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Olivie Blake’s Gifted & Talented Review: A Magical Succession Story

Olivie Blake’s Gifted & Talented Review: A Magical Succession Story

The real curse isn’t magic; it’s the crushing weight of your own unrealised potential. Olivie Blake’s Gifted & Talented takes the dysfunctional family saga and injects it with a dose of magical realism, corporate backstabbing, and the specific kind of melancholy that haunts former child prodigies. The novel follows the three Wren … Olivie Blake’s Gifted & Talented Review: A Magical Succession StoryRead more

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2025 Middle Grade Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Full Reviews & Ratings

2025 Middle Grade Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Full Reviews & Ratings

The best Middle Grade horror doesn’t just scare kids. It helps them process real pain. The Middle Grade Bram Stoker Award category remains young. The Horror Writers Association launched it only recently. But the preliminary ballot for 2025 already shows an impressive range. Young Blood has been rating and ranking … 2025 Middle Grade Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Full Reviews & RatingsRead more

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Killarney Lake Massacre Review: Why This Splatterpunk Novel Hits Harder Than Its Urban Legend

Killarney Lake Massacre Review: Why This Splatterpunk Novel Hits Harder Than Its Urban Legend

Gore with a pulse. Nunchaku with a point. Splatterpunk meets mother-daughter drama in Kumar Sivasubramanian’s Killarney Lake Massacre, a horror novel that subverts urban legend conventions with absurd humour and genuine emotional weight. When Nandini ventures into the woods to debunk the myth of Sally Pencilneck, a supernatural killer wielding nunchaku, … Killarney Lake Massacre Review: Why This Splatterpunk Novel Hits Harder Than Its Urban LegendRead more

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Bar Fridman-Tell’s Honeysuckle: A Flower Girl’s Gilded Cage needs final edirt

Bar Fridman-Tell’s Honeysuckle: A Flower Girl’s Gilded Cage needs final edirt

Bar Fridman-Tell’s Honeysuckle: A Flower Girl’s Gilded Cage A Review of the Dark Botanical Fantasy Taking Root in Readers’ Minds The most unsettling stories often start with the gentlest of premises. In her debut novel Honeysuckle, Bar Fridman-Tell presents a premise that could be plucked from a child’s sweetest daydream: a … Bar Fridman-Tell’s Honeysuckle: A Flower Girl’s Gilded Cage needs final edirtRead more

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Alpha: Review: Julia Ducournau’s Latest Lacks Raw Ferocity

Alpha: Review: Julia Ducournau’s Latest Lacks Raw Ferocity

Love and negligence collide in Alpha, a sombre, visually stunning family horror. Expectation is a brutal critic. For a filmmaker like Julia Ducournau, who arrived fully formed with the incendiary Raw in 2016, the weight of anticipation becomes almost impossible to manage. That debut, a cannibalistic coming-of-age story, announced a director unafraid … Alpha: Review: Julia Ducournau’s Latest Lacks Raw FerocityRead more

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Defensive Wounds by James Everington: A Collection That Changes You

Defensive Wounds by James Everington: A Collection That Changes You

Your home is safe. Your mind is not. James Everington has a habit of misplacing your expectations. (along with T shirts, yeah it still hurts James) His previous collection, Falling Over, introduced a writer who prefers the unsettling angle, the quiet moment that turns strange. With Defensive Wounds, his second collection from … Defensive Wounds by James Everington: A Collection That Changes YouRead more

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The Brentford Trilogy (All 9 of Them): A Resplendent Robert Rankin Retrospective

The Brentford Trilogy (All 9 of Them): A Resplendent Robert Rankin Retrospective

Robert Rankin called it a trilogy. He wrote nine books. He was right to do both Robert Rankin’s Brentford is a strange place. On the surface, it’s a quiet West London suburb. Below that surface, it’s a cosmic battlefield where aliens land, popes return from the dead, and the end … The Brentford Trilogy (All 9 of Them): A Resplendent Robert Rankin RetrospectiveRead more

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The 2025 YA Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Every Book Ranked and Reviewed

The 2025 YA Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Every Book Ranked and Reviewed

The 2025 YA Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Every Book Ranked and Reviewed The 2025 YA Bram Stoker Award preliminary ballot is out, and it is a stronger list than most years. Ten books. Four spots on the final ballot already confirmed. And a clear frontrunner that arguably deserves to … The 2025 YA Bram Stoker Award Preliminary Ballot: Every Book Ranked and ReviewedRead more

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Unshod Cackling and Naked by Tamika Thompson: 13 Short Stories That Refuse to Behave

Unshod Cackling and Naked by Tamika Thompson: 13 Short Stories That Refuse to Behave

Continuing my series of reviews that fell victim to my darkest depression days, today I bring back from the dead Tamika Thompson’s Unshod, Cackling, and Naked. In time for the release of her excellent debut novel, The Curse of Hester Gardens. And on the day we publish a fascinating interview … Unshod Cackling and Naked by Tamika Thompson: 13 Short Stories That Refuse to BehaveRead more

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Nowhere Burning Review: Catriona Ward’s Brilliant Premise, But Blurry Execution

Nowhere Burning Review: Catriona Ward’s Brilliant Premise, But Blurry Execution

The concept burns bright. The novel, unfortunately, smoulders. The prose is beautiful. The thematic ambition is undeniably massive. The execution simply falls flat. Some sanctuaries demand a price in blood, and this one simply asks for too much of your patience. Nowhere Burning Review: Catriona Ward’s Brilliant Premise, But Blurry … Nowhere Burning Review: Catriona Ward’s Brilliant Premise, But Blurry ExecutionRead more