May 2025

This.... what a strange book. Ok not necessarily stronge, but odd. Very cool magic [alchemy] system, very fluent with how it presents itself and the paranormal aspect of ghosts.

The odd thing is that wants me to root for the protagonist. Technically, the older brother is supposed to inherit. And while the protag ain't wrong, the older brother [antagonist] is a piece of shit, he still has the right to inherit first. According to the social and legal laws of this society, anyways. And yeah, plot twist, the will was switched out and hidden so the antagonist got the will. Nevertheless, it did feel odd to me. Forced, I suppose. I would have felt better if there was some ambiguity. Oh no he's an asshole, but it's a shit situation and the dickhead is trying to do right by the family: improve the living situation, bring the family name back up to basic standards, marry well into other wealth. Basic things the protag would do, albeit while not being a huge jackass to people.

I suppose it's a conversation about nature versus nuture. Protag has a nice mother, thus he got the Nice Genes. Antag and his sister got the Wacky Genes, thus they are assholes. I say with gritted teeth, this does align with the stupid idea of classism of this white upperclass british era.

Anyways, more of the plot. The protag is very plucky and slightly guileless and very, VERY well meaning. It almost felt Arthurian. Arthur needs to get the throne back from Mordred and he has his alchemist uncle, Merlin, assisting him. [don't get it wrong, there's no king arthur mythos in this at all]. It does feel like an adult oriented novel, as opposed to her previous YA audience novel. There's sex, infidelity, some violence and physical abuse. The tone is definitely more towards adults than simpler YA genre tones.

I liked the scratchlings. Whether or not all of them were ghosts, they were very much the ideal concept of servants of this era. Nigh invisible, easily commanded, and generally loyal provided you were kinder than any other master. Also the ghost aspect was neat and horrifying. Imagine dying at your workplace, but the second you come back as a ghost, your boss is like 'ok you never clocked out, can never again clock out, so uh yeah. Back to work with you!' Damn. That's the Real Horror, amirite?

I thought the inclusion of Spiritualism was neat. Not the generic ouija board and knuckle cracking, but actual drug abusing and ghost possessing shit. <.ch>Very creepy.

All in all, good book. Nevermind my personal hangups about the mandate of heaven type shit.

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The pacing is overly fast, largely incoherent, stumbles across haunted house tropes without understanding why or adding to any sort of tension or theme, characters are introduced and then forgotten, I'm not sure who half of them are or if I nerd to care enough to remember them for later. Largely disconnected from everything going on in this locale. The Mc seems to automatically know she's in a haunted house story when she's supposed to be a grieving sizer ignorant of the houses evilness. So much is told and not shown. But even then it still feels like half a story. This needs a rewrite. Definitely go slower. Maybe examine what happens in a single night and end on a cliffhanger of something Happening. I don't think I'm the audience for this book. spoiler text

I see what he was trying to do, but just didn't like it. Middling. It felt rushed and while I get there was supposed to be repetition to the curse, it worked against it. Too reliant on formatting for tension.

Ok so to start the book, you got a quick scary campfire story told by one of the townspeople about what happened to the alleged witch and her daughter. I think that implies the townspeople have been semi immortalized and forced to live for centuries, unable to leave the town? Unless it's just the people during that timespan and while their descendants can die, they cannot? I'm... confused. MOVING ON.

You got someone trying to make a extremely low / no budget movie, going through the usual frustrations of hollywood producer interference. Then the child actress flubs her lines, runs off in frustration, and gets semi kidnapped by the ghost witch woman. Which is odd because I don't think it's ever mentioned the ghost witch woman is always haunting the woods searching for her daughter? Or maybe it was and I just forgot. This book is just so dense with plot /sarcasm, it's not. MOVING ON.

Anyways there's a remake, the same damn thing happens except the child actress dies and the aged child actress [who was to play the witch woman this time around] is accused of murdering the child actress out of... jealousy? It feels like it missed the mark again. It feels like the book didn't pay attention to its own plot. The witch woman loves her daughter, they should have been on about how the aged child actress got possessed. Not murdered the child actress out of jealousy. Idk it's a murky mess. MOVING ON.

We finally have our Token Black. That's right, the sole Black character. Because they don't exist in hollywood, much less small towns. Much less anywhere, I guess?? Why is he the only Black character? EXPLAIN CHAPMAN. MOVING O oh no wait I need to explain his part. Ok ok. He's a true crime podcaster who has stalked the now elderly-ish child actress to her trailer park home in order to get an interview. This interview will launch him into stardom. So somehow he does just that. They do an interview at the site of where teh dead witch girl is buried. Supernatural shit happens. Again the witch mother shows up, leads around the Black man and supernatural shit happens just like the last two times. [yawn] The end.

All in all it feels like something more could have been done. The timeline fluctuations, the implications of forced immortality, the cold child abuse / neglect of the child actress versus the utter love the witch girl child the had for her mother, the 20 year timeline of Something Happening cycle. I guess call it a beach read because you can follow along well enough while making sure your kids don't get drowned by poseiden or carried off by feral sea gulls.

Fun lil paranormal short story. Good and funny plot twist. spoiler text

Folk horror, but it approaches subtly. Slasher except not really. Let's call it Home Invasion Horror, which is a new Bookshelf I'm making in my calibre library. It will join Michael J. Seidlinger's 'Anybody Home?', another fantastic book, albeit more crime than horror. That book does not have anything supernatural or paranormal in it, but I'd still call it horror as it falls under the slasher genre. This book is definitely supernatural, and done in a way I have yet to see. I'm honestly a little surprised to see it. It seems like such a clever idea, a joining of ancient folk lore and modern concepts.

Ok so. Someone's been inside their house. It's concerning, yes, but for some reason they don't take it seriously. And why would they? They're not even certain if something really did happen. And the thing that happened wasn't that serious in the first place. A missing shirt? Missing clothes? Perhaps a school bully has escalated from peer abuse to abusing their school mate's family. If only it were that simple, that reasonable. From missing clothes to mysterious figures lurking in the backyard, the claustrophobia and paranoia really sets in.

I thought the major plot twist was neat. That and, despite the attempt to resolve the growing danger, we're left questioning if it really was subverted. After all, if the monster would kill once to protect itself, wouldn't it kill again and again? A solid piece of folk horror, very well written and edited into a concise novella.

Going by the summary, I expected cheesy, half assed horror with a dull gimmick that's referenced just once until someone remembered 'oh yeah, evil train toy' at the finale.

Nope. The author definitely knows horror and understands how to deploy tropes AND subvert them neatly without it feeling like a bait and switch. I could see this as a miniseries, or even a movie. I could also see this as something stephen king fans would enjoy.

I'd call this tasteful, yet nostalgic. It never comes across as remembering the Good Ol Days and how they were so much better, especially in small towns where not whites didn't exist and the police chief ruled with an iron fist.

There is a slight mislead in the summary. It suggests the book focuses on Annie and her son, Charlie, as they struggle to survive the passing of a family member [Mr Annie's husband] and a tragedy that just shocked the world relating to Annie's picture books. There is a rotating POV which lends to building tension and unraveling the plot. The second POV is the chief of police for a small town where, incidentally, a toy train store has just set up shop. Yes, obviously this shop is linked to the haunted toy train Charlie has found in the rented house he and his mother is staying at.

I rather disliked the copaganda aspect of the cop character. Yeah I'm sure there's good people out there who do care about homeless people or arab americans getting hate crime threats in a post 9/11 world. But to make them a cop? I don't buy it. Cops are inherently selfish, greedy parasites, and those who aren't will be othered and ground down by other cops until they retire from the field. As sure as the sun. In terms of fiction, it's ok. I get why the author had it be a cop. The realistic abilities not restrained by, say, a child playing nancy drew / hardy boy. Or a adult private detective, who'd probably get stymied by lack of contacts in, idk, the fbi. I assume? Granted I don't know much about private dicks in the... I believe this is the 80s? 90s? Not sure, frankly. Anyways, it also makes sense because we do need to be at the crime scene(s) to see, phew, some fucked up shit.

There is gore and violence, but not excessively so. Enough to further the plot but the camera does not linger. There is tact and subtlety to the plot. I loved the plot twists, especially the one where it turns out there's two timelines happening, not just two different locations. I thought it was very well done and tied all the threads together in a satisfactory climax.

The monster / mythos was interesting despite the vagueness. Actually, maybe it wasn't so much vague as it was confident in its brevity. It told you this is why it's happening and did not linger or feel the need to explain further. The imagery was interesting as well. Wolf and a rat? An uncommon juxtaposition of predator and prey. I suppose it's indicative of it preying upon humanity [wolf], but also being an unwanted scourge that brings death and mayhem [rat].

Lastly, the woman survives. Thank fuck. No man [boy] pain via fridged women here.

Some dislikes. Kinda homophobic to mention a gay man is a gay man right before murdering him for the plot. That sure impacted the plot... You couldn't mention that sooner? Or was he limp wristing as he lay dying? Well. Nevermind my gripes about my gay brethren. It's a solid horror story and I don't expect perfection.

PHEW. What a rollercoaster. A tiny bit of a sausage fest but I'm not particularly complaining about that. I think it would detract from the focus on the main woman character(s). Besides, this is the MC [Hannah]'s story. And it works in that she's clearly the socially isolated trophy wife who is in yet another abusive relationship. I do love that she has agency, despite all that, and she finds a way to survive that situation.

The pacing was great, the switching of POVs really hooked me but also gave space to digest just what was going on. I thought the mystery was pretty good, and the clues were sprinkled in at an even pace. It didn't feel like we were being fed answers, nor was it a cheesy adult nancy drew chasing down suspicions.

Surprisingly, there were some paranormal aspects. Granted it was mostly fantasy than horror, but still. I appreciate the lack of cop out regarding the weird psychic powers. In any case, this is solidly psychological thriller with fantasy elements, not horror or fantasy genres. I did like that there was a point to include the psychic powers. I was expecting it to be delusions induced by long term childhood abuse.

Hey look. While there is cult abuse and all that it entails [csa, grooming, technical incest(?)] it's never on screen. But it is a topic that recurs and is is repeatedly discussed. It is clear what is happening, no allusions or metaphors used. I'd still recommend this book as I don't think it's romanticized or uses such a topic as a shock factor. [Also the technical incest is that the cult leader is technically their parental figure with a relationship to the mother(s), but not legally or otherwise. So, not incest but in the general sense it is incestuous]

The ending was great. All the povs and threads colliding. The final scene was a little, eh, iffy. PTSD doesn't just disappear because you have a new name and life and reconnected with a past lover. But honestly you're not going to see that unless there's a time skip. Which is fine, it's just a little knitpick. It was a good, solid ending, I felt satisfied having read it.

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A book for all the people who looked at their friends and thought 'why the fuck are you even together? Break up already, you morons, and go be happy elsewhere. Even I can tell the expiry date on your relationship is long since passed'.

But then again, maybe it's just me. Maybe I see things in more black and white terms. For example, if someone opened credit cards in my name, behind my back, got into even more massive debts, I wouldn't forgive them. At all. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

A couple recovering from a medical tragedy somehow has the money to buy a house. Granted it's in the middle of nowhere so that probably helped. Also they're british so their fake euro money isn't worth as much as real american money. Or is it worth more money? Idk the transfer rates at this time. Oh wait they have decent universal health care [for the moment]. That probably helped. MOVING ON. The house. It's big. Creepy. Straight off the bat the woman doesn't like it, and the man gaslights her about this. She's genre savvy and points this out. However the man does have the upper hand in that nobody actually was murdered in this house so ghosts probably wouldn't be haunting the place. And yet....

The book does a decent job of walking this tight rope. Are there ghosts? Is she mentally unstable due to, you know, massive head trauma and being in a fucking coma for nearly a year? Is the man trying to psychologically manipulate her as a secret punishment for... ??!?!?! who knows?!?! Because there are secrets. Oh boy, are there secrets.

See it isn't just the house that's weird. It's the people. Not in a Village Of The Damned movie sense, however. Sudden personality changes? Mysterious deaths that aren't deaths? Centered on this house? I won't spoil it, but it's such a neat concept for a haunted house. Yes it's a parasite, feeding on emotions not unlike a poltergeist does. And what the Main Character(s) do with such knowledge is great horror all around, really. I thought it was a cool plot twist.

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Points at title. Ahah I get it. Double meaning. Monarch as in monster and monarch as in head of a family unit. Both monsters. While there are no droves of Black people enslaved on this [former] plantation, Black slavery still plays a prominent role in this story. Spoilers: yes there's still a Black woman who is enslaved by the matriarch. I don't think it's portrayed very well. On one hand, this Black woman isn't going to cling to the first white woman she sees in a bid for freedom. On the other hand, having the Black woman be more than comfortable with being enslaved for centuries? Kinda weird. It makes sense, I know it makes sense. I know what grooming and abusive situations is. I just think its weird that even the outsider [MC] refuses to bring it up. Wait. As I was typing this I remembered that the MC is white and therefore probably never ever thinks about Black slavery, ever. Well alright. MOVING ON.

The monster. Yeah it's a gross murdering violent man thing. But not so hilariously, it's not the most evil character. No that's the humans. And I can't tell if that's on purpose. Like whoa, the REAL monsters are humans ?! #deep #RealEyesRealizeRealLies #twinpeakscore #weirdcore #makesyouthink Also the monster was a basic swamp creature, not really eldritch or scary.

The misogyny. Bad things happen to women. A lot. A LOT a lot. One is trafficked, another gang raped, one is murdered , one is eternally enslaved , one gets physically abused and literally tortured. I guess it's a commentary on how bad women got it in modern and historical society. It's just kinda tedious to read. Like yeah, I know. I get sexually harassed every time I go to the grocery store. I'm well aware of this shit, Rainey. It does feel gratuitous. What happens to the men characters? Not much. They get murdered, sure, but it's a relatively quick death. Nobody is torturing them to death over the course of several days. Also there's rape and grooming.

Again, most of this shit makes sense in terms of story. It's gratuitous, yeah, but not exactly out of left field.

I guess read this if you like grimdark shit with a hint of supernatural monsters.

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Very introspective, yet emotionally tumultuous. I liked that, despite being such an intimate quarrel of oneself of oneself, the experience wasn't necessarily singular. We see there are many such brothers who went through something similar, if not the same thing. Fascinating how much of what we think are personal experiences really do overlap with many other people's experiences. We're alone and yet everything we feel is felt by others.

Dnf apparently it's quote totally for reals no lies native America lore about "an evil spirit in a evil hill" Come on man in 2025? A fucking generic ass mediocre brown savages scared of spooky dooky hill oh noes trope? Also it's basically moloch, the middle eastern Demon God thing. Except it's typed out as 'Mul Loc'. Like can't you even be original in your tedious racism?

also it's a real sausage fest. There's one main, recurring woman character. The girlfriend, who is probably bipolar. That's her character, by the way. Sometimes there's a mom and also there's an off screen woman dying of cancer. But that's it. There's nothing but men characters.

Ended on page 194 of 393

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Despite the main characters all being 18-19 yos, this wasn't too irritating to read. Most of the time, usually in ya genre books, teen characters are just that. Annoying, immature, and boring to read as an adult. Not that it's a bad thing to be a teen, it's just not something I want to read. I've read enough of that as a teen myself. The MC, I believe, is 19 years old so there's no pedophilia thankfully. I mention this because there is a teacher student relationship, briefly. I liked that there was some complexity to it. She wasn't just a anxious, social media obsessed caricature. There was depth to her obsession as it grew to lethal levels.

I wouldn't call this splatterpunk, definitely slasher. But there's enough gore and violence that it'd count as splatterpunk. However the intention isn't to show off how much gore can happen per page, it's merely the side effect.There's some good variety to the murders which keeps things fresh. Which is also compels the plot: that the MC needs to keep escalating in order to maintain a positive parasocial relationship to her social media. There's also a fair amount of plot twists, which feel cohesive and fairly foreshadowed.

There's some decent commentary on obsessions over social media. However I wouldn't call it too deep. This is firmly in the slasher genre and while you could read into themes, I'd hesitate to say it's intended to be a heavy commentary.

I'd say this could go in the same list as Rekt by Alex Gonzalez. But the themes are entirely different, only the topics of social media, self harm and depersonalization, and extreme gore would link them. This book is a silly fun version of social media and self harm through extreme violence.

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I don't like lovecraft. Yeah I read all his shit but I don't like him. So when I see a novel that claims inspiration from lovecraft, I either pass on by or seriously contemplate reading it at all. I only read this novella because I had read and enjoyed another work of Kuhl's, The Island of Small Misfortunes. I don't regret reading this. That there was little obvious lovecraft helped greatly. While the monsters are explicit and on screen, repeatedly, the lovecraft mythos was more the background than yet another lovecraft not-quite-fanfic. [ok that's a bit disparaging but you know what I mean.]

This story was thoughtful. Well constructed. I enjoyed that characters deliberating with each other in the themes of the story itself, which did not come across as proselytizing or blatant author speaking through the characters. The main woman character was fairly independent for her time period. There were multiple women characters, all of whom were fairly unique and had some depth to them. That's honestly far more than most stories, particularly lovecraft based stories, have to them. And that no women characters died was utterly surprising. Wow, you forswore the usual plot point, amazing.

There was some violence, but it wasn't gratuitous or excessive, and was infrequent.

Kuhl is very consistent in the quality of his writing and continues to improve. I think even if you dislike lovecraft and his mythos, this was an enjoyable read of a horror novella.

If Starling somehow dropped dead or out of existence, this would be the peak of her published works. [resident evil voice] What a mansion [of a story]!

Is that insensitive to say? I enjoy Starling's art and wish her no ill intentions. I look forward to whatever art she publishes next, if anything at all. We're not owed her art, after all, and I'll accept what's offered.

You might see from the artwork [the one I have, anyhow] of what is hinted in the novel. A divine woman, catholic flavored religious robes, beehive, artwork dated or reminiscent of ye olde times. But don't get it wrong, this is ahistorical [afaik] and of an alternate world that took similar routes of european catholicism.

I don't think there's Black characters or characters of color. I have no issue with that in this case. I'd assume this is a largely isolated locale in the middle of Not Europe, and were there to be similar historically accurate Not Atlantic Slave Trade, it wouldn't happen yet. In any case, I appreciate the lack of forced diversity. Sometimes you don't need to see a 'Token Black [character]' being made to eat human flesh. The problems with that concept alone is not necessary to bring up, methinks, in this book. There is less emphasize on bioessentialist social divisions. There is a knight who is a woman, but she's not disparaged for her gender compared to other knights.

Oh spoiler? There's cannibalism. Granted that's not explicit in the summary but cmon. 'intoxicating feasts of terrible origin' what else can that be?

This is such a fantastic take on eldritch horror. Something monstrous and not human, taking the shape of Not Catholic saints? Yeah I'm hooked. It's very well done, well researched, and well executed. There is depth to this world building that makes it twice as enthralling. The author knows how to create a story and knows how to build a stage to play it out on. It's not slapdash aesthetics taken from tumblr posts. [TIL people used to tell bees that people died so bees can pass on the message to the afterworld? Post hashtags: wow, whoa, studyblr, til, smart posts, dark academia, collegecore, 10k, my posts, omg my notifs are breaking] I feel respected as a reader.

The prose is purple but not densely unreadable nor do you need to look up multiple historically accurate terms. But at the same time, it very much feels like the time period its set in. I never once thought 'this bitch knows what bluesky is' about a character. Not unlike many fantasy or historical genre books.

The plot twists were fantastic. I loved that it focused on women characters.They felt individual and complex. This is definitely in my top 20 of the year list.

kinda boring. If you like slasher I guess you'd like this. I don't and I didn't. I think I prefer Everson's shorter stories. I thought it dragged on a bit much, or maybe I simply checked out.

There was pretty excellent gore and splatterpunk, and I liked the halloween haunted house theme it had. I think the premise was pretty cool. A literal haunted house complete with a witch curse. It's a slow burn but the pay off is excellent. Lots of murder, gore, violence.

​ I guess I can appreciate an author that has the courage to involve excrement, specifically anal birthing shit goblins , in their story. I'm guessing by the Clockwork Orange quotes, this was intended to be surreal but coherent? Not sure. It was a pretty standard novella about a lady dropping acid and woops! the blotter got all on top of her and well she's seeing.... Eh, not that much. A single phantasmagoric scene, sure. I was kinda hoping for more mental degradation than a single bad trip. But I guess you can't fit that into a novella. Nor can you fit anything more about this otherworldly shit. Honestly, one dimension breaking trip and that's it? Kinda disappointing. I really was expecting more drug fueled shenanigans.

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​ Still, it was fairly entertaining. You had more than Ms Bad Trip. There was also a subplot about two auxiliary men characters faking a stick up in order to get more money for drugs. Not the Drencrom drug, though. Which I can appreciate, that did have a good, proper set up to their future death by shit goblin. It wasn't out of nowhere. I liked the bloodbath and the ending was pretty decent. Weird that she didn't go whole hog into capitalism and start selling drencrom herself. I could see that sequeing into a decent sequel. Splatterpunk drecrom cult.

Interesting. Superficial but in a fun way. Charming, fast paced very good multiple plot twists.

The official book summary: "The Great Gatsby meets Hellraiser."

First of all no. Second of all, no. Other than being set in the same time period, it's got none of the themes or prose or characterization of Gatsby. And other than some body horror, it's got nothing to do with Hellraiser or its plot. I wish it did! I wish there was torture and violence, that would be interesting.

Instead we got a low class woman who was manipulated into selling her soul and now she has to compete in a solo America's Got Talent show while murdering audience members to steal their souls. Also she needs to get 100 of them within a month. Yeah ok. I see it, the capitalism metaphor. It's a tad obvious, and threaded throughout the book. People are repeatedly given this deal and are thrown away once they're all used up. But not freed of course, this is trafficking / slavery with pretty euphemisms.

The feel and tone of the book is basically romantasy with the serial numbers filed off. Which makes the hellraiser reference really fucking irrelevant. You got the spunky main woman character, the underdog male romantic interest with personal reasons why he's involved with being enslaved. You got the evil antagonist slave master to fight against. All of them pretty much cardboard in terms of motivation and characterization. It's very by-the-numbers.

There's charm to it, don't get me wrong. It's very superficial and don't expect it to interrogate the workings of capitalism, either period accurate or modern times. The point is to have fun and watch this quirky spitfire survive. There's a fair amount of reasonably good plot twists. You could have fun reading this. but don't expect any sort of deep thoughts to it.

Not quite underwhelming. Felt like an entry to the thriller genre but it wasn't particularly thrilling. Didn't care for the lack of subtlety regarding the 'evil music' thing. I like that having disabilities saved multiple people. It's a blunter kind of prose. Theres no subtext to give it depth. It's very in our face about there bring cursed space music., Fascinating that this author actually included religions besides Christianity. It feels a little incongruous but it's still enjoyable. I think this author might do better with short stories. I've never read a full novel from him, but some short stories. I'm not in a rush to read more from him. This was a dud, for me.

If you read books often enough, you'll sometimes stumble across a book that makes it feel like you've read and understood a book for the very first time. Like you can see all the themes and layers interlocking that the author conceived and pieced together. This is one such book. Partly because I am a 'filthy genre reader' who reads mainly horror. And sure not every book will be the watermark, the golden standard. But man, horror novels can be kinda garbage. Kinda real bad.

That the MC is named Sequoia, a tree indigenous to North America, and yet is [most likely] a descendant of a white european colonizer. That he's lowerclass, nay, BROKE! While the others are rich people that they're on an island isolated on purpose because that crazy and rich grandfather recreated the location of his war trauma.

There is so much depth to this book. One parts grief as a metaphor for horror, one parts generational mental illness, one parts jingoism? There's just so much going on here. The concept of whether the truth should be told or if lies should be upheld just because they bring comfort. Even at the cost of life, of dignity. I think people who like western horror may appreciate this one even if it's not set in the Wild West era. But not limited to them alone. This author understands themes and concepts. Wild. I'm absolutely watching this author for what comes next.

Straightforward weirdness. Weird fiction. Kinda horror, I guess. But no more horror than scifi. An examination of talent and skill and honing craft and question how far you'd sell out and if it's worth it. Well written and beautiful world setting.

I thought the mystery was pretty neat. It felt solid, like a genuine bafflement that defies science known to the characters. But not in a stale scifi trope way with Weird Metal and Orbs or something. There was something familiar and yet its cause was entirely unfamiliar. Like eye spots on butterfly wings. You recognize the eyes peering out at you, but maybe you're not butterfly wizard, you don't know the full mechanicals of scales and iridescence that goes into making those 'eyes'. It startles you.

Very good characterization and resulting conflict / congruity. I did buy that these strangers just met and started caring for each other in their own way, without outsider influence. It didn't feel forced nor did it feel like a automatic, cheesy found family trope slapped on. Kinda cishetero for the MCs but whatever. I can pretend they're bisexual like I usually do.

The pacing was good, though at times the blended POV switches confused me. Particularly when we started with two people going to the cave and suddenly(?) we're with the other team at the other site. Maybe that was just a me thing. The body horror of the alien mystery was pretty cool. Not quite zombie but there was de-humanization and desperation as it afflicts the mind. I bought into the effects of the alien thing, it felt like a real danger.

I came across Levai's works as audiobook episodes in podcasts, and it interested me enough to read this book. I'd certainly read more from this author.

In a word: ok. If you want a short read to knock out for some such reading challenge, here you go. The stories are easy, decently written, have interesting concepts and alright execution. While I don't have particular favorites, Poltergeist Password is probably the least best of the bunch. I don't know, reading a transcript of a fake podcast isn't my idea of fun. Needs more variety, make it epistolary or something.

◆ Knock on Wood’ by Leigh Kenny

Major immolation, unsanitary, kidnapping, body horror,

Medium suicide, child abuse, incest, csa,

Minor sexual content, vomit,

◆ Nesting’ by Dan Franklin

Major childbirth, pregnancy, medical content, gore, death, miscarriages

Medium menstruation,

◆ Poltergeist Password by Nick Roberts

Major alcohol use, torture,

Medium gore,

Minor date rape, vomit,

This felt like nuclear family trad wife propaganda. Giving up a fucking scholarship just because you're in love? Shut the fuck up. Get your dumb ass in school, you are not throwing your life away for some dumb fuck. This must be ya genre. The place I got it from didn't mention audience orientation. It felt very superficial. The ocean horror was underwhelming and underdeveloped. I guess you can chalk the underdevelopedness up to these being literal teens and thus not very smart in regards to research or knowing what the fuck this parasite shit is. There's drama and it's the tedious, non communicative you associate with teens and emotional immaturity.

I wish it leaned more into body horror of the parasites. As it stands, it's just some weird chronic disease that needs uh 'air therapy' treatment to prevent them from dying. The parasites themselves were vaguely and flimsy. They're telepathic and thus can draw people in? But why? Why do they need to turn people into mermaids? Do they do this with other animals as well?

Oh also there's a mystery about the MC's missing mother who abandoned her as a child. Also a mystery about who her father is which I didn't even realize was a mystery. It's wildly bad. Telegraphed. If you have read a book before then you know the plot twist to it's solution.

I guess if you're a teen and like horror maybe you'd like this. I wouldn't rec it for adults. Actually I wouldn't rec this for young people either. You deserve better horror than this. I know you have good taste.

Not a horror novel, but certainly a horrifying novel. I guess I'd call this lightly literary horror, though there is nothing paranormal, supernatural, or horror genre at all. Maybe it'd be gothic? Yes there's some phantasmagoric, hallucination parts, but the origins aren't unnatural. The house isn't haunted, but its inhabitants are still ghosts, still haunted by grief and departed, who then haunt the town.

It's also a very good portrayal of mental illness. Specifically bipolar disorder, and how it does attract abusers who'd take advantage of it. How it affects children and how they handle their own inherited mental illness.

Unfortunately the 'cursed manuscript' is a lie. There is no curse, just small town shunning and victim blaming. So don't read it for that.

Nonetheless I'd suggest this to horror readers, provided they're aware it isn't horror, and adjust expectations accordingly. It's a solid mystery with lesbian main characters. The epistolary portions are interesting and lend depth to the story.

A pretty solid supernatural ghost story. I thought it was well written and edited and didn't drag on unnecessarily. The premise was very interesting, a death and a homecoming, which was echoed in the later half of the book. The author certainly knows how to handle themes.

There was one part where the flash forward / backward was a little confusing--the first cemetery part. I wasn't sure if the ebook chapters was accidentally switched around.

I've heard of the blue skinned Appalachian people before this. I'm surprised it handled it well enough. They weren't evil monsters or inbred incestuous cannibals. They were just people who did magic, which may not be that far off the mark in regards to the real life Appalachian people.

The ending was abrupt but I think it's in line with the book itself. Death plays a large part and isn't that what death is? Abrupt.

While I only truly adored 3 out of 21, every one of them nailed the mark. On theme, well written, a very good variety of topics and genres. I'd definitely recommend this as a mix of horror, fantasy, and scifi.

Personal favorites:

◆ A Realm Alive After Dusk – Ai Jiang = paranormal fantasy historical horror

◆ Salt – K. S. Walker = contemporary, location horror, small town horror, Black horror, folk horror, supernatural, grief is horror

◆ Notes Towards a History of LeHorn’s Hollow – Brian Keene = Epistolary, cosmic vaguely Lovecraft horror, forest horrors, small town horror]

◆ Girlboss in Wonderworld, USA – Vivian Chou

Major gore,,

Minor abortion pedophilia,

◆ Blood in Coldwater – Danian Darrell Jerry

Major death, murder, gore, bullying, drowning scenarios, child abuse,,

Medium colonization,

◆ This side of the living – VH Ncube

Major suicide attempts, medical content,

Medium forest fires, immolation, death,

◆ Hulderhola – Oliver Ferrie

Major domestic abuse,

◆ Silverheels – Rebecca E. Treasure

Major sexual harassment, rape attempts, murder, death,

◆ Three Ways to Break You – Beth Dawkins

Major police brutality, police,

Medium dogs,

◆ Place of Lost Stories – Rich Larson

Major body horror, alcoholism, gore, amputation, leg trauma,

◆ All Praise the Durians – Joshua Lim

Major death,,

◆ A Realm Alive After Dusk – Ai Jiang

Major mass death, murder,

Minor child death,,

◆ Salt – K.S. Walker

Major grief, parent death, foot trauma, injuries,

◆ Development/Hell – Samit Basu

Minor guns, death,

◆ The (Lost) Tribe of Ishmael – Maurice Broaddus

Major black slavery, kidnapping, trafficking, antiblack racism,

◆ Chuckle Wet, Chuckle Low – R.L. Meza

Major murder, claustrophobia, live burial, child death,

Minor burns, child abuse, car crashes, death,

◆ Codewalker – G.M. Paniccia

Major unreality,

◆ In Nobody’s Debt – Jenny Rowe

Major drowning, death,

◆ The Death of Black Fatima – Muhammed Awal Ahmed

Major slavery, possession,, child abuse, physical abuse, violence, confinement, torture, immolation,

Medium colorism, skin bleaching,

◆ Notes Towards a History of LeHorn’s Hollow – Brian Keene

Major dogs, wars,

Medium murder,ableism

Minor forest fires, infidelity, death penalty, child death, murder, necrophilia, serial killers, medical content, injuries, gore infidelity, beastiality,

◆ The Promised Void – Dimitra Nikolaidou

Major body horror, live burial,

Medium body horror, injuries, foot trauma, vomit, alcohol use,

◆ You Have Eaten of Our Salt – Fatima Taqvi

Major parent death

Probably the first novella that I didn't particularly enjoy. I think maybe he excels at ambiguity and plot twists into fictional nonfiction than outright supernatural horror. The summary is a little more interesting to read than the novella itself. It felt.... undercooked. Not terribly tense or scary. I think more could have been done with the super isolated stations and doppelganger, though I'm not sure what. I think the pay off was decent. I'd still read more from this author and would recommend this as a brief bit of train based folk horror. It's not a typical locale and I liked the variety.

While I only truly adored 3 out of 21, every one of them nailed the mark. On theme, well written, a very good variety of topics and genres. I'd definitely recommend this as a mix of horror, fantasy, and scifi.

Personal favorites:

◆ A Realm Alive After Dusk – Ai Jiang = paranormal fantasy historical horror

◆ Salt – K. S. Walker = contemporary, location horror, small town horror, Black horror, folk horror, sipernatural, grief is horror

◆ Notes Towards a History of LeHorn’s Hollow – Brian Keene = Epistolary, cosmic vaguely Lovecraft horror, forest horrors, small town horror]

This is the second book from him that I actually finished. The first was marketed as a high concept horror which frankly is dumb and is just recycled 'literary horror' imo. I can see why they market that and this(?) book as such. Yeah I see it. X as a metaphor for horror. In this case X is cult indoctrination, trauma, and I suppose mental illness / being a piece of shit person that's unrelated to mental illness. The rotating pov was welcome. It did serve its purpose of maintaining tension and keeping me intrigued. I liked that it had the guts to kill off characters instead of trying to save everyone. There was weight to choices and scenes, I'll give it that.

This had some decent plot twists and good action scenes. I can see this as a big budget movie. The setting itself is very cool. A half sunken ship with mangroves growing out of it? Damn.

The supernatural monster was... a little cheesy. Laughable, ish? It reminded me of the Goat of 1000 Young monster from the Alone In The Dark 2024(?) remake. Though that one was invented by lovecraft and this? I have no idea. I assume it's based in something nordic. [fuck lovecraft btw] Maybe it's a me thing, maybe I just don't take nordic mythology and its monsters seriously enough to be wowed. Much like every other Black child and child of color, I grew up surrounded by white mythologies and white european cultures in popular culture. You had to dig to get not white anything in popular media and being a child I did not have access to that in 1999. In any case. This shit is stale to me now. I don't care this bitch has antlers. I've seen that all over the place circa 2012 hipster tumblr. It was a very good monster, I just rolled my eyes at most of it. Maybe someone else would be impressed.

I might read his other works but I'm not rushing to do so like I did with Alex Gonzalez's works.

Charming, heartwarming, good, occult, supernatural horror. I got no complaints besides the usual sexism in noir. One token woman out of 4 main men characters, the rest being men aside from one other woman. While I don't want to read a story bloated with characters just to fill a statistic, it is eye rolling how few women there are. Oh wait there's the dead mom wife character who got murdered for man pain purposes. Ok. Audible sigh. OK.

Anyways, there's no mythos but the monster was pretty cool and well done. The magic system was likewise well done and interesting. Not a Wicca knock off and not a lovecraft rip off. Basic occult magic, explained enough to be interesting but doesn't overstay its welcome.

I appreciated the length [short] as I can't stand noir and thought it was well edited enough that it told a cohesive, fascinating story. I did read a work of his previously--The Grand Dark and thought it was great. That's mainly why I read this one. Ordinarily I don't read noir.

Not good slow paced uninteresting mythos. This book has a weird scene where a homeless man says magical shit then, presumably, is never seen again. Kinda gross use of unhoused people. Very tell not show, slow paced.

When the MC gets to Meemaw's castle he finds her old diary except it's titled manuscript. The manuscript / diary written by Meemaw about her life and how she kidnapped a magical girlchild monster in order to use her tears for immortality and curing people. Frankly the manuscript parts were more interesting than the main character. The MC was some impoverished underdog with very little personality beyond 'I have writers block' and 'I like this random man I just met'.

The mythos / monster was laughable. You have a 100 yo JPN man explaining about a magical island that someone tried to colonize but they all got eaten. Except for a disabled [blind] slave who was nice to monsters therefore the monsters adopted him into their family. There's something about drinking a single monster tear which birthed a butterfly inside you, the butterfly would steal one heartbeat. Then when you died the butterfly would come back and restart your heart, giving you immortality. This sounds incredibly interesting but the way the 100 yo JPN man described it made it sound like a 12 yo's idea of a super duper cool fantasy story. Which isn't a bad thing, 12 yos can come up with some badass cool ideas. But it's not a good thing to come from a adult man author.

The whole plot twist was Meemaw faking her death in order to get her grandson to come to her house so she can do a ritual to transfer her soul into his body. I'm not sure if it worked or not, I was barely paying attention at that point.

Oh there's a gay love interest. It's very.... softcore fanfic flavored bland love. I'm not sure if he died or not, I don't care.

Oh also there's a scene where Meemaw [cw islamophobia] [as a child] forcibly removes her mother's hijab. I'm not muslim so no comment but well. There's that.

I'm strongly NOT interested in anything else from this author. It's not a good debut and it's not a interesting, well written story. I do not see talent or skill and I think this should have been rewritten a few more times before heading to a publisher.

It's no Talented Mr Ripley. I guess it was interesting. I do love that the protagonist was low / middle class. Do NOT make me root for rich people unless they're going to die horribly or suffer. I was mainly interested in how she murdered a bunch of rich people. I guess the feminism part was a man swooping in to get all the rewards for the effort she put in. Idk I'd rather see her murder everyone. Hashtag womens wrongs and all that. I don't know, I'm not particularly thrilled or disappointed.

The antichrist prompted apocalypse but with lesbians. I have no complaints. Decent plot twist. Very good themes, very realistic. Because nobody cares about lesbians or women, especially not the fucking catholic church. A little thin in comparison to her other works. In regards to themes and mythos, imo. I liked her 'San Juan's Sowing' a lot more. Still, I'm interested in reading this author's other works.

I can't tell if it's because I don't like vampires or if this was especially boring. I mean. It's a perfectly acceptable mystery, I just don't care about vampires. I was expecting more on screen mruder and less shit about 'you killed my fiance so I'm going to harass you to death for centuries'.

Not horror at all, but suspense mystery. While it wasn't anything groundbreaking, it was satisfactory. I really was expecting a serial killer parent, generically the dad while the mom was the weak female bullied into it. Thankfully not. The pace wasn't too slow nor too fast, and the clues were alright. The family dynamic was interesting and realistic. The black sheep, the parentified caretaker, the golden child. As with all good mysteries, in retrospect the killer was obvious.

Not really horror. Horror flavored, sure, but it's more domestic psychological with mystery and some occult tinge to it. As far as mystery goes, it was alright. The horror genre gave it an ok ending but all in all, don't read it for horror like I did.

To its credit, it does actually mention some things from Black culture. Their hair, specifically, and how to wash it. I suppose the child being lightskinned enough that there's no issues there? Not that I recall being mentioned. I also don't recall particular antiblack racism directed at the mother. I suppose I can appreciate that it sticks to the main plot of creepy smart child.

The child character felt realistic. Well, as far as a suddenly super intelligent due to head injury child character can be depicted. There is actual growth in her character from guileless child to scheming sort of tween.

I liked the semi mystery of just what the experiment the child was doing. There was a good amount of questioning whether it was really working, if it was scientific, or if there may have been supernatural influence to make it work. I don't think there was anything eldritch or supernatural happening. So suspending disbelief that a child could make a functioning soul transfer device was a little hard to believe. Or at least, if there was supernatural things going on, they did not appear on screen.

Despite the minimal mystery investigation of the child's experiment, there was a good amount of interpersonal drama to hold my attention. The coparenting attempts, the issue of schooling, grandparents death, etc. I think it culminated very well with a tidy bow.