Hello! It has been a little while since I have spoken through this forum. A combination of starting a new job and actively trying to mix up reading all the new great horror stories with those that have been on my list for years has meant that I just have not been reviewing so much […]
About Charlie Battison
Review: Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman
Synopsis: Noah Fairchild has been losing his formerly polite Southern parents to far-right cable news for years, so when his mother leaves him a voicemail warning him that the “Great Reawakening” is here, he assumes it’s related to one of the many conspiracy theories she believes in. But when his own phone calls go unanswered, […]
Review: Sacrificial Animals by Kailee Pedersen
Synopsis: The last thing Nick Morrow expected to receive was an invitation from his father to return home. When he left rural Nebraska behind, he believed he was leaving everything there, including his abusive father, Carlyle, and the farm that loomed so large in memory, forever. But neither Nick nor his brother Joshua, disowned for […]
Review: So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison
Synopsis: Sloane Parker is dreading her birthday. She doesn’t need a reminder she’s getting older, or that she’s feeling indifferent about her own life. Her husband surprises her with a birthday weekend getaway—not with him, but with Sloane’s longtime best friend, troublemaker extraordinaire Naomi. Sloane anticipates a weekend of wine tastings and cozy robes and […]
Review: Heads Will Roll by Josh Winning
Synopsis: Willow’s worst nightmare was being canceled. But the shadows in the woods of Camp Castaway might destroy more than her reputation. After sitcom star Willow tweeted herself into infamy and stumbled blind-drunk into a swimming pool, her agent shipped her off to Camp Castaway. Tucked away in upstate New York, Castaway is a summer […]
Review: Incidents Around the House by Josh Malerman
Synopsis: To eight-year-old Bela, her family is her world. There’s Mommy, Daddo, and Grandma Ruth. But there is also Other Mommy, a malevolent entity who asks her every day: “Can I go inside your heart?” When horrifying incidents around the house signal that Other Mommy is growing tired of asking Bela the same question, over and over . . . […]
Review: I Was a Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones
Synopsis: 1989, Lamesa, Texas. A small west Texas town driven by oil and cotton—and a place where everyone knows everyone else’s business. So it goes for Tolly Driver, a good kid with more potential than application, seventeen, and about to be cursed to kill for revenge. Here Stephen Graham Jones explores the Texas he grew […]
Review: Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle
Synopsis: Misha is a jaded scriptwriter who has been working in Hollywood for years and has just been nominated for his first Oscar. But when he’s pressured by his producers to kill off a gay character in the upcoming season finale―”for the algorithm”―Misha discovers that it’s not that simple. As he is haunted by his […]
Review: Deliver Me by Elle Nash
Synopsis: At a meatpacking facility in the Missouri Ozarks, Dee-Dee and her co-workers kill and butcher 40,000 chickens in a single shift. The work is repetitive and brutal, with each stab and cut a punishment to her hands and joints, but Dee-Dee’s more concerned with what is happening inside her body. After a series of […]
Review: Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay
Synopsis: In June 1993, a group of young guerilla filmmakers spent four weeks making Horror Movie, a notorious, disturbing, art-house horror flick. The weird part? Only three of the film’s scenes were ever released to the public, but Horror Movie has nevertheless grown a rabid fanbase. Three decades later, Hollywood is pushing for a big budget reboot. The man […]
Review: Lost Man’s Lane by Scott Carson
Synopsis: A teenager explores the darkness hidden within his hometown in this spellbinding supernatural thriller from bestselling author Scott Carson. For a sixteen-year-old, a summer internship working for a private investigator seems like a dream come true—particularly since the PI is investigating the most shocking crime to hit Bloomington, Indiana, in decades. A local woman […]
Review: Small Town Horror by Ronald Malfi
Synopsis: Five childhood friends are forced to confront their own dark past as well as the curse placed upon them in this horror masterpiece from the bestselling author of Come with Me. Maybe this is a ghost story… Andrew Larimer thought he left the past behind. But when he receives a late-night phone call from […]