries to sleep, disturbing and urgent visions blur the lines between reality and the supernatural, and the other side sends a terrifying message.

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Review

I'm not one for domestic abuse in horror. Often it is repetitive in motions and does not often anything but a well tread story. That may be enjoyable for some, but not me. I think this was an interesting take on paranormal, almost a haunted house story. Albeit one set in / around a motel than domestic household. I liked that the survivor of abuse still does not recognize the abusive situation she was in to the point of visiting the last location of her family for desperately unhappy reasons. I liked the the abuse had fairly reasonable, realistic reasons for abuse. They weren't necessarily choosing The Most Evil Option, they were a mentally ill, alcoholic person with personal issues that led to harming those around them. The story had wonderful visual and physical metaphors for domestic abuse, ie the carbon monoxide. And yes the ending is a happy one for those averse to 'misery porn'.

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Content Warnings

Major car crashes murder child death, domestic abuse, family annihilation, grief, suicide ideation

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

When the lights go out and the slideshow begins, middle manager Jennifer has a disturbing vision: a headless colleague right across the boardroom table. Is it a trick of the light, or a vision of the future? She tries to brush it off and salvage the afternoon—but when her ex unexpectedly drops off her son at the office after school, suddenly her whole world takes an alarming turn.

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Review

The real villain of the story? Deadbeat dads. A tense psychological horror of capitalism, both in the form of shitty bosses, poor support systems for childcare, rarely maintained buildings, and oh yeah freaky premonitions. It is tragic and heartfelt all at once.

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Content Warnings

Major amputation, arm trauma, gore, injuries

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

A helping hand, a fateful cost. In this ominous short story from New York Times bestselling author Owen King, the cost of living keeps rising—and it collects payment from the soul.

Sensing his mother’s failing health, a struggling teenager pours out his worries in a letter and drops it through the mail slot of an abandoned show house. He’s surprised when a response arrives, promising good fortune for the price of just one name: someone he hates. He’d give anything for his mother. But the true cost may be more than he’s willing to pay.

Owen King’s Letter Slot is part of The Shivers, a collection of haunting stories that reveal the otherworldly terrors all around us. Once you know, there’s no going back. Read or listen to each story in one unsettling sitting.

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Review

This felt like an almost old, cliche story. Not in a bad way, I mean. A single parent with a Injury, raising a Sad Teen who just wants to help out the old 'rent so they don't have to work so hard. Almost a knock off disney channel movie, albeit one too horror genre to tell to the kiddies. It doesn't feel stale, however. The pacing is reasonable and the backfiring of the wishes pg-13 but interesting enough that it doesn't break keyfabe into 'you have summoned cthulhu and this deadbeat tenta-daddy is mad you're bugging him about paying mommy's electric bill' territory. There's minimal plot twists, at least ones not already obvious by the story itself. I enjoyed it enough that I would check out the author's other works.

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Content Warnings

Major bone fractures, car crashes, domestic violence, injuries, medical content, parent death, suicide

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

Residents have an unspoken pact with the island’s unnatural inhabitants: ignore them, live happily. But in Grady Hendrix’s thrilling short story, one boy can’t look away—and pays the price.

Jeckle Island offers Rachel’s children the chance to spend summers roaming wild and free, as long as they follow the rules. But when her son comes face to face with a terror they dare not speak of, she must prepare for their perfect world to change. Forever.

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Review

Not many stories can make me relate or empathize with bougie class richie rich folks. This one didn't, and I think the parent character(s) were empathetic enough while not forgetting they were Rich People. And Rich People aren't normal like normal people. They had grief as parents but survival skills of both parents and Rich People. They had no qualms enjoying, no, trespassing on land that is clearly still inhabited by the titular Blanks, as well as sacrificing their own to them in exchange for staying on this land. A fascinating, sad tale of of supernatural monsters and realistic monsters that murder. It was sufficient, didn't not meander, and told the story in an adequately paced measure. Fans of Hendrix will enjoy this, and those unfamiliar with the author's works can experience what to expect from his work.

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Content Warnings

Major child death, death, drowning scenarios

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

From Nick Roberts, the best-selling author of The Exorcist's House and Anathema, comes fifteen dark tales that are as horrific as they are moving.

Witness absolute evil in “Sally Under the Bed” and “It Haunts the Mind.” Endure vengeance and violence in “The Noose” and “The Bitter End.” Face the realities of addiction and grief in “Thanks for Sharing” and “The Weeping Wind.” Survive otherworldly monsters in “The Paperboy” and “Voodoo Bay.”

In balancing the terrors of the supernatural with the horrors of real life, this collection drags you down the dark alleys of a haunted mind, forcing you to confront your demons, both real and imaginary. “Nick Roberts has an uncanny ability to scare the bejesus out of readers. With It Haunts the Mind & Other Stories, he does it time and time again. Highly recommended if you don’t want to sleep in the dark again.”—James Aquilone, Bram Stoker Award nominated editor and writer of Classic Monsters Unleashed, Shakespeare Unleashed, and Kolchak: The Night Stalker - 50th Anniversary

This horror fiction book is perfect for fans of horror short stories, short story anthologies, horror collections, U.S. Horror fiction, ghost fiction, suspense horror, stories about substance abuse, possession, and coming of age horror.

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Review

More crime than horror, though there are some supernatural elements. However, don't read it for the horror genre, you will be disappointed by the scantness of that genre. It's more a general fiction / suspense anthology. Heavily features small towns and the mental illness of addiction. Both positively and poorly. Competently written, decent pacing, a good variety of settings and characters. But having come off reading this mainly horror genre novels, this felt like an unwelcome step to the side. If you want more horror, the only stories I'd suggest from this is 'Sally Under the Bed', a folk horror paranormal story, and 'The Paperboy', a supernatural coming of age esque story. I much prefer his other works, specifically the novel 'Mean Spirited' and novella 'Dead End Tunnel'

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Content Warnings

Major ableism, ableism towards drug use, addiction, alcohol abuse, alcoholism, amputation, car crashes, child abuse, child death, child's death, corpse desecration, death, drug abuse, drugs meth, electrocution, excrement, explosions, eye trauma, foot trauma, gore, gun violence, guns, hand trauma, hard drugs, hunting, infidelity, injuries, lesbophobia, manipulation, mass murder, medical content, murder, overdoses, parent death, physical abuse, serial killers, sexual content, suicide, unsanitary, violemce, violence, wars

Medium addiction, cannibalism, car crashes, classism, death, grief, incest, infidelity, kidnapping, parent death, present death, suicide, violence

Minor necrophilia

Summary

This is the hotel where our nightmares go...

It's where horrors come to be themselves, and the dead pause to rest between worlds. Recently widowed and unemployed, Richard Carter finds a new job, and a new life for him and his daughter Serena, as manager of the mysterious Deadfall Hotel. Jacob Ascher, the caretaker, is there to show Richard the ropes, and to tell him the many rules and traditions, but from the beginning, their new world haunts and transforms them.

It's a terrible place. As the seasons pass, the supernatural and the sublime become a part of life, as routine as a morning cup of coffee, but it's not safe, by any means. Deadfall Hotel is where Richard and Serena will rebuild the life that was taken from them...if it doesn't kill them first.

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Review

A series of vignettes of a widowed father and his tween daughter that's placidly charming, and mildly sexist. Nonetheless it's very white cishet author at times. Sexist, dated. The locale is a fascinating bit of architecture horror that's largely taken at face value, if only because the danger it poses is that of a sleeping dragon that only wakes once every one thousand years to solely eat sheep and go back to sleep. There's certainly danger, but it's not from the house. The locale draws accursed, dark, and unusual beings. That's not to say it's a vortex of pure evil, only that the rare and strange in addition to the mortal, mundane sinners are drawn to this place. The house is haunted, but that's simply a symptom of existing there.

The hauntings are background radiation. There, potentially harmful if you intentionally manipulate that which is outside set boundaries, and no more dangerous than risking death by car crash on a walk to the grocery store. The symptoms of the hotel's haunting--specters, monsters, etc--are hardly the focus on the story.

I love the description of the cat in 'The King of the Cats'. Phantasmagoric. It reminds me in a good way of older books meant for children that have a slightly older than the audience prose that feels grown up to read, but was still accessible. The writing is gorgeous and I'd suggest reading it for that alone. I do like the variety of stories, centering around the MC and his daughter but still including enough one off characters to not be repetitive.

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Content Warnings

Major ableism, ableism towards drug use, addiction, alcohol abuse, alcoholism, amputation, car crashes, child abuse, child death, child's death, corpse desecration, death, drug abuse, drugs meth, electrocution, excrement, explosions, eye trauma, foot trauma, gore, gun violence, guns, hand trauma, hard drugs, hunting, infidelity, injuries, lesbophobia, manipulation, mass murder, medical content, murder, overdoses, parent death, physical abuse, serial killers, sexual content, suicide, unsanitary, violence, wars

Medium addiction, cannibalism, car crashes, classism, death, grief, incest, infidelity, kidnapping, parent death, present death, suicide, violence

Minor necrophilia

Summary

The second book in the Fever House Duology series

No one expected the apocalypse would be broadcast via phone call. But in this chilling sequel to Fever House, anyone who managed to survive that doomsday call has a harrowing answer to the question, “Where were you when the Message came through?”

Five years after the event that drove most of the global population to madness, the world is overrun with the “fevered”—once-human, zombielike creatures drawn indiscriminately to violence and murder. In a campaign to restabilize the country, the massive corporation known as Terradyne Industries has merged with the U.S. government in a partnership of dubious motives, quarantining major American cities behind towering walls and corralling the afflicted there with the hope, they say, of developing a vaccine.

In Portland, where it all began, guilt-ridden detective John Bonner scours the city’s darkest corners for clues to humanity’s redemption. In New England, Katherine Moriarty mourns the devastating losses of her husband and son while in hiding from Terradyne. And across the ocean in France, a sixteen-year-old girl named Naomi Laurent discovers she has a disturbing and powerful gift—which may just be the key to the world’s salvation.

Equal parts gruesome and beautiful, The Devil by Name is a heart-stopping, breakneck saga of survival. As its characters’ paths inevitably collide across the ravaged landscape of a post-apocalyptic America, they are united by the desire to not just escape death but to carve out some way to live anew.

Everything starts and ends in the fever house.

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Review

A solid story and conclusion to the first book. Loved that we got just enough info to fill in the blanks about the ritual and what was behind the ritual in the first place.

I loved that women and love and hope for humanity saved everyone. I liked the rotating POV, we got new and old characters and I liked that we get a solid conclusion for their arcs.

The body horror was great. The lack of copaganda was welcome.

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Content Warnings

Major antiblack racism, body horror, child abuse, confinement, drug abuse, emotional abuse, hard drugs, kidnapping, physical abuse, prisons, torture, vomit, xenophobia

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

The boys on the row are only after one thing, but that bullshit's for pledges. Tiffany's on the hunt for something more.

Kill for Love is a searing satirical thriller about Tiffany, a privileged Los Angeles sorority sister who is struggling to keep her sadistic impulses—and haunting nightmares of fire and destruction—at bay. After a frat party hookup devolves into a bloody, fatal affair, Tiffany realizes something within her has awoken: the insatiable desire to kill attractive young men.

As Tiffany's bloodlust deepens and the bodies pile up, she must contend with mounting legal scrutiny, social media-fueled competing murders, and her growing relationship with Weston, who she thinks could be the perfect boyfriend. A female-driven, modern-day American Psycho, Kill for Love exposes modern toxic plasticity with dark comedy and propulsive plot.

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Review

Fantastic entry to the slasher genre. Women's wrongs: the novel. Is this a disparaging depiction of psychopathy? Maybe. But she's such a fun character you can forgive that. Tiffany is a cunt and you will adore her for that. She's mentally ill and murders to cope. So what? Girls literally just wanna have fun.

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Content Warnings

Major animal cruelty, animal death, blood, diets, disordered eating, murder

Medium classism, victim blaming, vomit

Minor n/a

Summary

Inez is missing, but missing things can always be found. Mae knows this as fact, even though the police investigation has come to a standstill, even though her parents are moving on. But when she goes to clear out her older sister’s studio, she finds a mess of research and an old white canvas set in an ornate gold frame. The closer Mae gets to the canvas, the more difficult it is to pull her eyes away from its mottled surface. Its heavy layers of white paint. The peeling top corner she’s tempted to pull to see what’s beneath. But she doesn’t. Not yet.

Mae is certain that Inez’s disappearance is connected to the painting. With the help of a strange, beautiful boy who says he’s inez’s neighbor, she decides to retrace her sister’s steps. So begins a scavenger hunt for what Inez left behind. One that leads to centuries-old questions best left unasked and secrets best kept in the shadows.

From the author of A Guide to the Dark comes another romantic and eerie mystery about the lengths we are willing to go for the truth and the ones we love.

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Review

Not terrible, not fantastic either. A decent story with alright plot twists. I wish the love interest plot twist was telegraphed slightly more. Like little details not quite adding up or brushing off the MC's questions. Slightly juvenile feeling even though the book is meant for adult audience. I think? I'd read more from this author but I'm not rushing to track down her bibliography. It was charming. Minimal horror, more mystery with supernatural / fantasy leanings. FAKE EDIT oh my god this is a fucking reimaging. I had no idea. Fuck that, if I wanted to reread 'The PDorian Gray' I would fucking reread the original.

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Content Warnings

Major infidelity, murder, violence

Medium n/a

Minor n/a

Summary

A disturbing examination of toxic masculinity and the darkest pits of the Internet, about a young man’s algorithmic descent into depravity in a future that’s nearly here.

> be me, 26

> about to end it all

> feels good, man

Once, Sammy Dominguez thought he knew how the world worked. The ugly things in his head—his uncle’s pathetic death, his parents’ mistrust, the twisted horrors he writes for the Internet—didn’t matter, because he and his girl, Ellery, were on track for the good life in this messed-up world.

Then a car accident changed everything.

Spiraling with grief and guilt, Sammy scrambles for distraction. He finds it in shock-value videos of gore and violence that terrified him as a child. When someone messages him a dark web link to footage of Ellery dying, he watches—first the car crash that killed her, then hundreds of other deaths, even for people still alive. Accidents. Diseases. Suicides. Murders.

The host site, chinsky, is sadistic, vicious, impossible. It even seems to read his mind, manipulate his searches. But is chinsky even real? And who is Haruspx, the web handle who led him into this virtual nightmare? As Sammy watches compulsively, the darkness in his mind blooms, driving him down a twisted path to find the roots of chinsky, even if he must become a nightmare himself

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Review

This did not go the way I thought it would. Man is traumatized, writes creepypasta, somehow creepypasta comes to life and bad things ensue.

NO WAY.

The plot is gangstalking fueled and run by a bunch of intentionally self harming mentally ill murdering gamblers who collectively obsessed over their favorite creepypasta writer. The way this is revealed is amazing and slow and foreshadowed to some degree and I love it. There is nothing else like that that I have read so far.

The plot twists are great. The trajectory is fantastic. It's almost like Beta Vulgaris [Margie Sarsfield] in that we're watching a traumatized man of color devolving mentally and physically both from grief and childhood trauma and self harming trauma and the trauma caused by others intentionally intervening with his life.

It reminds me of those groups who stalk and harass certain neurodivegent or mentally ill people. Chris Chan being the most obvious and notable, but in general. Any person who is ND or showing obvious symptoms of mental illness can become a target of collective stalking, as if this is a game of real life The Sims. That this MC is a man of color is also a reason why he became a target.

The final 'chapters' aka online epistolary entries were a really interesting way to tie off the plot and conclude the story. It almost feels like the main novel was the 'creepypasta' and this was the comment section, albeit across multiple sites.

The way the 'story' of Wax Man was revealed was heartbreaking.

Between this and Land Shark [prev novel] this is an author to watch for. *grabs you by the throat* read this fucking book NOW.

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Content Warnings

Major alcoholism, csa, death, drug abuse, grief, male on male rape, murder, orphaning, parent death, rape attempts, sexual content, trafficking, violence

Medium child abuse, confinement, excrement, torture

Minor car crashes

Summary

The first mission to Europa—Jupiter's enigmatic moon—has landed, and humanity’s darkest fears are about to awaken. For years, mankind has speculated that this frozen world harbors a hidden ocean twice the size of all Earth’s oceans combined—an ocean potentially teeming with life.

Driven by this tantalizing mystery, they venture forth to unlock its secrets. But what they discover in the abyssal depths is far beyond anything they could have imagined.

Nearly four hundred million miles from Earth, their search for life has succeeded. But in their triumph, they overlook the most terrifying truth: what they have found is something far older and more horrifying than they ever could have conceived. Something has been trapped in the dark for eons—watching, and waiting, for them.

Now, the crew stands at the threshold of unimaginable terror, realizing too late that Hell, in its purest form, is cold.

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Review

This is aliens prometheus levels of stupid. And only partially as entertaining., The premise is simple. go to planet, planet is hostile, try to survive, escape back to earth.

I liked the weird europan wildlife. That was cool.

I didn't like how much of a sausage fest it was, despite there being woman characters. All these people are supposed to be scientists, they're finally achieving their greatest dreams of space flight. But the second they meet some dumb fuck of a man they want to ditch it all to have babies and get settled down? FUCK YO GRIEG BECK. Absolute shit characterization to make every single woman character want to do that.

I hated the magic AI shit. That's not how AI works and even if it did, it wouldn't work on a fucking alien language.

All in all, ok. Wouldn't recommend unless you like really dumb scifi.

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Content Warnings

Major death, diseases, gore, immolation, insects, parasites

Medium n/a

Minor n/a