Synopsis: From her cell in a mysterious convent, a woman writes the story of her life in whatever she can find—discarded ink, dirt, and even her own blood. A lower member of the Sacred Sisterhood, deemed an unworthy, she dreams of ascending to the ranks of the Enlightened at the center of the convent and […]
About Josh Hanson
Review: Lucky Day by Chuck Tingle
Synopsis: Vera is a survivor of a global catastrophe known as the Low Probability Event, but she definitely isn’t thriving. Once a passionate professor of statistics, she no longer finds meaning in anything at all. But when problematic government agent Layne knocks on her door, she’s the only one who can help him uncover the […]
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: Mapping the Interior by Stephen Graham Jones
Synopsis: Walking through his own house at night, a fifteen-year-old thinks he sees another person stepping through a doorway. Instead of the people who could be there, his mother or his brother, the figure reminds him of his long-gone father, who died mysteriously before his family left the reservation. When he follows it he discovers […]
Review: Coffin Moon by Keith Rosson
Synopsis: It’s the winter of 1975, and Duane Minor, back home in Portland, Oregon, after a tour in Vietnam, is struggling to quell his anger and keep his drinking in check, keep his young marriage intact, and keep the nightmares away. Things get even more complicated when his thirteen-year-old niece, Julia, is sent across the […]
Review: The Peregrine Estate trilogy by C.S. Humble
Review: When I first discovered C.S. Humble’s The Massacre at Yellow Hill, I was giddy. That book mixes a gritty western mythos with vampires, secret societies, and cosmic horror, but more importantly, it does what I come to story for: it gave me new people to love. Gilbert Ptolemy and his adopted son, Carson; Tabitha […]
Review: A Game in Yellow by Hailey Piper
Synopsis: A kink-fixated couple, Carmen and Blanca, have been in a rut. That is until Blanca discovers the enigmatic Smoke in an under-street drug den, who holds pages to a strange play, The King in Yellow. Read too much, and you’ll fall into madness. But read just a little and pull back, and it gives you […]
Review: Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker
Synopsis: Cora Zeng is a crime scene cleaner, washing away the remains of brutal murders and suicides in Chinatown. But none of that seems so terrible when she’s already witnessed the most horrific thing possible: her sister, Delilah, being pushed in front of a train. Before fleeing the scene, the murderer shouted two words: bat eater. […]
Review: D7 by Philip Fracassi
Synopsis: A haunted jukebox at an out-of-the-way dive bar not only lures patrons, but then doesn’t allow them to leave. Review: D7, the new novelette from Philip Fracassi, feels like a particularly menacing episode of Twilight Zone, as our generically yuppieish protagonists get lost on the backroads to find sanctuary in a roadside bar. Inside, […]
Review: The Unkillable Frank Lightning by Josh Rountree
Synopsis: Catherine Coldbridge is a complicated woman: a doctor, an occultist, and briefly, a widow. In 1879, her husband, Private Frank Humble, was killed in a Sioux attack. Consumed by grief, Catherine used her formidable skills to resurrect her husband. But after the reanimation, Frank lost his soul, becoming a vicious undead monster. Unable to […]
Review: The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones
Synopsis: A diary, written in 1912 by a Lutheran pastor is discovered within a wall. What it unveils is a slow massacre, a chain of events that go back to 217 Blackfeet dead in the snow. Told in transcribed interviews by a Blackfeet named Good Stab, who shares the narrative of his peculiar life over […]
Review: When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy
Synopsis: One night, Jess, a struggling actress, finds a five-year-old runaway hiding in the bushes outside her apartment. After a violent, bloody encounter with the boy’s father, she and the boy find themselves running for their lives. As they attempt to evade the boy’s increasingly desperate father, Jess slowly comes to a horrifying understanding of […]