Exiles by Mason Coile (pseudonym of the late Andrew Pyper) drops us in the deep end by outlining the harsh realities of space travel that usually get skimmed over (which, tbh, is fine with me, but that’s because blood is about the only bodily fluid or excretion that doesn’t gross me out. I know. That level of TMI is probably on par with what I’m getting from the first pages of Exiles). 

I went into Black Flame by Gretchen Felker-Martin knowing little about it except that it was about a cursed film and, according to several people, I had to read it. They were right.

As the very good boy and at least part Australian cattle dog (just like my old girl Laika, also rescued from a shelter) alerts them almost immediately, evil is afoot.

Part folk horror, bigger part body horror, You Weren’t Meant to Be Human is a beautiful, brutal read.  I was uncomfortable almost immediately as blurred (or non-existent?) consent lines were crossed in the opening paragraphs (see note on content warnings below) - and that feeling never totally left. 

My suggested taglines:

• The sound bath will be a blood bath!

• Instead of meditation, decapitation!

• They came for inner peace, they’ll leave in pieces!

Some things I liked:

• Some of my favorite phrases

  • ”secret squirrel shenanigans”

  • “eponymous plastic raincoat”

• Herman!!! Everyone should have a black cat.

• The names of the mushrooms like “Father of Lies” and “The Harlot’s Progress”

Nowhere Land by Pamela Kinney starts with a bang as a group of ghost hunters in Virginia who’ve been hired to investigate a property outside of Gloucester called Burkett make a fatal discovery - that there is definitely paranormal activity in Nowhere Land. 

What I got that I was expecting: dark comedy and vampires

What I got that I was not expecting: family drama, characters dealing with misogyny and/or racism, and some legitimately scary and/ or tense scenes - made especially so by the amazing audio production.

Reading this collection was like taking a walk through a dark, dappled forest where mushrooms grow and wild creatures populate inside and outside of us, where sunlight only rarely makes it way through the canopy.

Clown in a Cornfield is that unicorn of a YA novel that is YA only in that its main characters are teenagers that act like teenagers, but, unlike some in the market, Adam Cesare's writing is - for lack of a better word - good.

She’s a Lamb is everything it promises - dark, funny, smart. What surprised me is how Meredith Hambrock makes us empathize with Jessamyn - especially since Jessamyn is fundamentally incapable of feeling empathy for anyone - even herself.

When a book opens with a perfectly hilarious - but no less heart-pounding- description of a man feeling his power (whom we will learn is POTUS - or as Sam Seaborn tells us in the opening scenes of The West Wing- the President of the United States) having his soul hurtle through a metaphysical tunnel system to be deposited in a, let’s say, more modest, actual infant, you know you’re in for a ride of your own. 

It’s obvious from page 1 that Garrett Boatman’s Bloody Bones is not going to be the sanitized (if still scary) version of folk tales you heard on your mamaw’s porch.  And that’s (mostly) a good thing - just be ready for the darkness. 

As someone who unironically uses the phrase "statistically significant" in her day job several times a week, I was drawn to Lucky Day's concept, and, in true Chuck Tingle style, it delivered.

Cló‘s dreams and memories begin overlapping with the perspectives we read from the other timelines, and I couldn’t read fast enough to see how they and the people around her are connected.

Night & Day, besides being edited by THE name in genre short story collection editing, Ellen Datlow, reads like a who’s who of horror - and it does not disappoint.

The Library at Hellebore is like what would happen if you populated Brakebills (“The Magicians”) with gods and monsters then held a battle royale.

J. H. Markert’s Spider to the Fly stressed me out in the best way, though I had to remind myself to breathe for about the last quarter of it.

Like his earlier novel, Come Knocking draws the reader in by appealing to that nature within us that makes us marvel at tragedy while challenging us to empathize with instigators and victims alike.

Secret Lives of the Dead is an effectively creepy folk horror from Tim Lebbon that centers around a family cursed by a witch and a woman whose life was forever changed as a teenager by the man who has spent his life trying to break that curse.