You’ve heard of mushroom horror? Well, make room for its new cousin: algae horror. Anyone who has experienced the notorious “red tides” off of the United States’ southern coasts knows just how harmful, creepy, and off-putting large-scale algal blooms can be. But Trang Thahn Tran (author of She Is a Haunting) takes the red tide to new supernatural heights in their latest YA horror novel, They Bloom at Night, which came out earlier this month. Continue reading Review of They Bloom at Night—Algae Horror
Category: Genre
Review of Beneath the Poet’s House—A Poe-inspired Thriller
It’s not unusual these days to see modern horror stories inspired by the works of Edgar Allan Poe. Here on The Gothic Library, I’ve reviewed such books as T. Kingfisher’s fantastical reimagining of “The Fall of the House of Usher” and a YA anthology that retells a variety of Poe stories for the next generation. But Christa Carmen takes this idea a step further by drawing not just on Poe’s fiction but also from his real life—and even more obscurely, his romantic and literary relationship with the poet Sarah Helen Whitman—in her suspense novel Beneath the Poet’s House, which came out back in December. Whether you’re a hardcore Edgar Allan Poe nerd or you just like your fiction paired with fun facts about fascinating historical figures, Beneath the Poet’s House is a great way to learn some literary history while also experiencing some serious thrills and chills. Continue reading Review of Beneath the Poet’s House—A Poe-inspired Thriller
Review of The River Has Roots—Magic and Murder Ballads
If you’re into folk music or murder ballads at all, you have probably heard at least one version of the classic ballad sometimes known as “The Two Sisters” or “The Bonny Swans.” The song has many variations, but the lyrics generally tell the story of one sister who drowns the other out of romantic jealousy. The body of the dead sister is then made into a musical instrument and sings out her accusation of murder. Amal El-Mohtar takes this ballad as inspiration for fantasy novella The River Has Roots, but flips the story to explore both sisterly and romantic love in a bite-sized tale with beautifully lyrical prose and a fascinating magic system. The book comes out next Wednesday, March 4. Continue reading Review of The River Has Roots—Magic and Murder Ballads
Review of Dark Archives—Macabre Nonfiction
Books bound in human skin—it’s a gruesome image and one most often tied to legends of occult treatises or murderous keepsakes. But are all of the macabre legends out there really true? How can you tell the difference between leather made from human skin and that made from animals? And, historically, what kind of books have actually gotten this treatment? Megan Rosenbloom, the world’s foremost expert on the subject, explores these questions and more in her book Dark Archives: A Librarian’s Investigation into the Science and History of Books Bound in Human Skin, which came out back in 2020. I don’t breeze through nonfiction books quite the way I do with fiction, but I’ve long appreciated Megan Rosenbloom’s work with the Order of the Good Death and I can never resist a good book about the history of books. Though it took me a while to get around to it, I found Dark Archives to be fascinating, informative, and definitely worth the read! Continue reading Review of Dark Archives—Macabre Nonfiction
Review of The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years—Multi-faceted Hauntings
Looking for a beautiful, lyrical haunted house story unlike anything you’ve read before? The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years by Shubnum Khan came out last January and was first on my list most anticipated 2024 reads, but I didn’t get to it until the end of the year. However, I’m glad I waited until I was able to take my time and savor this slow and atmospheric story! Continue reading Review of The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years—Multi-faceted Hauntings
Review of The Spite House—An Emotional Haunting
Need a good haunted house book for Halloween that will genuinely send shivers down your spine? Johnny Compton’s debut horror novel, The Spite House, which came out last year, features a desperate dad who moves with his two daughters into a strangely built house haunted by a handful of ghosts and generations of spite. Continue reading Review of The Spite House—An Emotional Haunting
Review of The Marrow Thieves—Indigenous Dystopia
Would an apocalyptic future cause history to repeat itself? Cherie Dimaline explores this question in terms of the persecution of Canada’s indigenous peoples in her YA dystopia novel The Marrow Thieves, which came out back in 2017. Continue reading Review of The Marrow Thieves—Indigenous Dystopia
Review of Lady Macbeth—A Grimdark Reimagining
“Who would have thought the old man to have so much blood in him?” Lady Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s most memorable female characters, but what is it that motivates this murderess in the Scottish Play? Ava Reid uses this Shakespearean drama as loose inspiration for her gritty medieval fantasy tale Lady Macbeth, which came out last month. Continue reading Review of Lady Macbeth—A Grimdark Reimagining
Review of Mortimer and the Witches—Niche New York History
New York largely stayed out of the witch trial hysteria that plagued much of New England in the seventeenth century. But nearly two centuries later, New York City was engaged in a different kind of witch hunt: cracking down on the working-class women who earned their bread as fortune tellers on the Lower East Side. This movement was led in large part by the journalists who entertained their readers by seeking out these women’s services only to write mocking, derisive articles about their experience in the papers. In Mortimer and the Witches, a new nonfiction book that came out earlier this year, historian and NYC tour guide Marie Carter interweaves the biography of one such journalist with a study of the fortune tellers whose livelihoods he so reviled. Continue reading Review of Mortimer and the Witches—Niche New York History
Review of I Was a Teenage Slasher
Have you ever wondered what goes through a slasher’s mind as he goes on his bloody rampage? If you’ve read any of Stephen Graham Jones’s other novels (such as My Heart is a Chainsaw or The Only Good Indians), you’ll notice that Jones is fascinated by classic slasher films and their tropes and often uses these topics as a lens through which to explore deeper issues. In his latest horror novel, I Was a Teenage Slasher, which came out last month, he returns to this topic once again but from a new perspective: that of a reluctant killer. Continue reading Review of I Was a Teenage Slasher