SYNOPSIS: Tananarive Due, a winner of the American Book Award and an Essence and Los Angeles Times bestselling author, brings you her debut short fiction collection! The title novella, Ghost Summer, won a Kindred Award from the Carl Brandon Society (originally published in The Ancestors). This collection includes Patient Zero, The Lake, The Knowing, Herd Immunity, and many other stories.
This book is such an amazing, perfect way to kick off Women in Horror Month. My favorites are the ones set in Gracetown, but none of the stories left me with a 'meh' reaction. ((special mention to Free Jim's Mine, because I started that one, had to get the kids to bed, and then woke up the next morning having somehow sprained my wrist. Couldn't write notes on it, but I *had* to finish it anyway and then read it aloud to anyone who'd hold still long enough)) There's a theme running throughout so many of the stories of children forced to grow up before their time, sometimes to the point of parenting the adults in their lives. The kids in these stories, god; I love all of them. Quotes/Lines (spoilers below!) THE LAKE -- Abbie is very much striking me as the 'too much money and too little sense' type. Who drops $150,000 on a house on a whim?? -- 'But there would be boys at the school, strong and tireless boys, who could help her mend what needed fixing. In her experience, there were always willing boys.' UM. This is setting off creeper-bells. -- 'In retrospect, she was foolish. But in all fairness, how could she have known?' There's just a subtle skin-prickling wariness to the tone of this story that I love. -- 'No rows of desks would mar her classroom' *how do you do, fellow kids gif* -- Dismissing the girls immediately and being way too studious of the boys. The way she's thinking about Derek-- he is sixteen. He's a kid. Hire a goddamn contractor like the rest of us lady -- oh no he's fifteen even worse -- "But you know, Derek, it's easy for people to get the wrong idea if you say you're going to a teacher's house..." His face was bright red now. "Oh, I wouldn't say nothing. I mean...anything." RED ALERT HELL NO I HAVE READ 'GIFT OF FEAR' THIS IS GOING NOWHERE GOOD this kid better make it through okay i stg -- "It's all right if you don't have trunks," she said. "My back yard is private, and there's no harm in friends taking a swim." Where's a gator when you need one -- 'That was what she and Mary Kay had always believed. Anyone who thought differently was just being politically correct. In ancient times, or in other cultures, a boy Jack's age would already have a wife, a child of his own.' The hell is wrong with you?? Is your friend Mary Kay Letourneau? -- HOLY SHIT IT IS -- oh god this ending. GAH. **full-body shudder** SUMMER -- 'Grandmother had passed three summers ago after a stroke in her garden, and now that she was gone, Danielle had a thousand and one questions for her. The lost questions hurt the most.' My grandma passed from Alzheimer's last year, and the truth in this. -- 'Danielle wasn't sure if she was patient and wise, or if she was a tragedy unfolding slowly, one hot summer day at a time.' This LINE. -- 'The baby's legs banged against the crib railings, but Danielle knew her wailing was only for show. Lola was thirteen months old and a liar already.' ...okay, you absolutely need some help before you do something unforgivable. That is PPD rearing its ugly head. -- So her husband suspects she might have it, but she's determined she's too strong for such a thing to affect her. That's such a common, awful trap. -- "Only a fool would buy one of those plots." I love connected short stories. -- *thank you* for calling Odetta. Also hooray for horrifying mental imagery that will never go away, I have never been more glad that my kids are past infancy -- "I bet there's some folks who see it as a blessing in disguise, even if they'd never say so." I had PPD, and I would have. Ohhh, this is gonna unsettle me for *days*. Just picture me holding the book at arm's length as I keep reading. GHOST SUMMER -- 'Later, Davie would wonder why he hadn't realized right then that something was very, very wrong. Had known, maybe, but hadn't wanted to.' Poor kiddo. -- 'Not 'Mommy', he reminded himself. He was twelve years old now. He was going to middle school in the fall, and he'd heard enough nightmarish stories about middle school to know that if any of the other kids heard him call his mother Mommy, he'd come home with a bloody nose every day.' He's not wrong. Middle school = hell on earth -- 'Watching, Davie remembered that Dad hadn't always been a grown man. He'd been a little boy once, just like him, and he looked like a boy again, clinging to his mother in a way he always warned Davie not to cling to Mommy. Mom.' I'm fascinated by whatever ghosts he's looking forward to seeing, of course, but even without the supernatural elements, the human narrative here, this little boy navigating his way to adulthood, is just captivating. -- 'Ignorance was the only mercy he could still do for them.' Bless his little heart he's trying so hard and needs a hug -- 'Neema wasn't just a ghost hunter-- Neema, it turned out, was a kamikaze.' I love this kid too. -- 'She knows, Davie realized. She wants to know if I know too.' *sound of my heart shattering into a million pieces* -- 'But he lay that shotgun on his shoulder and walked away. That's the part everyone forgets.' I'm gonna cry -- 'The secret weighed heavier with each passing moment. But the Timmons boys carried it. They were stronger than anyone could have imagined.' Babies what happened to you oh god -- 'If the three boys weren't hurting, they wouldn't be trying so hard to be heard. But Neema didn't need to have that spelled out. Like all ghosts, they just wanted their story known.' <3 -- "This one time Davie. I need you to grow up very fucking fast." THIS IS NOT GOOD FOR MY HEART RATE -- 'Combined, their feet sounded like an army, and Davie hoped they were.' FREE JIM'S MINE -- so this was where I sprained my wrist and took no notes but just know this story absolutely kicked my ass and it's amazing THE KNOWING -- 'I guess she fells like she'll be all right if she just runs away from it, as if you could run away from your own head.' What a situation. :( -- "Mama, it ain't you. Knowing ain't the same as deciding. TV Guide don't decide what's on TV." This kid is amazing. -- "Telling to hurt somebody is the worst thing a person can do. Even the devil couldn't do nothing worse." ... 'I don't think she can help it. I was only six when she did it to me' Oh look all my sympathy for the mom just evaporated -- 'When you grow up around someone like Mama and you hear about it all the time, you know everybody has a turn, and you just try and find something interesting every day to make you glad it hasn't happened yet.' Ohhh, hon. That's so mature and a position you never should've been put in. I wish you could've stayed with Rosa. LIKE DAUGHTER -- 'So, yes, I understood why Neecy needed looking after. No one else was doing it.' This entire situation is infuriating and heartbreaking. -- 'Neither of them had learned, after two divorces, that people can't be applied to wounds like gauze.' DAMN. AFTERMOON -- werewolf story ahhhhhhhh -- "How did you know about me?" "The music. If you didn't have the genes, all you'd hear was Muzak." Worldbuilding adoration ahoy. (also the doctor's sense of humor is perfect) TRIAL DAY -- 'Bernadette never said these things aloud like an evil stepmother in a fairy tale, but she didn't have to. Letitia knew words were only part of who people were, and usually the least important part.' *fills out adoption papers for yet another fictional child* -- No wonder he shrank in her eyes. Also, the sheer toxicity of her father's relationship... -- "This is one o' them times you got a choice, Letitia. You can do what you want and hope things don't turn out wrong, or you can do what you know will make things right." 1) that is a hell of a line 2) I had a cat named Midnight so I'm just gonna skim from this point on thanks -- OH thank goodness -- 'The sound of that purring engine as it drove away was as sweet as the memory of Daddy's laughter with Brother on the porch that night.' my goddamn HEART help PATIENT ZERO -- 'But Veronica told me the NFL people had a meeting and decided not to have football anymore' This story is going to hit SO hard right now isn't it -- 'I've been staring at my Dan Marino picture all day, and I think the handwriting on the autograph looks like Dr. Ben's. But I'm afraid to ask anyone about that.' Ohhhh kid. -- "People are giving it to each other. They don't usually know they're sick for two weeks, and by then they've passed it to a lot of other people." ...so when was this written again -- Just the little hints of how *badly* things are falling apart outside, brrrrrrr -- 'She said it was the security code for my door. She said she wanted to give the code to me because my buzzer wasn't working, and I might need to leave my room if she overslept and nobody came to bring me food.' This amazing woman, trying to give him comfort and normalcy as best she can. DANGER WORD -- ZOMBIES!! ((normally not my thing, but at this point I would buy a copy of a restaurant menu if Tananarive Due wrote it so I am curious)) -- 'He'd done what he had to do to save the boy, then shut the memories away where they couldn't sneak into his dreams. Then drank enough to make the dreams blurry.' I love you so much sir -- 'Daddy, she'd called him. She hadn't called him that in years.' Oh okay so this is going to be a multiple-tissues story -- His love and practicality with this kid even when he knows the worst is coming I *cannot*. Also going to pick up the two YA zombie novels she mentions in the afterword; neverending TBR list! REMOVAL ORDER -- oh NO not fleas visible like that. We had a regular at the donut shop and you could see the fleas crawling on his white socks when he came up to the counter. -- My grandma was fortunate to never get bedsores, but all the rest of this, having to move her and her screaming in pain and just not understanding why any of it was happening... worst memories. -- 'A gunshot exploded inside the house.' Yeah, I thought that was what he was going to do. Jesus. HERD IMMUNITY -- 'He left a trail of candy wrappers. Chocolate bars mostly, always the minis.' My apocalypse counterpart. -- "People who were careful," he said.' Yeahhh, because everyone else who got sick just wasn't as dedicated to their safety as you are. Jackass. -- Taking the stuffed elephant from the fair, bless -- Ohhhh, I don't want to know what's inside the Rescue Center please do not open the door thanks. -- 'Make sure everyone in your party takes a full cup. Parents, watch your children drink before drinking yourself.' oh god no -- 'Kyle slept on as Nayima pressed her lips to his.' WHAT the HELL. He SAID he wanted you to stay back. No still means no in the middle of the apocalypse, lady-- and what if he actually did get lucky instead of being naturally immune? Slim chance, but not for you to decide. -- 'By dawn, Nayima awoke to the sound of his retching. ... Nausea came first. Nausea came fast.' oh christ, this was told in such a sweet way, trying to find connection in a destroyed world, but really you stalked and murdered a man. Go to hell. -- 'The man didn't turn to look at her as she stood over him and picked through his things.' Go to hell *faster*. Also, I like how he's back to being 'the man' instead of Kyle or someone you absolutely 'can't' live without now that you ignored his explicit wishes and killed him. CARRIERS -- 'Naymia's sleep had turned restless as she aged' Oh, so happy to see you got to have a long life, asshole -- 'She fired once into the dark and hoped she'd hit him. Fucking cats.' I remember you being so happy to see Tango after your grandmother was killed. Is that part of you entirely gone, after everything you went through and everything you *did*? -- ...she named one of her pet cats Tango. I am feeling things against my will here -- 'Of course he did. Toys and gadgets. That was Raul.' Yeah, god forbid the guy like the read, or remember his family and happier times and want to talk about them. Just awful. -- 'She jacked a shell into the chamber. "You could've shot me before I did all that work," Raul said.' Pffffft. -- "She doesn't have one," he said. "What?" "Nobody bothered to name her. In the records, she's called Specimen 120."' noooo, poor baby -- 'Makeup had yet to make a comeback, except the enhanced red lips favored by both men and women. Full of life.' I love this little worldbuilding snippet. -- 'the anecdote about her extracted tooth violated guidelines' Oh, well, we obviously can't have THAT. I wouldn't go anywhere near that place either. -- 'dear Jesus, this angel had Gram's nose and plump, cheerful cheeks' **cries** SENORA SUERTE -- You seem pleasant. Eesh. -- I love the story of how this piece came about. VANISHINGS -- 'A mother should see it first, not last.' So much denial and pain, all through this story.
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SYNOPSIS:
When the Imagine Network commissioned a documentary on mermaids, to be filmed from the cruise ship Atargatis, they expected what they had always received before: an assortment of eyewitness reports that proved nothing, some footage that proved even less, and the kind of ratings that only came from peddling imaginary creatures to the masses. They didn't expect actual mermaids. They certainly didn't expect those mermaids to have teeth. This is the story of the Atargatis, lost at sea with all hands. Some have called it a hoax; others have called it a maritime tragedy. Whatever the truth may be, it will only be found below the bathypelagic zone in the Mariana Trench…and the depths are very good at keeping secrets. Killer mermaids. Do you really need to know anything more than that? ;) This is a fun, fast read that gives exactly what it promises on the cover-- creepy death-at-sea and horrifying creatures. I love ocean-based horror, and this was fantastic. There was also obvious thought given to the mermaids' biology and why they would evolve the way that they have, which was a great touch. I wish I'd known more about some of the characters before they became mermaid snacks, but-- novella. Quotes/Lines: ((spoilers below!)) -- "Some of the people sailing with you will be spending time on private projects as well; this has been approved" *flashbacks to Aliens* One of them is going to try and bring a mermaid back alive, aren't they?? ((and man, going into this knowing that nobody is going to make it?)) -- "While our viewers are aware that we fals--er, fictionalize certain elements in our documentaries" pffffft -- 'Maybe that was why she wasn't allowed to smile that way on camera. If she looked too real, she'd become less of an idealized fantasy, and half their viewers would run.' :( -- "We're not porters." "Which is good, since you didn't port anything," replied his boyfriend Anton' On-page representation at 8% into the book ILU MIRA -- "They're bringing the interns with them." Thirty fresh-faced young things recruited straight out of college by Imagine, lured in with promises of publication and television experience.' ohhhhhh man -- I love the Captain. And Alexandra seems to have a good head on her shoulders. -- "Captain Seghers just went to peel the mermaids out of the bar" I cannot explain how much I adore the idea of a drunken troupe of mermaid performers. -- 'watching the ocean as it slid by around them, featureless as a mannequin's face' LINE. -- "Is it really safe to have a deaf man involved with piloting a vessel of this size?" She is gonna throw you overboard and be 110% justified -- "Even Christopher Columbus wasn't immune to their charms, and left several accounts of having seen these elusive sirens." Would that he'd just gone into the water after them. -- Wheelchair-using instead of wheelchair-bound yesssss -- The fact that it all starts because of a misunderstanding rather than someone pulling a 'let's capture a mermaid!' makes this even more awful -- "I'm on this ship because I actually do believe that there's something out here, and more, I believe that whatever it is, it's going to need protection once we prove it exists. Humanity destroys the things it loves. Something mysterious and unique enough to be the source of mermaid legends? We're going to be all over destroying that." I like you, Sonja. -- GET OUT OF THE WATER -- nnnnnnnn I like everybody so much this is gonna hurt -- No wait I take it back Bobby and Adrian can get eaten, and then everyone else can transport to an alternate dimension so they don't all die -- 'The official record says that all hands were lost at sea. We believe that something far worse occurred. We believe that they were found.' O______o -- 'All the needed to do was dive. And so she did.' *cries* -- 'somehow having managed to put on a full face of perfect makeup using her reflection on the side of a coffee pot. This skill, among others, was why she was Imagine's most popular convention correspondent. She had once fixed her lipstick in the shine off a Wolverine cosplayer's claws.' I love this little character tidbit. -- "This is clean, open ocean, with very little pollution and very high levels of the protein tags and chemicals that indicate a healthy ecosystem. So where are the predators?" DO NOT ASK THAT -- 'She could be angry. She could be devastated. But blaming Captain Seghers wasn't fair, and she refused to let grief make her into someone she wasn't." Sunnie. <3 -- The description of the mermaid's face. the eyes 'bioluminescent green and horror movie black'. 'This was a creature that could pucker up for kiss right before biting someone's face off.' PERFECT. -- 'Anne Stewart, first woman to bring back proof that mermaids existed. Anne Stewart, journalistic hero.' Oh honey. :( -- 'Was there any reason in the world to expect a deep-sea predator with that many teeth to be friendly?' Alexandra with the important questions. -- OH SHIT Anton no do not poke the mermaid -- "All the stories about mermaids drowning sailors, all the men lost at sea...we never took those into account. ... We turned monsters into myths, and then we turned them into fairy tales." Fantastic line. -- Yeah I'm starting Into the Drowning Deep right tf now SYNOPSIS: In this mosaic horror/crime novel, ghosts and old gods guide the hands of those caught up in a violent struggle to save the soul of the American southwest. A man tasked with shuttling children over the border believes the Virgin Mary is guiding him towards final justice. A woman offers colonizer blood to the Mother of Chaos. A boy joins corpse destroyers to seek vengeance for the death of his father. These stories intertwine with those of a vengeful spirit and a hungry creature to paint a timely, compelling, pulpy portrait of revenge, family, and hope.
I'm not entirely sure where to start, except for I love this book wholeheartedly. It's unlike anything I've ever read, and Iglesias made my auto-buy list right away. The format of the book, following several characters in short sections with many of them connecting near the end, was really well done; it brought together the feelings of a novel and of a good anthology. The subject matter is dark; the book absolutely kicked my ass but it wasn't the type of nihilistic darkness that would make me regret reading it in the first place. Quotes/lines: ((spoilers below!)) PEDRITO -- 'Pedrito knew they didn't really think the fish was a ghost that lived in dead water, but that telling him these things was the best way to teach him about the creature, the best way to get him to pay attention and prevent him from underestimating the enormous fish and its mouthful of daggers.' Having seen alligator gar, yes to all of this. (also, 'a ghost that lived in dead water' is so evocative) -- The mix of Spanish and English threw me off a little bit at first (it's been way too long since high school Spanish) but it honestly surprised me how much I can understand due to context and remembering more than I thought I did. I can only imagine that some editors would've balked at the decision to do this, and I'm glad it stayed like it is. -- 'When fishing, nothingness was full of possibility, quietness was a timeless inhalation before a scream, and inaction was just a fuse of indeterminate length before an explosion.' I've been fishing before and was never a fan, but this kid's clear love for it is actually making me feel nostalgic. -- OH FUCK -- Oh Pedrito, sweetie, no no no RUN KID -- what the everloving hell you racist asshole if you want to kill yourself then do it without taking someone else with you THE MOTHER -- I want to hug this lady so much. -- 'all that was left was emptiness, an all-consuming hollowness that she couldn't fill regardless of what she did or thought. ... She was stuck in a perennial state of agitated stagnation.' She's in a much different situation, but hello there depression/PPD. -- Body horror x 1000 AUGH THE COYOTE -- 'and castrating rapists doesn't help children get across the border' No, but damn is it satisfying. -- 'She thanked him in a cracked voice that reminded him of those dolls that talk after you pull a string on their back.' -- 'If they look too good, too healthy, the fucking gringos will do everything in their power to send them back to whatever hell they came from. Hurt them just right and a better future will make their scars feel like blessings. Pain is sometimes the only path to deliverance.' If you'll excuse me I'm gathering matches to burn down the world JAIME -- 'No, the only thing he could do was wonder why he couldn't do anything now, why he felt like he was frozen, and why that frozen feeling locked him in place and forced him to stay in his room, without the need for barbed-wire fences or guards. ... He knew these simple tasks would help him escape the trap he was setting himself. Unfortunately, moving his body struck him as an impossibility, something that could only be accomplished with the help of a few strong men.' This sounds like the worst case of executive dysfunction ever. Poor guy. -- Kick his ass, Jaime! -- oh shit he deserved it but the cops won't bother understanding that run ALMA -- 'The idea was there, an unformed thing waiting for her to shape it into words, but the space it had to travel to get from her brain to the page was apparently plagued by hungry predators.' This seems particularly relevant at the beginning of NaNo. ;) -- Okay the rest of this section is going to be me quoting my favorite parts because THIS SECTION. I do not even have words. It's horrifyingly beautiful. -- 'I hear her voice in my blood say that no person should ever be owned and that laughing in the face of death is better than having to live as abused property.' -- 'and a kid becomes a walking miracle as she crosses the border without being raped or abused or denigrated' -- 'I hear the obscene screams of angry gods who were forced to dress their black skin in whiteness to survive once their devotees were brought to the Caribbean. Their strength is there, coursing through the streets like blood courses through my veins, because we still call their names, pray to them, light candles, offer them tiny deaths and food and fire and dreams.' -- 'and a million other dumb comments that scholars say I should call 'microaggressions' but that sometimes feel anything but micro.' -- 'I hear the cultures that came together to make my blood scream at the fact that no one wanted things to turn out the way they did.' -- 'I hear all this and more, and then I open my eyes and read about others wanting "pure blood," wanting to keep their racial purity, their god a blue-eyed hipster, their bastardized language intact. That makes me laugh with closed fists. You don't know the beauty of flavor, pendejo. You keep your dumb ideas of purity and I'll revel in the music of my mixed blood, my mutt blood, my earthly blood, my multitudinous blood, my brown and Rican and black and European and white and African blood, my eternal, magic, ancient blood.' This was the first section of the book that I read, an excerpt that the writer posted on Twitter, and I bought it straight away. -- 'To do it, she will need more than words.' Honey. What're you doing? Please don't hurt yourself. The tone of your thoughts makes me nervous. ((just do a performance art piece of what you just wrote; anyone unaffected wouldn't be reachable anyway)) LA BRUJA -- ooooh, ghost story -- 'finding each other in that same miraculous way loose hairs in a house can find each other and morph into small balls of discarded human' -- 'The third hour brought with it rumors of abandonment.' Oh no. No. -- 'The children were the first to go.' I am not emotionally equipped for this oh god -- 'Inmaculada swore revenge against the men who had done this to them, swore she'd stick around until all the coyotes were dead and there was enough blood along the border to make powerful people take care of the problems that had put them in that trailer.' how do i hug a ghost -- 'The thing that had screamed that night was the soul of a shattered, hurt mother facing the loss of everything she loved, and that is something even the Devil should fear.' godDAMN. PEDRITO -- Pedrito!! I was wondering when the stories would start connecting. -- 'He also knew that what he was going to do would be bad but, as his abuelo told him more than once, sometimes bad things are right.' Pedrito, sweetie, what are you up to? -- I love that the taxi driver tried to give him his rosary. THE MOTHER -- 'The dishes were waiting for her hands. She hadn't cooked in two days, and there was no more bread or tortas in the house. The laundry was a stinky, multicolored pile near the bathroom door that she hadn't dared to look at in days for fear of what she'd see moving around in there if she did.' Honey. THE COYOTE -- Clemencia I adore you -- 'President Pendejo' accurate af -- listen to Clemencia sir JAIME -- 'Jaime smashed his open hand against the steering wheel three times, and abandoned the last shreds of common sense.' Not good not good. -- I saw it coming but noooo. ALMA -- 'She knew her only real job was creating something that hadn't existed until the moment she brought it to life.' <3 -- 'That's when Alma heard the giggling coming from the closet.' Congrats book you just joined the 'scared the hell out of me' ranks LA BRUJA -- 'She was a goddess standing on the dividing line between right and wrong, her head among the angels and her tired feet bathed in the blood of innocents.' PEDRITO -- 'La Casa de la Muerte'? Yes, that sounds like a very safe place to approach alone -- YIKES THE MOTHER -- 'She was going to kill that fucking thing, or die trying.' I do not know whether you're right and I should root for you or whether this is some kind of grief-induced psychosis and you need help. A particularly horrifying metaphor for depression? THE COYOTE -- 'One of them started kneeling, his mouth running in what surely was an apology or a desperate prayer, but La Virgencita moved. She brought her arms behind her back and then back to the front again. Two Sig Sauers 1911, just like the one the coyote carried around.' ...this is the most amazing mental image ever -- okay, holy missions never end well would you please listen to Clemencia JAIME -- oh no I don't want to read about him actually dying, I like the kid. He hurt a wife-beater; he did the right thing. -- 'Tiny colorful angels. Misplaced Christmas lights.' **crying** ALMA -- 'She was angry and frustrated, and something was telling her that making assholes bleed was the only way to improve her mood.' As much as I understand, please do not get yourself killed. -- "I assure you people will talk about it for months." UM. LA BRUJA -- 'Seeing those people handle the bodies stirred the maelstrom of feelings inside Inmaculada until it threatened to become a black hole that would swallow the world.' -- 'She understood the scream in a way she couldn't share.' PEDRITO -- I've heard of La Llorona and El Cucuy and El Chupacabra, but not El Cadejo. -- So he has the guy killed and then he takes the shoes and leaves them for people crossing the desert with an admonishment to care about the living. Santos fascinates me. (in a stay-far-away kind of way) THE MOTHER -- 'There was a dull pain that made her think of cavities, but too many teeth were moving around in there.' eeeeeeeugh THE COYOTE -- "Thankfully the fucking sumbitches showed up early and I took them out with minimal fuzz." Padre, you obviously had one hell of a creepy past, but I can't say I don't like you now. -- "I wouldn't cross that woman." Listen to the Padre. If you go against him and Clemencia it might not be you who pays for it. -- 'Then, for the first time, he realized that the questions he had asked himself so many times were stupid. He was a brown man, and for many people, the color of his skin was as bad as the images on Padre Frank's body.' That just hit like a fist to the gut. -- I want this to go well but I'm so scared it won't. ALMA -- Alma honey, why the hell do you have machetes? -- Her 'muse' is La Bruja, I take it? -- 'Their gig was easy: barricade the front and back doors' shit -- 'She hoped this level of revenge was enough to go viral.' I'm sure it will, but it's not going to have the framing you want. LA BRUJA -- 'Anger was a planet covered in water that simultaneously obeyed the pull of too many whimsical moons.' PEDRITO -- "Once we're done with these cabrones, people on both sides of la frontera will know that fucking with kids will not be tolerated.' I wish it would work that way. THE MOTHER -- Please be killing an actual monster. I think that you were?? I'm going to assume that you were and that this has a happy ending. THE COYOTE -- OH NO I JUST REALIZED HOW THESE TIE TOGETHER LA BRUJA -- 'Destruction was part of the answer and certainly something many deserved, but it wasn't the only element necessary for change.' Haunted house novels are very prolific- and small wonder, it's a classic trope- so the challenge becomes doing something original with the concept.
Taylor hits on some traditional tropes: isolated cabin; creepy lake; emotionally fragile protagonist. But there's enough fresh stuff here to keep it interesting. (including a twist on one of my favorite scary tropes ever, the slowly-changing painting. I WILL NEVER LOOK AT PUZZLES THE SAME WAY AGAIN) This one is DARK. If you're looking for a happy ending or a more humorous take on the genre, look elsewhere. The subplot about Ben's mom is probably going to give me nightmares. I appreciate the "is he hallucinating or haunted" angle, but I felt like that aspect went on a bit too long. Nothing that made me regret reading it though, there's a lot to like here. (Cloud skeleton! Relocating bones! Dock monster! A MEOWING CAT SKULL AHHHH) Also! One of the main character's best friends is a gay man. I loved Doug, and I also love when queer people are acknowledged in modern horror/any fiction. 💗 (see also: The Hunger) Short review: HOLY. SHIT.
Longer review: I know it's not a giant book, but I still didn't expect to tear through it so fast. My own son is 8, so the child-in-peril (or worse) aspect would normally put this on my Do Not Read list. I couldn't put the damn thing down. Haunting, moving words that don't slip into purple prose. The formatting itself adds to the story. And there's so much familiar to parenthood here: (("I said, stop!" The man was louder, searching for the tone that would actually halt the boy.)) Been there. It's a fast read but not a light one, and while I absolutely recommend it I also recommend having something cheerful to read/watch lined up for afterward. Because I'm terrible at taking my own advice, I'm instead going to go add Johnson's Entropy in Bloom to my buy-after-payday list. |
A WORLD WITH A BLUER SUNMy reviews are set up a little like live-tweets: I write down lines I like/impressions as I read, and then transcribe. Reviews will contain spoilers, but I'll give a warning before they start. Archives
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