Synopsis:
A new collection of short stories and novellas from Bram Stoker Award finalist Philip Fracassi, featuring an introduction by NYT bestselling author Matt Dinniman.
From the mind of Stoker and British Fantasy award-nominated author Philip Fracassi comes fourteen stories of the macabre that will frighten, disturb, and ensnare readers in a dark web of twisted tales.
In these pages you’ll find talking corpses and deadly tombs, misguided exorcists, technology gone wrong, blood-soaked prison riots, and enough vengeful spirits and haunted objects to fill a grave.
With an introduction by bestselling author Matt Dinniman (Dungeon Crawler Carl), Traps and Specters will chill, thrill, entertain, and leave you gasping in shock and terror at the horrors waiting within.
Review:
While I’m fairly new to reading horror, I’ve had the massive luck to be able to read a few of Philip Fracassi’s works over the past two years. Last year I read and reviewed The Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre, and earlier this year I discovered the phenomenal Sarafina. With both of them I found a writer who isn’t messing around. Taking bold swings with tension, violence, and humor, Philip Fracassi has proven himself to be a writer not to be missed. Now, he’s back with a short story and novella collection — Traps and Specters: Stories.
And if you’re looking for a top notch short story collection, you can’t go wrong with Traps and Specters. Inside the covers of Fracassi’s new book you’ll find 14 stories that will stick with you for some time. Days later I’m still thinking about them, bouncing from one to another, and digging the twists and turns out of the recesses of my mind.
A few of Fracassi’s stories that really resonated with me. Here are my favorites from Traps and Specters (which honestly may change depending on the day and my mood):
The Mummified Corpse of Reese Witherspoon — This one completely surprised me. To be honest, when I flipped to the first page of this story and saw the title, I couldn’t help but laugh. What a ridiculous title, but surely it wasn’t actually about Reese Witherspoon, star of movies like Legally Blonde and Sweet Home Alabama? Oh, it’s totally about her…at least her mummified corpse that continues promoting Reese’s Book Club, even after she’s left this mortal coil…or has she? This is a delightfully dark, twisted, and often funny little story.
I Think My Treehouse is Haunted — This story is near the end of the entire collection and when I saw the title, it made me think a little of the Reese Witherspoon story, but they are nothing alike. If there is humor here, it is unintentional or awkwardly dark. Instead, we see a slow reveal of darkness that lingers behind after a brutal murder and the mystery that our main character investigates.
The Servitor — Whether it’s a tomb from Raiders of the Lost Ark or a dungeon inside of a video game or RPG, there is an invisible aspect you don’t see. Who maintains and upkeeps the traps and levers so each adventurer can experience their own run through as it for the first time? In this fantasy story, Fracassi provides a peek behind the wall of arrows and booby traps to a man who learned from his father before him of how to dutifully take care of the ancient tomb entrusted to them.
Honestly? Not a loser in the batch. Fracassi knows how to dial up the tension in just a few words, putting the reader on edge just enough that when the time comes, he can either push us off the ledge or pull us to safety.
There’s a lot of variety to these tales, but also, a lot of these stories are almost domestic in origin – stories about families, husbands and wives, abusive fathers, mothers and daughters, etc. Stories that should center us and keep us grounded, but instead Fracassi uses that foundation to shift our perspective on the world and on life just a bit.
I heartily recommend Traps and Specters by Philip Fracassi for horror and short story readers, or simply if you like fantastic stories that will grip you from the jump.
Thank you to Shortwave Publishing for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
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