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
The horror doesn’t jump. It settles in. And by the time you feel it, it’s already under your skin. Wolf Worm sits comfortably in the top tier of Kingfisher’s work. It shows an author who has refined her craft, who knows exactly what kind of horror she wants to write and … Wolf Worm by T. Kingfisher: A Gothic Horror That Crawls Under Your SkinRead more
The sound is driving them mad. The silence is even worse. Dan Howarth writes with a specific kind of fury. It is the sound of a steamroller on asphalt, relentless and flattening. For fans of horror fiction, being caught beneath it is a privilege. His latest novella, Drone, proves he is … Drone by Dan Howarth Review: Rural Horror at Its Most RelentlessRead more
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
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
The haunting was always real. Thompson just gave it a name. Social horror has always worked best when the monster points somewhere. At something. At us. Tamika Thompson’s debut novel, The Curse of Hester Gardens, published by Erewhon Books in March 2026, does exactly that, and it does it with … The Ghost Is the System: Tamika Thompson on The Curse of Hester Gardens and the Horror America BuiltRead more
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
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
What if saving the world meant killing its saviour? What happens when a man convinced he’s hearing the voice of God sets out to murder Jesus Christ before the ministry can begin? David Scott Hay’s The Butcher of Nazareth (check out our interview with David here) takes this provocative premise and … The Butcher of Nazareth Review: David Scott Hay’s Violent Theological MasterpieceRead more
A ghost story about exile, family secrets, and the things we leave behind. Olesya Salnikova Gilmore’s third novel, The Fortune Tellers of Rue Daru, trades epic mythology for something quieter and more potent: a ghost story about exile, a grandmother’s buried secrets, and a young woman learning that the dead … The Fortune Tellers of Rue Daru: A Novel of Ghosts and Exile in 1920s ParisRead more
Forget what you think you know about vampire fiction. The Evans women run a funeral parlor, bury the dead, and handle the ones that won’t stay down. The thing about small towns is that they all have a family people whisper about. The ones who’ve been there forever, who run … Bless Your Heart Review: The Cozy Horror Novel That Serves Blood and Sweet Tea in Equal MeasureRead more
She’s Not the Final Girl. She’s Why There Isn’t One. Amber Dean’s debut burns with the kind of dark energy that doesn’t ask for permission. This is not a book for everyone. It will bother some readers. It should. The kind of female rage explored here is not the kind … Hysterical by Amber Dean: When Obsession Eats Itself AliveRead more
Some monsters wear sequins. Some wear scalpels. Hache Pueyo writes about both. We carry our childhood horrors in the strangest places. In the hitch of a prosthetic limb. In the way we flinch when someone touches us too fast. In the quiet acceptance that the monsters who broke us might … Cabaret in Flames, Consent, Consumption and Chattering Teeth: Hache Pueyo’s Return to the MonstrousRead more
Her past was buried. Their marriage was the grave. In Michael Botur’s gripping new short story, Truth & Reconciliation, a couple’s attempt to save their marriage through therapy uncovers a secret tied to South Africa’s darkest days. Vaughn lives in fear of his wife Serena’s violent mood swings, born from a … Truth & Reconciliation: A Short Story of Apartheid’s Ghosts and a Marriage Built on LiesRead more
What if love, pushed to its limits, creates the very thing it fears most? What does it mean to love someone so completely that you would reshape the natural world for them? And what happens when that reshaping becomes its own kind of violence? These questions sit at the heart … A Review of Kirsten Kaschock’s An Impossibility of Crows: Motherhood, Monsters, and the Crows of LetortRead more
