Shadows of Carcosa: Tales of Cosmic Horror by Lovecraft, Chambers, Machen, Poe, and Other Masters of the Weird

5/5 stars

What's it about? This collection of top-notch stories explores atmospheric horror and the dread of the unknown. A book of veritable bangers.

How’d I find it? When I managed a bookstore at Busboys & Poets, this book always caught my eye. Now it’s mine!

Who will enjoy this book? The cryptic editor’s note at the end of the book suggests that this read is meant for the Lovecraft fans, but any horror lover would appreciate.

What stood out? Despite the fact that all the stories are written by men whose oeuvres straddle the 19th and 20 centuries, these tales showcase a diversity of style and subject, united in their pervasive creepiness. “The White People” by Arthur Machen and Ambrose Bierce’s “The Damned Thing” were absolute masterpieces. I didn’t quite understand the meaning of “cosmic horror” or why these pieces were lumped together, but fortunately the work stands alone

Which line made me feel something? This terrifying landscape description from “An Inhabitant of Carcosa” by Ambrose Bierce: “Protruded at long intervals above it, stood strangely shaped and somber-colored rocks, which seemed to have an understanding with one another and to exchange looks of uncomfortable significance, as if they had reared their heads to watch the issue of some foreseen event. A few blasted trees here and there appeared as leaders in this malevolent conspiracy of silent expectation.” Shudder.

Holly by Stephen King

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? One Tuesday last September, a customer rushed into the bookstore searching the shelves for this newly released Stephen King novel. Our copies had not yet arrived. A few months later, this most excellent cover enticed me from the shelves at Walmart, and I took it home.

Why not 3 or more stars? Holly takes place from within the firm clutches of COVID-19 tragedy and fear. It all felt forced to me and got in the way of the greater story at hand. Why did the specificities of pandemic America matter to this book? I’m not quite sure, but I am certain that the pace of the story warranted more speed, especially since the baddies are revealed from the outset. Hurry up, Holly!

Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton

5/5 stars

What's it about? I recognize that this may be very confusing within a book review for Jurassic Park, but I cannot restrain myself: “‘God creates dinosaurs. God destroys dinosaurs. God creates man. Man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs.’ ‘Dinosaurs eat man. Woman inherits the earth.’” An apt synopsis of the book, though the earth inheritors are unstoppable female dinosaurs rather than human women.

How’d I find it? My spouse said I should read this, and I couldn’t put it down for four days. Thanks to Powell’s for the copy.

Who will enjoy this book? I’m pretty sure most readers already know whether or not they like Jurassic Park. Horror fans, you are in for a terrifying book.

What stood out? Crichton’s ability to build tension rewards the reader mightily; he had me chewing my nails over breakfast at Lutz Tavern. I appreciated the story’s pacing, its tangents into chaos theory, and the perspective shifts between characters. Not a page is wasted. A downside: Dr. Sattler gets little to do except nurse, and Crichton only tells us a character’s race if they’re not white.

Which line made me feel something? Ian Malcolm with the truth bombs: “But we have soothed ourselves into imagining sudden change as something that happens outside the normal order of things. An accident, like a car crash. Or beyond our control, like a fatal illness. We do not conceive of sudden, radical, irrational change as built into the very fabric of existence. Yet it is.”

This Thing Between Us by Gus Moreno

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? One of my truest joys is browsing the horror section at Powell’s Books on Hawthorne on a Saturday afternoon. This was a jewel from one of those excursions.

Why not 3 or more stars? This Thing Between Us is worth a look; it’s not a bad book by any means. I took issue with the epistolary format that didn’t end with the book’s climax and its meandering conclusion. There’s a certain sloppiness here that gets under my skin, especially when the story has such potential. Itches remain unscratched. Siri gone mad? I craved something a bit more ME3AN.

Later by Stephen King

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? My aunt and I share a love of Stephen King, and she passed along this title.

Why not 3 or more stars? Thanks to King’s writing skills and ability to fully inhabit a persona, Later is generally a good time. Readers will find this story easily digested in a sitting or two, and Jamie Conklin makes for an amiable narrator.

However. A well-written story with low stakes requires something to make it shine, and Later lacks that gleam. The use of the title as a literary device didn’t work for me; the payoff it promises fails to materialize in the closing pages, though little should be expected from the one dimensional characters we come to know (Villains gotta vill, right?). The supernatural and crime elements never coalesce either, but this may have more to do with the choice of perspective. The corrupt cop Liz as our narrator would have made for quite an ending. If only!

Most egregiously, King resurrects the Ritual of Chüd but deploys it weakly. Mr. King, if you’re going to reference It, a truly outstanding piece of literature, you better make it count.

The Grip of It by Jac Jemc

4/5 stars

What's it about? Julie and James leave the city to buy their first home, and the experience exposes their raw and ugly through a nightmarish possession. Is the house and its sinister history to blame, or have the tensions in their marriage finally stretched to breaking? A thoroughly haunting story that creeps under your skin and refuses to fade, much like Julie’s mysterious bruises.

How’d I find it? I comb horror lists every year, and The Grip of It makes repeat appearances. Spotting the unsettling cover at Greedy Reads inspired me to take it home.

Who will enjoy this book? The destabilizing effect of The Grip of It recalls Charlie Kaufman’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things or the more recent (but decidedly less satisfying) Barbarian. Horror fans, you must pick this up.

What stood out? Jemc knows how to spook a reader, and The Grip of It leaves one panting with dread. A scene involving a Mardi Gras mask had me tossing and turning all night. The book is content to leave many of its questions unanswered, including the motives of the voyeuristic neighbor next door. Successful elements aside, the language can become overworked in more emotional moments (“we buck and shatter against the tedium,” for example).

Which line made me feel something? “There is still a chance that everything might be true, that we both might be filled with scars and substances that cause our synapses to fire inefficiently, that cause us to make decisions that are unwise and fantastic, and to believe what shouldn’t be believed, but that is not to say that the world outside our minds is reasonable. That is just to say there is no sense in knowing where the line is drawn.”

Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? Oh, the buzz! Folks have been talking about this one for some time, so I picked up a copy at Enoch Pratt Free Library.

Why not 3 or more stars? Humans are being bred for meat, and all is not what it seems. In the opening pages, slaughterhouse employee Marcos may not want to remember how this new reality came to be, but he sure does, in blunt prose that explains the world of Tender Is the Flesh. After being spoon-fed all this backstory, I figured Bazterrica had a fast-paced adventure in store. Alas, rubbing readers’ noses in the horror appears to be the ultimate goal, and the myriad ways in which characters debase and mutilate each other quickly turn gratuitous. In one particularly gross scene, the penis of a rock star is served to a game reserve proprietor who strongly channels Hannibal Lecter. Most disappointing is Jasmine, the “First Generation Pure” female gifted to Marcos. She gets no agency, no chapter, no voice, or any real opportunity to challenge the morality of this depraved system.

In a book so dark that it contains puppy murders, the yuck has to be justified. Is the turn to human meat (called “special meat”) a ploy by the government to curb population growth? What should we make of the Scavengers, the people who lurk outside the slaughterhouse hoping for scraps? Does anyone buck against the new order? What is the difference between human and food?

Do you need to read this? You don’t need to read this.

Survivor Song by Paul Tremblay

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? I have been meaning to pick up Paul Tremblay’s work for years and stumbled across this title at Politics & Prose.

Why not 3 or more stars? There is much to admire in Survivor Song, namely its humor, the holy bro-ness of teens Luis and Josh, and the terrifying opening scene in Natalie and Paul’s home that left my heart thumping. Cohesion is the novel’s main flaw, and it reveals itself early. While attacks by the infected bring the horror, these scenes quickly become repetitive and rarely teach us anything new. The chapters in which Natalie records messages to her unborn child present another thorn, as they fail both to advance the plot (and are infuriating rehashed in best friend Ramola’s narration) and to elicit the intended emotional tug. Tremblay calls this story a “song,” but I couldn’t hear the music.

Night of the Mannequins by Stephen Graham Jones

1/5 stars

How’d I find it? One of the perks of East City Bookshop is its dedicated horror section. I promised myself to only get one book, then agonized over the selection. So many good options.

Why not 3 or more stars? Like My Heart Is a Chainsaw, this book features a destructive and impulsive lead with a savior complex. Sadly for Sawyer, our unlikable narrator, the repetitive and juvenile prose style makes him tedious to follow, redeemable if there'd been more plot to punch up the story.

Oftentimes after reading the last line of a book like Night of the Mannequins, I'm overcome by that delicious creeped-out sensation where I feel alone and hyperaware, alert to another's footstep behind me on the sidewalk or in need of an extra lamp that evening. The gruesome mercy kills were gratuitous and ludicrous in this one; I closed the book feeling only yucky.