Published June 2, 2023 by Macfarlane Lantern Publishing

A village abandons all they knew in search of water.

A man covets the last roses of summer and pays the price in blood.

Two young monsters seek a peaceful life by the seaside.

A scorching prophecy threatens to destroy all that a princess holds dear.

Once upon a time stories travelled from place to place on the tongues of merchants and thieves and kings alike. Around a crackling bonfire beneath a sky that never grew dark they were shared, and traded, and altered, until every corner of the globe had their own collection of tales.

In the spirit of these age-old stories comes Once Upon a Summer , a seasonal anthology of folk and fairy tales from 15 authors across the globe. It covers everything from summer romances to eco-terror to seaside ghost stories, and features both intriguing twists on classic tales and exciting original stories.

The second of four planned seasonal anthologies from Macfarlane Lantern Publishing, Once Upon a Summer is sure to have a story for just about everyone. Grab your copy in time for the solstice today!

Inside this

The I Scream Van by Caroline Logan

What Big Geese You Have by Adie Hart

The Forest at the End of the World by Josie Jaffrey

It Is Written by S. Markem

These Burning Bones by Laila Amado

Vespertine by Elanna Bellows

The Last Roses of Summer by Kate Longstone

Love, Pride, Virtue and Fate by Bharat Krishnan

Juniper and the Upside Down Well by Ella Holmes

Love in the Time of Volcanoes by Jake Curran-Pipe

Bluebeard’s Beach House by Jenna Smithwick

The Knucker of Lyminster by Katherine Shaw

Summer Dreams by R. A. Gerritse

The Witches of Dogtown by A. J. Van Belle

Contract with a Mermaid by M. J. Weatherall

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My love for fairytale retellings is no secret here. Having previously read, Once Upon a Winter (You can read my review here.), I was excited to dive into the summer. I wasn't able to spend as much time with this anthology as I wanted but I did jump in on a couple of the stories. What I read, I loved! Most are cute and fluffy, while a few are dark, which is exactly what I wanted. 

Bluebeard’s Beach House by Jenna Smithwick was the story I most wanted to read, given its' darker origin story. Bluebeard, or La barbe bleue,  was written down by Charles Perrault—who also authored Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Little Red Riding Hood. The story begins with a wealthy nobleman wanting to remarry after the death of his SIX previous wives. Red flag much? Of course, it is, which is why after much debate (mostly due to his ugly blue beard and NOT the dead wives), one of the daughters of a neighbor agrees to marry him,  He leaves, but before he does, he gives his new wife the keys to all his treasures. Strangely, given all that he is giving her free access to, she is forbidden, upon severe punishment, to open one particular closet. While he's away she has her sister and family over for a party and her curiosity gets the best of her. When she enters the closet, she finds the previous six wives' bodies laying there! She drops the key in the blood on the floor, and no matter what she tries, she can't get the blood off. When the husband arrives home, seeing the blood on the key and knowing what she saw, he is going to kill her. She asks for one last prayer with her sister, Anne. After stalling, she goes downstairs to her fate, but right before she's killed, her brothers show up and stab Bluebeard to death. She inherits the estate and remarries, giving her a happily ever after...hopefully.

**Spoilers ahead**

In Smithwick's story, the new wife Josephine, is preparing in full 50s housewife magazine style for a dinner party. The magazines came from wife #2, Danielle. In her version of the story, Henry, our clean-shaven Bluebeard, is a little less rich, and the dinner party is to charm prospective partners. Josephine wonders if wife #2, felt the way she feels having to live up to Henry's expectations of his first wife. She has a certain amount of resigned jealousy seeing their portraits hanging still from their place of honor at the top of the stairs. She feels inadequate in the face of his previous marriages and under constant disapproval from Henry. Thinking she sees the portrait move, she drops the glass she's holding, a wedding gift of Henry and Mary's, and cuts herself in the process of cleaning the shards up. Pleading illness, Henry goes alone to the party but warns her not to rummage in the attic. After a ghostly vision of Mary urging her to give in to temptation, Josephine grabs the key and heads upstairs. The first thing she experiences is the smell, and there are weird skittering and scratching sounds, there's blood on the neck of a dress, and are those...feet? She stumbles over a dollhouse, a complete miniature of the house she's in, and inside the attic room, there are two dolls—Mary and Danielle. Blood from her cut hand gets on the white dresses of the dolls and she knows Henry will know she's been in the attic. She calls her sister in panic, who comes over. Henry arrives home and threatens her, Anne smacks him with a cast iron pan, and Josephine locks him in the attic, and sets the place on fire. Her happy ending comes with building a new house on the land, one that is airy and comfortable, and while there may be a new love interest there, it's not dependent on a man. 

This was such a great story! The buildup of tension and the creepy atmosphere were perfect! I loved the changes that Smithwick made to the classic story: the ghostly visitations/visions that Josephine had of the two previous wives, how they are actually warning her, and how Josephine, in the end, releases them from the house. Even though there aren't bloody bodies laying in a closet, I thought that the dollhouse was a very effective way of linking back to the origin stories. I especially loved the twist at the end of Josephine's little girl playing with the dollhouse, saying that Daddy is being mean, and how Josephine picks up the doll that looks like Henry, puts him in the attic, and shuts the door. This is exactly how you take a fairytale and give it a contemporary twist. 

Be sure to go back and check out the other stops on the tour! 

Published August 30, 2022 by Entangled: Teen

Some shadows protect you…others will kill you in this dazzling new fantasy series from award-winning author Abigail Owen.

Everything about my life is a lie. As a hidden twin princess, born second, I have only one purpose—to sacrifice my life for my sister if death comes for her. I’ve been living under the guise of a poor, obscure girl of no standing, slipping into the palace and into the role of the true princess when danger is present.

Now the queen is dead and the ageless King Eidolon has sent my sister a gift—an eerily familiar gift—and a proposal to wed. I don’t trust him, so I do what I was born to do and secretly take her place on the eve of the coronation. Which is why, when a figure made of shadow kidnaps the new queen, he gets me by mistake.

As I try to escape, all the lies start to unravel. And not just my lies. The Shadowraith who took me has secrets of his own. He struggles to contain the shadows he wields—other faces, identities that threaten my very life.

Winter is at the walls. Darkness is looming. And the only way to save my sister and our dominion is to kill Eidolon…and the Shadowraith who has stolen my heart.

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Young adult fantasy can be very hit or miss for me so I started The Liar's Crown with a little trepidation. As it turns out, I had nothing to be hesitant about. Classic tropes, magic, a little romance with a little spice, and a well-built fantasy world made this one a fun read. 

Meren is an interesting protagonist. Since birth, she's been trained to be a copy of her sister, the real princess. She's had all the training to talk like her, act like her, and take her place should danger arise. It's kinda a bum deal, but Meren takes it very seriously. She doesn't whine about her station or her sister for that matter. It's just the way things are. When their grandmother dies, her sister is set to take the throne. Of course, danger may be present at the coronation, so Meren is put in place to keep her sister, and the real queen to be, safe. Before any of that can occur, Meren is stolen away by Reven to supposedly protect her from getting in the clutches of Eiolodon, a tyrant and enemy of the crown. 

Reven didn't quite know what he was in store for. Meren is witty, full of sass, and not at all what he was expecting the meek princess to be. Their banter is perfect and what an adventure they have set themselves on the road for! Reven's the perfect tortured love interest, a little dangerous, but trying to do the right thing. All's not what it seems for him as well, and some days he's barely holding it together. Moral gray love interests can be exciting if done right and Reven is as broody and dark as they come. 

While Owen didn't do anything to reinvent the YA fantasy genre, the world-building is top-notch and the magical elements were distinctive. You can easily engross yourself in the story without getting distracted by things that just don't make sense. The characters were entertaining, apart and together, and gave just enough steam without completely losing the adventure of things. The Liar's Crown is a solid, young adult fantasy that I'd recommend for fans of the genre. 

Published January 17, 2023 by Berkley

Grady Hendrix takes on the haunted house in a thrilling new novel that explores the way your past—and your family—can haunt you like nothing else.

When Louise finds out her parents have died, she dreads going home. She doesn’t want to leave her daughter with her ex and fly to Charleston. She doesn’t want to deal with her family home, stuffed to the rafters with the remnants of her father’s academic career and her mother’s lifelong obsession with puppets and dolls. She doesn’t want to learn how to live without the two people who knew and loved her best in the world.

Most of all, she doesn’t want to deal with her brother, Mark, who never left their hometown, gets fired from one job after another, and resents her success. Unfortunately, she’ll need his help to get the house ready for sale because it’ll take more than some new paint on the walls and clearing out a lifetime of memories to get this place on the market.

But some houses don’t want to be sold, and their home has other plans for both of them…

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Grady Hendrix twists childhood imagination in the most demented way possible in this hilarious but unnerving romp that has to be his best novel yet. It's campy. It's creepy. It's just plain delightful.

Louise and her younger brother Mark have so much emotional debris to shift through after the unexpected death of both their parents—to say nothing of the decades of accumulated stuff (like creepy puppets and dolls). Character growth was not shirked throughout the novel and the two main characters had a lot of developing to do. So much, at times, I couldn't stand either of the jerks.  Unlikeable character redemption arcs are always tricky, but Hendrix pulled it off. 

Hendrix takes a long time setting up his characters and the scene. The weirdness doesn't start immediately, and even when it does, it can be rationalized. Given what we know of the sibling's relationship, it's not surprising at all that Louise thinks her jackass brother is trying to freak her out. You have to be in this for the long haul as Hendrix spends a lot of time on the sibling's relationship.

Oh buddy, though, when it all starts happening, watch out. I did get this one as an audiobook, which was especially horrific since the narrators did the voices too. I had a hard time not looking like a crazy person listening to this at work. I laughed many times at the characters or just the insaneness of it all. In other scenes, I cringed, and I'm sure I made all kinds of faces during a few of the later scenes. In the middle of it all, there's still that weird humor that Hendrix is noted for and is my favorite kind: dark! Squirrel Baby Jesus was dear to my heart and had me giggling insanely to myself and yet still cringing!  If Christopher Moore decided to write horror, I think his brainchild would end up in the realm of How to Sell a Haunted House. 

After what felt like the final showdown of the book, I was excited to see that I was only 2/3rds through. I thought "What could possibly come after this?"...and then I found out. Honestly, I was too busy enjoying the ride to bother trying to figure out where things were going. It's not often a book comes along that can completely immerse me in the world. Would I recommend this book? Hell, yeah. It's not going to be for everyone. If you like your horror fast and dirty, you're probably going to despise the amount of time waiting for something to happen. If you don't mind the build-up and back-story family drama, you're going to love it. 

Published March 24, 2023 by Wicked House Publishing

When Ryne Burdette inherits his family's old hunting cabin deep in the Yukon wilderness, he wants to say no. Nothing much is left in that place except for unpleasant memories and the smoke of old burns. But after a tragic year, he sees a weekend trip to the cabin with his best friends as a way to recuperate and begin again.

But there is something strange about these woods. As a winter storm moves in, the animals begin acting strangely, and the natural laws of the wilderness seem to fall apart. Then, the soft voices start whispering through the trees. Something is watching them.

As the storm gets worse and the woods get darker, the three friends must dive into the darkest waters of the Burdette family lineage. Because the horrible truth is deep, resting in the shadowed places no one wants to look.

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The setting: An old hunting lodge in the woods with a freak blizzard bearing down on the area. The characters: Best friends, all carrying some form of trauma. The takeaway: The Broken Places is isolation folk horror done right.

It begins with one of the three, Ryne, recalling an odd occurrence from his childhood when he, his father, and his uncle made a trip to the cabin. Then, adult Ryne and two of his childhood friends, Shawn and Noah, are on the road heading toward that same isolated cabin from Ryne's past. The trip is full of memories, both good and bad, family history, and the bond of brotherhood. Sounds great, right? While initially a slow-burn horror, once the scare wheel starts turning, it's all speed ahead. 

The Broken Places' main strength is its character development. The three friends all have some type of trauma that they are carrying with them into this place. While Ryne's is the main focus, Noah and Shawn have their own emotional backstories, but their tight bond of friendship is strong and has kept them together across the years. Rather than only getting one viewpoint throughout the occurrences, you get to step into the lives of each of them in turn. The varying perspective could confuse and delay the story but, in this case, only adds more poignancy to what's occurring.

This debut novel by Blaine Daigle couldn't get into my head fast enough. This is not just a horror story; It's a tale about loss, grief, and depression. A perfectly atmospheric folk terror to haunt you long after you've finished the last page. 

Published February 7, 2023 by Tor Nightfire

Eric Ross is on the run from a mysterious past with his two daughters in tow. Having left his wife, his house, his whole life behind in Maryland, he’s desperate for money–it’s not easy to find safe work when you can’t provide references, you can’t stay in one place for long, and you’re paranoid that your past is creeping back up on you.

When he comes across the strange ad for the Masson House in Degener, Texas, Eric thinks they may have finally caught a lucky break. The Masson property, notorious for being one of the most haunted places in Texas, needs a caretaker of sorts. The owner is looking for proof of paranormal activity. All they need to do is stay in the house and keep a detailed record of everything that happens there. Provided the house’s horrors don’t drive them all mad, like the caretakers before them.

The job calls to Eric, not just because there’s a huge payout if they can make it through, but because he wants to explore the secrets of the spite house. If it is indeed haunted, maybe it’ll help him understand the uncanny power that clings to his family, driving them from town to town, making them afraid to stop running. A terrifying Gothic thriller about grief and death and the depths of a father’s love, Johnny Compton’s The Spite House is a stunning debut by a horror master in the making.

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Eric and his two daughters, eighteen-year-old Dess, and seven-year-old Stacy are on the run.  His youngest daughter has been counseled to run and to hide if he says so. What trouble could they possibly be in? Has he stolen away his kids without custody? Was it an unsafe home life? One thing is for sure, he is a father looking for a safe spot for them to land after the transient life they've been forced to endure. After seeing an opening for a position at Masson House in Degener, Texas advertising a tidy sum of money, Eric packs up his girls and drives to apply. The rules given to Eric by the very wealthy Eunice are simple; live in the house and report anything that happens. What trouble the trio is in is left as a mystery until close to the end. 

Spite houses, if you are unfamiliar with the term, are houses that are built in the way of something else, like a neighbor's view, or as part of a land disagreement. (My personal favorite is The Equality House in Topeka, Kansas built across the street from Westboro Baptist Church and painted in the pride flag colors.) The Masson House is weird, both in architecture and history and I applaud Compton for choosing such an unusual setting, diverting the typically dark and stormy haunted house tropes. 

While I loved that it held its secrets tight until almost the very end, I wanted more from The Spite House. I enjoyed the characters and the mystery of both their past and that of the spite house, but it felt like it was forgetting something. For a house billed as one of the most haunted in the state, there wasn't the gothic atmospheric dread and buildup that I expected. The characters themselves were excellent and I was invested in their story but the jumping timelines didn't do any favors to my drifting attention span. It often felt like an info dump with more tell than show. While the origin story of the house was crucial to the ending, the deviation from the characters I was already invested in stalled the read for me at times. When a book leaves so many questions unanswered in the beginning, I expected an ending showering all the information out in a downpour. However, there were still a lot of questions that didn't feel answered after the last page. 

I did experience this one via audiobook and must say Adam Lazarre-White was the perfect narrator for the job. Johnny Compton's writing could drift a bit on the tedious side with the multiple viewpoints and numerous timelines. The narration brought vibrancy to the characters that might not have been there otherwise. 

 

Published July 12, 2022 by Tor Nightfire

What Moves the Dead is Kingfisher's retelling of Edgar Allan Poe's classic "The Fall of the House of Usher.”

When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania.

What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.

Aided by a redoubtable British mycologist and a baffled American doctor, Alex must unravel the secret of the House of Usher before it consumes them all.

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T. Kingfisher could write an encyclopedia that I'd want to read, so when I saw that What Moves The Dead was a revamping of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher", I was giddy with excitement. Yes, giddy. I said what I said. Instead of a regurgitated version, Kingfisher has added her own reconception to Poe's short story and it's a doozy.

As with Poe, Kingfisher begins her tale with a first-person narrative. However, unlike Poe and his exceptionally vague male protagonist, Lieutenant Alex Easton is a genderqueer retired soldier friend of the female Usher—a deviation from Poe's who is a friend of the male sibling. Kingfisher has also made the addition of a female mycologist, an American doctor, as well as various townspeople, to complete the cast. Though I have to admit Angus, the Scottish personal assistant of Lt. Easton, was a personal favorite. 

Kingfisher always crafts her stories with creeping dread and from the beginning pages, she molds (pun not intended but in this case, highly appropriate) this inspired tale with care. The Usher property is blooming with nasty, foul-smelling mushrooms, the manor house is crumbling and filled with mildew and decay,  and the Ushers themselves are pallid skeletal things. None of that is anything new.  Oh, but the hares. If nothing else will give you the heebie-jeebies in this story, the hares will. You know that feeling you get while watching horror movies, where a person skitters around on all fours or jerkily ambulates—familiar but thoroughly alien? Kingfisher must dream of that feeling because she excels at writing the wrongness of things. 

It's like Kingfisher took a look at Poe's narrative and decided to complete all of the gaps, mapping out the dark corners and watery lake depths. She scaffolded onto the original with a light touch, melding some gratifying humor and wit with the expected gothic conventions. However, if you were a fan of Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic and Jeff Vandermeer’s Annihilation, you'll be over the moon to know that this is also a fungal horror. Undeniably, Kingfisher gives us the answers to the questions that plagued us after finishing the original.  Poe's version left the reader with so many interpretations and very little solid evidence. Kingfisher doesn't wait for the House of Usher to break atwain; She lights it on fire and watches it burn. 

Published September 27, 2022 by Tordotcom

In an isolated chateau, as far north as north goes, the baron’s doctor has died. The doctor’s replacement has a mystery to solve: discovering how the Institute lost track of one of its many bodies.

For hundreds of years the Interprovincial Medical Institute has grown by taking root in young minds and shaping them into doctors, replacing every human practitioner of medicine. The Institute is here to help humanity, to cure and to cut, to cradle and protect the species from the apocalyptic horrors their ancestors unleashed.

In the frozen north, the Institute's body will discover a competitor for its rung at the top of the evolutionary ladder. A parasite is spreading through the baron's castle, already a dark pit of secrets, lies, violence, and fear. The two will make war on the battlefield of the body. Whichever wins, humanity will lose again.

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Leech is a baffling gothic body-horror-filled affair and one in which, I was not totally sold...at first. Intrigued? You should be. It's most likely the most inscrutable read of my entire year (2022 that is). I started Leech initially thinking I was getting a drafty cold chateau set in a bleak snowy landscape with a parasite on the loose—and it delivered that but also much more. So much, in fact, that I initially gave up on it completely at a loss of what was occurring and resigned it to the DNF pile, but when I saw the audiobook, I decided to give it another shot. The narration was exactly what I needed to wade through the details and pique my interest again. 

When we first meet the doctor, they are arriving by train through a wintry desolate landscape to the frozen grounds of the Château de Verdira. It's the perfect gothic setting. The doctor has come after the death of the previous doctor to uncover exactly what caused the death. From there it only gets stranger. The doctor is part of the "The Institute" and has only just arrived, but seems to know all the inhabitants of the Château already. How is this? Well, that's part of Leech's charm. 

This book is dense. The language is stilted and the narrative constantly jumps; past, future, person to person, sometimes it's many voices at once in a strange mind share. The pacing is constantly speeding up and then slowing down. The setting seems primitive and yet the baron is kept alive by an innumerable amount of machinery, tubing, levers, and dials. There are talks of vestigial tails and a vendigeaux side by side with plastiophages and old nuclear plants. You get some answers, and more questions until it culminates in a fantastical ending. The trick of Leech is reading without the expectation to comprehend. It truly is dropping you in the middle of a myriad of things and tromping along until it makes sense in a very ah-ha manner. 

It's a curious beast of medical horror, sci-fi, and old-school gothic. It's body horror all wrapped up in existential dread and dubious bodily autonomy. It's vivid, disgusting things of mucous and fluids, of black tendrils and blood. It's a difficult read, but one where you get to the end, sit back and ruminate before deciding whether or not you truly enjoyed the read.  

 Published June 5th 2022 by Birchwood Press

All Charlotte Deerborn wanted was a nice Thanksgiving dinner with family and friends. Too bad for her no one else wanted to be there. By the time the turkey is carved, old grievances, bad behavior, and crass remarks have transformed her dinner party into a disaster. And then a werewolf shows up to do some carving of its own.

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Wolf at the Door has all the delightful family drama of the Thanksgiving table in a nutshell. Disapproving inlaws, a divorce on the horizon, jealousy, envy, oh it has all of it. That's certainly enough for one day but then it gets hairy. Like really hairy. No one invited the werewolf for turkey and gravy but he's there huffing and puffing and blowing the little house down. Okay, enough puns. I love werewolf stories. As far as tropes go, it's at least in my top ten. A werewolf ripping and tearing its way through the entire Days of Our Lives dysfunction should have been a blast but the novella didn't deliver on some aspects for me. 

This is not a book where you pick that one character to enthusiastically want to see them escape the clutches of evil. I didn't like any of the characters. Head ripped off? Cool. Survived the night? Whatever. I didn't have any strong feelings for or against any of them meeting their ghastly end at the hands, er...paws of the wolf. That also means there is no underdog to root for to make it out alive. Now obviously that's on purpose as all the characters are constructed with all their faults at the forefront. Liking a character doesn't automatically equate to a great read. However, I expected to be more invested in the characters and it didn't happen.

Still, there's an abundance of innards becoming out-ards and all kinds of squelchy goodness.  If you want a quick read where the walls run red, McKay certainly delivers the splatter. I'd say that people who don't typically read horror would have fun with this novella but most seasoned horror readers are going to want more developed characters and a more nuanced plot. 

Published October 4, 2022 by Berkley Books

A young woman in need of a transformation finds herself in touch with the animal inside in this gripping, incisive novel from the author of Cackle and The Return.

Rory Morris isn't thrilled to be moving back to her hometown, even if it is temporary. There are bad memories there. But her twin sister, Scarlett, is pregnant, estranged from the baby's father, and needs support, so Rory returns to the place she thought she'd put in her rearview. After a night out at a bar where she runs into an old almost-flame, she hits a large animal with her car. And when she gets out to investigate, she's attacked.

Rory survives, miraculously, but life begins to look and feel different. She's unnaturally strong, with an aversion to silver--and suddenly the moon has her in its thrall. She's changing into someone else--something else, maybe even a monster. But does that mean she's putting those close to her in danger? Or is embracing the wildness inside of her the key to acceptance?

This darkly comedic love story is a brilliantly layered portrait of trauma, rage, and vulnerability.

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A darkly comedic love story about a girl turned werewolf by Rachel Harrison? Yes, please. I couldn't wait to get to this one. Harrison previously covered zombies in the gruesomely funny The Return and the fellowship of witches in Cackle. One would think that werewolves would be a logical next step.

The first few pages throw the reader right into the fray as Rory leaves a bar on a misty night and hits an animal on the dark road. We all know from the cover that this is going to be a werewolf story so no one is really surprised (except for Rory) when it's divulged that what she hit was a freakin' werewolf. It attacks, leaving Rory bleeding in the woods, but somehow still alive the next day. Rory knows that people will think she's totally nuts if she runs screaming about being attacked by a werewolf so she creates a story about a bear attack. 

 As Rory manages all the physical and emotional changes along the way, there's plenty of sarcastic banter with others and inside Rory's head. She's a completely chaotic mess but she's going through a lot right now, okay? Becoming a werewolf is tough! Rory approaches all the crazy changes with a can-do attitude. She's leaking silver blood, she's stronger, has a craving for all things meat, and her hair is looking Ah-mazing. Sure, she's thinking WTF the whole time but she's learning how to vibe. 

The dynamic between main characters is always at the forefront of Harrison's books and Such Sharp Teeth is no different. Rory and her twin sister Scarlett have a close relationship; close enough that Rory drops everything to head back to her hometown when Scarlett calls saying she needs her. Rory loves the freedom of her life in the city but willingly stepped away from it all temporarily to give support to her pregnant sister.  

It might sound very strange to call a werewolf book endearing, but that's somehow just what Harrison manages to evoke. The addition of romance might put a lot of people off as horror and romance aren't often themes merged but I enjoyed it. I appreciated that it wasn't love at first sight and it wasn't easy. Rory's complicated internal conflicts kept her from being completely honest with herself. 

Before you think it's a Hallmark movie, Harrison manages to tackle some tough subjects. (TW) Rory is dealing with the trauma of a sexual assault as a child and she still harbors resentment towards her mother, leading to a tumultuous relationship. Bodily autonomy is also wrapped up in the narrative as both Rory and her sister navigate their changing bodies—Rory's lycanthropy and Scarlett's pregnancy changes. 

While it's more little horror light or cozy horror, Such Sharp Teeth is fast-paced and hilarious, while still being beyond adorable. It's very female forward and about loving who you are. Comedy and horror is one of my favorite combinations and Harrison does it right.

Published March 29th 2022 by Flame Tree Press

Investigator Oscar Basaran travels to Kidney Island off the coast of Maine to document the negative effects of shadow flicker from wind turbines on residents living near the windmills, but is unprepared for what he encounters from the islanders.

Oscar’s research shows that sleep deprivation, light deficiency and ringing headaches brought on by the noise and constant strobe-like effect of the sun filtered through the spinning blades of the turbines brings on hallucinatory episodes for the closest neighbors to the machines.

Melody Larson’s elderly father nearly chokes to death after stuffing dandelion heads into his mouth. The Granberrys' pregnant cow repeatedly runs headlong into a fence post. Tatum Gallagher mourns her young son who vanished more than a year ago, presumed swept out to sea by a wave while fishing on the rocky shore, but several people claim to see him appear only in the glimmer of the shadow flicker.

Aerosource, the energy corporation that owns the turbines, hired Oscar to investigate the neighbors’ claims, but the insurance agent shows no allegiance to the conglomerate, especially after learning a previous employee sent to the island a year before has disappeared without a trace.

When Oscar meets former island school science teacher Norris Squires, fired for teaching his students about the harmful effects of shadow flicker, he learns a theory regarding Aerosource that sounds too preposterous to believe.

While it seems the shadow flicker effect has driven some of the island’s animals crazy, is it possible it’s caused an even worse mental breakdown among the human inhabitants? Or is something more nefarious at work on the island?

As Oscar’s investigation deepens, he discovers the turbines create an unexpected phenomena kept secret by a select group of people on Kidney Island who have made a scientific breakthrough and attempt to harness its dark power.

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If you aren't familiar with shadow flicker, imagine a fan blade spinning with a bright light behind it. Now imagine that fan is up to 500 feet tall and it's between the windows of your house and the evening sun. That constant whir and light-dark-light pattern would be enough to drive anyone insane. 

Fictionally based on the true-life phenomenon of shadow flicker, the story follows investigator Oscar as he travels to Kidney Island on behalf of the Aerospace company to see if there really are ill effects on the residents from the turbines. After highly enjoying the author's winter-based novel, Snowball, I was thrilled to pick up Shadow Flicker. 

Horror frequently targets the small town and Kidney Island is no different. There are a ton of strange happenings on the island as both people and animals act erratically. At first, the symptoms of the shadow flicker fall into the expected territory—inability to sleep due to the hum, headaches from the flashing light, animals disturbed by the turbines. Then the true oddness is discovered. A child thought to have drowned in the water is seen again, but only in the flicker. Time actually stops for one of the island's residents. Oscar is treated like the outsider he is and slowly sinks into the oddness and delirium affecting the area and its inhabitants. 

As with Snowball, this takes about another bizarre turn with its slow burn. More and more of the characters' backgrounds start to creep to the surface. Where you think the novel will lead, is not where it takes you. I didn't dislike the ending but it definitely took it in a direction that I was not expecting. 

Published February 8th 2022 by Tor Nightfire 

(first published May 7th 2019)

NATURE IS CALLING—but they shouldn't have answered.

Travel journalist and mountaineer Nick Grevers awakes from a coma to find that his climbing buddy, Augustin, is missing and presumed dead. Nick’s own injuries are as extensive as they are horrifying. His face wrapped in bandages and unable to speak, Nick claims amnesia—but he remembers everything.

He remembers how he and Augustin were mysteriously drawn to the Maudit, a remote and scarcely documented peak in the Swiss Alps.

He remembers how the slopes of Maudit were eerily quiet, and how, when they entered its valley, they got the ominous sense that they were not alone.

He remembers: something was waiting for them...

But it isn’t just the memory of the accident that haunts Nick. Something has awakened inside of him, something that endangers the lives of everyone around him…

It’s one thing to lose your life. It’s another to lose your soul.

FROM THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING SENSATION THOMAS OLDE HEUVELT comes a thrilling descent into madness and obsession as one man confronts nature—and something even more ancient and evil answers back. 

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Nick Greeves wakes in the hospital bandaged and with no memory of what occurred to his climbing partner, Augustin on the Maudit in the Swiss Alps. Broken both physically and mentally, Nick's Adonis face is now craggy and sharp. Nick's boyfriend, Sam, is also trying to come to grips with knowing that Nick will never be the same in spite of surgeries to fix the defect. He's attempting to be grateful that Nick is still alive, but it's challenging with Nick's continued silence about what happened on that mountain. With Nick's face wrapped like a mummy from a tomb, Sam is desperately trying to get Nick to let his guards down.

Our story doesn't start that way though. It starts with a terrifying encounter with Sam's sister, Julia, as she wakes in the middle of the night seeing shadow people standing at the bottom of the stairs. Every time she takes her eyes off them, even to blink, they get closer...and closer. Whoo. Easily one of the most terrifying intros I've read.

There's no denying that Echo is dark and unsettling. The first chapter only solidifies that fact with its shades on the stairs waking nightmare. It can't possibly continue that momentum so what Thomas Olde Heuvelt presents instead is a character-driven narrative. He gets us completely invested in Sam and Nick's strained relationship as we attempt to empathize with both sides. It's difficult at first to like Nick as a character. He's reserved and withdrawn, even from Sam who despondently loves him. Echo toys with our emotions in the relationship between the two. It's romantic and heartbreaking and we can only watch as it plays out.

Told in bits and pieces from diary passages, manuscripts, and notes, we eventually get the story of what happened on the mountain and thus to Augustin. Echo is a lengthy novel with an excess of technical climbing information. While that lends credence to the story, I think it could have benefited from a good editing chop. The pacing also falters at times. We get that great opening, some creepy moments, and then not a whole lot of anything in the middle. The ending, however, sees it all crashing down around us.

Having been less than impressed with the follow-through of Hex, I was reluctant to pick up Echo but I don't regret it. It's not an in-your-face fright but a steady, steep (if you'll excuse the pun) climb to the peak. A complex building of pressure with imagery both brutal and beautiful.  There's a fantastic tie-in of folklore and small village superstition, especially with the birds. I don't want to give anything away as this is one that needs experiencing but sometimes the abyss stares back.

Published March 22nd, 2022 by Titan Books

Jack Corman is failing at life. Jobless, jaded, and facing the threat of eviction, he’s also reeling from the death of his father, one-time film director Bob Corman. Back in the eighties, Bob poured his heart and soul into the creation of his 1986 puppet fantasy The Shadow Glass, but the film flopped on release and Bob was never the same again.

In the wake of Bob’s death, Jack returns to his decaying childhood home, where he is confronted with the impossible — the puppet heroes from The Shadow Glass are alive, and they need his help. Tipped into a desperate quest to save the world from the more nefarious of his father’s creations, Jack teams up with an excitable fanboy and a spiky studio exec to navigate the labyrinth of his father’s legacy and ignite a Shadow Glass resurgence that could, finally, do Bob proud.

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Eighties babies, do you remember the magic of your childhood watching Atreyu set off on his journey to save the Empress or Jen and Kira on the quest to retrieve the crystal? What about Sarah's trek to the center of the labyrinth or Jack traveling to Darkness' castle to release the unicorn? All of those movies that we watched a million times over wishing that magic was real and that we, too, had an epic fantasy quest that we were destined for. Listen to me when I tell you, this book will bring all those feelings back for you in your monotonous, suburban 8-5 life. Maybe that's a bit harsh but can it compare to a grand adventure? The Shadow Glass is just that; a grand adventure where fiction meets fact.

In 1986, Bob Corman constructed a world of warring tribes of creatures in Iri and brought them to life on film. While the film didn't do so well upon release, it became a sensation years later as all the kids who grew up watching it, well, grew up idolizing the film. We're talking Comic cons and cosplaying the characters that ingrained themselves upon young hearts and minds. Poor Bob never got to see it play out though and instead spent his life drinking his bitterness away. Towards the end, Bob became seemingly confused, frequently stating that the characters and worlds were real—the apparent ramblings of a senile mind for all to see. He was so enamored of this other world that his own son Jack spent his life feeling unloved and forgotten, becoming quite bitter himself.

Now before you go feeling too sorry for Jack, the only reason he's even in this story is that he's returned to his father's home after his death. He's not there to close the estate or reminisce about his father. He's there hoping to retrieve one of his father's treasured puppets to sell to pay off his own debts. Yeah, he's a peach. Only he discovers that his father wasn't so crazy as the world of Iri literally comes to life in the attic of his father's house. Jack is quickly thrown back into the memories of his childhood as he and his newfound nerdy motley crew set out to find all the pieces of the mirror that will put Iri back to right. 

The Shadow Glass was a surprise to me, to be honest. I went into it with no preconceived notions and found myself absolutely unable to set it down. By the end of the first few chapters, I was invested in Iri and its inhabitants and in Jack's tale as well. There is a bit of everything we 80s kids loved about the epic fantasies of our youth—action, adventure, great villains and even greater heroes, high stakes, humor, and even the unexpected emotional tug on your heartstrings. The stories of our youth never shied away from the darkness and neither does The Shadow Glass. Josh Winning weaves all the enchantment with hard topics such as Bob's alcoholism and Jack's feelings of abandonment. There is absolutely no doubt that he knows his fantasy tropes and employs them liberally. Instead of these tired tropes feeling unoriginal, he manages to spin them into something familiar yet new, rocking us 80s babies in the cradle of the stories that we cut our teeth on. 

Published June 7, 2022 by Black Spot Books

The skeletons in the closet have nothing on the one in your backyard.

Freshly divorced and grieving the death of her father, Josie Lauer has caged herself inside her home. To cope with her losses, Josie follows a strict daily routine of work, playing with her dog, Po, and trying to remember to eat a decent meal—and ending each night by drinking copious amounts of vodka. In other words, she is not coping at all.

Everything changes when Josie wakes to find a small shrub has sprouted in her otherwise dirt backyard the morning after yet another bender. Within hours, the vine-like plant is running amok—and it’s brought company. The appearance of the unwieldy growth has also heralded the arrival of a busybody new neighbor who insists on thrusting herself into Josie’s life. The neighbor Josie can deal with. The talking skeleton called Skelly that has perched itself in Josie’s backyard on a throne made of vines, however, is an entirely different matter.

As the strangely sentient plant continues to grow and twist its tendrils inside Josie’s suddenly complicated life, Josie begins to realize her new neighbor knows a lot more about the vines and her bizarre new visitor than she initially lets on. There’s a reason Skelly has chosen to appear in Josie’s suddenly-blooming backyard and insists on pulling her out of her carefully kept self-isolation. All Josie has to do is figure out what that reason is—and she has only a few days to do it, or else she might find herself on the wrong side of catastrophe.

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Tiffany Mueret came onto my radar thanks to A Flood of Posies, a very strange but disorienting novel about two sisters, a flooded world, and the creatures that lie beneath the waters. It was definitely an experience but while mesmeric, it's one of those that you aren't sure if it's happening in the characters head or if it's really happening.. I felt that exact same way while reading Little Bird. 

To start with, Mueret undoubtedly writes substantial characters. As with A Flood of Posies, her main character is a complicated woman with complex emotions.  In this case, Josie Lauer is grieving after the death of her father and the end of her marriage. She sequesters herself inside her house with only her dog, Po, for company and seeks to drown herself each night in copious amounts of vodka so she doesn't have to face her grief. She's crotchety and unsociable, with her only interactions being by email for the company she runs, which ironically is teaching companies how to communicate effectively to solve problems with their clients. Being in customer service myself, I can certainly understand the duality of being "on" professionally and hating people in private. That sounds horrid but anyone front-facing in their jobs understands, so I completely get Josie.  

One day, what Josie thinks is a weed pops up in her backyard. Shortly thereafter, a new neighbor appears; a very assertive and cheerfully demanding neighbor, who doesn't get that Josie just wants to be left alone. Then up shoots Skelly, a philosophical sentient skeleton sitting on throne made of vines in the backyard. Suddenly, Josie is no longer alone and can't shut everyone out. 

While the interactions of Skelly the skeleton and Josie are unquestionably interesting and oftimes humourous, I kept waiting for something additional to happen. The majority of the book is spent with Skelly and Josie in conversation or Josie in her on head. While I had expectations at first, I wouldn't say it is horror. There's an assuredly supernatural aspect to it but I'd still file it somewhere under dark fantasy or magical realism than horror. There's nothing inherently scary about it—even the skeleton is described as a Halloween decoration or toy. It's about grief, tough emotions, and having to  and sometimes those can be scary enough.

Published June 1, 2021 by Waldron Lake Books

Magic may be secret, but it’ll kill you anyway.

Small town mayor’s assistant Elizabeth has enough on her plate grieving her father’s suicide. She doesn’t need his stash of magical knowledge in the attic. She doesn’t need the hidden supernatural subculture of monsters it pulls her into. And she certainly doesn’t need hints that her father’s madness might have been a smokescreen for something far darker.

But uncovering her father’s secrets could be the only way Elizabeth can stop a string of suspicious suicides… if the local wizard doesn’t rip the memories out of her mind, first.

Wizards, right?

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Ordinary humans stumbling into the magical world isn't anything new, though usually those humans are far from ordinary as they typically have yet unfulfilled magical powers. Not so in A Grimoire for Gamblers. Our protagonist is truly human and has only stumbled into the magical world after the death of her father many years after admitting himself into a psychiatric ward. 

I appreciated that Elizabeth doesn't have any powers. She's been thrown into this world and she doesn't mysteriously pick everything up through mitosis. As with most urban fantasy MCs, she's a little bit snarky and we spend a lot of time in her head listening to her as she tries to figure this all out. She doesn't immediately merge with this new world and spends a lot of the time wondering if her father's supposed insanity isn't genetic. At this point though, why not try a spell to see and she does, with the help of computers, scanners, and even a Cricut. Annnd promptly sets herself on fire. Okay, so she's muddling through the best she can but she's smart and she'll figure it out. 

True to the rules of urban fantasy, the world-building is enmeshed in the "real" world as we humans know it. Oh sure, there are some interesting locales such as the casino where humans are gambling with their souls and a fighting arena where supernatural creatures are pitted against each other. At the same time, the vast majority of this book takes place right here, in the city Elizabeth knows. 

There were a few holes in the plot I think, or at least in the plot devices. While the toy voodoo train set up in the attic was neat, I didn't really understand what it had to do with everything. Why would her dad have a train linked to the real-world train? And some of the characters weren't really explained. Gravelings? Vampiric Spirits? Also, from the first pages, Elizabeth mentions her boyfriend and thinks about him throughout the novel. He's not even really in the book other than her thoughts, so what was the point of having her in a relationship? 

All in all, though, this was a pretty solid urban fantasy. It managed to be very unique in a lot of ways, including the technology-boosted magic. Work smarter, not harder, right? There were obviously some things that didn't work as well for me, but as this is the first in the series, I'm not going to judge it too harshly. It's hard to do urban fantasy that hasn't been done before and this is a solid foundation for the series to continue.

Publication date: March 31st, 2022

Links: Amazon | Goodreads

Turn the lights on. Lock the door. Things are about to get SERIOUSLY SCARY!

The brand new must-read middle-grade novel from the author of super-spooky Crater Lake. Perfect for 9+ fans of R.L.Stine’s Goosebumps

It's basically the worst school detention ever. When classmates (but not mate-mates) Hallie, Angelo, Gustav and Naira are forced to come to school on a SATURDAY, they think things can’t get much worse. But they’re wrong. Things are about to get seriously scary.

What has dragged their teacher underground? Why do the creepy caretakers keeping humming the tune to Itsy Bitsy Spider? And what horrors lurk in the shadows, getting stronger and meaner every minute…? Cut off from help and in danger each time they touch the ground, the gang’s only hope is to work together. But it’s no coincidence that they're all there on detention. Someone has been watching and plotting and is out for revenge…

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Dread Wood follows Angelo and classmates Hallie, Gustav, and Naria as they head to detention on a Saturday. They are only told to wear PE clothes and shoes for "outdoor activities" so they are figuring they'll be stuck doing chores around the place. Gustav is described as "walking chaos", Naria being the "uptight, overachiever", and Hallie as "vegetarian, an LGBTQ+ ally, and welcomer of refugees." None of them are friends but they are all stuck in this together. 

It doesn't take any time for the tension to really get ratcheted up. Mr. Canton is in charge of this Back On Track session as it's called but he quickly goes missing while looking for the groundskeeper. They find Mr. C again, but something sucks him straight into the ground and he's gone, clawing and scraping at the grass that is sucking him under.  From there it's a mad dash of twists and turns, as these four play a terrifying game of survival.

I appreciated that there was more to the characters than at first anticipated. They are so much more than their first takes and as they find a way to work together, all these unexpected qualities shine through. As it turns out, they all have personal struggles and it actually bonds them together as they learn more about each other. There are some pretty serious issues that they are grappling with: bullying, poverty, disability, and living up to parental pressures. It's all handled with grace and a lot of quippy humor.

Don't think just because it's middle-grade that it doesn't have its share of chills and thrills! Arachnophobes may want to bypass this one. (There are spides on the covers so no spoiler there.)  Dread Wood is a fun, action-filled romp through creepy town! 

 

About the Author

Jennifer Killick is the author of Crater Lake, the Alex Sparrow series, and middle-grade sci-fi adventure Mo, Lottie and the Junkers. She regularly visits schools and festivals, and her books have three times been selected for The Reading Agency's Summer Reading Challenge. She lives in Uxbridge, in a house full of children, animals and Lego. When she isn't busy mothering or step-mothering (which isn't often) she loves to read, write and run, as fast as she can.

Twitter: @JenniferKillick