C. J. Daley

Thanks to the author for the e-ARC! This short story collection was a lot of fun.

Investation is the story of a man that invested his inheritance into purchasing a solar system. One way out of the way, but with the hopes of wealth sometime in the future. That sometime happens to come up much faster for them than expected, and with wealth comes problems. This felt kind of like Childhood’s End, just somewhat flipped, and taken to its extreme.

Rememory is a futuristic story, taking place in what felt like a Blade Runner-esque Japan, where memory has become the only form of currency. And just like with dollars and cents, where there’s profit, there’s always someone wanting more. The rich covet, investing in people who are referred to as Hard-Drivers, aka those kept safe like a piggy bank of others memories. This has some thriller notes that were reminiscent of the film In Time, and some of the more scifi notes involving memory recall/replay that are hit upon in the movie of the same name, Rememory.

The Hunter Remains reminded me of The Land Before Time or the book Hunted, in that the author here has personified dinosaurs. Their is still a hierarchy of hunters and pray, but they have thought throughout. Unlike the two examples though, this is kind of an adult, violent, dinosaur-fueled Noah’s Ark.

Good As Gold features the city, New Yesterday, which is also the name of one of the author’s novels. So I can only assume this is related, which is exciting, as this was an awesome concept. A city where anything can be ‘retrograded’, any past can be rewritten. This is a bank robbery gone wrong in a shifting personal perspective that felt very a la Inception.

Dragonpiercer is an interesting one. A man and his helping lover create, at long last, a potion with the power to change him into dragon. It’s a dream he’s been chasing since birth. It’s somehow both super scifi and fantasy as one. Both castle Dracula vibes and monster Frankenstein.

The Forgotten Melody is a real quick one. A musician and a beautician seek to awaken statues with a partially stolen song.

Postcards From Another World was one of my favorites! It reminded me of my friend’s release, I Tried Calling, in that it features a story entirely told through transcriptions. This was a quick scifi read, but it dealt with parenthood, loss, grief, and finding peace again.

Hear No Evil is a fantastic supernatural/superpower story that meshes with detective crime! An officer that can collect evidence through unusual means is caught in the web of the wrong person. All I can say is that I want a full novel of this asap.

The Caretaker is the story of a silicon based copy of military persons given to their families to help with the distance. The story has the war taking place off world, so assumably quite far. Very reminiscent of The Black Mirror episode, Be Right Back, with notes of Detroit Become Human and A Sorrow Named Joy by Sarah Chorn. With an ending that made me wish it was only the beginning.

Skybound is another story that’s more than likely novelette length. It is an eco-scifi/horror that’s a little too near-future for me. The destruction of the planet is worse than ever, and by 2030, weather is uncontrollable. Kind of like the scientists of today, they look to space as the answer. Reminiscent of statements made by Elon Musk, and the film Interstellar.

A Stitch Between Worlds isn’t exactly a sequel story to Rememory, but it is kind of an adjacent one. An agent is pulled off of investigating Felix and Jock to work a new case. This case involves a man that can seemingly create dreamscapes that appear to be real. The only problem is, they just might me. This was a really awesome way to wrap up the entire collection, interlocking each.

All in all, I absolutely loved every single story included in this collection. Strong writing, well thought out concepts, and super fast paces. This might be one of my favorite collections I’ve ever read.

Thanks to Truborn Press for the e-ARC, I’m glad for this spooky read!

With the son’s name being Craven, and the way the story opened, I really thought this was going to be some kind of modernized werewolf story. I’m not entirely sure why, but that was the first thought that hit me. It’s not, and I happened to like the direction the story took.

Leo is the daughter of one of Paul’s closest patients. So when something goes wrong, his wife thinks it’s only right that they take him in. The eight year old has some real quirks to him, and it’s a learning curve for the entirety family. He’s obsessed with death, recruiting a small army of roadkill and dead animals. He keeps them in a backpack, and plays with them like toys. However, when he does, strange things happen, and they even seem to move…

It’s not just Craven having a hard time adjusting to this new life change…frankly there’s something off about Leo and his parents just can’t see it. He tries to reach out and make the brotherly connection, but it doesn’t work, doesn’t last, and things go wrong from there. I even liked how Leo speaks in a way that’s not usual for a child to his adoptive father, really adding to that layer of other.

While this is short, it does do a solid job of building an atmosphere of paranoia, and Craven seems to be the only one noticing that there’s something wrong with Leo. It could be Paul’s blissful ignorance, his wife’s plotting, or something else entirely that’s keeping them blinded to it. But will they catch on only when it’s too late? The later, more demonic, parts of this book brought to mind scenes from Paramount’s Evil, which I loved.

The examination of familial ties is really well done, and although I wish this had a wider, more in depth ending, the story really is about that examination overall. The ties that bind them are also part of the problem, dragging them down. This family’s legacy is anything but normal.

Thanks to NetGalley, MCD books and Macmillan Audio for the ARC. Unfortunately, I’m really not sure which way I’m leaning on this one.

For starters, this was not at all what I expected, and it was not at all what I was looking for. While that’s not the fault of the book, it did hinder my enjoyment throughout. I find the blurb to be quite misleading, as it continually questions if things are supernatural, demonic, possessive. That’s not really what this is about. There are hints, or even outright comments, but it’s something all its own.

Now that the novel is out, and it’s getting into spooky season, it’s worth noting that this is not a haunted house story. At least not the Halloween month-style most readers will be looking for. One of the things I enjoyed the most, which I assume is what they meant by ‘a new kind of haunted-house story’, is that the novel is really pushing the idea that a house can be haunted in way more ways than the paranormal. With that concept it’s really pushing those bounds with its themes.

After the death of their parents, Ezri is forced home to Texas to meet with their sisters to finalize things. While each and every occupant of the house suffered, Ezri’s journey through childhood was the darkest. Perhaps that’s why they fled all the way to England. They’ve always been different, and that’s also a huge portion of why. The author labeled them as trans, although with their desire to be and broadcast as both at different times, I did wonder if the term gender-fluid was more accurate (but I don’t know). Either way, the author does make a point to showcase their experience and traumas as different, and that stood out much more to me than most of the commentary on race, even though a huge part of the plot is them being the first black family in an all white neighborhood. However the woman in the beginning saying “so articulate”, really led right off with how the book would commentate. And from the author of The Deep, you shouldn’t be surprised there. The twist at the end also hit in a kind of Get Out way that I will not spoil.

One this that took me 100% out of the story multiple times, is that the blurb mentions upper-middle class, but then the parents actions clash with that, and then there’s also all the kids feeling like their parents were frugal and they didn’t know they had money? Right in the beginning, a neighbor mentioned wanting the house but picking a different one, the mother insinuates that it was because the woman could not afford their house. The house is commented on as being large, and inside an entirely gated community. The mother’s tastes for furniture are expensive, even imported foreign pieces. They comment on the fact that the father HAD to have a $100,000 tv. In one pivotal scene, that showcases the mother in a particularly good mood, she wants to take them to a dinner to celebrate good news. It is remarked upon that they are not dressed for that kind of restaurant. So, instead of going to change, the mother buys every single on of them a brand new outfit. Head to toe to be able to go to the fancier dinner spot. Then one sibling asks if they can ice skate after dinner at the mall too and the mother says of course. Then in the present day portion of the novel, the family is astonished to hear that they were set to receive over a million dollars prior to liquidating anything else. I’m sorry, and maybe it’s just my lower middle class upbringing catching all the surprise here, but that sounds like an incredibly wealthy family, not one breaking into the upper middle class?

As one of four siblings, there were also some very odd things the siblings did together that stood out to me, but maybe that’s just my family dynamic? Like cuddling together in bed as adults, comments on wanting to lick tears away, as well as some questionably off massaging. Maybe this was another layer to show reactions to the trauma, but it took me out of the story a bit too much.

But at one point towards the end, someone’s reading The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, and I felt that the novel’s name drop was a really good choice as this is kind of an amalgamation of that book with the idea of a haunted house. All in all, some things in this that I really liked, and others that detracted from them.

I’ve had this paperback for a while, so I decided to get to it as a spooky season read, as well as a Hispanic Heritage Month read.

The first story, The Crossing Guard, is also available separately as a kind of sample to the author’s writing. There is something off about Val the crossing guard. Eric has taken notice, and he feels certain. She’s doing something funky to the water bottles she offers out to the school kids. But when she catches him trying to destroy them, he quickly blames another passing kid. Safe for the moment, but no less culpable.

It read like a Goosebumps short, like something from Tales to Give You Goosebumps or even the newer series Stinetinglers. It even has the kind of classic cliffhanger ending you’d expect. I look forward to the sequel story.

While many of these shorts read like the author’s version of Goosebumps, they do range from middle grade characters/feeling to adult reads. Some of which are definitely more extreme too. One of my favorites is a story about a break in that’s mixed the feelings of slashers/The Strangers vibes with those of the more mysterious and ancient ritual tropes. Think home invasion times un-killable killer. It allowed for some really interesting twists, and even got my own creative ideas flowing honestly.

From monsters to aliens, theme parks to bugs, magic napkins and evil lies, Heredia knows his way around some horror tropes. And this collection has a fantastic set of story headers.

There’s also a great deal of diversity present in these stories that I feel as if you don’t exactly see elsewhere. That remembrance to include others. If it wasn’t the main character, it was a named character that was involved. And I thought that was perfect for Hispanic Heritage Month.

There is something off about Val the crossing guard. Eric has taken notice, and he feels certain. She’s doing something funky to the water bottles she offers out to the school kids. But when she catches him trying to destroy them, he quickly blames another passing kid. Safe for the moment, but no less culpable.

This was quick and enjoyable. It read like a Goosebumps short, like something from Tales to Give You Goosebumps or even the newer series Stinetinglers. It even has the kind of classic cliffhanger ending you’d expect.

This is available in the full collection Nightmares From a Desk, but for $0.99 this is a great sample of the author’s work if you’re on the fence.

The audio done by Thom Rivera is well performed and I think he’s a good voice for Peter and Spidey.

Personally I love Spider-Man, but I didn’t grow up in a comic book household. So for me, my first Segway into it was the 90s animated series. And then I became a mega fan when Tobey took on the role.

This collection starts with a pretty awesome novella that covers the origin story. Peter is bitten by an irradiated spider that has been causing some problems inside Dr. Otto’s mechanical arms. While not so different from many of the other versions, I like the idea of one of his greatest enemies having a direct connection to creating his alter ego. The accident that ensues also inadvertently creates Doc Ock. Then in a very similar sequence to the Sam Raimi movie, Peter creates this alter ego in hopes of stopping the burglar that killed his uncle Ben. I’ve always like the idea of finding new strength and immediately wanting revenge, but then becoming this superhero that’s arguably the most genuinely ‘good’ out of all of them. This “good guy” version is kind of what they seem to be doing with Tom Holland’s portrayal.

The other stories are collected like an anthology. I liked and disliked some of them, but nothing stuck out as particularly bad. Mostly they felt like they belonged to a bigger piece, which made them kind of seem like they were always missing something. I did enjoy a story where Mary Jane asks simply for five more minutes, just for Peter to be told by a police officer that he was five minutes too late to save someone. A really good short on the idea of time and how particularly hard it would be to be a hero and also try to have personal life.

Knew I wanted to get to this while it was still new. After reading The Devil Takes You Home and getting a feel for the author, that desire only went up. Also nicely fit as a Hispanic Heritage Month read!

This is a revenge story like no other. A group of friends seek revenge after one of their mothers is murdered. These childhood friends stick together no matter how dark and dangerous things become. No matter how many twists or lies become uncovered. As I am coming to gather is the author’s signature, this book is anything but just a revenge story. Multilayered and devastating, their devotion to each other will have you recalling childhood friendships that seemed so unbreakable, and have you thankful things never came to this.

One thing that seems a constant, is that no matter where the author takes us—in this case Puerto Rico—his writing has this razor sharp edge to it, that is both poetic and devastating. As with his other novel I’ve read, this book has huge dialogue sections mixed with Spanish and no translation. This unerring stance is his stamp of authenticity that will keep me coming back for years to come. I do not speak Spanish, and as I was listening to the audio while working, I am not in the camp of people translating for themselves as they read. Especially as I do not have any text. I just love this idea that there’s three experiences out there for every book he writes. No translations, translations while reading, and Spanish speaking. The fact that I can find so much to enjoy while not knowing chunks of dialogue is such a success to me, and makes me want to experience it in other ways.

And as these friends get deeper and deeper into this revenge plot, the further they’re forced to go is also getting deeper. Iglesias does so much with violence that I never knew was even possible. These bouts of hyper-violence are so dark and shocking, but still so layered into how everyone processes them, that they further the plot too. Each friend feels differently, will do something differently. But they’re together til the end, right? The author uses this shock value to further hammer home his themes.

As a hurricane blows in, the author uses it as the perfect curtain to draw over everything and add in a bit of mysticism and supernatural. And while metaphoric in itself, it’s also a shockingly creepy twist all on its own.

“All stories are ghost stories, and some stories turn us into ghosts.”

How far would you go for revenge? Would you up the violence, the depravity, to reach your goal? Would you let it whittle you away until there was nothing left?

I was contacted by a publicist and offered a physical ARC. I’m glad I said yes! I believe this release is a reissue from Hellbound Books.

The novel focuses in part on Ted. Ted’s mother was a real piece of work, and although his time in the military most likely exasperated things, she was the crux to his unhinging. Now, Ted has an insatiable hunger, the drive to kill. These are what Ted calls his score. One couple, a particularly important score for Ted, is one of the town’s greatest unsolved mysteries. One that the local police took into their retirement even. And I loved that the marketing used the ‘newspaper’ clipping of it as the book wrapping. Ted’s got quite the long list of kills, making him one hell of a serial killer.

The other focus, is on the Benton family. Especially the daughter Jules and her boyfriend David. I originally thought this was a kind of unique way to set up a final girl, but this isn’t your typical slasher. Jules and David have been talking about when and how to do it for the very first time, and when David’s parents go away for a week, the timing seems perfect. The chaos that ensues after is almost endless. Deceit, cheating, lies, and sneaking around lead them on a path of their own destruction. A path that may lead right to an elderly Ted.

Now one thing that I can’t really tell if I liked or not, was the incredible amount of sex in the story. The author does pretty well with having it present, while not making the reading all that X rated, which for me is a plus. My issue is that it’s so constantly present that it bleeds into everything. Ted’s disgusting perversion, teenagers (Jules and David especially, and even the Benton parents. And while that’s certainly fitting for those old school slashers, it just made it feel like there was no destination between anyone or the different arcs. But I’m not saying I dislike it, because part of me wonders if it was in itself a commentary of that.

There were a few moments, like with Ted and his mother and then again later in the novel where I felt like we were getting into something that felt almost like it could be Dexter: New Blood-ish. Not to mention Ted’s drive certainly has a ‘dark passenger’ feel to it from the very beginning. And while I wished that this truly did come to pass, I enjoyed the ending the way it was. No one is safe. And no one can ever truly know the depths that they’re willing to go until they get there. Three different incidents, and three differently viewed types of evil.

Thanks to NetGalley and Quirk Books for the audiobook ARC! Cassidy Brown did a nice job, handling the author’s humor well.

This was a unique read for me. The kind that stuck out to me the entire time. It is a nonfiction book, about many horror movies that are originally books. So… a book about film based off a book. I don’t know, maybe that’s not that special/weird.

For me, the ones I appreciated listening to the most, were the ones I’ve seen before (and some I’ve even read). They are: Psycho, The Exorcist, Halloween, The Shining, The Thing, Candyman, Scream, The Blair Witch Project, The Ring, 28 Days Later, Saw, The Conjuring, It Follows, Get Out, and Hereditary. While the majority here may not be based off books, there is a slew of unmentioned goodies throughout that are, and are equally worth checking out I’m sure. I enjoyed these because it was nice to hear someone else’s take aways and thoughts on things I don’t get to discuss much.

As somewhat of a newbie to horror myself, it was interesting to read someone else’s journey through finding horror later in life. And no spoilers, but it was equally interesting to find out which of the FanFi/FearForAll crew were also Weenies! I used to not even stay in the room if someone else had something scary on, and what counted as scary was shockingly mild compared to now.

The author runs the reader through each film almost like giving a synopsis, then discusses why they found it an important inclusion, and then explains some interesting tidbits that they say you could use at a party with diehard fans. I took this as more wit, because honestly I wouldn’t go toe to toe with any facts on something that was someone else’s favorite. Not me at least.

My favorite part was the author discussing what impact the choices had on horror as a whole. Why it was a hit, or flop, and how it impacted the horror industry. Not everyone may agree with the choices made, but for me, there’s a whole new set on movies on my to-watch list now.

Had my eyes on this one for a while and decided to grab it for National Book Buying Day. Perfect timing for Hispanic Heritage Month too!

Nathan Crane is a typical young adult. Handsome, somewhat charming, normal. Sure he’s had some issues with love in the past, and sure his life at home isn’t perfect, but who hasn’t gone through something like that?

When Nathan meets Christine, the new girl at school, they instantly connect, and while he walks her to class, they agree to meet up again for lunch. The friendship is fast and strong, and Nathan is immediately taken with her, even ignoring Marlene, who so obviously is interested in him. One night at an alcohol-infused party, Christine is a little too generous with herself, and Nathan leaves upset—which also hurts Christine. But when Nathan finally lays his heart out to her, she’s quick to turn him down. Already coming undone throughout the novel, Nathan starts to crack and splinter, spiraling into a deep, dark descent.

Personally, I happened to really enjoy the fact that the relationship has some building before the initial rejection starts. In that way, it’s a lot deeper than the blurb gives it credit for. Christine is interested, she’s flirtatious, she’s engaging, she just doesn’t want to be with Nathan. For me, it just gives the story a much needed layer where it allows for Nathan to not just be this colossal creep.

However, once Nathan has gone over the edge, and settled on his plan, there’s nothing left to keep the creep from showing, and god is he awful. Perhaps Reyes’ best writing yet, this is a fantastic showcasing of infatuation, toxic masculinity, and a torturous upbringing coalescing into all out obsession. If Nathan can’t have Christine, no one can.

Nathan’s spiral gives Reyes the room to give us some unique and gruesome kills. From self defense to unfettered cruelty. And while I wouldn’t say I had fun with them, as I was so investing in the creep factor, this is a set of spree killings that really do show just how unhinged the main character is. There is a small paranormal plot line that the reader is never really sure about throughout the story. It’s quick and small, and I found myself wondering why it was there. The twist it brings really worked for me though, and it adds to Nathan’s craziness once you understand.

Thanks to NetGalley, Tor Nightfire and Macmillan Audio for the ARC, I really enjoyed this one!

This was a first for me from the author, and I’m quite satisfied with the outcome. This is part commentary/satire of Hollywood, social media, and the all powerful algorithm, part supernatural, part slasher, and even part trauma story. The blend is unique, and I imagine probably quite hard to balance, but the author does it fantastically.

Misha is a screenwriter, doing his best to write characters and stories that he never got to see as a kid. Unfortunately, he is still beholden to the world that we live in, where characters are at best perhaps gay, rather than openly out. The author does a fantastic job of showcasing the conflict and intricacies within by having Misha himself being only “LA out,” but not officially out to his family or hometown. And that is where the trauma lies.

In the ever-growing scifi world we live in, with holograms and cloning and AI-altering, the author perfectly lines up a horror story that’s just farfetched enough to read as near future. When Misha’s boss sits him down, stating that the company wants his characters killed, rather than getting their excruciatingly earned and beautiful outing, Misha is understandably outraged. Even refusing and promising a lawsuit even after being (not so) more or less discreetly threatened.

The idea that the company he worked so hard for, made money for, would come after him was simply too absurd to put any faith in. So when characters from Misha’s filmography start popping up and interfering with his life, he assumes it’s nothing more than a cosplaying prank. Some well done cosmetics, a high quality costume, a well planned and tailored prank set to make Misha feel frightened enough to submit. Nothing more. But as his more outlandish characters start to appear, and the body count starts to grow, Misha learns it’s anything but a prank.

Is this a horror novel, is it horrific? Yes of course. There are interesting villains and kills, and the villain at large is something wholly unique. But what makes this book so good is what it’s actually saying.

The author ends this harrowing trial by flipping the script. This is not just a trauma story, we are not simply our past, nor are we our fears. Misha gets to give a beautiful speech in which he finally announces to the world what he should have years ago. Representation is important, but it’s not just about being seen. It’s not gay misfortune, it’s life, and love, and it’s joy and growth. And Chuck Tingle, through Misha and Zeke, is showing the world that in explosive fashion.

Wanted to like this as it seems like a new take on urban fantasy and vampires/creatures, but 20% in there’s nothing but talking/rambling and no work done whatsoever to make me like the characters enough to listen.

Huge thanks to ShortWave for the physical ARC. I love this cover!

This is a science fiction short story collection, and I loved that the stories varied in length from flash fiction to novelette. I also really enjoyed the mixture of sub genres this goes through, from dystopian to horror. There’s some really incredible concepts being played with here, and the distinction the author draws between loss, love, grief, and affection in such a short amount of words is a huge win.

The title novelette, Limelight, is the real highlight for me. Experimental treatments allow for those dearly departed to come back. Would you make that decision? Could you leave them alone if there were options to tweak things, enhance things? For the parents in this heart breaking story, they’re split right up the street. But when one wins out over the other, they may find they get more than they bargained for.

The idea of changing, or even enhancing someone that you loved and lost, is in my opinion, directly besmirching their memory. But if your intentions were pure, what then? Or, do you really believe that that could ever be pure? For me this hit notes of Black Mirror, Ex Machina and Sarah Chorn’s A Sorrow Named Joy. A dystopian world where something like this could exist, but never fully be accepted. As a high schooler, she is ridiculed and insulted for being brought back, for living. A choice that was never truly hers. To me that made this the most horror based story in the collection.

As her mother continues to grasp for more and more control over her, all in the name of giving her daughter the life she ‘deserves’, her father does his best to stay away, ashamed of what he’s allowed. The juxtaposition of the two’s feelings were really well done. The split between obsession story and self guilt really drove home the theme. Personally, right as this one ends, I’d love to see it open up into an entire novel, but I’m blown away with how well it worked as it stands.

From scifi stories that seem near future, to those that seem out of reach, the thing this collection drives home is that Croal knows exactly how to make believable, and heart wrenching short stories. Body enhancing/manipulating mixed with various angles of corporate greed, make this its own kind of new body horror that I frankly want nothing to do with!

Absolutely love this cover, and when I came across it on Twitter, I was stoked to find that I already owned it. So I decided to give it a read.

The Cradle of the Sky is humanity’s last hope. Thousands of years ago, humans set sail to the great beyond in the far flung hopes that they could one day reach a new home. A planet that could sustain them the way that earth had. The earth they had destroyed. 4000 years into the 6000 year journey, and things are maybeee not going so great?

Due to the need of everyone having a specified role on the cradle, life has fallen back into work related castes. Jett Dresden, part of the hull repair crew, makes a shocking discovery that leads her to find out a secret that the navigation caste wants hidden. A little chaos ensues…

I enjoyed that while this is a dystopian twist to the utopia chasing tale, there was still goodness within the story. Jett’s father and sister are still with her. Their food allotment includes fresh produce, as well as a great scene talking about garlic. Jett even has her own room. And even though the cradle is hurdling towards something they didn’t expect, Jett doesn’t despair and tries to envision solutions. She ended up being a very powerful personality for a main character in such a short number of pages.

I also enjoyed the author’s decision to include different kinds of Christianity. With the tagline of ‘God Does Not Want Us here,’ I’m glad he didn’t just give us a straight forward force-feeding of the Bible. This is 4000 years into their travels, and there are new sects that you’ve never imagined. I thoroughly enjoyed this. It’s not always about the destination, it’s about the survival.

I went with the audio for this one too. It had a multi-narrator cast again, mostly tackling the different POVs, and they did a good job.

This is 10 more short stories from the master of middle grade horror. As always, I’m not really sure on the legality of these things, but I’m eternally wondering why all of his stories aren’t under the umbrella of Goosebumps. It’s his signature style anyway, and they all bring to mind GB stories anyway.

These 10 are spooky too, some of which were actually quite a bit scarier than the second book. Particularly the idea of trading bodies with a dead person, where in the story, this zombie kindly asks for 30 minutes inside a living body. You’d still be alive, but you’d shortly live inside their deteriorated zombie-esque body. To me, the ending, and what was left as the consequence, could have been even scarier than the story itself. I’d really have liked to see that become a full novel from Stine, with notes of Attack of the Graveyard Ghouls and (a really) Freaky Friday.

This one unfortunately did not continue on with Stine introducing the shorts. It was a bit jarring to hear someone random do it, and definitely felt like a downgrade. But I’m sure a middle grade reader probably would not notice something like that. Maybe he was too busy?

Spooky, eerie, silly, multiversal, and body changing, these stories from Stine continue to offer interesting and enjoyable places to go for a short while. While I feel like some of these hold back a bit more than Goosebumps did, I’m glad generations to come are getting their intro to Stine.

I went with the audio for this one. It had a multi-narrator cast, mostly based on the perspective of the story, and they were pretty much all solid.

This is 10 new short stories from the master of middle grade horror. Again, I’m not really sure on the legality of these things, but I’m always left wondering why all of his stories aren’t under the umbrella of Goosebumps. It’s his signature style anyway.

With that being said, these 10 are spooky, eerie, a little silly, and some even have a blend of scifi. Stine continues to prove that he has quite the imagination, and I loved that these featured an introduction for each story. The intros were even recorded by Stine too, and I love that their inspiration is mostly from his childhood experiences. I just can’t imagine writing that many stories, some of which feature similar ideas and plot lines. Like how do you keep track?

While I wouldn’t necessarily put these on the level of Tales to Give You Goosebumps or the somewhat longer shorts in Goosebumps Triple Header 1, these are still enjoyable stories for a quick little read. I love their covers too.

Went with the audio for this, and Scott Brick did a good job bringing the pace and action to life in this one.

An attempted store robbery, a bus crash. A tragic death that was not only a drowning, but a complete freezing beneath the frozen lake. When John Reiff wakes up in a scientific lab, what should be an absolute miracle, he has no idea where he is, or who he can trust—nor does he know why he has this sneaking suspicion that things are not as they seem. As the events of the novel progress, the reader just might find out that everyone has secrets.

I listened to this one while reading I Was a Teenage Slasher, and the thing that stuck out the most was the authors’ completely different decisions: this one features incredibly short chapters, over 100 total. And while that could easily turn your night of “just one more” into a never ending sequence of more, I did find the shorter bits to be hard to digest as there was a lot of science, as well as a lot of confusion. As a plot structure, it makes perfect sense, as we know and find things out as John Reiff begins to, it just didn’t fully grab me. Until one particular line at the end of chapter 44 completely hooked me. Like I actually said, “alright I’m all in.” And while I won’t spoil it, I’m excited for readers to get into it.

With how technothriller the blurb sounds, I was surprised with how dystopian this was. The world outside of the lab is shambles of what once was. War, famine, inflation, the use of AI—has turned the world into a husk. People died, starved to death, while the richer got richer still. So of course John Reiff has been roped into something completely corrupted! A guinea pig to a bigger scheme.

I really enjoyed the mystery of this one, as well as the fact that almost everyone was hiding something different. The commentary of where it seems we are headed was nice as well, although a bit jarring as this is rather near, near-future. While the end did go a bit action thriller on us, it was entertaining throughout and I enjoyed the ending a lot. I’m glad to see there’s a planned sequel.

Thanks to NetGalley and Flatiron Books/Macmillan Audio for this one. I received the audio, of which there were multiple narrators, each doing a different POV that kind of felt like Scooby Doo to me (for adults, and in a good way). This is a first for me from the author.

This is a novella that features a ragtag group of late night smokers that meet every night in the local cemetery. At the beginning of the story, which atmospherically takes place in October, they stumble upon a hole in the ground that was definitely not there before! They think that this digger may be linked to other strangenesses around town.

Unfortunately for me, while I did enjoy each of the characters and their differences, the paraphrase of the blurb above is just about as deep and descriptive as the novella as a whole. While I’m still kind of in the middle on this one, as there were several things I did enjoy, this just read like an introduction, not a story. There’s more development of the characters as they are introduced in the switching POV than there is in the development of the story itself.

They chase a suspect of the digging, which you’d think would be this giant reveal, but it just kind of happened before petering out. Then they were onto the next thing. Which is what left me hanging, because the atmosphere is palpable during the scene. And the scene that involves a certain rat was a highlight for me, creepy, dark, eerily toothy, but even though it does tie into the overall arc, it just needed more for me to sink my teeth into.

I really like the cover, and as both rats and fungus are kind of topical for the FanFiAddict crew, I wanted to feel like this was a hit. I don’t want to bring in any spoilers here, but the ending felt rushed, underdeveloped in the sense that it’s just handed to you and it’s over.

I went with audio for this, and I’ll tell you, Sena Bryer knocked it out of the park for me. Some really good and completely different voices in here.

This is an interesting concept. Earth was lost, and those on Gaea are raised to train with only one thing in mind, revenge. It’s an endless war. But when the main character, Kyr finds out that her brother has gone “rogue” and that she has been sentenced to work in the nursery, a near death sentence regardless of her being a top solider, things start to become a little clearer.

This is almost like an Inception-y, Time Travel creating changes like in Loki, multiversal kind of mixture that had a great pace to it. Can the past change the future if it’s the one that already exists? The twists are present, and they’re interesting, I just kind of felt like maybe the execution was a tad off. I found things that I thought were cool or interesting, but felt like they didn’t exactly pan out, and I wasn’t as engaged as I should have been.

The idea of the nursery as a whole, a set of selected women that were chosen for life to birth the next generation of humans, could have been set up to make a hell of a statement…but it kind of just is what it is—lacking commentary? Even in the future, during an all-out war for survival, even while being the top marks solider out of all the women, you can still be seen as just a womb. And while that is kind of what it’s saying it also felt kind of flat, like they didn’t try to really get the point across. It also kind of felt off putting to me that Kyr’s brother, the large and muscly super solider was weird and different, and the way that it was played off was that he was different simply because he was gay? At least that’s how it feels. It needed to be deeper, or to not be there at all for me.

The other main issue I had, was that many, if not most, of the characters are just genuinely unlikable. It’s hard to be truly surprised, heartened, or heart broken with the twists when you don’t feel enough for those it’s happening too. So while there were things that kept me going, kept me listening on to the end, I just feel kind of somewhere in the middle on this one.

Thanks to Saga Press for the physical ARC. This book has a great design and I’m happy to own one.

This book was a bit of a gamble for me. I was really interested in the blurb, had seen some early reviews that were great including other FanFiFam, but I had read one full length from the author and I hadn’t really gotten along with it. After finishing this and loving it, now I’m wondering if it was simply because I read the other when I was newer to horror. So perhaps a reread of The Only Good Indians is imminent now.

This has to be one of the most unique takes on the Slasher genre. It brings to mind another recent read for me, which was Brian McAuley’s debut, Curse of the Reaper. Where that novel blends Slasher tropes with psychological horror, Jones went completely off the rails and made a slasher memoir. And not just any memoir, but one that takes place within a world where slashers do exist. There’s definitely no wondering here why zombie stories take place in worlds where no one knows what a zombie is, Jones has offered up his teenage slasher all the reference material he needs.

In a kind of self referential nod that felt like Jamie Kennedy’s Randy from Scream/Scream 2, our main character’s best friend Amber is the launch board for all of Tolly Driver’s necessary slasher info. Her brother, a slasher fanatic, has the goods on what’s going to happen, when, how, and maybe even where, not that she’s necessarily going to share all of it. And on the inverse of maybe the ‘why’ zombie worlds don’t know of zombies, this created this really interesting tension where Tolly spends a huge portion of the book not believing what happened to him simply because his real life couldn’t become like the movies. These things existed in his world, but as fiction, they couldn’t possibly become him, right?

The detachment of Tolly from his Slasher self is another really unique dynamic to this novel. The Driver (pun intended), taking over has this supernatural angle to it that starts all the way at the beginning with the blood from the Joss kid. And just like any slasher, revenge is the driving force, right? And while the reader does live through the near death experience with Tolly, it did kind of feel like a somewhat weak reason to go around killing people. However, slashers aren’t usually known for being reasonable, rational, believable even. And it’s within that, that this story lies. There are things that seem extreme, things you’d never believe or assume, but neither did Tolly.

Multilayered and compelling, Tolly Driver is anything but a mindless killer. With notes of coming of age, of finding oneself, with angles of grief and strength, this bleeds through as a love letter to Lamesa and Texas as a whole. And I absolutely loved Tolly’s internal commentary and struggles from the passenger seat. Jones has this way about his writing, this meandering, sometimes longwinded, sometimes unconventional sentence structuring, that just lends itself so well to someone telling their own story. And, I think, especially someone trying to remember it as well. It had this really nice stark contract to another read of mine at the time, Deep Freeze by Michael C. Grumley, which had such short chapters to enhance its pace that there were over 100. Jones instead, uses long winding pieces of each day to show just how much Tolly was really going through, both trying to stop it, and failing miserably.

Poetic and heart breaking, the final 15 pages of this may break you.

This is a short story that features cover art done by the author, which is such a cool piece of art that I had to grab it. I’ve been reading shorter pieces during dead time at work, so this fit perfectly.

The short is a kind of alt historical fantasy that features centaurs as mercenaries. And I think it’s really unique in that it actually focuses on the women, the centaurines, as the fighting force of the main character’s group. Taller, faster, stronger than humans, they are employed as the fighting forces, and I found the references to historical places to be really cool.

The main focus of the story is not war though. Our lead’s colt has died, and in the postpartum grief that follows, she’s now also battling with the loss. Lost and on uneven ground, she doesn’t quite know how to handle her situation, how to get back to her warrior spirit. So when she runs into a human orphan, one that has been sent to her tribe to work for them, she battles with every possible feeling, interior and exterior, as she tries to keep herself from latching to the boy in her grief.

An interesting tale of motherhood, loss, and grief. And while I found this quite enjoyable, I do wish there was more clarity on the relationship between humans and centaurs, especially as they seem to think lowly of humans, but also rely entirely upon them.

Grabbed up a whole bunch of these on a wild audible sale, and I’m finally getting back to it. R.C. Bray does yet another fantastic narration for the series.

I’ve said it before, and I’m sure I’ll say it again, but these have such a breakneck pace with so much action that they’re just so fun. I also realized during this one that I listen to my audiobooks fast, which means there’s hardly a breath between action beats.

Xavier takes to the sea, finally in sight of the paradise they so desperately seek. But sea monsters, radiation, and crazy storms aren’t the only thing that he’ll have to overcome. Tin, and the new captain will take on a different mission, this time in Cuba. The stakes are higher than ever, but the payoff is information for the reader!

Is finally finding a home in the sun worth entering an all-out war? Not to mention a war that they’re not even sure they can win…

And folks, we’ve finally got it! The full explanation as to why the world is the way it is! Remember this is an alt history scifi, where radiation is so high that the remnants of humanity have been forced to live in airships above the crazy weather patterns to survive. The need for repairs, supplies and answers, drives those willing to dive down to the surface for the sake of everyone else…the hell divers. For spoilers-sake, I won’t discuss the reason the world fell apart, but it brought to mind notes Horizon Zero Dawn and Terminator.

With new enemies and horrors, the suspense was at an all-time high, and I was just surprised to not have another run in with the sirens (at least for me, a favorite enemy). This one did feel kind of like the cliffhanger came out of nowhere I will say, kind of like we got half a climax, but I’m certainly on the edge of my seat for more. And finally we got the sea…and with it, SHARKS.

As always a huge thanks to Shortwave Media for this one. This is Killer VHS # 4, and as always the cover and design continues to be flawless.

Cicada is the creature feature that I never knew I wanted or needed. While not horrifically graphic, the idea alone of a giant cicada is disgusting enough!

The story is self referential and self indulgent in all the best ways. It perfectly encapsulates the cult classic horror vibe with its town full of merch and fandom coming together (for once off their message boards where they build and manipulate their own head-canon). And in those references and commentary it really reminded me of Scream 2.

While I really appreciate the cicada-wing speed of the action once it gets off the ground, I do think the story could have benefited by either a shorter opening—because as it stands it’s about 50% set up, 50% nightmare—or it could have been longer in general which would have made the opening seem shorter. Ash spends so long fighting with her boyfriend and wondering why things are weird that it became a bit noticeable for me.

The descriptions of the cicada, with its hairy legs and body, its eerily humanoid-esque head, as well as its machete length proboscis, were enough to raise the hairs on my arms. Bugs are absolutely disgusting, and especially with all the husks cicadas leave around, it was a brilliant choice to horror-fy. Can you imagine the sound a large one would be capable of? And the way the bug just kind of…drank people into their own kind of husks? Chilling.

If you’ve been a fan of the others, in this series people keep calling modern day Goosebumps for adults, then you better buckle up, because this one sits right up there with the others. Like mixing The Blair Witch Project with 1994’s Mosquito.

I’ve had kind of a mixed bag of experiences with King so far, having only really read shorter stuff like The Mist, and Secret Window, Secret Garden and not really loving either. But then I saw the narrator was Michael C. Hall, and I had to grab it. It helps that the other members of Fear For All love his stuff too.

First off, I thought this was fantastic. Reading something finally full length from King really allowed for the story to open up. Both growing in creepiness, and heightening those emotional touch points. Of course, it might just help that I decided to read one that is considered up there with his best, but still.

The copy I got from Audible included an introduction from the author, he spoke about how he thought this was his darkest novel, perhaps even too dark that it shouldn’t have been published. He also spoke about the origin of the spelling of Pet Sematary, its inclusion in the novel, and eventual taking over as the title. That kind of inclusion and connection really heightened my enjoyment heading into the story.

Louis accepts a new job, moving his family into the rural town of Ludlow, Maine. Their new house seems too good to be true, their neighbor Jud already showing them hospitality. But even from the earliest pages of the novel, theirs a dangerous undertone. Let alone when they get shown the cemetery behind their property where all the town’s beloved pets have been buried…I personally have pets, and although the thought of having them nearby is endearing, this is still just so creepy.

But when the road finally claims another victim, this time Louis’ daughter’s beloved cat Church, Jud tells him to wait for his call and that they’d handle it. And when Church shows back up, after being buried no less, Louis does his best to rationalize the appearance, but underneath it all, he knows better. The general creepiness of this, as well as the behavioral problems that follow with Church, should have been a clear indication of how far this novel would go, but I wasn’t ready.

The loss of a child, is often something that writers avoid like the plague, especially in horror I feel. So for King to go so far into this, so deep, especially given the year when this released originally, is a testament to him. And yeah…this really is super super dark. For me, the imagining of if it didn’t happen, and where his life could have gone, was even sadder to read than the death itself.

It does kind of feel like I’ve managed to live under a rock, as I’ve not had any of this really ruined for me, and I’ve never seen any screen adaptation so far. With the mixed bag that has come from his wide filmography, I think maybe I had started to link that directly to him, even though they are adaptations of his works? This was so eerie and riveting. It brought to mind that building dread that I loved in Nat Cassidy’s Nestlings, that ability to show that building in different ways between husband, wife, and daughter.

Michael C. Hall did such a fantastic job. I would like him to take over narrating my life now. The voices were great, the novel had life, and this once again brought to mind just how much we are missing that he has not narrated the Dexter series.

Grabbed another one by the author after finishing Dollface the other day!

Jane has been has been arrested for killing eight men during eight different snow storms, earning her the name The Snowfall Slasher. This is her psychiatric interview. From denial to gleeful pride, Jane takes the reading through various stages of discontent and discomfort. From claiming it’s not satanic worship to screaming names from the Bible, it’s quite obvious early on that nothing Jane says can be taken at face value.

The office, as well as the decision by the author to make the entire perspective an interview, brought to mind scenes from the Hannibal show, scenes from Evil when Kristen visits her therapist, little tidbits of Long Legs with the creepy antagonist, as well as plenty of its own personal flair. I can definitely see the author’s penchant from the extreme coming out in this novel as we see some seriously heinous acts described. Like The Exorcist but as a cannibal revenge story.

Well written and concise, I really enjoyed this one as it had more of a styled writing than just the extreme. All I really want to know is, how did her family not taste it all?!