Synopsis: Single mom Harry Adams has always loved horror movies, so when she’s offered a job cleaning for revered horror director Javier Castillo, she leaps at the chance. His forbidding Chicago mansion, Bright Horses, is filled from top to bottom with terrifying props and costumes, as well as glittering awards from his decades-long career making […]
Gothic
Review: The House That Horror Built by Christina Henry
Synopsis A single mother working in the gothic mansion of a reclusive horror director stumbles upon terrifying secrets. Harry Adams loves horror movies, so it’s no coincidence that she accepted a job cleaning house for horror-movie director Javier Castillo. His forbidding gray-stone Chicago mansion, Bright Horses, is filled from top to bottom with terrifying props and costumes as well as […]
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 […]
Review: Midwestern Gothic by Scott Thomas
Synopsis: In The Door in the Field, a construction worker’s bad day becomes a far worse night when drinks at an off-the-books bar send him down an unforeseeably bloody path. In The Boy in the Woods, something evil has infected the counselors at a summer camp, and a young boy will have to do anything he can […]
Review: Diavola by Jennifer Marie Thorne
Synopsis Jennifer Thorne skewers all-too-familiar family dynamics in this sly, wickedly funny vacation-Gothic. Beautifully unhinged and deeply satisfying, Diavola is a sharp twist on the classic haunted house story, exploring loneliness, belonging, and the seemingly inescapable bonds of family mythology. Anna has two rules for the annual Pace family destination vacations: Tread lightly and survive. It isn’t easy when […]
Review: Forgotten Sisters by Cynthia Pelayo
Synopsis A city’s haunted history and fairy-tale horrors converge for two women in an addictive novel of psychological suspense by a multiple Bram Stoker Award–nominated author. Sisters Anna and Jennie live in a historic bungalow on the Chicago River. They’re tethered to a disquieting past, and with nowhere else to go, nothing can part them […]
Review: Skin Thief by Susan Palumbo
A book review for Skin Thief: a short story collection that explores our sense of identity and belonging mixed with some delightful gothic themes.
Review: Nestlings by Nat Cassidy
Synopsis Ana and Reid need a break. The horrifically complicated birth of their first child has left Ana paralyzed, bitter, and struggling―with mobility, with her relationship with Reid, with resentment for her baby. Reid dismisses disturbing events and Ana’s deep unease and paranoia, but he can’t explain the needle-like bite marks on their baby. Review […]
Review: The Folly by Gemma Amor
Synopsis: Morgan always knew her father, Owen, never murdered her mother, and has spent the last six years campaigning for his release from prison. Finally he is set free, but they can no longer live in the house that was last decorated by her mother’s blood. Salvation comes in the form of a tall, dark […]
Review: The Fisherman by John Langan
Synopsis: In upstate New York, in the woods around Woodstock, Dutchman’s Creek flows out of the Ashokan Reservoir. Steep-banked, fast-moving, it offers the promise of fine fishing, and of something more, a possibility too fantastic to be true. When Abe and Dan, two widowers who have found solace in each other’s company and a shared […]
Review: Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas
Synopsis As the daughter of a rancher in 1840s Mexico, Nena knows a thing or two about monsters—her home has long been threatened by tensions with Anglo settlers from the north. But something more sinister lurks near the ranch at night, something that drains men of their blood and leaves them for dead. Something that […]
Review: The Folly by Gemma Amor
Synopsis From Bram Stoker and British Fantasy Award nominated author Gemma Amor comes an atmospheric gothic mystery that will haunt you long after the final page is turned. Morgan always knew her father, Owen, never murdered her mother, and has spent the last six years campaigning for his release from prison. Finally he is set free, […]