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Review: A House With Good Bones by T. Kingfisher

15 Sunday Oct 2023

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Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐/5

Haunted house stories may be my favorite horror sub-genre. Some of my favorite horror books—99 Fear Street, The Haunting of Hill House, The Witching Hour—are either about or set in big, old spooky houses. So it’s no surprise that this title, A House With Good Bones by T Kingfisher, called to me.

Since finishing the book, I’ve learned that T. Kingfisher is the adult fiction pseudonym of children’s author and illustrator Ursula Vernon. Whether she’s doing picture books, webcomics, or Southern Gothic mysteries like A House With Good Bones, it’s clear that she has a gift for storytelling and imagery by any name.

When Sam Montgomery, an archaeo-entymologist, returns to her family home in North Carolina after being furloughed from her dig, she’s startled to find that it seems to have gone backward in time. The rooms her mom had once painted with bright colors are now covered in bland off-whites, and artwork long stored in the back corners of the attic is up on the walls again. In fact the house looks just like it did back when Sam’s grandmother, a rose-obsessed old lady with strong traditional (AKA racist and patriarchal) values, owned it. Well, except for the vultures that now seem to be always watching the house. And Sam’s mom is different too—she’s anxious and jumpy, almost as if the ghost of Gran Mae is looking over her shoulder…As Sam tries to pinpoint a cause for her mother’s change in personality, she befriends the neighborhood handyman Phil, as well as Gayle, the nature-loving neighbor who was Gran Mae’s rival. As they help Sam try to learn the truth about her family, none of them suspects the terrible secrets overgrown by Gran Mae’s beloved rose bushes.

Having seen mixed reviews for A House With Good Bones ahead of reading it, I wasn’t sure what to expect. It turned out to be a very solid read. I really enjoyed Sam as a main character. A nerdy, plus-size protagonist who likes pineapple on pizza is all right with me. The interesting facts about bugs, birds and roses that she drops throughout the narrative added a fascinating flavor to what is altogether a familiarly-structured haunted house/garden mystery.

The story wraps up cleanly, with no obvious dangling plot threads. Kingfisher does a great job sprinkling bits of information throughout the story and bringing them back later in satisfying ways—like Edie’s notes to herself, and the mentions of the underground children as boogeymen wielded by Gran Mae. The final part of the book where Sam and her party finally expose and are forced to deal with the thing that’s really haunting the house is genuinely creepy and unsettling in a way that I didn’t see coming.

A House With Good Bones does have some minor weaknesses. I didn’t love the fourth-wall breaking Sam occasionally engages in as the narrator—where she turns aside to the reader to say things like, “Don’t judge me,” or “I was under a lot of stress, okay?” I think perhaps this was meant to come off as self-consciousness, a humanizing character trait for Sam, but it was annoying enough to take me out of the story. Additionally, the process of Sam trying to learn the cause of her mom’s off-ness felt slightly drawn-out to me, though not to a point where I wanted to put the book down.

But there is so much to love about this book. The relationship between Sam and her mom is great—warm and companionable, with enough mother-daughter banter to keep it from being sickeningly sweet. It’s clear that part of their bond comes from the shared experience of each growing up in their own way under the iron fist of Gran Mae. And I really like the little touch of Sam finding a way to understand and empathize with her grandmother by the end. This is a novel that quietly says a whole lot about dealing with generational trauma, a theme that will resonate with basically anyone who’s ever had a family.

This novel of vultures, roses and ladybugs pulls the reader in with its Southern charm and good humor, and then gets under the skin with its creeping sense of dread as the situation at the Montgomery house slowly deteriorates. An easy four stars. This is my first T. Kingfisher novel, but I do forsee myself becoming a repeat customer.

Are you a T. Kingfisher/Ursula Vernon fan? What did you think of A House With Good Bones by T Kingfisher? What’s your FAVORITE haunted house book? Step into my comments and we’ll talk about it!

Review: 6 Amazon Original Creature Feature Novellas

08 Sunday Oct 2023

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At the end of September, Amazon released the Creature Feature Collection on its Kindle and Audible platforms. This assemblage of horror novellas features spine-chilling stories from six acclaimed best-selling authors, and they’re all free for Kindle Unlimited and Amazon Prime members. With their eye-catching covers and appealing price tag, of course I got my hands on them pretty much immediately. In this article, these six mini-books get six mini-reviews.

“It Waits in the Woods” by Josh Malerman

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

I’m a sucker for a story about a girl alone in a forest, so this was the first of the Creature Feature Collection that I went for.

When Brenda hears a local legend about a faceless man inhabiting the national forest where her sister went missing, she thinks there may be more truth to the tale than the police believe. Could these rumors of a mournful hermit who won’t stop killing until he finds a new face really be based in reality? And more importantly, could they lead Brenda to her sister? With no one to trust but herself, Brenda ventures out into the forest alone to find out.

This story was my vibe through and through. Creepy shit in the woods is my jam, and I loved the urban legend and filmmaker aspects to this story as well. If you liked The Blair Witch Project, or Stephen King’s The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, then chances are you’d be into this. I highly recommended the audiobook, Lauren Ezzo does an incredible job narrating. I would listen to this around a campfire.

“Ankle Snatcher” by Grady Hendrix

⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Pretty much his whole life, Marcus has never gotten out of bed at night without turning on the lights. He knows it’s silly. Completely silly. But ever since his father claimed that Marcus’s mother was killed by a monster he called “the ankle snatcher,” Marcus can’t get the idea out of his head that something could reach out from the darkness beneath his bed and pull him under. Deep down he knows how ridiculous that superstition is. There’s no way the Ankle Snatcher can be real. Right?

Though “what if men who were convicted of murdering women were actually framed by the boogeyman” isn’t my favorite concept for a horror story, I can’t argue with the execution. This was well-paced and genuinely creepy. I enjoyed reading it even though it wasn’t my favorite of this collection.

“Best of Luck” by Jason Mott

⭐⭐⭐⭐/5

When Barry’s best friend Will shows up brandishing a shotgun, Barry isn’t quite sure what to do. He knows Will has had a rough few years, and perhaps it’s natural for Will to want to lash out at his friend whose life has been so good in comparison. But when Will starts talking about the voice in his head whispering that all his misfortune is Barry’s fault, Barry knows he’ll need to be very lucky indeed to get out of this situation.

For a story that’s basically just 30 pages of two dudes talking, “Best of Luck” was riveting. Mott does an incredible job keeping that string of tension pulled taut throughout the scene, so it’s impossible to look away. And I didn’t see the ending coming at all. To be honest, though, I didn’t find it very scary—it mostly just made me sad.

“Big Bad” by Chandler Baker

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

As Rachel and Sam Strauss do their best to raise their two daughters in rural Oregon, tensions build between them. Rachel, a career academic, has been the main breadwinner for years and is always traveling to conferences, while Sam has put his career on the back burner to prioritize caring for their kids. Neither spouse is the person the other one fell in love with. When a stranger shows up at their front door one evening looking for a place to stay, Sam does his best to turn him away. He’s so sick of always having to be the bad guy.

I really, really liked “Big Bad.” The story is fairly short, but it packs in a lot of plot. Shifting viewpoints keep the reader guessing as to what secrets the characters could be hiding, and the twists and turns subvert any expectations that may develop in the first few pages. Each member of the family has their own unique perspective and voice, yet the story keeps a consistent tone and level of suspense throughout. This is the first thing I’ve read by Chandler Baker, and I’m really excited now to check out more of her work.

“In Bloom” by Paul Tremblay

⭐️⭐️/5

When Heidi travels to Cape Cod to do research for a story about the noxious algae blooms taking over local waterways in the face of record-high summer temps, she’s not prepared for the story that her interview subject, Jimmy Lang, tells her. He was just a kid the last time something like this happened, but he was there, and he remembers. Heidi knows that these blooms can cause serious side effects like skin rashes and hallucinations, so that must have effected what Jimmy thinks he saw. After all, at the end of the day it’s just algae.

There were many good things about “In Bloom.” I liked the big Jaws vibes of a New England tourist town on the brink of a summertime disaster. I liked the flashback sequence of Jimmy’s story and his account of the years-ago disaster, of which no one else seems to have the same memory. I liked the idea of a climate change horror. However, the story ends just when it seems that all this setup is about to go somewhere. “In Bloom” is like a trip to an amusement park where you just drive around the block looking at the rides, think about parking and going in, then drive home instead and try to convince yourself you had a fun time.

“The Pram” by Joe Hill

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫/5

Following the miscarriage that derailed their happy-family plans, Willy and Marianne leave their Brooklyn apartment for a charming old home in rural Maine. They hope the change of scenery and lifestyle will help them heal. The surrounding land is so lovely, and the nearby general store so quaint. When Willy borrows an old pram to wheel his groceries home, he imagines what it would feel like to be a father out for a walk with his child. In fact he can almost hear the baby cooing. But there’s no way he can just wish a baby into existence. That’s impossible…isn’t it?

“The Pram” has this slow creep of unease that is deliciously haunting. The aesthetic of the house in the forest and the quaint town with its weird technophobic blood cult is perfect, and made me wish that this was a full-length novel. The grief that Marianne and Willy deal with over the loss of their baby felt very genuine, and it’s easy to root for them to succeed in their new home (even though this is a horror story and you know they’re doomed).

The one thing that took me out of this story, though, was near the end. The main character is having his inner monologue of terror, and blatantly spells out the supernatural thing that is implied by the text and the plot like it’s a completely normal conclusion to jump to. Subtlety isn’t required for me to enjoy a story, but in my opinion the lack of it here takes away from what is otherwise a good resolution to this stunning novella. That’s a pretty minor gripe, though. At the end of the day, I did enjoy “The Pram” very much and see myself revisiting this story when I need a quick, devastatingly spooky read.

What are your thoughts on these Creature Feature Collection novellas? Did you experience them in e-book or audiobook format? Get to the comments and tell me about your experience.

Review: The Butcher and the Wren by Alaina Urquhart

01 Sunday Oct 2023

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Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

I have not listened to the podcast Morbid, although I am no stranger to the true crime podcast genre. When I heard that this novel, The Butcher and the Wren, had been written by Alaina Urquhart, and that she was the co-host of Morbid by night and an autopsy technician by day, that sounded like exactly the type of book I’d be into.

I wanted to like The Butcher and the Wren. It has many of my main pop culture food groups: crime scene investigation, a serial killer, and a strong connection to a true crime podcast. However, there are two major blows that, for me, have rendered this novel incapacitated and ineffective.

In the humid haze of a New Orleans summer Dr. Wren Muller, medical examiner for the NOPD, hunts a brutal serial murderer who tortures his victims before dumping them in public locations. The only clues are those the killer wants them to find: taunting scraps of cryptic information, and a grimy coating of Louisiana swamp muck. Meanwhile, sadistic psychopath Jeremy stalks his classmate Emily, learning her habits so that he can kidnap her and hunt her for sport. As Wren pursues justice for Jeremy’s victims, it begins to feel like the murderer is speaking to her directly. What connection could Wren possibly share with this vicious butcher?

The Butcher and the Wren is beautifully paced. Short chapters, alternating in viewpoint between Jeremy and Wren, keep the action moving right along. I listened to the audiobook version of this (shoutout to narrators Sophie Amoss and Joe Knezevich for a great read) and finished it in less than a day.

The scenes where Wren and the police are investigating the crime scenes are the reason to keep reading. Urquhart does a great job showing off her knowledge of the autopsy table, while still keeping things accessible to readers who may not be familiar with true crime or crime fiction. There is enough forensic detail to be fascinating, but not so much that it threatens to steal the spotlight from the plot.

Unfortunately, from an understandable desire to create a serial killer who doesn’t come off as an antihero, Urquhart makes Jeremy so unlikeable that I couldn’t wait for the book to be over. There is this (rightfully held) mantra in the true crime podcast world that Serial Killers Are Not To Be Admired. There is a line between fascination and exaltation that needs to be held. But in attempting to hold her fictional character to this standard and making him purposely unlikeable, I feel like Urquhart kneecapped her own novel. Jeremy is too whiny to be remotely charming, too arrogant to be pitiful, and too incompetent to be a genius. There’s no way to even kind of root for him, which makes this novel far less interesting as a cat-and-mouse game between fugitive and investigator.

Then, The Butcher and the Wren ends so abruptly. Immediately upon finishing, I intended to give it a two-star rating. I got to the acknowledgments and shouted out loud, “That’s IT?!?!” I felt very let down and like I had wasted my time. But after giving myself time to think about the story, I realized that it had at least hooked me enough to get me upset that there wasn’t more of it. That deserves a little consideration.

Because, at the end of the day, this book does do some things well. This book made me double-check that all my doors and windows were locked before I went to bed at night. And the detailed chapters from the point of view of our morgue-dwelling protagonist were good enough that they made spending every other chapter with Jeremy almost bearable. I think his unlikability may not have bothered me as much if there had been less Jeremy and more Wren.

The Butcher and the Wren gets three stars from me. It’s not terrible for a debut novel. However, too much time spent with an unlikable POV character, and an ending that doesn’t really resolve much of anything meant that it just didn’t hit for me. It seems like this is supposed to be the first book in a series, which is bold for a first-time author. I think Urquhart can become a good writer if she sticks with it. I don’t think, though, that I liked Wren and Jeremy enough to pick up another book about them.

Are you a fan of Morbid? What did you think of The Butcher and the Wren? Leave a comment so we can chat about it!

Review: The Witching Hour by Anne Rice

10 Sunday Sep 2023

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Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐💫

I just finished Anne Rice’s expansive 1990 novel The Witching Hour, or as I like to call it, Sexghost: A Southern Gothic.

I tried and failed to read this book when I was seventeen. After having read the first three books of The Vampire Chronicles, to say I was obsessed would have been be a gross understatement. Rice pulled me into this darkly beautiful world of sexy immortals who had lots of adventures and inner turmoil. I wanted to be one of them so badly! So I went into The Witching Hour looking for more of that sort of feeling.

This novel, which gives an exhaustive description of each character’s entire life experience before much of anything plot-related happens, was not it. I got a little over a hundred pages in, then summer ended and I’m pretty sure I just left the book at my grandparents’ beach house.

Anne Rice ended up back on my radar recently, probably because of a podcast, so I figured it was time to give The Witching Hour another whirl. I did make it through to the end, though it felt like a slog at times. I’m really glad that I powered through, though, because this is a gorgeously crafted, luscious work of horror that deserves your time.

At a decaying house in New Orleans, an old woman sits on the porch. Both—the house as well as the woman—are rumored to be haunted. Across the continent in San Francisco bay, clairvoyant surgeon Rowan Mayfair rescues a man from the ocean. He returns to life with the power to see into the past of any object he touches. They’ll soon discover that their lives are already intertwined in extraordinary ways. In Anne Rice’s epic saga The Witching Hour, Rowan and Michael journey back to their home town of New Orleans to learn of the Mayfair legacy and how it’s connected to their destiny. This rich and artful history of the powerful Mayfair witch family tells a tale of forbidden romance, corruption, and an unbreakable pact with a supernatural force. Will Rowan’s powers be enough to save her from being consumed by her family’s past?

Some of the tropes in this book:
Bad Powers, Good People
Good Powers, Bad People
13 Is Unlucky
Tangled Family Tree
Switching POV
I Just Want To Be Normal
Medicate the Medium
Psychic Powers
Superior Successor
Powerful family

I’m really glad I experienced this book mostly in audiobook format. I have a hardback copy as well, and I read from that here and there, but mostly I listened to The Witching Hour on my earbuds. That was the right way to do it. While Rice’s imagery is vivid and haunting, the characters layered, and the plot built on a strong foundation of in-world history, that plot takes a REALLY REALLY LONG TIME to get moving. You have to put in a lot of time on that backstory. It was nice, then, to passively cruise through those parts while I went about my day taking care of my responsibilities.

Rice’s gorgeous prose is the saving grace of this work. It is rich and deep, like a decadent high-end dessert. When she describes the First Street house rotting in the New Orleans humidity, she engages every sense so that you swear you can feel the suffocating heat and smell the flowers growing wild in the neglected gardens there. Each chapter feels like a setpiece you could almost walk through.

And speaking of the house, it’s possible that I enjoyed reading about the house more than any of the actual characters (and I enjoyed the majority of the characters quite a bit). In a way, this book is like a really long, dark episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Early in the novel, we learn that the protagonist Michael enjoys “house movies,” films in which a grand old house figures prominently . This is definitely a house book.

One way The Witching Hour stands out as surprisingly progressive is in its portrayal of a lead female character with sexual agency, who really knows what she wants and voices it frankly. I like Rowan as a character quite a bit—even though the sex ghost stuff gets pretty bizarre there toward the end. We get it, Anne, you’re a kinky bitch.

On that note, there is a whole heap of problematic sex stuff in this novel. From incest that makes the Targaryens look like the Brady Bunch, to statuatory rape, to incredibly mind-boggling things I can’t mention for spoilers, The Witching Hour is filled with it. Rice did not shy away from sexual horror. Anyone who finds themselves upset by that brand of terror will not be into this book.

I was a bit bothered by the fact that, despite this book being set mostly in New Orleans, no black characters were developed in any meaningful way. The ones that do appear are either servants or just there to be atmospheric—like when Michael is walking through his childhood neighborhood noticing how rundown it’s become, and he realizes that no white people live in the area anymore. Some may argue that that’s likely accurate to New Orleans in the late 80s, but even if that’s the case, ouch. BIPOC representation wasn’t encouraged in fiction back then the way it is now, but still, I’m disappointed that Rice had the opportunity and didn’t take it.

Last gripe: Michael didn’t really need to put any effort into looking for answers, did he? Fortunately for him, Aaron is there to function as the Exposition Fairy, literally handing Michael the “How We Got Here” of it all in the form of a file on the Mayfair family. Rice doesn’t summarize the contents of this file from Michael’s point of view, oh no, she slaps the entirety of the file right into the middle of this book. It was already both dense and lengthy, but Rice made a decision between the main plot and dedicating space to the immensely detailed family history. Choosing to go for the history feels a little self-indulgent.

But then again, I can’t argue with the results. I was absolutely riveted by the time, 45 hours into the audiobook, that Lasher and Rowan were finally together in the same room having a conversation. There was so much buildup getting to that point, so many agonizing hours of varying eyewitness accounts and achingly detailed descriptions of everything. Somehow, though, Rice was able to summon with her beautiful voice a level of dramatic, disturbing horror that made the journey feel worth it. I felt well-rewarded for my time.

The Witching Hour by Anne Rice gets 4.5 stars from me. She took this story to some truly bold, horrifying places. I can’t count the number of times I muttered “what the fuck” out loud to myself while listening to it. It is dense and lush, and sometimes you’re just trucking along enjoying the scenery when SNAP! something darts out to bite you, and you’re like, “oh my god Anne Rice, what did you just do to me?” And while the novel could have benefitted from some abridging of the voluminous Mayfair family history in favor of the main plot, the result by the end was so enjoyable to me as a horror fan that I almost feel bad taking half a star away.

What are your thoughts on this book, or on Anne Rice as an author? Chat with me in the comments!

6 Public Domain Horror Novels You Can Read for Free Right Now

03 Sunday Sep 2023

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If you’re always chasing the next good scare, then you know what a dent that horror habit can put in your book budget. But it doesn’t always have to! Because we’ve been enchanted with scaring ourselves and each other for millennia, there are plenty of eerie tales out there in the public domain, just waiting to find a new home inside your brain. Read on for a list of legendary spine-chillers that you can find for free online whenever you want.

The Vampyre

Read The Vampyre free through Project Gutenberg

Conceived at the same Lake Geneva retreat where Mary Shelley famously penned Frankenstein, The Vampyre has the distinction of being the first English vampire story ever published — pre-dating Dracula by over 70 years. This tale written by Dr. John Polidori follows the independently wealthy gentleman Aubrey as he becomes acquainted, and travels around Europe, with the mysterious Lord Ruthven. As the nobleman’s debauchery escalates, Aubrey begins to understand that there may be a supernatural predator hiding behind Ruthven’s morose playboy façade.

The Night Land

Read The Night Land free through Project Gutenberg

You are on Earth in the far future. The sun is dead, and the remnants of humanity all live together in a giant metal pyramid. No one can go outside, as that would mean facing the inhuman (in some cases formerly human) monsters that live out there in the dark, waiting for the last of Earth’s volcanic energy to run itself out so that they might claim man’s last bastion for the darkness. This is the setup for William Hope Hodgson’s 1912 novel The Night Land, a work of fantastical horror that H.P. Lovecraft deemed unforgettable (if somewhat verbose) in its dark, macabre imagery. This somber future landscape is so captivating and influential that over a century later, writers are still churning out tales set in Hodgson’s haunting Night Land.

Frankenstein

Read Frankenstein free through Standard Ebooks

One of the most famous novels of the 19th century, Frankenstein was written while western Europe was experiencing a renaissance in the sciences, with new and seemingly groundbreaking discoveries being made practically every day. But what if one of those ambitious doctors decided to take on the ultimate villain: death? That’s the question that Mary Shelley, the mother of science fiction, explores in her heartbreaking and bone-chilling gothic tale of an ambitious medical student who must learn to face the consequences of his curiosity.

The Mysteries of Udolpho

Read The Mysteries of Udolpho free through Global Grey Ebooks

Love a dark romance set in a crumbling castle? How about forbidden love, fallen nobility and grand journeys through picturesque European vistas? If that sounds like your vibe, then Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho ticks all the boxes. This genre-defining late 18th century gothic novel follows Emily St. Aubert as she’s forced to move in with her aunt and her aunt’s shifty new husband to a remote castle in Northern Italy. Separated from her true love and fending off unwanted advances from a disgraced count, Emily’s life spirals into terror as she struggles to separate the ghosts that haunt the castle from those haunting her soul.

The Island of Doctor Moreau

Read The Island of Dr. Moreau free through Planet Ebook

You’ve never had a tropical island getaway like this. H.G. Wells explores what it would be like to be stranded in the South Pacific with a mad scientist and his creations in this extraordinarily dark 1896 sci-fi novel. It follows in the footsteps of Shelley, dealing with themes of playing god and what it means to be human, and building on them to probe at the ethical controversies surrounding late 19th century advances in science and medicine. Filled with bizarre monstrous humanoids and a sense of foreboding that settles in almost immediately and slowly builds, this surprisingly short work is a densely-packed grotesquerie that asks the still-timely question: Just because science can, does that mean it should?

The Dead Smile

Read “The Dead Smile” free through Digital Eel

Picture a grin that is so infectious, so evil in its stubborn persistence, that it lives on through generations. That’s the inspiration for “The Dead Smile,” Francis Marion Crawford’s masterful tale of a banshee, a vindictive corpse and a forbidden love. This short work of horror is perfect for the reader who loves poring over gorgeous prose while getting the creeps. Forty-four pages of concentrated poetic dread, this blood-chilling novella is quite potent in its ability to horrify as it delivers repeated gut-punches of shock and fear.

Any of these classics is your perfect companion for a stay at a cabin in the woods, or a dark, stormy night—and they don’t cost a cent. Be sure to light a fire (or turn on a space heater) to warm you while these dark tales chill your soul.

Do you have recommendations for public domain works of horror that aren’t mentioned here? Let me know so I can add them to my list!

Re-Read Review: The Burning (The Fear Street Saga #3) by R.L. Stine

27 Sunday Aug 2023

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This is part three of a three-part review of The Fear Street Saga by R.L. Stine. Click here for part 1, The Betrayal. Or click here for part 2, The Secret.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

The Fear Street Saga 3: The Burning was the first book in this trilogy that made it into my greasy little kid hands. I was in the fourth grade at the time, and that month our teacher assigned us a book report that could be about any book we wanted. I turned in 4 handwritten pages, front and back, that were essentially just a very detailed, bordering on plagiaristic, summary of the whole Hannah and Julia plot arc. It was the most tragic and horrifying thing I’d ever read. I was completely obsessed.

Fun fact: Ever since then, the song “(I Just) Died in Your Arms” by Cutting Crew has reminded me of this book.

The final Fear Street Saga book, The Burning, follows Simon Fear as he debuts in New Orleans with a new name and a new ambition to bring the freshly-christened Fear family back to its former glory. When he sets his sights on the rich and glamorous Angelica Pierce, he knows the only way to win her is to use the terrific powers of his ancestors to remove anyone who stands in his way. Later on, Simon’s daughters Hannah and Julia struggle to come of age in the high society of their new town, Shadyside. But being a teenager isn’t easy when the strings are being pulled by the unseen hands of their family’s curse… Then, Daniel Fear tries to reconnect with long lost family in Shadyside, only to find himself falling in love with Nora Goode. They know that only a marriage between them can unite their families and end the curse. But will Simon Fear allow it?

Some of the tropes in this book:
Gold Digger
Artifact of Doom
Rich Suitor, Poor Suitor
Hereditary Curse
Murder by Mistake
Let the Past Burn
The Cassandra

I loved cracking open this book and immediately jumping into my favorite part of the whole trilogy: The whole plot arc of Simon trying to win over Angelica. Perhaps it’s because it was my introduction to these books, but even reading it now I found it to be the most fun segment out of all three novels. The ballgowns! The Opera! The horrific deaths! I also love Angelica’s glamour and mystique, and wish Stine had done more with her in the latter half of the book.

As mentioned in the intro, the segment with the sisters in the second half of the book blew my preteen mind. I still enjoyed it in this reread, though their “awkward boring sister vs. charming beautiful sister” dynamic didn’t land as well for me this go around. Part of this is because of the characterization of the sisters—like geez, everyone’s thoughts about Julia are so mean!—but I think another part is how it begins from Julia’s point of view, then switches to Hannah for the remainder. I feel I would have preferred it if the viewpoint had either switched back and forth between them more consistently, or just stuck with one sister all the way through.

Also, why don’t we get to find out what happens with Elizabeth Fier from the last book? She’s the POV character for around 1/4 of The Secret, but the only thing we learn about her after that book is that she gave Simon the evil Fear family pendant at some point before he left their home for New Orleans. Please, Jovial Bob, couldn’t we get just one measly paragraph about Elizabeth for continuity?

And another thing: A Fear tries to marry a Goode to break the curse AGAIN?!? That’s three times in three books! In so many generations of Fears, can’t we see one of them come up with a slightly better or at least different idea for breaking the curse?

With all it’s faults, though, The Burning still kills it with the pacing, ambience and action that makes these books so enjoyable. Simon holding his dying daughter in his arms is the image that haunted me the most when I read these as a kid, but others such as the riverboat scene and Simon and Angelica drinking blood together were perhaps even more fun to experience as a grownup.

I still have that original copy of The Burning that I got from the grocery store. The front cover is missing. The spine is unreadable, but still in one piece. Of all the books I’ve lost and donated and “lent” over the years, I’ve never been able to let go of this one.

This is the book that cemented my love of reading late into the night, promising over and over that I’ll go to bed after this next chapter. Of reading something terrifying when I’m alone, something that makes me suspicious of the darkness around me so that I shiver and in a burst of energy get up to turn on all the lights. It’s because of this experience that I went on in my teenage years to seek out incredible horror writers like Anne Rice, Stephen King, Bram Stoker, and so many more.

Four stars for The Burning, and a strong recommend for young people who are just starting to dip their toes into horror. While this trilogy isn’t by any means the best preteen horror out there, it’s a bone-chilling romp that makes a great gateway to the genre.

Did you read The Fear Street Saga as a kid? What were your thoughts then vs. now? I can’t wait to hear what you think, so leave me a comment below!

Re-Read Review: The Secret (The Fear Street Saga #2) by R.L. Stine

20 Sunday Aug 2023

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Rating: ⭐⭐⭐+

The Secret, the second entry in R.L. Stine’s trilogy The Fear Street Saga, continues the origin story of the curse placed on the Fear family. If you read my last post on The Betrayal, then you’ll know that I found this series as a young kid—I was just nine years old, probably a little young for the level of juicy terror and gore peddled by Stine in this series. But I was hooked into the suspense and drama of it all, and age restrictions weren’t going to stop me.

Perhaps being below the intended age bracket is part of the reason this trilogy was so impactful for me. The Secret in particular shook me with its dark imagery and tragic characters. Of course, reading it as an adult has been a completely different experience. Its flaws are much more apparent to me now, but interestingly I enjoyed this one more than The Betrayal this time around, even though previously it was the opposite.

In The Secret, Ezra Fier is hot on the trail of the villainous Goodes when he and his family arrive in a town that’s been gutted by a terrible plague. In a place with so much hate and death, it doesn’t take long for the curse to find them… Jonathan survives Wickham Village and falls in love with Delilah, a preacher’s daughter. If being with her feels so good, then why do bad things happen seemingly from the moment they meet? Then, Elizabeth Fier unearths her ancestors’ mysterious amulet the same day a handsome drifter is welcomed into her family’s home. When she and her sister both catch feelings for the charming Franklin Goode, they have no way of knowing that their fates are already entangled with his.

Some of the tropes found in this book:

Moves Around A Lot
Hereditary Curse
Feuding Families
Artifact of Doom
Sins of Our Fathers
Ghostly Goals
Sibling Triangle
Bewildering Punishment

Right off the bat, The Secret comes in hot against the backdrop of a premium horror setting: a town with corpses as its only remaining inhabitants. Yes, corpse-ridden ghost town, let’s gooooooooo!

I also enjoyed that this book had a character with a longer POV. Even though The Secret is the shortest of the three books, Jonathan is the character we stick with the longest in the whole trilogy, clocking it at a whopping 91 pages from his viewpoint. Unlike other characters up to this point in the series, we see Jonathan survive, learn and grow. The character development in these books, short and fast-paced as they are, is pretty minimal. So it’s nice to have a character who is a little more filled-out.

Another strength this book had over The Betrayal was female characters who actually did interesting things that contributed to the plot. Jonathan’s sister Abigail takes it upon herself to drag her brother to explore the ghost town and lay some of the corpses there to rest, unwittingly unlocking a mystery that will unleash untold horrors on her family. Delilah also ends up being quite a bit more manipulative than she seems at first blush. Chicks in this book are taking charge, and I am here for it.

**SPOLER-RIDDEN RANT WARNING**
Skip the following three paragraphs if you want to remain un-spoiled for The Secret

Unfortunately this novel reaches a premature climax with the ending of part two. The third and final part is more or less a re-skin of the last part of The Betrayal. There are differences, but the moving parts are mostly the same: An unsuspecting family of Fiers, a handsome drifter concealing murderous intent, and a lone survivor to carry on the grudge.

And then there’s the absolutely mystifying way that part two of the book ends: the curse just…stops for 100 years? Apparently all the Fiers needed to do to stop the curse was…get rid of the pendant that literally has the word EVIL engraved on it?? Like, not even destroy it, just hide it really well??? Part 3 starts with a new family of Fiers, Jonathan’s great+ grandchildren, living a prosperous life of blissful curse-ignorance. I get that Stine needed to move the plot forward in time quickly, because it’s a long way from the 1740s to Nora’s framing device in 1900. But there has to be a better way to get there than just hiding the macguffin like a toy from a dog, then rebooting a plot it seemed I’d just read in the previous book.

And last gripe I swear: Where the heck did Franklin “The Last of the Goodes” Goode come from? I feel like Stine could have graced us with at least a page or two of backstory as to what’s been going on with the Goodes for the last 100 years for this dude to still be carrying a grudge when no one else seems to remember what he’s mad about.

**END SPOILER ZONE**
The rest of this article is spoiler-free

Though all that may make it sound like I really disliked the final part of this book, it was…fine. Reading about two sisters competing for the affection of a mysterious newcomer was actually fairly fun. And all together, I do think I enjoyed this book a bit more than The Betrayal. Images like a mother chasing the blue-ribboned hat of her dead daughter, and a knitting needle sticking out of someone’s chest have lived on in my brain since I first read these as a child, and they don’t disappoint today.

Overall, The Secret gets a 3.5 star rating from me. While it suffers from many of the same flaws as the first book, like weak dialogue and characters on mystifying plot rails, I enjoyed the characters in The Secret quite a bit more and actually felt bad when the horrors of the curse befell them. It also does a great job setting things up for the third and final book, The Burning. Number three is the strongest of the trilogy, in my (perhaps somewhat biased) opinion, so keep an eye out for my next review in which I dish all about it.

What did you think of The Secret, or The Fear Street Saga as a whole? Share your thoughts in the comments!

Re-Read Review: The Betrayal (The Fear Street Saga #1) by R.L. Stine + A Reintroduction

13 Sunday Aug 2023

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Before we dig into this Fear Street Saga review, a reintroduction is in order. If you’ve been here before, you may notice some big differences, like the name Adequate Squatch Reads. The old name (Mal Has Bookworms) didn’t really seem to fit anymore (and honestly, was a little bit gross). After a lot of deliberating and weeding out of name ideas that were already taken, I settled on Adequate Squatch because it sounded cool, and because it seems accurate to how I often feel as I move and exist in the world—like I’m a bit of an oddball, but one who’s doing a pretty okay job of blending in.

If this is your first time visiting, hello! I’m Mallory, a food-motivated Gemini who lives in the Midwest and really enjoys a good book or three or seven. I’ll be posting reviews and other book-related content. Check out my Reviews page to learn about my book review standards, and feel free while you’re there to browse my archive of old posts.

If you’re a lover of books, too, then come interact with me about them on social media! Follow @adequate_squatch on Instagram, or click here to be my friend on Goodreads. I can’t wait to talk smack about books with you! ^.^

ANYWAY. On to the reason you probably came here.

A Review of The Betrayal by R.L. Stine

betrayal

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

I recently came into a lot of Fear Street books.

fear street

Combing through these gems, I was incredibly psyched to get the opportunity to revisit one of my formative reading experiences: R.L. Stine’s The Fear Street Saga.

I read this trilogy out of order the first time around. I was nine years old and already a Goosebumps afficionado, with a few Fear Street books under my belt as well, when I first found a copy of The Burning (Book 3) in the little books and magazines section of the supermarket. It promised to be the origin story of the evil that plagued the citizens of Shadyside. The evil that made 99 Fear Street uninhabitable (for the living, anyway). The same evil that had possessed those cheerleaders! I HAD TO KNOOOOOOOOW!

I took that book home and devoured it. Then I immediately went back to the beginning and read it again. I couldn’t get it out of my head. It had everything I wanted in a story: a generations-spanning curse, forbidden love, fashion, betrayal, witchcraft, and people dying in all sorts of horrific ways. As soon as I could, I found the nearest willing adult to take me to the Tyrone Barnes & Noble to snag the first two books.

Upon finishing the entire trilogy, verily did I become shook. I’d never read something so haunting, violent and all-encompassingly dramatic. It was a shot of Miracle Gro to my budding horror fascination. As horror and its adjacent media genres are basically 60% of my personality today, it’s clear that I owe a lot to these books. Seriously revisiting them as an adult seems like the least I can do.

I had originally planned for this to be a single review for the whole trilogy, but it turns out I have a lot of opinions about these books. So this will be a three-part review, with one post dedicated to each book. Come along with me as I dig into the first book in this series: The Betrayal.

The Fear Street Saga (Subtitle: …where the terror began) was a young-adult horror trilogy by R.L. Stine. In it we meet Nora Goode, the last survivor of the fire that swallowed the Fear mansion. Nora knows of the horrific origins of the Fear family and the curse that has rained misery down upon its descendents. She knows about their legacy of evil and misfortune, and that it won’t stop with death. She knows the story must be told to prevent further tragedy.

The Betrayal tells the story of Susannah Goode, a young 17th century settler who has the misfortune of falling in love with Edward Fier. When Edward’s father Benjamin accuses Susannah and her mother of witchcraft, it sets in motion a chain of events that lead to a horrific curse that the Fiers can never hope to escape. Fleeing town and settling far away on a new farm can only keep the evil at bay for so long. Will Mary Fier be forced to pay the price for her family’s sins?

Note: This trilogy is not to be confused with the Fear Street Sagas, a 16-book series that Stine wrote after The Fear Street Saga. It also tells haunting tales of the Fear family and its curse, but they’re not in chronological order and there is no framing device tying them together.

Some of the tropes found in this book:
How We Got Here
Secret Relationship
Child Marriage Veto
Burn the Witch!
Artifact of Doom
Hereditary Curse
Feuding Families

Re-reading The Betrayal was like squeezing into a favorite old sweater: It’s a little small and out of fashion, but it’s so soft, it smells familiar in a really comforting way, and you remember how good you felt when you used to wear it all the time. In those first few chapters I was immediately sucked into the drama of the mansion on fire, the forbidden love between the rich Magistrate’s son and the poor farmer’s daughter, and the witch trial that seemed so maddeningly unfair.

The plot of The Betrayal is stacked with twists, turns and little cliffhangers that keep you turning the page. Then the witch trial arc ends and you realize that what seemed to be the climax of the story is only the beginning. The plot continues, following the Fiers to where they think they’re safe. You then get a front seat to the heart-pumping action as the curse comes calling. It’s just a whole lot of bloody, horrific fun.

I discovered while reading this, though, that while I love the nostalgia, atmosphere and fast-paced action of these books, like that beloved old sweater it’s just something that’s not meant for me anymore. These are 90s kids’ books and it shows. I found myself frustrated by the stiff dialogue, oversold melodrama, and plot-driven twists that made no sense for the characters—stuff that I didn’t really notice as a preteen, but which really stick out now that I’m (marginally, at least) a more mature reader. Things like the hilariously cartoonish evil of Matthew Fier and the artifically inflated drama of pretty much every scene made it tough to immerse myself in this book as much as I could when I was younger.

The handling of the female characters also bugged me. Two of the three POVs in this book are female, but the primary character trait for each of them is that they’re infatuated with a boy. They don’t have much agency of their own, and seem to primarily exist to be victims of the men’s blood-soaked schemes. As those are the actual juicy parts that move the plot forward, it leaves the women feeling like filler characters, only there to be acted upon for the sake of drama and body count.

All that being said, I truly enjoyed reading this book and there are images in it that may haunt me forever. The story of Susannah Goode as the catalyst for the curse that plagues Fear Street to this day is too good to ever forget. The mayhem that overwhelms the unsuspecting Fiers makes a worthy climax for this chilling introduction to the trilogy.

On re-read, this book earns a three-star rating from me. I understand that these are books for teens, but I also know that books for teens can be done way better than this. I would still recommend this as a really fun read for any teen or preteen who’s just starting to get into horror.

Have you read this book? Share your experience down in the comments. Then make sure you come back next week for my review of the second book in this series: The Secret.

The Outsider by Stephen King

07 Thursday May 2020

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50271461._sy475_I’ve read Stephen King since I was a teenager, and to me, starting one of his books is like slipping into an old bathrobe–familiar and comforting, with the knowledge that you’re about to have some satisfying relaxation time. Relaxing with a good horror novel is one of my favorite things in the world, and King rarely fails to disappoint. The Outsider was no exception. Though I had some minor gripes, overall I really enjoyed this one, and I’m sure it’ll make it into my rotation of regular Stephen King rereads.

Primarily set in the fictional town of Flint City, OK, The Outsider follows the investigation of a horrific child murder that rocks the local community. When multiple eyewitnesses come forward to corroborate the extensive DNA and fingerprint evidence found at the scene of the crime, investigators (let by Detective Ralph Anderson) believe they have a slam-dunk case against the accused: Terry Maitland, local little league coach and pillar of the community. But when doubts begin to arise and seasoned P.I. Holly Gibney gets involved, all of that easily-obtained evidence starts to point to something more sinister…and possibly supernatural.

The things that bring me back to Stephen King’s writing again and again are his characters, and his knack for pacing and suspense. These qualities shine through once again in The Outsider. Though this is one book of several I’ve started recently (quarantine restrictions have left me, like so many others, with plenty of time on my hands), this was the one that kept me turning the pages late into the night, long after I should have given up and gone to bed. King is adept at feeding his readers just enough information to make them hungry for more, dangling the prize feast just beyond reach until the perfect climactic moment–and just when you think you’ve had your fill, another tantalizing morsel is there to keep you salivating until the end.

When I say that King’s characters are something that I enjoy in his work, that comes with a qualifier. Sometimes his characters and the way he writes them are just awkward and forced for the sake of getting a message across and/or advancing the plot. For instance, Holly Gibney doesn’t need to have a radiant smile that lights up her whole face every time he wants the POV character to find her endearing. The thing about King’s character writing that draws me in is his tight third-person perspective, the way he’s in each character’s head to help you understand and sympathize with them, even if the character is a vile and terrible person doing awful things. Jack Hoskins was such a character in The Outsider. Though he was pretty obviously a bad person, and very misled, I couldn’t help feeling bad for him and even rooting for him in certain small moments. It’s because, when you’re reading a Stephen King novel, you are that character for a brief moment; you understand them and want them to succeed. Perhaps this is why I gravitate toward his books when I need an escape from my own reality.

This wasn’t a perfect book by any means. Some things happened too perfectly, too cleanly to be believable. Characters sometimes seemed drawn forward by The Plot rather than by their own motivations. But at the end of the day, those things weren’t egregious enough to keep me from truly enjoying The Outsider, which I very much did.

I also want to briefly mention the HBO adaptation, which I watched, and which was the reason I picked up this book in the first place. The show was pretty good, but the book was far better. I couldn’t believe some of the things the show added that I very much expected to have come from the book, or some of the things that were left out. However, both experiences were enjoyable–though I’ll probably re-read the book, but skip re-watching the series.

Anyway, I can’t give The Outsider five stars, because in my opinion it wasn’t King’s best. But it was still very good, and did a great job meeting my expectations as a long-time Stephen King fan. So it gets a strong four stars from me

The Wasp Factory by Iain M. Banks

06 Monday Apr 2009

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The Wasp Factory by Iain M. Banks

The Wasp Factory by Iain M. Banks

I picked up this book because I saw it included in a list of most disturbing books.  At first, I couldn’t figure out why.  In the beginning, I found it to be a little overly-detailed (really, I don’t need to know the details of the main character’s bathroom habits, especially if they don’t add anything to the story).  As the story progressed, I understood a bit more.  It’s a tale about a very fucked up individual who does a lot of very fucked up things.  Sadly, though, there’s not much more of a plot than that, and The Wasp Factory just kinda fizzles out like a dud firecracker.

Frank Cauldhamme lives alone with his father on an island.  Sometimes he goes into town to buy supplies, or to get drunk with his dwarf friend Jamie.  But for the most part he occupies himself with rituals.  Checking and refreshing his sacrifice poles.  Regular warfare against the rabbit population.  And a daily sacrifice to The Factory, which may warn him of impending danger.  Frank’s routine is interrupted when he hears of his brother’s escape from the insane asylum a few towns over.  As he prepares for his brother’s return, Frank discovers things that may forever change the way he sees the world and himself.

The Wasp Factory was slow to get going, and didn’t really start holding my attention until about 3/4 of the way through the book.  And though it did get a little more exciting toward the end, it doesn’t make up for the lack of plot.  There are a lot of flashbacks, a lot of talk about Frank’s personal philosophy, and a lot of explanation of his bizarre rituals.  But the only progressing thread throughout the book is the slow journey of Frank’s brother Eric, which the reader only hears about in short phone calls.  And even that part of the story, which you’re expecting to come to some spectacular climax, has almost no payoff.

I enjoyed some of the ironies of the story. How the narrator, an individual with some deep-seated mental issues, regularly refers to his disturbed brother as insane. Also, the little detail of the narrator’s hatred for women, and how it clashes with his eventual discovery of his true identity.

Overall, The Wasp Factory was well-written and memorable, though I would have enjoyed it more if it had had more relevant plot substance.