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to Horror Reviews
of Horror Reviews
Books for Review should be sent to: Don D'Ammassa, 323 Dodge Street, East Providence, RI 02914
Last Update 12/26/25
The Black Tide by Anthony M. Strong, West End, 2021
This was the first John Decker novel that I had trouble getting through. During World War II, an encounter with an alien life form allows the Germans to build a submarine with unlimited range and other advance technology. Nevertheless, it sinks off the coast of South America and is not found until the present. A team of investigators discovers that it is still air tight and they go aboard. But reality is not quite the same inside. There is an alien intelligence manipulating things in the background, and a handful of crew members are still alive. Decker deals with the situation and secures the technology, but the ending is mildly ambiguous. 12/26/25
House of Reckoning by John Saul, Ballantine, 2009
Saul’s final novel before retiring is one of his better efforts, although the resolution is a bit too cute. A teenaged girl is put into foster care with the family from Hell – bullies, thieves, fanatics. She also becomes a target for the local high school bullies. She does make two friends, a boy her age who has visions of his enemies bursting into flames and a teacher who recognizes that the girl’s drawings are evidence that she is clairvoyant. The house where the teacher lives is a former asylum where the patients were murdered and dismembered, although somehow that is a secret only revealed when she reads some old journals. The girl turns out to be the product of the teacher’s rape, so she is her daughter. The rapist was her friend’s father. The house sends the rapist back through time to become a patient in the asylum, and then helps kill the bullies in a violent showdown. 12/22/25
Faces of Fear by John Saul, Ballantine, 2008
This thriller is non-fantastic and I’m afraid I didn’t find it completely plausible. A plastic surgeon who recently lost his wife marries a woman whose teenaged daughter has unremarkable looks. He promises to turn her into a beautiful woman, despite her initial reluctance. She is more receptive after a while, but only until she sees a sketch of what he intends to do, and realizes that he is constructing a duplicate of his dead wife. At the same time, a serial killer has been slaughtering women and stealing body parts. It appears to be a separate plotline until we realize the surgeon is insane and believes he has found a way to restore his wife to life. 12/20/25
The Devil’s Labyrinth by John Saul, Ballantine, 2007
A young boy is sent to a Catholic boarding school where a new priest has discovered that the tunnels beneath the buildings are home to an evil supernatural force. There are several troubling incidents at the school, which he appears to solve with some exorcisms, but our hero eventually realizes that instead of driving the evil away, the ceremonies install a part of the entity into the minds of the students. The Pope becomes aware of the priest’s marvelous activities and comes with a retinue to review them. But this is part of a plan to seize control of the Pope and the Church. Naturally the boy thwarts the plan. 12/16/25
Perfect Nightmare by John Saul, Ballantine, 2005
This thriller uses the author’s constant theme of children in jeopardy, but there is nothing fantastic in this novel. A teenager is abducted and finds herself one of several prisoners in a dungeon managed by a masked man who abuses them eventually kills one of them in a moment of rage. A man who lost his family sets aside his grief to try to find the missing girl, but it’s pretty obvious from the outset that he himself is the kidnapper. It turns out that he has a split personality, which makes it mildly difficult to figure out early on. When discovered, he goes on a murderous rampage and then kills himself. Very close to being Saul’s weakest novel. 12/14/25
In the Dark of the Night by John Saul, Ballantine, 2006
Some vacationing teenagers find a hidden room on the property their parents are renting. Inside are several odd objects, not alarming in themselves, but somehow seeming connected. There is also a journal written by a previous tenant – who disappeared mysteriously – who was studying serial killers. They begin to have nightmares, and bizarre incidents begin to occur. A cat is mutilated, a local boy disappears, a dog is killed. And there is a rival group of boys who are clearly antagonistic. Then the murders start, mirroring a killing spree from years earlier, and directed by an intelligence that may be occupying the mind of a local man. One of Saul’s better books. 12/12/25
Black Creek Crossing by John Saul, Ballantine, 2004
Saul invokes witchcraft in this thriller which repeats his child in jeopardy themes. Two kids discover a book of spells hidden in the house where one of them lives. Both teens are abused by their fathers and harassed by three local boys. They use the spells to protect themselves, involving telekinesis, turning attacks back on the attacker, etc. The local boys are badly scared and one of them commits suicide. Both sets of parents die – either by accident or driven to it by the magic. There is also a phantom cat that returns from the dead and appears to be the manifestation of a young girl who died many years earlier. With all of their enemies gone, the two kids feel remorse and hang themselves. Has its moments but the ending is a bummer. 12/7/25
Midnight Voices by John Saul, Ballantine, 2002
After briefly leaving his child in jeopardy theme for one book, Saul returns to it, this time borrowing from Ira Levin’s Rosemary’s Baby. The protagonist is a new widow with two young children who moves into a creepy apartment building after being charmed by one of the male residents. The usual events follow – strange smells, bad dreams, mysterious night time prowlers, a possibly imprisoned neighbor’s child, mysterious illnesses, and a cult of mostly older people who seem very interested in the newcomers. Different enough not to be a copycat, but close enough that the comparison is inevitable. It’s actually not bad, but too predictable for me. 11/30/25
Reunion at Dawn by H. Russell Wakefiled, 2000
A collection of his lesser known stories. The title story involves a woman who poisons her husband and is found dead lying across his body, apparently strangled. Other stories involve ghosts of murdered wives contriving to have revenge on their killers – usually their husbands, dreams that turn out to be real, premonitions of disaster, telepathy, and other common supernatural elements. These tend to be shorter than his other work, with a couple of exceptions. Wakefield had a recurring structure for his stories – which often involve vengeance by both the living and the dead – and plays with variations of his themes. 11/26/25
Nightshade by John Saul, Ballantine, 2000
A somewhat ambiguous ghost story – is she real or just the product of guilt – and one of Saul’s better books. A happy family is disrupted when the wife’s mother comes to live with them after a fire destroys her home. The mother is clearly mentally ill and is obsessed with another daughter, now dead, to the point where she creates a copy of her bedroom in the house. She also causes tensions between husband and wife and her cruelty to the teenage son causes changes to his popularity. Throw in a murder, several disappearances, some gore, and more violence than usual, stir, and then reveal the climax and some nasty family secrets. 11/26/25
The Manhattan Hunt Club by John Saul, Ballantine, 2001
This was Saul’s best book by far, despite some plot problems. It is essentially a reworking of the classic short story, “The Most Dangerous Game.” A group of influential judges, police officers, etc. have created a secret game in the New York subway system. They kidnap convicted felons and hunt them, using homeless people as beaters and guards. The protagonist is one of those taken – although he is actually innocent – and he and a serial killer are forced to find a way to survive while the club members seek to hunt them down. They are free if they reach the surface, but the exits are guarded. His father and others suspect that he is still alive and eventually discover at least part of what happened to him. He does survive, but is traumatized for life. If you can suspend your disbelief a bit, this is a competent and exciting thriller. 11/26/25
The Clock Strikes 12 by H. Russell Wakefield, Ballantine, 1961 (originally published in 1946)
A collection of mostly traditional ghost stories, all very well told. The plots include a haunted house, a haunted stretch of roadway, a ventriloquist’s dummy that improvises during a performance, a clairvoyant who solves a murder mystery, a haunted car, a village that practices pagan human sacrifice, a dead author who forces the man who stole his work to write a book about his life, and others. This is a really fine collection and I liked all of the stories. Wakefield has a distinct style that is mildly archaic by current standards but perfectly suited for his kind of stories. I added his other collections to my reading pile. 11/19/25
Ghost Stories and Weird Tales by H. Russell Wakefield, Coachwhip, 2025
A very large selection of stories drawn from several previously published collections. One of the best is “He Cometh and He Passeth By,” which is somewhat similar to M.R. James’ classic “Casting the Runes.” Some of the stories do not provide complete answers – were they ghosts of the products of a guilty conscience? “The Red Lodge” is a standard but well done haunted house story. There is a chess playing ghost, a haunted golf course, a haunted hotel room, a clairvoyant who solves a murder mystery, a family curse, various forms of witchcraft, a phantom mountain climber, a murderous magician, and many more. I thoroughly enjoyed this very large – 440 pages – collection. 11/19/25
The Right Hand of Evil by John Saul, Ballantine, 1999
Saul “borrows” heavily from The Omen and The Shining for this one. Alcoholic Ted and his wife and three children move to a crumbling mansion in Louisiana after he inherits it from a distant relative who smothered her own baby, convinced that it was an evil creature. Ted wants to turn it into a small hotel, but the local people believe that it is a nexus of satanism and deny him permits, while the local police tries to force the family to leave the area. The children, meanwhile, begin hearing a baby crying in the night, and they experience hallucinations of a mysterious church, as well as seeing hideous creatures forming in the shadows. Despite a few good scenes, this was one of Saul’s worst books. 11/16/25
The Devil’s Game by Poul Anderson, Baen, 1980
This was the closest Anderson ever came to horror fiction. A rich man is influenced by Samael, presumably a demon, to organize a contest among seven people who are desperate to win the cash prize. They meet on a remote island where each has to propose a task that all seven must complete or be eliminated. Some of the tasks are very dangerous. It reads much like a reality television show. The contestants end up splitting into factions to reduce the number of people who will potentially win the money. Samael’s plans are never explained and we don’t know why the contest was proposed or what it was supposed to do. Some of the tasks are interesting but others are not. The characters are only sketchily drawn and I didn’t care in the least who won or lost. There are also some really self conscious sex scenes. 11/11/25
The Presence by John Saul, Crest, 1997
This reads almost like a self parody. It has the usual Saul elements – a teenager in danger, an evil corporation experimenting on humans – and is reasonably suspenseful, though scientifically illiterate. The villains are experimenting on human children because they have discovered undersea phenomena in Hawaii that may provide insight into the origin of human life, as well as profitable medical applications. The protagonist and her son are studying the same phenomena and discover that approaching an apparent sunken meteor makes them allergic to oxygen so that they have to breathe ammonia instead. Then we find out that an alien star system has been sending radio signals which are somehow deciphered as DNA coding and that they are manipulating human evolution. Irritatingly implausible. 11/11/25
The Blackstone Chronicles by John Saul, Crest, 1997
This was originally published as six novellas, imitating Stephen King’s The Green Mile. Each installment was pretty much complete unto itself, although there was a running back story about an abandoned asylum that is being torn down and which is the source of a curse that affects the entire town. Each story involves an object that appears mysteriously and with dire consequences – death, financial ruin, etc. The most common viewpoint character is the newspaper editor who realizes the truth, publishes a story warning people, and who is castigated for fear mongering, although the final installment vindicates him. This was among Saul’s better work, possibly because he did not have enough room for his usual slow moving plots to develop. 11/6/25
Bad Lands by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child, Grand Central, 2025
The latest Nora Kelly novel is primarily a mystery but it is creep enough – and contains one supernatural scene – that I’m listing it as horror. Two women have been found naked and dead in the desert, both apparent suicides. Years earlier they were both graduate students working under a charismatic professor who was obsessed with a subculture of the Pueblo civilization. The professor vanished more than a decade earlier and his other followers all seem to have taken up normal lives in the years that followed. But Kelly and her FBI agent friend Swanson believe that there is something evil and dangerous involved and that more deaths are imminent if the mystery is not revealed. Contains some pretty brutal violence. Very entertaining and quite intense at times. 11/3/25
Black Lightning by John Saul, Ballantine, 1995
Saul moved, mostly, away from the child in jeopardy theme for this one. A serial killer tells a reporter that his execution will not end the string of murders. His personality then jumps into the body of the reporter’s husband and continues killing people, leaving the same mysterious mutilation on each body. The story is complicated because there is also a copycat – whom the supernatural killer eventually murders. The reporter has two children, however, and they are on the endangered species list, so the book only strays a bit without actually abandoning his usual theme. Mildly suspenseful, but predictable and lacking in depth. 11/3/25
The Weird Tales of Dorothy K. Haynes, British Library, 2025
Thou Shalt Not Suffer a Witch by Dorothy K. Haynes, B&W, 1996 (originally published in 1949)
These two volumes, which overlap somewhat, collect almost all of the author’s short horror fiction. They are without exception quite short, no more than twelve pages. A good many of them are ambiguous – it is unclear if the fantastic content is real or just hallucinations or dreams. Other than ghost stories, Haynes avoided most of the common tropes – vampires, werewolves, etc. In many cases, the strange events are never explained – like the man who can stretch his body so that he can look into attic windows or the creatures that live inside chimneys. A few have no fantastic content at all, although even these are vaguely weird. 10/31/25
The Homing by John Saul, Crest, 1994
This is a comic book style horror novel that could have been the screenplay for a low budget 1950s horror film. Yes, it has children in jeopardy – as does virtually every Saul novel. But it also has a ludicrous mad scientists who is experimenting with bees and other insects, turning the bee stings into a lethal weapon. When he alters a medication given to a teenage girl, she becomes a kind of human queen bee. Boys are drawn to her against their will and she can open her mouth and spew out clouds of stinging insects. A doting mother and her not very bright farmer boyfriend have to protect her two daughters and figure out what is going on, although ultimately the villain is destroyed by his own creation. 10/28/25
Guardian by John Saul, Bantam, 1993
Saul mixes child in jeopardy with werewolves, sort of, in this one. A teenage boy is placed with a guardian after his parents are killed. He is reclusive and makes no friends. Then the murders begin, brutal, suggesting animal attacks, and he is the prime suspect. But it turns out his biological father was the subject of a – very unlikely – clandestine experiment in which wolf DNA was introduced into his body. He has since then developed wolf like habits and attitudes, and he is the killer. Although he is eventually disposed of, it is clear that he has passed on some of his bizarre attributes to his son, who commits a murder of his own at the end and disappears into the forest. Not as bad as many of the earlier books, but I’ve never particularly liked werewolf themes, however altered. 10/22/25
Shadows by John Saul, Bantam, 1992
Saul borrows from Curt Siodmak’s classic Donovan’s Brain for this, one of his least successful books. The Academy is a boarding school for children who have trouble adjusting to normal classes but who are above average in intelligence. Unfortunately, they have a habit of committing suicide. Except that it is not suicide. The comic book style director is a mad scientist who is staging the suicides so that he can extract the children’s brain and keep them alive in a nutrient solution. He also has them connected to a super computer. Without having a body to manage, the brains are able to develop superhuman powers. Pretty awful. 10/18/25
Darkness by John Saul, Bantam, 1991
Although this is yet another children in jeopardy novel, it is actually one of Saul’s better efforts. There is a much more evocative setting and better management of tension. The characters are marginally better drawn. There is also more explicit violence than usual, although Saul’s horrific scenes remain relatively low key. The menace is a mysterious figure known as the Dark Man who has been abducting children and turning them into zombies. Many of the local inhabitants are actually allied with them, so when two parents attempt to protect their daughter, they have their hands full. As usual, too long for its story content.
The Gods of Moab by Stephen Mark Rainey, Damned Rodan, 2024
This is a novelette in which two couples vacationing in Appalachia encounter a weird religious zealot with very strange beliefs. When they refuse to accept his views, he exerts his supernatural powers to force them into a kind of alternate reality populated by distorted and dangerous creatures. They have to learn the rules of their new environment and outwit or outfight the creatures who live there, while trying to find a way to return to the reality from which they have been expelled. Nicely done and not overlong for the plot.
Sleepwalk by John Saul, Bantam, 1990
Another standard plot from Saul, with his usual theme of child endangerment and a new one to which he will be inclined in future books, the sinister corporation. This time it is a chemical company that is secretly experimenting with a form of mind control, most effective when the subject is asleep. It can cause strokes, mental disorders, suicides, changes in personality, and cause people to carelessly have serious accidents. There is an undercurrent involving Native American lore which proves to be useful when a teenager discovers and exposes the truth. Far too long and much too predictable. 10/8/25
Second Child by John Saul, Bantam, 1990
Although there are some ambiguous hints linked to the legend of a woman who mutilated herself and who may be possessing a troubled teenager, this really is not supernatural. The teenager’s dreams could just as easily result from the abuse she suffers from her stepmother, her split personality, and knowledge of the legend. Her half sister is the real villain. In order to displace her sister as their father’s favorite, she murders a servant and tries to pin the crime on the teenager. This was the slowest moving book I’ve read yet by Saul, with the usual uninteresting characters, but with a particularly blah climax. 9/27/25
The Collected Supernatural & Weird Fiction of Edith Wharton, Leonaur, 2016 (2 volumes)
This set of two thick volumes includes all of the author’s ghost stories, which have been collected separately elsewhere, plus her other short fiction that involves fantastic content – although in most cases it is ambiguous or rationalized or even completely absent. One involves a statue that changes after its model dies by suicide and another has the soul of a dead woman speaking to Life personified. Most are not fantastic at all despite the title. The non-ghost stories involve subjects like an elderly woman who is about to lose the view from her window, an overzealous missionary in an Arab country, swindlers in Venice, revenge against German officers following the war, a plagiarist, a man who manipulates women, a dying man’s reconciliation with his past sins, etc. 9/19/25
The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton, Popular Library, 1976
Very well written but also very low key ghost stories, some of which are conventional and some of which have an interesting twist, like one in which the ghosts of several murdered dogs haunt the ruins of an abandoned mansion. One man is haunted by his own ghost from the future. One story involves a vampire. Other ghosts try to protect hidden secrets from the past, admonish their younger selves, or greet old friends in what might actually be an hallucination. The stories are quite literate, naturally, but they do not provide a lot of variety and I wasn’t unhappy to finish the last of them. 9/19/25
Creature by John Saul, Bantam, 1989
Another child in jeopardy story, with a comic book quality mad scientist and a host of flat, uninteresting characters. The sports center in a small town is actually a secret laboratory where the villain is experimenting with virtual reality and growth hormones. Despite knowing that the hormones result in violence, he arranges to inject some high school athletes. They get stronger but eventually begin to transform into malformed creatures. The chief protagonist is one of the boys, who eventually runs off into the woods where he can live without being bothered. We are not even given a satisfying death of the bad guy, who dies in an automobile crash. One of his worst books. 9/18/25
The Unloved by John Saul, Bantam,
The first half of this largely avoids the children in peril theme of all of his previous novels, but that changes midway through when the mother is killed, and a little later when the father is also murdered, leaving their two kids in the hands of an aunt who has been possessed by an evil grandmother. There are ghostly sightings, a series of strange accidents, and at least three more murders – the housekeeper and two teenagers who annoy the possessed woman. The story takes place in a crumbling southern mansion on an isolated island. There is a bit more action in this one than in the previous books, but there is still virtually no suspense. 9/14/25
The Unwanted by John Saul, Bantam, 1987
Another slow moving, demon child/child in jeopardy, thriller from an author that at this point in his career seemed stuck in that groove. The teenage protagonist has to go live with her alcoholic father after her mother dies in an accident. The father is abusive to his new wife and his son and makes things difficult for the newcomer as well. She doesn’t make friends easily except with animals, and the people she resents the most begin to experience mysterious accidents. It’s hard to take sides in this one because even though some of her targets are reprehensible, she is possibly even worse. 9/10/25
Hellfire by John Saul, Bantam, 1986
A wealthy family wants to reopen an old mill which, in times past, used child labor. Several of the children died, some of them in a fire. The family is torn by internal conflicts, unshared secrets, personality clashes, and a child who hears the voice of a child long dead. You don’t really need to read past page fifty to know virtually the entire story. The spirit of someone who died at the mill is determining to take control of the minds of contemporary children and use them to exact revenge on the descendants of the adults responsible. And this one has a cutesy ending that is infuriating. 9/7/25
Brain Child by John Saul, Bantam, 1985
A young boy is nearly brain dead when a brilliant surgeon manages to save his life. But he is different even after recovering, and readers will know that he is intermittently possessed by the spirit of a boy who saw his father lynched a century earlier. His emotional aspect is very subdued, and he begins to have blackouts. During those blackouts, people begin to die. The story proceeds very predictably, the only mystery being to what degree the living boy is cooperating with the dead one. The middle of the book moves at a glacial pace and the characters are bland. 9/4/25
Monuments in Darkness by Nicholas Kaufmann, Hippocampus, 2025, $20, ISBN 978-1-61498-471-9
A collection of twelve horror and fantasy stories, none of which I had read before. One is original to the collection. Several of the stories are reminiscent of Lovecraft, one of them directly, the others only in general theme. There are cosmic forces out there, including nasty gods and menacing beings. There is a ghost story, a very nice ambiguous tale of a woman whose talents might be more than human, and bizarre monsters who exist through the ages. The methods of narration vary a bit. There is conventional story telling, a tough detective story frame, and others. I would not describe any of them as light hearted. Kaufmann is very serious about his characters and stories and almost all of them are intensely suspenseful, although not always overtly. A good collection from an author I encounter too infrequently in my reading. 8/30/25
The Wendigo and Others by Algernon Blackwood, Hippocampus, 2025, $30, ISBN 978-1-61498-461-0
This is the third very large volume in what is planned as a complete collection of Blackwood's short fiction, a project of which I very much approve. This covers his fiction from 1910-1912, and that's over 500 pages. The title story is probably his most famous single story, but there are lots of good ones here, including "The Man Who the Trees Loved," "The Temptaiton of the Clay," and "The Goblin's Collection." Several of the stories here were new to me. Blackwood's short fiction often fluctuated between fantasy and the supernatural, with some religiously themed and some designed to illustrate some ethical proposition. Quite a few of the stories are quite short but I find that Blackwood is more impressive in his longer stories where he is better able to conjure up the weird settings and atmospheres that make his stories distinctive. This is a great buy for the price, as are the previous two volumes. 8/26/25
Nathaniel by John Saul, Bantam, 1986
Yet another child in jeopardy story of the supernatural. Recent widow and kids move to a small town near her in-laws, who act very strangely. Town has a legend of a ghostly child who wants vengeance for his death. Son of newcomers has a friend who refuses to let anyone else see him. Townspeople are secretive. The in-laws begin acting bizarrely and there are hints that their family is connected to the phantom child. The dead father may have been pushed to his death by a ghost. The story plods forward to the revelation that the grandfather killed his own son, that he was responsible for other deaths, and that an angry spirit is determined to avenge itself. 8/22/25
It Was Her House First by Cherie Priest, Poisoned Pen, 2025
There is a very slow moving start to this haunted house novel. A woman inherits an abandoned house with two ghosts, one benevolent and one not. The house is barely habitable and an extensive renovation project is necessary. The ghosts are connected to the death of a long ago film actress who was reportedly thrown off a cliff by her husband, although it appears that she may have committed suicide and framed him because she felt he was responsible for the death of their daughter. There is some mild poltergeist activity in the first half of the book, but nothing really happens of note until midway. This is the only book by Priest that didn’t hold my interest throughout. The pages and pages of discussion of the work necessary were just not interesting and the characters, though well done, could not keep my attention during the first few chapters. 8/17/25
The Mummy’s Foot and Other Fantastic Tales by Theophile Gautier, Hippocampus, 2018
Three short novels and a few stories. The stories often deal with seduction, by a woman from a tapestry and by a vampire. The title story is his best. “Avatar” is reasonably good – it’s about body swapping and a romantic triangle. The other two novellas are just okay, and actually “Spirite” is rather boring and verges on silliness. One of the stories is straight historical adventure featuring Cleopatra. These were all originally published in French but the translations here seem pretty good. I got rather tired of the appearances of vaguely erotic and not entirely earthbound women of extraordinary beauty. 8/14/25
Back There in the Grass by Irvin Cobb and Gouverneur Morris, Hippocampus, 2020
Horror stories by two authors whose body of work is too small for a collection. Cobb’s stories are usually ambiguous or completely rationalized. “Fishhead,” which reportedly influenced Lovecraft, is about a man whose features resemble a fish and catfish avenge his murder, a rare actually fantastic story. A hangman’s vision that causes him to kill himself is rationalized. “The Belled Buzzard,” a good suspense story, is merely insanity. Others have sometimes unconvincing rational explanations. Cobb’s stories are generally understated, used rural backgrounds, and suggest rather than describe. Morris also wrote understated stories. Some of those here are not fantastic. The ones that are generally involve some brief return of the dead, as a vision or otherwise. The title story – which involves diminutive human figures with poisonous fangs – is his best. 8/13/25
Twin Spirits by W.W. Jacobs, Hippocampus, 2018
Jacobs was a prolific short story writer, and most of them were on the shorter side. His most famous short is, of course, “The Monkey’s Paw.” This claims to be a collection of his weird fiction, but it is not. Most of the stories are mundane tales usually involving mysteries. Unlike that story, several of the ones included here are not fantastic at all. The odd events are rationalized, usually as a hoax or misunderstanding. There is a fairly funny one about a tame sea serpent. 8/13/25
The God Project by John Saul, Bantam, 1982
Children in jeopardy again. There is a rash of infant deaths and child abductions, which are rather obviously linked to a supposed research project that is actually experimenting on the children in a small town. Those who do not die seem to be immune to all diseases and even physical injuries heal almost instantly. There is a wave at a scientific explanation but it is doubletalk. The plot is too obvious and at times the momentum comes to a halt as the author provides us with peripheral scenes that do not advance the story. Saul seemed to be caught in a rut this point and seemed to be looking for a new direction. The novel feels like an inferior, bloated version of The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham. Corny ending. 8/11/25
If the Dead Knew by May Sinclair, Hippocampus, 2020
A collection of mostly mild supernatural and fantasy stories by an author whose work was mostly in the mainstream. There are two novellas. “The Intercessor” is a gentle ghost story in which the apparition actually triggers an improvement in the lives of people. “The Flaw in the Crystal” is more metaphysical. A woman is convinced that she can connect with some kind of cosmic power in order to help people with mental problems, but things do not go as she planned. Several are ghost stories, and the ghosts can sometimes manifest themselves physically. Some of them are benevolent or neutral, and some are vindictive. At least one story is surprisingly sexual for a story from this era. Some of the stories are simply excuses for philosophical discussions. 8/7/25
The Were-Wolf and Others by Clemence Housman, Hippocampus, 2023
The title story, a novelette, is the only story by this author that is of any interest today. It is packaged here with a short story set in a vague fantasy world that is of no interest at all. There is also a novel, The Unknown Sea. It is an episodic adventure about a voyage by a righteous young man and the woman he loves. Or is she a woman? She might be a mermaid or a manifestation of the sea itself. Their adventures include encounters with magic and it is all designed to be a metaphorical examination of various aspects of human existence. Christian dies at the end. The prose is pretty thick at times and despite the adventures, the story moves too slowly. 8/7/25
Lost Ghosts by Mary Wilkins Freeman, Hippocampus, 2018
This appears to contain all of the supernatural fiction by Freeman, who wrote mostly mainstream work for both children and adults. The stories involve ghosts, mostly not dangerous, premonitions, the intervention of unlikely angels, and so on. One story is a fantasy about a gateway to another reality. “Luella Miller,” “The Southwest Chamber,” and “The Shadows on the Wall” are the best stories in the collection. All three involve the lingering influence of the dead, but without traditional ghosts. They involve an aura of despair, poltergeist activity, and mysterious shadows cast by no object. 8/5/25
The Islands of Sorrow by Simon Raven, Valancourt, 2025
This is a collection of short stories. The title story, however, takes up about half the book. It is a very strange account of an island where victims of a particularly severe form of leprosy are isolated and cared for by a staff of very strange people. The caretakers turn out to be vampires, although they do not seem to drink blood. The other stories are much shorter and range from traditional ghost story to inexplicable experiences where past events influence people in the present, or predict the future. All of them are well written but except for the title story, none are particularly memorable. 8/2/25
Doctors Wear Scarlet by Simon Raven, Avon, 1960
Richard Fountain went to Greece to do routine research in pagan religions. There he meets a mysterious woman with whom he deserts his work for more arcane pleasures. The authorities are concerned because people in their vicinity have a tendency to disappear. The British police expect him to be expelled and sent home and want to get ahead of the problem and find out what is going on. Three of Fountain’s friends travel to Greece to find him and a long chase ensues as they hop from one island to another. The ending is tragic. Both Fountain and the woman have succumbed to a kind of psychological vampirism. He drinks her blood, expecting that they will both be transformed but instead she dies and he soon follows. A very atmospheric novel that is rather slow to get going but accelerates quite nicely in the second half. 8/2/25
Johnson Looked Back by Thomas Burke, Hippocampus, 2018
This is a collection of the fantastic fiction of Thomas Burke, who is better known for his mundane work. His two best known genre stories, both excellent, are “The Hands of Mr. Ottermole” and “Johnson Looked Back.” The first is about a serial killer and is not fantastic. The second is a grim metaphor. Other stories include a vengeful parrot, possessed murderers, premonitions of murder, magical spells that don’t last forever, magical vengeance, loops in time, a zombie, etc. Several of these are not remotely fantastic. One is just one day in the life of a factory worker. A couple are routine crime stories. They mostly age well. 7/27
When the Wind Blows by John Saul, Dell, 1981
Saul reused the child in jeopardy and ghostly child themes from his earlier work. A young orphan is taken in by an unmarried woman and her elderly mother, despite the latter’s objections. The younger woman is prone to blackouts when the wind is blowing and thinks she hears the sound of babies crying. The older woman’s opposition to the child seems irrational until the reader realizes that her daughter is insane and that the orphan is actually in great danger. Murder follows as the ghostly children – who may or may not be real – cause further mayhem and a deadly climax. 7/23/25
Comes the Blind Fury by John Saul, Dell, 1980
The ghost of a wrong child was a familiar theme in horror fiction in the 1980s. Saul used it more than once. The ghost uses a doll as a link to a girl a century after her death so that she can seek revenge on the people who wronged her, or rather, substitutes for the people who wronged her. The rationale of all this is pretty raw. Saul did a better job sticking to his main plot than he had in the past so the story moves along pretty well, but the apparent mental collapse of the victim’s father struck me as completely implausible and much of the story had been done so many times already that it never really came to life for me. 7/21/25
Senseless by Ronald Malfi, Titan, 2025
A woman is murdered and horribly mutilated. Her husband tracks down the man he believes responsible and kills him. This is covered up with the help of a sympathetic police detective. So both men are startled when a nearly exact duplicate of the crime occurs a year later. The details were never released to the public. Was it the wrong man who was killed? A second plotline concerns a disturbed young man whose girlfriend claims to be a vampire. A third describes the fraught relationship of a married couple who realize that the husband’s son by an earlier marriage might be a serial killer. Lots of supernatural hints, but they are ambiguous enough that this could be considered either horror or psychological suspense. 7/18/25
The Lime Kiln and Other Enchanted Spaces by Geoffrey Reiter, Hippocampus, 2025, $20, ISBN 9781-61498-466-5
Charnel Glamour by Mark Samuels, Hippocampus, 2025, $20, ISBN 978-1-61498-462-7
These are two quite different collections of short horror/weird fiction. I was unfamiliar with Reiter and had read none of these stories or poems before. A couple of the stories did not work for me but most were quite good, sometimes thought provoking, and conventional without being trite. The title story was my favorite, probably because I am so fond of Lovecraft pastiches and tributes. The story incorporates many of the good parts of HPL without carrying along his excesses and faults. I also quite liked "The Cartographer," which I suppose is more properly fantasy. Others involve Atlantis, witchcraft, mysterious forces, and the dangers of uncovering long lost knowledge. Well worth the price. I had already read a couple of books by Samuels, so I had a better idea what to expect. Samuels died recently, so this is likely to be his last collection. Most of the stories are loosely related - they are set in the same geographical area - and are somewhat Lovecraftian while not drawing directly from that body of work. The stories are very rich in atmosphere, with hints of greater mysteries just outside the words of the story and an atmosphere of imminent dread is present almost throughout the collection. "Dedicated to the Weird" - his final story - is possibly the best in the collection, although I also liked "Duxford's Blackberry Wine" and "A Universe of Charnel Glamour." Samuels' prose is a bit more dense but not prohibitively so. Both of these are above average collections and reasonably priced. 7/17/25
From the Dead by E. Nesbit, Tartarus, 2025
This is apparently the complete short supernatural fiction of an author who is best known for her children’s novels. Most of these are quite traditional – some ghost stories, revenge for murders in the past, a magical mirror, a phantom automobile, scientific experiments gone awry, presentiments that come true, curses, etc. The best known is “Man-sized in Marble,” in which two statues walk around a village on one night of each year and kill anyone who sees them. Many of the others are very readable not particularly dated. I am surprised that so few of these have been anthologized. My favorite is “The Pavilion,” which features a vine that kills people while they sleep. 7/12/25
Call for an Exorcist by Jerome Bixby, Brandon House, 1974
Aka The Devil’s Scrapbook. This is a collection of very short tales, all with supernatural elements and some soft core pornographic intent, although most of them are tame by conventional standards and could appear in mainstream publications with no trouble. They include deals with the devil, a goddess looking for the perfect human lover, werewolves, witchcraft, a succubus, and other standard elements of horror, although the tone in the stories ranges from comedy to light adventure and never attempts to be suspenseful or horrifying. Although ostensibly horror, they are light enough that one could equally well call it fantasy. 7/12/25
Waiting for the Night by Michael McCarty & Terrie Leigh Relf, Grinning Skull, 2025, ISBN 978-1947227996
A collection of mostly collaborative short stories, some of which are reprinted from earlier collections. A couple are science fiction but overall the themes are horrific, and often make use of standard horror elements and supernatural creatures. Sometimes they do not. "Red Rain" and "Dark Lord of the Martian Canals" were the two that best resonated with me, and they differ very much from each other. The stories tend to be on the shorter side and are very much plot oriented. They deliver their punches early and usually quite effectively. I thought a few of them would have benefited from some further development, which would have probably made them more suspenseful. 7/4/25
The Sin-Eater and Other Weird Stories by William Sharp/Fiona MacLeod, Hippocampus, 2025
William Sharp wrote most of his fantastic fiction under the MacLeod name. This is a selection of those stories and they skew more toward fantasy than horror. The title story and “The Gypsy Christ” are the two best in the book. The former is based on a Scottish legend about a ceremony performed at death that is perverted by personal feelings which leads to the doom of the protagonist. The second is a family curse that has led to the crucifixion of two of the protagonist’s ancestors. He now fears that he will be the next victim and eventually he does develop the stigmata and perishes. Several of the stories are vignettes and they are sometimes inter-related. Star crossed lovers, Celtic legends, and the conflict between Christianity and paganism are recurring themes. The prose style may put off some modern readers and as a whole, I found the collection readable but unmemorable other than two stories I mentioned. 7/2/25
Cry for the Strangers by John Saul, Dell, 1979
This suspense novel did not have any real fantastic content but it was billed as horror and I’m going to review it under that category. A small coastal town is almost pathological in its dislike of strangers, including newcomers to the community. There are rumors of a lingering curse that manifests itself in the frequent storms that affect the area. Then the deaths start. Some of them appear to be accidents or suicides, but it is obvious very quickly that they are being cleverly murdered. It’s also obvious pretty early who is responsible. The overbearing sheriff has blackouts and is oddly defensive about the deaths. Too long as well. 6/29/25
Punish the Sinners by John Saul, Dell, 1978
The protagonist is a new teacher at a parochial school for girls whose headmaster seems only marginally sane the first time we meet him. He is intolerant and his personality seems to have altered over the years, and not for the better. He also leads a group of seven priests who have formed an apparently harmless society to which the new teacher is invited to be a member. But none of them can remember what happens during their meetings, and several of the students attempt or succeed in committing suicide. The teacher realizes that headmaster believes himself to be the reincarnation of a famous martyr, and that he is channeling that personality to influence his students. Downbeat ending. Too long and slow moving for my taste. 6/24/25
Charmed Life by Bernard Taylor, Tor, 1994
This is a very unusual novel of the supernatural. There are two groups of people who monitor the future of various people through a series of holographic visions. They are both interested in Guy Holman because his twice has been foreseen three times, and in each case he somehow managed to avoid death. The two organizations are opposed to one another – they actively assassinate agents – and it is not clear what motivates either of them. Holman is oblivious to all of this. Then a new vision shows him being killed in an assassination attempt in a small country that leads to a civil war. But previous visions indicated that another man was killed and that this led to a peaceful transition.
This Is Midnight by Bernard Taylor, Valancourt, 2017
A collection of, I believe, all of Taylor’s short fiction, most of which is horror. There is considerable variation, but for the most part the horror elements are deliberately understated. Some of the themes are traditional. There is a werewolf story, for example, and the possible ghost of a serial killer. Another story involves a witch planning to kill her husband. A toddler commits murder. A woman jilted by her boyfriend holds him prisoner in her basement for decades. A scientist breeds a praying mantis as large as a human, but forgets what females of that species do to their mates. A serial killer swaps bodies with the husbands of his victims.
The Reaping by Bernard Taylor, Leisure, 1980
An artist agrees to stay at the sprawling house of an elderly woman who wants him to paint a portrait of her niece. There are strange goings on at the house and ultimately he discovers that no one is really interested in the painting. He was lured there and seduced by an actress who was being paid to have his baby. Several other young women, posing as nuns, have been employed to seduce other men. It’s a cabal, of course, and they want to sacrifice a child so that their leader will attain immortality. In a somewhat rushed ending, our hero foils the plot, saves his son, and kills the evil woman – who turns out to be his girlfriend in disguise. 6/9/25
Moorstone by Bernard Taylor, St Martins, 1982
Aka The Moorstone Sickness. A married couple move to a remote village to recover from the tragic death of her son. Although there is nothing overtly threatening, there are oddities. The villagers seem too perfect. Newcomers have a habit of never leaving. Older residents leave their estates to neighbors rather than distant family members. The husband begins to suspect something is serious wrong, but his wife is desperate to find a place where she can drown her grief. The solution, of course, is that the villagers are cult members who entice, ensorcel, and occasional elimination outsiders to preserve their way of life. 6/9/25
Sweetheart, Sweetheart by Bernard Taylor, Ballantine, 1997
The protagonist travels to England to visit his recently married twin brother only to discover that the wife died in a suspicious accident and his brother died in an automobile crash that might have been suicide. He also learns that there have been earlier tragedies in the house, usually women murdered by their husbands or lovers. When attempts are made on the life of his fiancé, he initially believes that a jealous local woman is responsible. Eventually he recognizes the truth. The ghost of a vengeful and jealous woman has haunted the cottage for generations. Despite the obvious danger, he decides to stay – which ultimately costs the lives of his fiancé and another woman. This was quite long and relatively slow moving, but it is remarkably effective and one of the best ghost novels of all time. 6/5/25
Suffer the Children by John Saul, Dell, 1977
The first novel to appear by this author under his own name was supernatural horror. A family is haunted by a brutal act a century earlier when a drunken man raped and killed his own child. Now it appears that both of those involved are able to impose their personalities on living people, at least briefly. Three children are kidnapped and imprisoned in a cave where they die. The story leaps forward fifteen years to the discovery of their bodies but no one is ever charged with their abduction. The curse appears to have ended. The motivations are sometimes obscure, the pacing is very slow, and there are a couple of cases of characters acting unbelievably dense. 6/5/25
Whitechapel Rising by Anthony Strong, West End, 2020
An excavation in London turns up a body and a bloody knife. For reasons known only to the author, everyone immediately knows that this is Jack the Ripper, despite a complete lack of evidence. And he’s not actually dead. The body wakens and walks off before the coroner can arrive. The Ripper is actually a vampire variant who uses blood to sustain his life indefinitely, but by means of an artifact rather than by drinking it. And the artifact is missing, taken by the people who walled him up a century earlier. Although the plot is quite predictable, the author adds some bits of lore that are mildly interesting, creating a fairly original vampire variation. 6/1/25
Evil Intent by Bernard Taylor, Leisure. 1994
The last supernatural novel by Taylor - he wrote thrillers after this - is an acknowledged tribute to "Casting the Runes" by M.R. James. A family moves to a rural part of England where they run afoul of a local man with an unpleasant personality. He begins sending them presents that contain rune, which cause them to die in "accidents" like bee stings and lightning. He had previously killed at least three other people. The father finally figures out what is going on and tricks the man into receiving one of his own runes, and dying as a consequence. 5/31/25
The Godsend by Bernard Taylor, Avon, 1976
A strange woman gives birth while visiting the Marlowes and disappears. Although they have four children of their own, they decide to foster the infant. Their own toddler dies, apparently crib death, and an accident results in another child drowning a few months later. The foundling is obviously murdering her competition and when the father finally realizes the truth, he is unable to convince his wife. Ultimately the evil child wins, despite the best efforts of the protagonist. A bit slow at times and the ending is definitely downbeat but it’s well written. This was the author’s first novel. 5/22/25
The Children of Eve by John Connolly, Emily Bestler, 2025
Charlie Parker returns, as does the ghost of his daughter. A friend’s lover disappears under strange circumstances and she hires him to find out where he is. He is connected to a complicated web of drug dealers, artifact smugglers, and the kidnapping of some Mexican children. Except that the kidnapped children do not appear to actually exist. Two professional killers hired by a cartel follow from one person to another, trying to locate the children, and horribly killing each link in the chain. Although most of the story involves thugs killing each other, sometimes brutally, the ending definitely involves the supernatural as one of those involved is not human. I thought this was only about average for the series. The byplay about the ghost of his daughter was distracting, although the byplay about his involvement with his living daughter was nicely done. 5/19/25
The House at Black Tooth Pond by Stephen Mark Rainey, Macabre, 2025
A body is found horribly mutilated in a locked room. Two brothers find an abandoned house that exudes an aura of dread. The two separate threads of plot will converge of course, as the local sheriff tries to figure out how the victim died as well as who was responsible. The brothers are soon uncertain that what they are experiencing is real. The house is, of course, a nexus for some never completely explained horror that is reminiscent of Lovecraft, although entirely original. Well written and suspenseful, and with an exceptionally good set of closing chapters. 5/12/25
Second Fire by Robert C. Wilson, Jove, 1993
This was Wilson’s third and apparently final novel. A potential archaeological dig site is the focus of a series of deaths. Although the authorities seek natural explanations, the victims were all killed by a kind of sentient fire that is somehow connected to a hidden cave where a large number of people were burned to death centuries earlier. Ojibwa traditions and modern civilization conflict, and misunderstandings on both sides further complicate matters. The murderous fire is an interesting variation but for some reason the novel never builds up much suspense, possibly because we know too much too early and the only mystery is the details. It is also a bit too long – I was ready for the climax a hundred pages before I reached it. 4/27/25
The Weird Tales of Tanith Lee, Immanion, 2017
Lee sold more than two dozen stories to Weird Tales magazine, and they are all collected in this good sized volume. A few have contemporary setting but most are either historical or take place in a more or less typical fantasy world. I had never read “The Unrequited Glove” before and it is very good. Ditto for “Where All Things Perish.” I generally find her relatively rare contemporary stories more interesting and more plot oriented. I find that Lee’s short stories vary dramatically in effectiveness for me, but this is overall one of the best selections, with only a few that I did not enjoy. 4/26/25
Grendel’s Labyrinth by Anthony M. Strong, West End, 2001
Part of a series about John Decker, a modern day monster hunter who is at this point working for a secret organization whose authority is unclear. When two archaeologists find the tomb of Grendel – in Ireland for some reason – Decker is part of a group dispatched to investigate. The story gets off to a mildly rocky start because the archaeologists are pretty badly done. There are only two of them, no workers, and they violate protocol almost immediately,. In any case, the local village has been sacrificing its dead to a demonic creature who lives in the caverns under the town, while concealing this from the outside world for reasons unknown. This was a considerable dip in quality from the previous books. The plot is problematic and the characters are flatly portrayed. I was nudged into looking up Grendel’s mother because I had not remembered that she was never named or described in Beowulf. 4/23/25
The Dweller on the Threshold by Robert Hichens, 1911
This one is a low key and generally unimpressive novel of the occult. A man recently returned from studying in Ceylon sets out to help another man become more self confident and assertive. Over the course of time he succeeds, but only because a fragment of his own personality is transferred into the other man’s mind. The situation changes when the occultist suddenly dies. The fragment vanishes from the personality of his friend, who is returned to his previous lackluster existence. 4/20/25
Blood 20 by Tanith Lee, Telos, 2015
This one is a collection of twenty stories about vampires, of various kinds. Most of these have historical settings, or take place in fantasy worlds that resemble our own past. The vampires range from the merely spiritual devourers of life force to physical monsters. There is surprisingly little violence in most of them. The longest, a novella, does not technically involve vampires at all except that one of the characters is writing a vampire novel that begins to affect the real world. Many of these are fantasy with horror elements. 4/17/25
Flames by Robert Hichens, 1897
This is an overly long occult novel that involves two dissolute young men who become interested in mysticism. They consult with an older man and they all perform a ceremony. One of the younger men and the older one both collapse and are pronounced dead, but the younger comes back to life. His personality has changed, however, and is so strong that it further corrupts his friend. A stereotyped prostitute with a heart of gold is in love with the friend, so she gets involved in figuring out what happened. The reader is likely to have guessed already that the older man transferred his soul into the younger body. 4/14/25
Crooked Tree by Robert C. Wilson, Berkley, 1980
The author should not be confused with Robert Charles Wilson, the SF writer. This Wilson only wrote three novels, all horror. This was his debut. The bears in a state park begin stalking and killing people. A chipmunk also attacks a man – but this is a bit incongruous because it does not fit with the rest of the story. The bears are possessed by an ancient Ottawa sorcerer, working through a living woman, because he had an affinity for bears. Then chipmunk is anomalous. There are a half dozen deaths before the protagonist accepts the truth and performs an ancient ritual to neutralize the sorcerer’s spirit. Pretty standard fare, and relatively slow moving, but not a bad read. 4/14/25
The Return of the Soul by Robert Hichens, Stark House, 2025
Hichens was mostly a mainstream writer but he wrote a few horror stories – the best of which is “How Love Came to Professor Guildea,” which is not included here. The title story is an overly long story about reincarnation. A cruel man kills his grandmother’s cat and many years later marries a woman who turns out to be the cat’s reincarnation. “The Cry of the Child” is ambiguous. A man whose neglect causes the death of a child is haunted by a cry audible to no one else until he marries a woman and she gives birth to the child’s reincarnation. The remaining stories are not fantastic and frankly none of them dates well. Hichens tended to belabor his points and the prose is rarely smooth. 4/9/25
When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy, Nightfire, 2025, $18.95, ISBN 978-1-250-35434-1
This unusual horror novel features both shape changing and other, less familiar supernatural events. The protagonist is an aspiring actress who finds a young boy who is clearly terrified. She decides to protect him from his father, who pursues them across the country. The father is the shape changer, a sort of werewolf, and he is determined to reclaim his son. The actress is just as determined that he fail. The violence grows steadily worse and closer as the story progresses. But there is a very surprising twist which I won’t reveal that changes the nature of the story, and points it toward a different outcome. Readers should be aware that this is written in present tense, which for me at least means that there is no possibility of any real suspense or immersion in the story. Your mileage may vary, because this is otherwise well written. 4/6/25
Crimson Deep by Anthony M. Strong, West End, 2020
The third adventure of John Decker – who somewhat reluctantly becomes a monster hunter – is another plot that could have been taken straight from a B horror movie screenplay. Someone steals a specimen from a genetics lab, and it escapes in the wilds of Florida. It superficially resembles an alligator, but it can walk on two legs and is much stronger, faster, and more powerful. The reader sees its encounters on land and underwater with various characters – a homeless alcoholic, a group of researchers testing a remotely operated submersible, a gang of bank robbers hiding out in a cabin, two young boys whose mischief places them in danger, and two men who make an unauthorized dive into uncharted caverns. Decker is almost a peripheral character for most of the book. Despite its familiarity, the plot moves quickly and efficiently and the prose is fine. I do quibble about the sheriff’s decision not to tell people that there is a dangerous animal in the area because he doesn’t want to cause a panic. Instead he puts everyone in risk of an attack. 4/5/25
The Basement by Bari Wood, Morrow, 1995
Myra knows there is something wrong about the basement in her house, but it is not until she decides it holds the ghost of a woman executed for witchcraft that the situation turns dangerous. She attempts a kind of exorcism that actually gives her a link with the witch’s powers. An obnoxious neighbor is stung to death by bees and other people who threaten her husband and herself are soon facing bizarre deaths of their own. This was a bit slow for the first half, but picks up speed halfway through and rushes toward a satisfactory ending. This was the author’s last published horror novel. 4/5/25
Doll’s Eyes by Bari Wood, Morrow, 1993
Wood wrote novels that broke little new ground, but she handled familiar themes more skillfully than almost all of her competition. This is one of those stories where a clairvoyant woman has a vision of a murder, but not enough to identify the killer. The killer finds out that she is having these visions, and decides to eliminate her before she learns more. The improvement here is that the characters are exceptionally well drawn and the motives are much more distinct and original. The ending comes as no surprise – the police arrive in the nick of time when he kidnaps the protagonist. An entertaining story even if it breaks no new ground. 3/24/25
Cold Sanctuary by Anthony M. Strong, West End, 2016
The second in the John Decker series – he hunts monsters – is a noticeable improvement on the first. The plot is straight out of B movie horror, but the writing is solid and there were some genuinely suspenseful scenes. A small, isolated Alaskan village is located near an abandoned military laboratory. When thieves sneak into the close facility, they set loose a biological agent that turns people into monsters almost instantly. Only one of them gets loose, but that leads to a string of grisly murders, including the local sheriff. Decker has been brought in as a consultant, but there is a mysterious agent who is determined to prevent him from discovering the truth. Not to mention the man who sent the thieves in the first place and who wants to know where they are. Entertaining. 3/20/25
The Tribe by Bari Wood, Signet, 1981
One barrack in a WWII concentration camp held well treated Jewish prisoners. All of the residents came from the same Polish village. Decades later, they are all living in the US when the son of one of them is murdered by a street gang. A short time later the gang is wiped out, their bodies mutilated, in a mysterious attack. It is clear very early that the villagers have control of a golem and use it to destroy their enemies, and that even the Nazis were forced to leave them alone to avoid retribution. But inevitably they abuse their power which causes their downfall. A bit slow at times and not particularly suspenseful, but the characters are interesting and the writing is solid. 3/18/25
Amy Girl by Bari Wood, Onyx, 1987
This is a relatively entertaining variant of the demon child story, one in which much of the reader’s sympathy goes to the child despite the menace she becomes. Beaten by her father, who then murdered her mother, Amy is adopted by a policeman and mostly fits into his family. But her foster brother is inherently hostile to other people, and he takes a particular dislike to the newcomer. I don’t want to spoil the ending for anyone who might be thinking about reading this, but it is not at all what you are likely to expect. 2/15/25The Killing Gift by Bari Wood, Signet, 1975
Although the plot for this debut novel is not particularly new, it is handled much better than usual. A young child has a strange aura that makes people nervous in her presence. Decades later, a burglar drops dead in her apartment and the police detective involved begins to trace several similar incidents in her past. She can mentally project a power that severs spinal cords or inflicts other damage. He is convinced this is true but struggles to find credible evidence. And he has a hidden motive. The ending was not what I expected. Quite good despite its familiarity. 2/11/25Cain’s Touch by Saul Wernick, Dell, 1978
Michael Hietala can heal with a touch, but most of the time he is just a swindler. Then he discovers that his twin brother, whom he killed when they were toddlers, has come back to occasionally share his body and the brother actually restore the dead to life. The two brothers hate each other and a lot of innocent people get caught in the crossfire before the twin finally seizes control of the body and commits suicide. The surprise ending is that there never was a twin, just two different fractions of his total personality. Way too long for the story, which wasn’t all that interesting in the first place. 2/8/25
Old Soul by Susan Barker, Putnam, 2025, $29, ISBN 978-0-593-71829-2
This is a rather unconventional treatment of a conventional horror meme, the psychic vampire who extends her own life by taking that of other people. The story begins when two strangers accidentally meet in an airport and share their stories about the lost of someone close to them. They slowly realize that the lost ones had a connection through a mysterious woman, and that leads them to investigate further. The novel is fairly episodic from that point on as each encounter with the woman is essentially a self contained story, although they are obviously linked. Nor is the "villain" entirely unsympathetic. She just does not want to die and is not cruel or conventionally evil. It took me a few dozen pages to get into the story for some reason, but once I had passed that point, it became much more engrossing. An author to watch for. 2/6/25
The Wild Adventures of Cthulhu 3 by Will Murray, Odyssey, 2024
This, as the title suggests, is a collection of stories mostly set within the Cthulhu Mythos created by H.P. Lovecraft. The stories do not form a series but rather are various tales inspired to a greater or lesser degree by the HPL creation, although sometimes with considerable liberties taken. Most of them have been previously published – a few are original in this collection. About a third of them struck me as quite good, a couple did not work for me, and the bulk are fairly standard pastiches with varying plots. Murray seems to be much more interested in the adventure/action aspects of his stories rather than development of a strong atmosphere. Lovecraft hovered between science fiction and horror and this collection sways more strongly toward the former. A few of the stories are written somewhat tongue in cheek, and I thought these were generally the best in the book. 1/15/25
What Vengeance Comes by Anthony M. Strong, West End, 2024
This is the first in a series of supernatural adventures, self published, that looked interesting enough that I decided to try it. The story is competently written with only a couple of awkward scenes. John Decker is a sheriff in a small town where a witch woman objects to having her property seized for road construction. She transforms herself into a kind of werewolf and begins killing people. I don’t generally like werewolf stories, which usually are mysteries in which we try to figure out who is the monster. The plot is different here because that part is obvious. The premise struck me as shaky. Why would killing random strangers all over town somehow prevent them from building the road? Lightweight but not without some entertainment value. 1/6/25
