Title: Blessed Skeletons (Occult Britain Book 4)

Author: Robert Weaver

Release date: February 14th, 2024

*Huge thanks to Robert for sending me a digital copy of this one!*

If I showed you the cover of this book, without title/author etc listed. Would you think I was suggesting you read a Mike Mignola book? Maybe something in the Baltimore world? If you don’t know that name, Mike created Hellboy and the BPRD and his art is very distinctive. Even without reading the synopsis, when Robert emailed me about this book, I was intrigued. Seeing it was book four, I was a bit concerned, as I’d not read the previous three, but from what I gathered, this one is part of a series, but can be read on its own, so with that in mind, I went in, hoping to be chilled and creeped out.

I’m happy to report, I was!

What I liked: Ten years after being exiled from Wovenham, former judge Wolfe Remington is summoned back. At the end of his time as judge, he found a man guilty of murder and put him to death. Now, new bodies are being found, and they all have similarities to the man Wolfe sent to death. Similarities so close and not known by the public, that it seems as though the dead man has returned.

Wovenham as a whole is a fantastic dark location. Weaver fills this book to the brim with strange characters, odd encounters and a feeling like no matter which direction you turn in, it’s raining and the sun refuses to break through the clouds.

Wolfe is conflicted, dealing with secrets, but that seems to be the standard for pretty much every character within, and as the story unravels and Weaver deftly clicks the puzzle pieces together, the reader is richly rewarded. It’s told in novel form, but throughout it really did have a comic book sensibility to it, as though told through cell blocks, not paragraphs.

The cinematic scope of the story is truly breathtaking and if this is indicative of the other three books in the series, I think readers need to flock to this series, and the gorgeous illustrations throughout made for wonderful accompaniment.

The tail end of this book speeds up ever so slightly, which aids in closing things off and answering many of those burning questions Weaver asked earlier on.

What I didn’t like: The middle section does slow down a bit and gets tricky to follow along. I typically hop between four to six books that I’m reading, but I found once I got to that section, I really needed to focus and diligently work my way through, so that I kept up with all of the moving parts.

Why you should buy this: This novel is as though Neil Gaiman & Mike Mignola wrote a story together. Dark, broody, atmospheric and dirty, Weaver spins a web that grabbed this reader and never let go. A wonderfully gothic story about death, secrets and what happens when the doors open when they should’ve remained locked.

4/5

Title: When the Night Falls

Author: Glenn Rolfe

Release date: June 11th, 2024

*Huge thanks to Netgalley & Flame Tree Press for the digital ARC!*

Ahhhhh… sequels. 

The seemingly expected follow up to every novel.

At least it seems that way. That every author writes a novel and then must write a sequel, especially when readers love that first book to pieces. It’s a position every author who has written something finds themselves in and sometimes there’s more. Sometimes there’s not. And sometimes an idea isn’t there until it is.

Back in 2020, Glenn released his novel ‘Until Summer Comes Around,’ which was a fantastic riff on 80’s nostalgia and vampire fiction. We had Rocky, a teenaged main character who we instantly all clicked with and we had the emergence of bodies being found and sinister forces at work.

Glenn himself said that he thought that was going to be a singular release… until it wasn’t. And when the new idea clicked and things fell into place, voila, the sequel arrived.

Now, can Glenn follow up that fantastic story with a new entry?

I was excited to find out.

What I liked: Ten years after the events of book one, Rocky is just trying to live as normal as a life as he can. Gone is the back brace and now, he’s working as a firefighter. Until he isn’t. One day he’s there, the next gone, wanting to switch up his life and figure out where to go next. That is, until word comes that a TV station is planning on doing a ten-year anniversary special about the killings, even after Rocky refused to be involved and threatened them with a lawsuit if they went ahead with it.

The set up is great, and knowing the way Glenn crafts his stories, we see the weight of the events sitting heavy on Rocky. He still loves November, even if it is complicated, and he compares every new woman in his life to her. Is it a case of teenage love remembered through foggy glasses? Could be. But Rolfe does a great job of playing those emotions off each other well. November is still there, still lurking and still has feelings for Rocky.

The town is as vibrant as ever and its that familiarity that sets us readers at ease, even as Rolfe starts to spray the blood and sully the streets. Action comes fast and furious and we go from a coming-of-age remembrance piece to a full on Blade movie level of carnage quick. 

One aspect that I think works really well, is that Glenn’s vampires can move about during the day and are not immortal. Those two aspects tend to fully shape and guide most vampire stories, but these adjustments work so very well to ramp up the tensions and not let anyone have a moment to relax.

The ending of this one is emotionally spot on. Don’t get me wrong, Glenn plays with our emotions throughout – perfectly I might add – but the ending works to close several chapters, answer questions and ultimately wrap things up. Does this mean there will be more? Never say never, but if this is where we end Rocky’s story, it’s a mighty find ending.

What I didn’t like: I think, personally, the 80’s nostalgia worked very well in book one, but the 90s aspects didn’t shine through as much as I thought they would in comparison. It could’ve been a way for Glenn to make this try to be timeless, or it could’ve been a case of me reading a bunch of books lately all set around that time period, but it didn’t highlight the story like the 80’s did in book one.

Why you should buy this: If you’re a fan of Glenn’s you’ll be all over this. If you loved book one, you’ll be all over this. If you love vampire fiction you’ll be all over this. Can this be read as a stand alone? Yes-ish, though reading book one and book two back to back would be a really great way to dive into this story. Overall, Glenn has once again created a vibrant place, with vibrant people and then ripped them to shreds. And really, that’s exactly what we’ve come to expect from Glenn.

5/5

Title: Kiss Me

Author: Andrew Pyper

Release date: January 1st, 1996

For the past six years (maybe seven?) I’ve been rampaging my social media pages with all things Andrew Pyper during the month of May. When I say rampaging, I mean posting EVEN MORE Pyper content than usual. I dubbed it Pyper-May-Nia (with Andrew’s blessing) and outside of year one which was kind of lame (and 100% my fault for being lame), it’s been a fun time. Now, of course, there’s always the negative Nancy’s, those who comment or DM about the frequency of my Pyper posting, but the funny thing is, if I was posting about an author who wrote ‘IT’ or ‘The Dark Tower’ series every day, those same people would be loving it. So, to them I say, tough shit.

I often do a reread or two during May of Andrew’s work as well, and in the lead up to May arriving, I dove back into his debut collection, ‘Kiss Me.’ I personally prefer the simple, stark cover image of Leah McLaren (who was Andrew’s girlfriend at the time, and the phot was taken by Andrew) in the diner that adorned Porcupine Quill’s original version, versus the re-released edition through Harper Perennial where they added some color, filtering and reference Andrew’s highly successful debut novel ‘Lost Girls,’ which is why I chose that one for this post.

My first time through this collection was back in the halcyon days of 2019.

I went in tentatively, not sure how I’d connect with a collection that was purely literary fiction. Outside of a single story (1001 Names and Their Meanings), where the ending can be considered a turn for the worst, if you see it that way, there are no shades of the juggernaut Andrew would become soon after in the Canadian Horror world, or the wider world thereafter.

The stories within this are a sublime mix of growing up. Of the micro and macro of each person’s life, as seen through the lens of a writer also trying to find their footing in the fiction world. In the past, I’ve written a non-fiction piece comparing an Andrew book to a movie (One Week) and making the further connection to iconic Canadian Band, The Tragically Hip. After having reread this collection now, I’m confident in saying that Andrew is to Canadian Fiction what The Tragically Hip is to Canadian Alternative/Rock. Both shape their stories/lyrics around people, place and Canadiana. Both speak deeply of the people and through their writing/singing voice, connect with those across the globe.

Within this collection, Andrew showcases his versatility and within that versatility, we are richly rewarded for meeting each and every character, no matter how flawed they are.

The collection opens with ‘Dime Bag Girl,’ a story that immediately showcases the emotional depth that Andrew will be laying on the reader. Now, as a 42-year-old, I look back at those days in high school with a mixture of fondness and frustration. But I connected deeply with this story. It reminded me of certain people, of different events and ultimately the struggle to look beyond as a teenager, to move on and leave those we cared for behind. In this case, a new girl moves to town, her dad the judge. She connects with our MC, and they form a fast friendship. When it hits that she’ll be moving soon and life will go on, Andrew addresses those emotions so very well, and it connected with me that in about a decade, my son will be in the same place this MC is, potentially going through the very same thing.

I won’t go through each and every story here, but ‘Dime Bag Girl’ is a great micro aspect of the macro effect that this book delivered. ‘Call Roxanne,’ was a reflection piece, about a young man being dropped off at an institution by his father. We get a great look at the complexities of a father and son, of connection and the inabilities to express emotions between generations. Within the story, our MC uses a washroom and written on the wall is a phone number and the words ‘Call Roxanne,’ which resonates with the MC in ways he never thought possible. This story was so very powerful in its approach but also about the aspects around mental health and how sometimes, those we call parents can’t see past their children’s perceived flaws.

Andrew tells each story as they are, unflinching and combative at times, not giving the characters or the reader an inch of ‘oh jeez’ compassion. This is greatly on display with the gut wrenching title story, ‘Kiss Me.’ Andrew introduces us to a man who has found the love of his life. Then, on a seemingly ordinary day, he lights the BBQ and suffers horrible burns. From that point on, we watch him spiral into a self-imposed isolation where the only person who wants to keep loving him can no longer love who he’s become. This was heartbreaking, frustrating and a story that is timeless in its asking the reader ‘what would you do in this situation?’

‘X-Ray’ is another such story that pushes the reader in ways unexpected. An X-Ray tech details her perfect life, which includes her boyfriend who seems like the perfect catch until he becomes physically and mentally abusive. It’s a tough, but powerful read and shows the lengths those within abusive relationships go to gaslight themselves in the search for a perfect life and a life with a significant other they love.

Within each story, we get little glimpses of the Pyper writer to come. From ‘Kiss Me’ and the burned character – foreshadowing Miles in ‘The Wildfire Season’ – and such is the case with ‘Camp Sacred Heart,’ which alludes to a scene/setting in the 2019 release, ‘The Homecoming.’

The story on itself is fairly straightforward. A boy is sent off to summer camp, wondering how it’ll go and haunted by his dad’s parting words of, ‘don’t get homesick!’ Once there, though, he immediately hits it off with another boy. The two become fast friends and are attached at the hip. On their final night before heading home, feelings are expressed, a kiss takes place and all within this, Pyper deftly showcases the complexities of young feelings, of the heart sometimes struggling to deal with the brain’s response and how sometimes, the distance of time doesn’t change anything. From start to finish this story was as about to close to perfect as you can get and one that I’ll be returning to again and again.

At the end of the day, the stories compiled in ‘Kiss Me’ showcase Andrew through his formative fiction progression years. Of a burgeoning author who fits in writing between academic commitments and who showcases – even back then – his gift of prose and of creating complex characters that you feel like you’ve known forever. Andrew Pyper has a distinct writing voice and, as a long-time fan of his work, it was wonderful to see that it has always been on display, even from the earliest days.

‘Kiss Me’ is a collection that every reader of literary fiction should read. Filled with love, loss, flaws, decisions and the ramifications of such, Pyper’s gift of storytelling is on full display here, buoyed by youth, hope and life experiences.

5/5

https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?kn=Kiss%20Me%20Andrew%20Pyper&sts=t&ds=20

Title: Crota

Author: Owl Goingback

Release date: April 17th, 1996

What makes a book a classic book? It’s a question that readers and scholars have pondered and offered answers since the written word was formulated into a story structure and released to the wider public to digest.

I myself am no scholar. Just a simple reader with simple tastes and simpler reviews.

But, if I was asked what I consider makes a book a classic – or soon to be classic in the case of newer releases – I’d suggest the biggest aspect would be staying power or, to use a single word, timelessness. If a book, no matter when it was written or released, can solidly transport you somewhere and, within the scope of WHEN you read it, it doesn’t lose any of its luster, it can be considered a classic. Or, in ‘Crota’s’ case, a modern classic, as it’s just about to turn thirty.

Going in, I’d never read any of Owl’s long fiction, just some of his shorter fiction, but that has all been amazing, and Owl himself has always been one of the kindest folks I’ve ever come across and interacted with. I’ve had ‘Crota’ on my Kindle for some time, but just never got to it, but recently I felt a pull, and knew it was time to dive in, and boy, am I glad I did. This is a modern classic and one that has populated ‘Best Of’ lists since before it won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Debut Novel back in ’96.

What I liked: The novel takes place in a small town, where suddenly livestock is being slaughtered and soon after, some of its residents. The Sheriff, Skip Harding, wants to put a quick end to that, but when he himself has a one-on-one encounter, he knows that this thing isn’t a rogue bear, as has been suspected.

Our other main narrative, is following John Little Hawk. John’s character is what takes this from your standard creature-in-the-woods thriller and transforms this into a complex story. John takes us on a vision quest, and the mix of Indigenous rituals and their approach to, first identifying what it is they’re up against, and second, how to destroy it, was fascinating, and while I cringe to use the term ‘elevate,’ it’s John’s character and story arc that does just that when you compare this to many books that start out with a similar plot.

Along the way, we get some secondary characters that play vital roles, Lloyd, the officer gunning for Skip’s job who won’t believe what Skip saw and leads other officers below to search for the ‘bear,’ and John introduces us to his adopted father, who shows Skip how to connect with his own heritage and how to look past his ‘white man’ view of the situation and use his ancestral senses, which was such a powerful moment.

The Crota itself was a wonderfully frightening creation, and Goingback used the Devil’s Boot location perfectly, to have the humans have to confront it on unfamiliar ground.

There’s a very powerful, emotional ending to the novel, which was such a heartwarming aspect that seemingly came out of nowhere and I loved that it ended on such a high note.

What I didn’t like:  It’s hard to pick out anything that I noticed when reading such a wonderfully crafted novel, but if I was forced to say something, I’d suggest that the end battle between Crota and humans suffered from the standard plot structure of long lead up with a shorter climax. With how devastating the beast had been, I’d have loved to see a longer battle, especially seeing how much Skip went through to get to that point, but on the flip side, in nature, most battles are explosive, violent and over quickly. If you’ve never seen two bears fight in the wild, go find a Youtube video. It’s a three to five minute experience that’ll never leave your head.

Why you should buy this: Well, I very well might be one of the last horror readers in the world to read ‘Crota,’ but if there are others out there who haven’t, don’t sleep on this modern classic (there I said it!). The pacing is wonderful, the narratives weave together so nicely and Owl’s command of each character is masterful. Such a phenomenal novel, and one that I took far too long to read.

5/5

Title: Headless

Author: Scott Cole

Release date: March 5th, 2024

A few years back, I read Cole’s bonkers novella, ‘Crazytimes,’ about the world suddenly becoming unhinged and infuriated and bloodthirsty maniac’s. Meteors are falling and everyone is out to kill the people around them.

When I saw Cole announce ‘Headless,’ with a synopsis that mirrored ‘Crazytimes’ to a degree, I was excited. In this one, strange ‘bouncing’ hail/rain is falling from the sky, satellite dishes are crumbling and re-entering the atmosphere and every where around the world, heads on top of shoulders are suddenly changing color before they explode. But once the heads go ‘pop!’ the bodies keep moving.

Cole has a knack for believable bonkers, so with ‘Headless,’ I was chomping at the bit to see just what in the hell he’d created this time.

What I liked: The story opens up with three different characters living their lives. Joanna just wants to be known as Joanna, not Joe, and is grabbing her groceries. Linzy wants her significant other to get home so they can get it on. This headache she’s been fighting isn’t leaving and maybe a quick romp will alleviate it. And Carter lives a solitary life just down the hall from Linzy. Working from home while being a bachelor.

Then, Linzy’s dealing with her boyfriends head missing, and the world is flipped upside down. The three of them are thrust into Carter’s car, escaping the city and driving to find somewhere ‘safe.’ But just where is that safe place? Infrastructure is crumbling, people’s heads keep exploding and the car’s gas tank gets lower and lower.

Cole does a great job of throwing these three at the reader, but also forcing them together to overcome and try to survive the seemingly unsurvivable.

As the story progresses, the trio travel further, eventually having to stop to find gas and food. It’s here where the most extreme moments occur, some that’ll potentially be the DNF point for readers, but Cole handles it like the master of extreme he is, and uses it to push the emotional boundary, as well as the ‘what would I do’ should I ever find myself in that situation.

The ending is spot on and executed so very well. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise – and won’t for many readers – but I was rooting for these folks and when you get to that point, it because difficult to let some characters go.

What I didn’t like: Two things really. At first, I wasn’t really sold on the trio as separate story lines. Because the chapters are short and snappy, I didn’t get to really know any of them until they all came together. It was necessary, but at first was a bit chaotic trying to learn who was who.

Secondly, I’m not totally sure I’m sold or was ever sold, on the necessity of the alien interludes. Sprinkled throughout are small, paragraph length chapters, told through the alien’s POV. It’s used to create sentience, or to educate the readers that they have a plan, but I found it kind of took me out of the story, even in that brief moment.

Why you should buy this: Fans of Cole’s will be all over this, as will fans of anything Grindhouse Press releases. For fans of extreme/Splatterpunk, you’ll have a field day with this one. It’s kind of like ripping through a dusty road at 100 mph knowing full well that the vehicle you’re in has no brakes. Ruthless, breakneck and vicious, Cole did a wonderful job of ripping everything apart.

5/5

Title: The Day of the Door

Author: Laurel Hightower

Release date: April 23rd, 2024

*Huge thanks to Laurel for sending me a digital ARC!*

When one of your favorite authors announces they have a book coming out, you get excited, you preorder it and then you patiently wait for the release day to devour it. In this case, I was lucky enough to jump the release day window when Laurel kindly sent me an ARC (though to be fair, I kind of subtlety whined about it on FB, when I said I was jealous a buddy of mine had already read it and Laurel DM’d me! And I stand by jealousy from that time, HA!!).

Everything about this one screamed to me that it would destroy me. Trevor Henderson cover. Check. A sibling dying under mysterious circumstances. Check. Laurel Hightower writing it. Check. Everything Laurel writes is gold, but sometimes, like in this case, its gold wrapped in golden gold. What I mean is, this one was solid gold.

What I liked: The story that unfolds within focuses on Nathan Lasco and the surviving siblings who have lived all these years after their brother died. While nothing had ever been confirmed, they all believe it was their mother who killed him, behind that closed door, though she’s always insisted a malevolent entity was behind his death.

When Nathan finds out that a film crew wants to get them all back together, the kids and his estranged mom, he hopes things will finally come out and a confession can be obtained.

It’s from this point on that Hightower gives us one of the most infuriating, gas-lighting and self-centered bitch of a character you’ll ever read. Not since Caitlin Marceau’s ‘This Is Where We Talk Things Out’ have I been this frustrated and a big part of that is just how fucking accurate the depiction within of the mother is. She’s one of those people who suck you dry, slurp the energy from the room and somehow make you feel bad and that you’re the one who did everything, not her. Time and time again, literally in every single paragraph that she appears in – and many where she’s being mentioned – this character ignites a fury in the reader and will piss you off so much that you want to just scream at the top of your lungs for somebody to walk over to her and just smack the shit out of her.

Hightower nails this character, and typically, knowing how she operates, this character is based off someone specific, which ramps up that fury and passionate dislike even more.

Nathan himself is a very complicated character, one who you both feel for but also wish he’d get things together. He comes off as a guy who is willing to try and turn things around, but not willing to go all the way, other than his firm belief that nothing paranormal occurred all those years ago. That is, until the repressed memories start to return and we get snippets of a darkness that walked the hallways and lurked in the corners.

Between the anger that the mother creates in the reader and the sheer terror Hightower creates throughout, this novel had me hooked and hooked hard. It was something that called to me when I wasn’t reading it and I love when a book does that.

The ending of the events and the revelation of what really happened was both cathartic and horrifying and really worked well to show the bond of the siblings, who they themselves were solid, if not secondary characters, but to also answer the question about whether this was a haunting or not.

What I didn’t like: While Nathan’s boss/crush was a solid character, I wasn’t really sold on her ending aspect within the novel. I can’t share more than that, for spoilers, but her role was great otherwise, I just don’t know if it was a way to try and utilize her in the future for a second book, which it kind of felt like.

Why you should buy this: Hightower never holds back from unleashing terror and this is yet another reason why she’s a must-read author for me. From start to finish this rips along and as the lights dim and the stairs creak, she does a wonderful job of scaring the shit out of the reader. All while making them want to slap that person who gaslights them in real life, because we can’t slap this fictional mother.

Which is such a shame.

5/5

Title: How to Make a Horror Movie and Survive

Author: Craig DiLouie

Release date: June 18th, 2024

*Huge thanks to Netgalley, the author and publisher for the digital ARC!*

Over the last number of years, I’ve been blazing my way through Craig’s horror-centric bibliography and loving it. Craig also has released some critically acclaimed military fiction, but that’s not something that I really read much of and so I haven’t explored any of those. Craig’s writing has run the gamut of subjects, themes and has always provoked visceral responses from readers – good and bad. If you scroll through Instagram or, lately, Tik Tok, you’ll see his novel ‘Suffer the Children’ mentioned in 99% of every video titled – ‘Horror Novels That Emotionally Destroyed Me’ – and for good reason. His novel ‘One Of Us’ is easily one of the most powerful horror/dystopian novels ever released and he’s managed to conjure cults, Djinn’s and haunting ghost hunting shows that will stay with each reader for the rest of time.

But, if you follow him on Facebook, one thing that you’ll notice is his affinity to motion pictures. When Craig posts about a movie or TV show he’s recently watched, you’ll notice that the promotional poster/image is always accompanied by a very in-depth and engaging discussion on what worked and what didn’t for Craig. It’s never a simple short paragraph, it’s a scholarly look at what he’s absorbed, and I say that positively.

Which meant, going into his newest, ‘How to Make a Horror Movie and Survive,’ I knew I wouldn’t be reading a simple slasher. A formulaic, by-the-numbers story of a horror movie and a quaint cast of characters who were specifically there to play their part before the knife beheaded them and we moved on.

No, what Craig ended up doing was flipping the ‘horror’ aspect and gave us a deep dive into the 70s slasher boom in film, where horror fits into the pantheon of genre – both in film and an introspective approach about writing horror novels – and the lengths some auteurs go in the hopes of being remembered forever and finding their place in cinematic history.

What I liked: The novel initially focuses on Max, a director who has just wrapped up his trilogy of movies titled ‘Jack the Knife.’ It started small, low-budget and dark. Now, he’s realized its become campy and too popular. Film goers are laughing when they should be screaming and he’s determined to make a horror movie so frightening it’ll make him a legend.

This of course comes with a set of problems. A producer who wants more Jake the Knife, not art-house. And the reality that most horror had been done before. Then he meets Sally Priest, a young woman who happens to be sleeping with – and attending acting classes taught by – the sole survivor of a horrifying mass death that happened on a film set. Sally and Max become unlikely sole mates, even after Max acquires the very camera that was used to film that cursed movie. A camera that is cursed itself.

DiLouie walks a really fine-line between fiction and meta-ness. If you’ve written anything before, you’ll relate to a lot of the banter and internal struggles that Max has, that Sally has and that those they interact with have. As well, as Craig dives into the making of movies, the struggle to get greenlit and have something financed and made is one of the hardest things to pull off. Add in the headbutting between Max, the director, and the producer, who each have different views on how things should be done, we get Craig injecting the novel with an unexpected psychological turmoil. Max, who desperately wants to direct and film his magnum opus turns to this cursed camera, a thing that begins to speak to him and show him how he can make the most terrifying film ever made.

In the beginning, Max is a clear cut main character, but as the story progresses, Sally herself gets elevated from a secondary starlet to co-headlining. It mirrors her transformation from sultry, blonde, eye candy, to the bad girl, the final girl, the role she so desperately desires.

Once we get to the final 25%, DiLouie has set the domino’s up perfectly to watch them all fall. There’s so many really unique aspects to this novel, but to share them would be spoiler domain and I just don’t want to ruin that for any future readers. Safe to say, there is plenty of gore, buckets of blood and some truly harrowing scenes – both physical and psychological.

It all leads to a really well executed finale and a worthy closing to this novel.

What I didn’t like: I think, for me at least, was I was more invested in Max’s journey and Sally’s transformation that I never truly found myself scared or unnerved. I was more in this for the dynamics and the ‘we can do this’-ness of Max and Sally together that the haunted camera and the horror movie making and the events that occur didn’t make for unnerving moments, not in the way ‘Suffer the Children’ or ‘Episode Thirteen’ did, and we didn’t get the emotional impact moments that were so prevalent within ‘One Of Us.’

Why you should buy this: DiLouie really has outdone himself with this one, though. ‘How to Make…’ is a novel that transcends just fiction. It speaks to those who read, watch and consume horror. It’s a love letter to the fans who don’t care what producers say. To those who don’t want a part four but a new take on an old trope. With this one, DiLouie showcases his ability to craft phenomenal characters that take you along on their journey, a journey you care about, and a journey not purely there to have them killed off by a nameless knife-wielding maniac.

Loved this one.

5/5

Title: Threads of Ash: South (The Frayed Kingdom Book 1)

Author: S.H. Cooper

Release date: May 24th, 2024

*Huge thanks to S.H. Cooper for sending me a digital ARC!*

You know, it’s not uncommon for any of us to scroll through any of the various social media pages we all have and come across the argument that a writer should only write in a singular genre. That they should pick a trope and not go beyond it. That they should pick their lane and stay in it.

Yet, almost without fail, the authors I love reading most AND the authors who continue to push the envelope and advance every genre are those that hop back and forth like an elementary kid playing hopscotch.

I’ve read a number of S.H. Cooper’s books in the past – I was even honored to previously blurb one of her standout releases – and time and time again, Cooper crafts stories that are masterful. Saying that, I’ve not yet read any of her fantasy releases, so, when I saw her putting out a call for reviews, I quickly sent her a DM. This one sounded fantastic and that cover art had me sold.

I had no idea what I was going to be in for, but I was excited to dive in!

What I liked: The story begins with a bang. We’re thrown into the mix of a town under siege. A ‘disease’ known as the weeping blight is sweeping the land and teen/young woman Yaveta is trying to flee. Soon enough, while chased, she encounters a man, a northerner that they refer to as milkskin’s that is armored and ready to fight. The man’s name is Wulfren and together they flee, heading south.

From there, it’s a gripping mix of fantasy/horror and comradery dynamics. Wulfren is quiet, brooding and secretive. Yaveta is young, questioning and innocent. She’s trusting of all and because of this, we see that openness continually put them into harms way, even as Wulfren warns her about what is going to happen next.

As they continue on towards the town of Orkeas, where Wulfren is to meet someone and where Yaveta’s aunt lives, Cooper works her magic by writing a fantasy novel with the sensibilities of pulse-pounding horror. There is no bloat here. We don’t get thirty pages dedicated to describe what it is they’re eating for dinner or pages and pages of purple prose showcasing the details of the land and the hills around it. No, Cooper keeps it sleek, streamlined and the reader is richly rewarded for that. It creates an atmosphere throughout of ever growing tension. If things are bad in the outskirt areas, just what awaits them in the next town.

And what does await them is fantastic and a phenomenally executed mix of fantasy-horror creature creation. I won’t spoil it here, but Cooper has outdone herself with the world building and the figures and things that inhabit it. Even when we get brief moments of backstory or historical information, its to the point and solidly shared.

Once we get to the ‘final destination,’ where we all know this won’t be the ending, because A) it’s a fantasy book and B) I mean it says it in the title that this is book one!, we see where they need to go next and just what might await them.

Cooper does a great job of leaving this on a chaotic, tension-filled cliffhanger and one that will have readers desperately begging for book two to arrive sooner than later!

What I didn’t like: Really, the only thing I didn’t like was that it ended on a cliffhanger. Look, I knew it was going to, and I knew this was book one, yadda yadda, but that will always be the thing that will make me pull the limited hair I can still grow on my head out! I just wish more fantasy ended each book with a finish that still set up where the next book would go.

Why you should buy this: Are you a book snob who turns your nose up at fantasy? Well, consider this more of a horror story with an armored guy with an axe! Are you a book snob who turns your nose up at horror? Well, consider this a fantasy story with creatures and action. Hey wait, that’s like all the other fantasy out there.

Look, the reality is here, that S.H. Cooper has written her ass off to create this PHENOMENAL story that is 100% about two people who are so completely different in normal times they’d never team up, who are thrust together because of things outside of their control and have to figure out a way to band together and survive. This is pretty much every horror AND fantasy novel and movie that’s ever been released, but told through the lens of a masterful storyteller who will have you gripped from page one and just doesn’t let go.

I honestly can’t wait until book two and I’m annoyed that Cooper hasn’t announced it already!

Outstanding novel and I’m sure this will be an outstanding series sure to be raved about for decades to come!

5/5

Goodreads link;

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/205821290-threads-of-ash

I’ll update this with a pre-order or live link once it’s available!

Title: Stallo

Author: Stefan Spjut

Release date: January 1st, 2012

Just yesterday, in the review I posted, I mentioned how I love the strange ways books end up on a readers radar. Well, today’s review is another one with a mildly fun case of ‘how’d I learn of this book!’ It was actually Adam Nevill who shared that he’d read Spjut’s novel ‘Trolls,’ which turned out to be the sequel to ‘Stallo.’ Unbeknownst to him, Adam had read book two first before diving back into book one. Hearing that he’d loved it and knowing how Adam’s own books have ingrained themselves in my reading brain, I snagged ‘Stallo.’ But I did hesitate for one main reason. Page count. At just over 600 pages, I had to find a moment where I mentally wanted to commit to a book that voluminous. I can zip through novellas and even novels up to 400 pages, but as soon as I know a book is over 400 pages, my brain seems to categorize that as something else. As though I’ve gone from watching a single episode of a TV show to suddenly committing to watching the entirety of the Lord of the Rings Extended Editions in one go.

But, this one kept calling to me. Look at the opening of the synopsis – ‘In the summer of 1978 a young boy disappears without trace from a summer cabin in the woods. His mother claims that he was abducted by a giant. The boy is never found.

The previous year, over in a Swedish National Park, a wildlife photographer takes a strange picture from his small airplane, of a bear running over the marshes. On its back sits a creature, which the photographer claims is something extraordinary.’

HELLO, THIS BOOK SOUNDS PERFECT. It checks all of my boxes. Woods. Check. Creatures. Check. WTF is going on? Check. It was time to dive in. And so, I cracked this open (in reality, just went to it on my Kindle) and dove in, not completely aware of the wonderful world Spjut was about to introduce me to.

What I liked: The book starts off exactly as the synopsis bit says. Magnus, a young boy, goes to a cabin in the woods with his mother. There, they have some fun and he goes exploring. Not long after, they see some wild animals lurking around, a fox making itself known. Then, when the mother sees something odd outside, Magnus wants to see and before she can stop him, he rushes outside, where a massive being grabs him and he’s gone.

Fast forward twenty-five years later and we meet Susso, a young woman who believes her grandfather managed to take a photo of a small troll on the back of a bear. She runs a website around the photo and other stories similar. She’s contacted by a woman who believes a forest person is visiting her home. Then, that woman’s grandson is kidnapped seemingly at random, but soon it appears that its related to the stories of the trolls and shapeshifters that hide in the woods.

From here ,Spjut takes us on a rollercoaster of Susso, her mother and her former boyfriend, racing around Sweden in search of clues and hoping to find where this boy, Mattias, was taken. We get a ton of really great folklore intertwined and we even get a really great introduction of John Bauer and his role in the troll history. I do have to say, in my life, I’ve always seen trolls as massive beings and never really considered them in the smaller forms or shapeshifting forms, so huge thanks to my friend Espen Aukan who answered some of my questions regarding the Sami people, the Stallo folklore and some troll related questions!

The final quarter of the novel is jam-packed with action, revelations and we get to learn more about who these big trolls were/are and how we could potentially end up with a sequel, which was released in 2017.

What I didn’t like: This book does have a lot of slow down spots, particularly when time is spent with the trio going from hotel to hotel and we get limited movement of the major chess pieces. It has moments that come off as bloated and I’m not sure if that is due to translation – I suspect Swedish might be more succinct than English – or if the novel itself tried to include too much small subplots, but at times I had to step away for a day or two, when it just felt like nothing was happening.

Additionally, I wasn’t a fan of the majority of the story being told in third person, but a first person shift would come whenever it was being focused on Susso’s mom. That was an often grating shift and I found the book would lose its momentum.

Why you should buy this: Overall, I did really enjoy this, if not the slower moments. But man alive, when this thing fired, it fired on all cylinders. We got some phenomenal scenes in the woods, in apartments with a squirrel and even at an old farmhouse complex in the middle of nowhere. The folklore elements were great, really having my imagination run wild and the historical elements that Spjut sprinkled throughout were wonderful.

This was a novel that I greatly enjoyed and one I’m glad to have tackled. I’m still on the fence about reading the sequel, but who knows, the mountains often call my name and when its a troll whispering it on the wind, that pull is sometimes too hard to ignore.

4/5

Title: Worse Than Myself

Author: Adam Golaski

Release date: July 17th, 2008

If you’ve read any of my reviews over the last almost-decade of me posting reviews, you’ll see that I’m a huge lover of the randomness of how books get onto a readers radar. 99% of the time, it’s a new book release being announced and we collectively lose our minds, preorder and repeat. But it’s that other 1% that I think would make for a wonderfully odd anthology. A book about those random occurrences that put a specific book in our hands. Such as ‘I was waiting in line to buy a water at the airport and I spotted a curly haired man with glasses sneakily signing a book.’ That’s a true story. Over on Instagram, Neil Gaiman posted about it maybe two or three years ago. He often stealth signs and in this case, a woman saw him doing it, asked him about it, as she had never read his work, and bought that book, excited to read it and having a very cool story about acquiring it.

Now, in the case of ‘Worse Than Myself’ by Adam Golaski, my story isn’t as crazily coincident and cool as that woman’s (and it doesn’t involve Neil Gaiman, though I do believe he’d love this collection!), but it was still a neat confluence. Or not? You decide. I’d jumped onto Twitter to reply to a DM, when I saw Canada’s King of Monster’s Trevor Henderson had posted that the first story in this collection was perhaps the best short story he’d ever read. I was immediately intrigued, so I went and bought the Kindle edition and read it.

Ok, so my story is DEFINITELY not as cool as the woman in the airport, but anyways, here we are and now that I’ve read this collection, I think Adam should sign a few copies and leave them in an airport book store!

What I liked: I’ll admit that I’m often weary of the word ‘weird’ when it comes to storytelling. I’m not sure why, maybe it’s me equating it to Bizarro in a way? Though I do enjoy some Bizarro. But more likely it’s that I often prefer my short fiction ‘straight forward,’ as in A-B-C storytelling without strange side narratives or things like that.

So, it seems that when I read a collection described a ‘weird fiction’ I’m often a bit more on guard, a bit more hesitant when reading, expecting the floor of the story to drop out at any moment.

The collection opens up with the story Trevor had mentioned, ‘The Animators House,’ and I will say, this was superb – though not my favorite of the batch. It starts off with a family going to visit their cousin, Mike. Mike is now a minister, devoting his time to religion and Molly and her parents haven’t seen him in some time. Once there, he tells them a horrendously terrifying story about why he chose his calling and after they leave, they’ve put it behind them. That is, until they stop at a roadside restaurant and everything takes a turn. This one goes ‘weird,’ but not in a bad way. I can’t say much more for spoilers, but this story will absolutely get under your skin.

Other highlights for me were, ‘The Demon,’ where we see a couple and their friend head to a very strange costume party at a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. A hallucinatory nightmare, this one starts creepy and becomes downright LSD-infused by the end.

‘They Look Like Little Girls’ was a phenomenal piece where tension was king. It follows a group of random strangers on a Greyhound bus. They stop at a remote stop as the bus is having mechanical issues and they must wait for a replacement to arrive. Small talk begins, but soon, things moving in the darkness outside is spotted and what they first believe are ‘dogs’ show themselves to the travelers. This was just outstanding.

Which brings me to the absolute highlight of the collection for me – ‘The Man From the Peak.’ A folklore story masquerading as a love triangle story, a man attends his best friends going away party, as his expensive home high in the mountains. He is secretly seeing his friends girlfriend and he’s hoping she’ll stay and not move to Boston. There’s a bunch of people there for the party, but when a strange man appears from higher up in the mountains and forces his way into the party, things take a turn. We get bits and pieces of what he really is, and the ending of this one was so spot on pristine that I was truly upset it was over.

What I didn’t like: Throughout, some stories either just didn’t connect with me, or started out well before going off the railings. Case in point, was the story ‘In the Cellar.’ This was initially feeling like a story that would be one of my favorites. It followed a man recounting a strange visit he had to a cottage, and it involved a girl and some stairs. But the last ending line was so jarring and felt so out of place, that it really ruined how that story presented itself.

As I said, I often struggle with ‘weird,’ so take that with a grain of salt. As with all collections what I loved you may not and what you love, may not have been something I enjoyed.

Why you should buy this: This collection, no matter whether the story resonated or not, was written masterfully. Adam throws you into each mini-world he’s created with glee and you almost feel like you’re trapped while reading it, one hand wrapped around your throat as the other frantically gets the words on the page. From start to finish, this was a dark, brutal collection that really pushes the reader to the edge. And sometimes, they get pushed over.

4/5

Raw Dog Screaming Press Direct Link:

Worse Than Myself

Amazon: