Synopsis:

In this Lovecraftian tale of horror and espionage, Tomb of the Black Pharaoh follows Robert B. Danforth, a former Miskatonic University scholar still reeling from the horrific events At the Mountains of Madness. Now part of the newly formed Office of the Coordinator of Information (COI) – the predecessor of the famed Office of Strategic Services (OSS) – Danforth is dispatched to Cairo to thwart a Nazi plot to recover the Talisman of Nephren-ka, buried deep within the lost tomb of Black Pharaoh. Said to grant unspeakable power, the artifact could tip the scales of World War II in the Nazis’ favor. As Danforth delves into the ancient tomb, he faces cults devoted to Nephren-ka, Nazi occultists, and cosmic horrors that strain the limits of his sanity.

Danforth must battle not only the looming threat of the Nazis but also the terrifying implications of the Amulet’s power. As eldritch forces close in and the boundaries between reality and madness begin to crumble, Danforth realizes the cost of failure may be far greater than even the war—humanity itself may be at stake.

This heart-pounding mix of Lovecraftian horror and historical espionage will captivate fans of cosmic terror and WWII thrillers alike. It immerses readers in a world where ancient gods and modern warfare collide in a fight for ultimate power.

Review:

Lovecraft is an author I haven’t dabbled in much, but over the past year, I read At the Mountains of Madness to acquaint myself with the writer beloved by so many. Being familiar with that story—and its characters—was the perfect lead-in to Tomb of the Black Pharaoh by Christopher Michael.

This tale follows Robert B. Danforth, who survived the harrowing Antarctic expedition in At the Mountains of Madness. Though those events were both treacherous and horrifying, Danforth finds himself longing for more of the unknown. So when he’s sent to Egypt to uncover secrets of hidden, dangerous power, he accepts without question.

The most compelling aspect of Danforth’s character is the tension between his nobility and his obsession. While he is committed to doing the right thing, he’s also mesmerized—perhaps fatally so—by the eldritch horrors he encounters. That fascination consumes him, and his descent into obsession is both disturbing and deeply human.

The story moves at a strong pace, especially once the initial groundwork is laid. The action is tight and purposeful, and the characters Danforth meets are a blend of intriguing, informative, and, at times, utterly monstrous.

Where this story truly shines is in the way its world is rendered—rich in dread, thick with mystery, and painted with a thoroughly Lovecraftian brush. Each scene drips with decadent vocabulary and vivid atmosphere.

Christopher Michael masterfully weaves historical detail into the narrative without weighing it down. The backstory of Nephren-Ka, a figure borrowed from Lovecraft’s own mythos, is especially gripping. And, true to form, the story leaves readers with the central, haunting question that defines cosmic horror: Why?

Filled with the mythology, madness, and occultism that define Lovecraft’s legacy, Tomb of the Black Pharaoh is a harrowing continuation that fans of the genre will appreciate.

I had the pleasure of experiencing this book on audio, and narrator J.T. Verona brings the characters to life with impressive skill, delivering pitch-perfect accents, suspenseful monologues, and a voice that’s easy to listen to for hours. If you enjoy poetic horror, historical adventures, and obsessive journeys into the unknown, Tomb of the Black Pharaoh is a must-read (or must-listen).

Synopsis

Struggling with the pressures of being a new father and the weight of regrets, Jamie Fletcher travels to Hawaii hoping to connect with his estranged brother, Eric. After a shocking act of violence that ends with corpses in an alley, the brothers end up on a fishing boat, along with the captain and his troubled son, in the middle of the ocean, where they encounter an uncanny and terrifying phenomenon that will signal a shift in the evolution of the world.

Review

This starts out as an almost familial drama. Jamie travels to Hawaii to reconnect with his brother Eric. He’s also running from his mistakes and the pressure of fatherhood. But after hardly any relaxation time, the story turns the violence up to a whole new level. The author takes no time at all to crack on into this one. 

A drug deal gone wrong, a fist fight gone too far. Now Jamie, Eric, and Eric’s boss and his son, are out on the open ocean, hoping to dispose of a problem before it starts. What follows this time—and I did go into this entirely blind—is another tonal shift as the author brings on almost-Lovecraftian cosmic horrors. There were twists I did not expect, and the under-ocean world shift made me think of Pirates of the Caribbean when they flipped the boat in Davy Jones’ Locker. Although this shift felt much more like a science fiction twist. 

I’ll be honest, I haven’t quite gotten along with cosmic horror. And while I did enjoy this, I was much more a fan of the parts that were about the brothers. And I believe a little length might have helped me to connect with them and their struggles. I honestly thought at first it would be a crime/murder novella. That, and I expected more of the ocean to come into play, although the creepy ‘being’ taking over deep sea creatures was definitely a highlight. The infected water, as well as the ‘being’ itself, felt like a mix of The Sundowner’s Dance by Todd Keisling with the more scientific infection from Symbiote by Michael Nayak. Both those if they were meshed with the scifi ending of The Sound of Suffering by Mark Towse. All of which definitely published after this one, so if you’ve liked anything I’ve said, or if you are a fan of cosmic horror—this is definitely unique!—this could be a hit for you!

Synopsis:

On the Seventh Webway planet of Exteron, an unprecedented disaster wipes out two-thirds of the terraforming colonists. Two teams are sent to the pre-terrestrial world on behalf of the Galactic Human Alliance, mankind’s centralized governing structure, and FLORA, the terraforming super-conglomerate whose technology allowed mankind to inhabit new worlds. The prospect of future Human dominion over Exteron, a world hellbent on rejecting mankind, rests on this investigatory slew of mercenaries, statesmen, and corporate catspaws.

Review:

Burkhardt is a master at Lovecraftian horror, so when I started Doril Song, I thought I knew what I was getting into. I only had an inkling. This tale, a futuristic science fiction horror, took me by surprise within the first few chapters. I thought I knew where it was going, but Burkhardt killed that notion early on.

Burkhardt creates his science fiction world in my favorite ways: snippets of information, dialogue, and description. He keeps it short and simple, giving only pertinent details without breaking the suspense.

Written in third-person, the horrific accounts are delivered by multiple characters. There are many instances of contact with the planet of Exteron, and each one is brutal and terrifying. Each character has their personal goal as to why they venture to the doomed world—politics, money, duty—and some moments reminded me of slasher films, where you are shouting at the screen for the character not to go investigate that sound in the woods, but of course they do anyway.

Exteron is inhabited by…something. The creatures are not just brutal and violent, they seem to have supernatural abilities that ensure the end of anyone who meets them.

Burkhardt’s descriptions of fatal moments are not just visceral and descriptive. At times, they are nearly poetic. Each demise was unique, and I felt that I was visualizing it in front of me.

Though Doril Song is a short read, Burkhardt offers backstories and banter to familiarize the reader with the characters. He provides reasons to root for the characters and relate to them. In horror, this is always bad, but as a reader who loves horror, I enjoyed the heartbreak. The version I read was the audiobook, narrated beautifully by Farah D. This came along with voice effects to mimic helmet comms and space transmissions. The creatures even had their own eerie vocalizations.
Burkhardt’s writing is always precise and sharp. Doril Song blends an eerie atmosphere with a horror that can never be escaped. This story will leave the mind wondering what horrors abide in deep space and haunt you like a lingering melody.

Synopsis

Combat Monsters brings together twenty award-winning and bestselling speculative fiction authors who each bring their own spin on an alternate history of World War II.

New research has uncovered deeply buried military secrets—both the Allied and Axis special operations during World War II included monsters. Did the Soviets use a dragon to win the Battle of Kursk? Did a vampire fight for the Canadians in Holland? Did the US drop the second atomic bomb on a kaiju?

This collection takes real events from World War II and injects them with fantastical creatures that mirror the “unreality” of war itself. Each story—and two poems—feature mythical, mystical, and otherwise unexplainable beings that change the course of history. Dragons rise and fall, witches cast deadly spells, mermaids reroute torpedoes, and all manner of “monsters” intervene for better or worse in the global turmoil of World War II.

Together, Combat Monsters challenge the very definition of monstrous, with the brutality of war as a sobering backdrop.

Review

Thanks to NetGalley and Blackstone Publishing for this audio arc. 

A concise set of stories meshing monsters with the atrocities of WWII. Vampires, witches, werewolves, dragons, krakens, genetically modified humans and animals, and DNA-altered bears, oh my. I particularly appreciated the generous take on “monster” as well as the shaping of war being the true evil. I don’t tend to enjoy war stuff that alters historical events in any big way as I feel it takes away from the people that paid for the outcome with their lives, and I’m glad to say this one skirted that exceptionally. The editor asked each contributor to ground their story in fact, within real events, but the outcomes were the same and the supernatural elements were simply helping or layered within. 

I enjoyed how each story took readers to a new place, a new perspective, a new country even. Including countries I wasn’t even aware took part in the war. We traveled the world and learned of the supernatural just under the surface. We read stories from the beginning of the war, and we read stories from the very bombing that ended the war. The variety within is really what makes this collection so special. 

Particular stand outs included a story that acted as almost an unauthorized sequel to Dracula and the Demeter, a werewolf that’s helped by something else, a crazy croctopus taking out strike teams, and the farming bears. I apologize because as I did the audio, which I typically do while driving, I didn’t think to note the names/authors!

Synopsis

Legends say a dead god is buried under the stone city of Ishcairn, protecting its inhabitants by dashing enemy fleets into the jagged coast of Craeburn. Adjunct professor Corrie Ecksley doesn’t believe any of that, but she knows from her work excavating nearby burial sites that the ancient Craeburn people believed it enough to name the city after their dead god, Ish.

When the ripples of a great war finally reach Craeburn’s shores, a terrifying new weapon is unleashed on the city that not even Ish can deter. A bomb that tears souls from bodies, driving anyone who witnessed the blast insane. But it is not the living that Corrie fears. Displaced spirits are hungry for a body, and care not if it already plays host to a soul.

No bullets can stop them, no walls are thick enough to keep them out.

No help is coming.

No one left but Corrie to stop the carnage, if she even can.

Review

Shattered Spirits by Cal Black was a much anticipated novella where I loved everything I learned about it beforehand, from the cover to the keywords to the map and finally a full description. I didn’t think I’d be able to read it before pub day, but then I said screw it and dropped everything else to start this as soon as I received it.

I read No Land for Heroes and really liked the smooth prose that allowed me to read the story quickly without overthinking it. I really liked that here as well but despite the short length of the book, I felt there were more descriptions about the world. Or maybe her words were just really well chosen and allowed me to visualize it more easily than I usually do while reading.

I knew this story would be different for me from the usual (can I still say that when I’ve said it so often lately hahaha) and I was here for it. It had me glued to the screen from the first chapter on, with my heart racing and my mind wanting more, more, more. Just a couple of words here and there made me feel really creeped out but, like with a train wreck, I just couldn’t look away.

I liked that the ending took us somewhere completely different than I had first expected. You think you know what’s coming but you really don’t. That felt really well done. I also liked how some of the character development turned to places I didn’t think we would go.

If you want a dark read for spooky season that doesn’t do a deep dive into horror, then definitely check this one out. I’m really eager to see what Cal Black writes next because with her current trajectory, she’ll shoot up to my favorite authors soon.

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 the adrenaline rush of survivor’s euphoria, leading Carmen to fall into a game of lust at a nightmare’s edge.

As the line blurs between the world Carmen knows and the one that she visits after reading from the play, she begins to desire more time in this other world no matter what horrors she brings back with her.

Review:

Hailey Piper can’t help herself: she’s gonna write her some cosmic horror. A weird western? Cosmic horror. A vampire novel? Just kidding. Also cosmic horror. Almost all of her work navigates that line along the thin and thinning edges of this world and what lies beyond, often plunging us through and downward, into dark places where the rules no longer apply.

And it’s always a wild ride.

In her upcoming novel, A Game in Yellow, Piper cuts to the chase and uses Robert W. Chambers The King in Yellow as its central device. Chambers’ book came out in 1895, and its loosely connected stories revolve around a cursed play that drives its readers mad. It also introduces a supernatural entity (the eponymous villain), the mysterious land of Carcosa, as well as “the yellow sign.” Over the years, all of this has been synthesized and subsumed into the cosmic horror universe and folded into the Lovecraft Mythos, and its influences can be found everywhere, from role playing games to the first season of True Detective.

Perhaps it’s needless to say, but Piper is up to something a little different here.

In A Game in Yellow, Carmen is a woman sleepwalking through her workaday life. Her only respite is at home, engaging in ever-more-complex dominant/submissive sex play with her longterm partner, Blanca. There’s a lot done here with the seemingly counter-intuitive politics of Blanca’s submissiveness and the ways it allows her complete control over her otherwise spiraling life.

Trouble is, even that isn’t quite doing it anymore. Carmen and Blanca’s “play” (and yes, this is a deliberate double entendre) is getting more and more extreme, Carmen needing more and more danger to achieve her particular pleasures. It doesn’t help that she sees this as emblematic of the relationship’s failure in general. And she might not be wrong.

When Blanca introduces her to Smoke, it’s intended to be a way to take their play to that next level, theoretically healing what’s ailing in their relationship. Smoke is a mysterious figure who has a new toy: a portion of the cursed play, The King in Yellow. Smoke portions out small passages of the play to Carmen, walking her up to the edge of madness before pulling her back.

The trouble, of course, is that what this relationship really needs is an honest conversation (and maybe some therapy), and soon Carmen is jonesing for another glimpse into Carcosa, a kind of mirror world where her own history is mixed up in Chambers’ mythology, and soon, the promised madness is near at hand.

There are certainly erotic passages in The Game in Yellow, but I’m not sure they necessarily “work” in any prurient way. Piper instead walks the razor-thin line between Eros and Thanatos, mixing BDSM with possibly world-ending cosmic calamity, and there’s absolutely no promise that things will turn out well for anyone.

All of this is so wild and wildly compelling, that it would be easy to overlook the little glimpses of these characters’ back-stories, all of them buried under layers of traumatic scar tissue, and these passages are poignantly heart-rending.

In the end, A Game in Yellow, is a strange and particularly dark ride, but Piper’s storytelling chops guide us through the darkness holding out hope of redemption even as she snatches it away.

Synopsis

Most Anticipated by Goodreads, People, BookRiot, Reactor, Screenrant, and more!

For fans of Jordan Peele’s films, Stranger Things, and The Other Black Girl, Listen To Your Sister is a laugh-out-loud, deeply terrifying, and big-hearted speculative horror novel from electrifying debut talent Neena Viel.

Twenty-five year old Calla Williams is struggling since becoming guardian to her brother, Jamie. Calla is overwhelmed and tired of being the one who makes sacrifices to keep the family together. Jamie, full of good-natured sixteen-year-old recklessness, is usually off fighting for what matters to him or getting into mischief, often at the same time. Dre, their brother, promised he would help raise Jamie–but now the ink is dry on the paperwork and in classic middle-child fashion, he’s off doing his own thing. And through it all, The Nightmare never stops haunting Calla: recurring images of her brothers dying that she is powerless to stop.

When Jamie’s actions at a protest spiral out of control, the siblings must go on the run. Taking refuge in a remote cabin that looks like it belongs on a slasher movie poster rather than an AirBNB, the siblings now face a new threat where their lives–and reality–hang in the balance. Their sister always warned them about her nightmares. They really should have listened.

“A knockout debut.” -Ashley Winstead

“Incredibly original and seriously scary.” – Nick Medina

Review

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the audio of this one. The trio that is Eric Lockley, Kristolyn Lloyd, and Zeno Robinson did a really well balanced narration—each taking on a sibling and giving them life. 

This novel is a lot of things. It’s a critique on race relations and police involvement, in kind of an à la Jordan Peele-style. It mixes hyper-violence and realism with humor, in a way that I’ve found makes it more palatable for a lot of people that wouldn’t listen/read/watch these types of things otherwise. It’s also a family saga. Dysfunctional as all hell, each jaded in their own way, and each nursing scars they’re too hurt to discuss…even if they claim they have. Calla is broke, forced to take in her younger brother Jamie—who her other brother, Dre, most definitely said he’d help way more than he is with. And most of all she’s tired. Jamie, an aspiring musician, can’t get out of his way enough to realize that he’s way less street than he realizes. And Dre is stuck somewhere in between—too annoyed by Calla to be of much help, and too ‘straight and narrow’ to reach Jamie. And then there’s the nightmares. 

On top of tackling all the real world horrors, the author has also blended in nightmarish horrors kind of à la Stranger Things and Love Craft Country (I’m primarily recalling the twin girls scene, but also the idea of shedding skins works well here). Except these strange things are rather more R rated, come from within, and only want to murder the three of them. I struggled with the build up to the climax, wondering if it was about to fumble the twist, and luckily, the author really pulled it off. The explanation of the Calla’s really worked for me, and that unique spin on sacrificing yourself for your siblings, that breaking yourself down into smaller and smaller pieces—or versions of yourself—even when you have nothing more to give, was really powerful. 

This book also tackles anger. Being angry with the world, with the hand you’ve been dealt, with not being loved and wanted, with your family, and even with yourself. Jamie can’t get over the way life has treated him. He’s angry, and he’s even angrier that as a black teen, the world isn’t build to accept his anger. It’s raw, it’s real, and I found this novel to be a really strong way to talk about the subject. There’s things to learn here below the surface, and it also works as a functional horror if that’s not your thing.

Synopsis

“Todd Keisling is already a mainstay of modern horror, and this book proves why. A wildly original and unsettling tale, The Sundowner’s Dance is an unforgettable journey of grief, cosmic horror, and making the most of the time we’ve got left. Pick up a copy of this book immediately.” -Gwendolyn Kiste, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Reluctant Immortals and The Haunting of Velkwood

Jerry Campbell just wants to be left alone. Grief-stricken over the death of his wife Abigail, the elderly widower and recent retiree is desperate for a change of scenery. When his realtor suggests a new home in Fairview Acres, a retirement community in the Poconos, Jerry figures it will be a nice place to spend the rest of his days in solitude.

Until he moves in.

Weird neighbors. Nightly block parties. Strange noises across his rooftop at all hours. Worst of all is Arthur Peterson, chairman of the Fairview Acres Community Association, who seems obsessed with coaxing Jerry into participating in these neighborhood activities.

At first, Jerry shrugs off the incidents and eccentricities, telling himself he doesn’t want to be the guy who complains about everything-but that all changes one evening when Katherine Dunnally appears on his doorstep with an ominous warning: “You need to leave. The worms…they dance at nightfall…”

His neighbors all say Katherine suffers from a form of dementia called Sundowner’s Syndrome, but as the weeks progress and the strangeness mounts, Jerry begins to suspect there is something else going on in his neighborhood. Something that has to do with the huge stone in the community park…

Heartfelt and unsettling, Todd Keisling’s latest novel, The Sundowner’s Dance, propels readers through a terrifying exploration of grief, dementia, and perhaps the greatest horror of all: growing old.

“Todd Keisling’s The Sundowner’s Dance is a harrowing work of cosmic horror that masterfully inhabits a dark territory somewhere between John Langan and Bentley Little. Highly recommended.” -Brian Keene

“Reading The Sundowner’s Dance is a bit like casting a spell to ward off existential dread despite the greatest terrors of the novel evoking this very thing; the beauty and hopefulness at the core of the story refuse to be stamped out by either the wrath of an alien invader or the ravages of age. It’s Todd Keisling at his absolute finest: dark, unflinching, visceral, and innovative. His pitch-perfect prose and masterful storytelling will leave you, quite literally, breathless.” -Christa Carmen, Bram Stoker Award-winning and Shirley Jackson Award-nominated author of The Daughters of Block Island

Review

Reeling from the loss of his wife, retiree Jerry Campbell decides it’s time for a change. The house he and Abby called home is too big and filled with too many memories. He wants to retreat and spend what little time he has left in solitude. Fairview Acres, a retirement community in the Poconos, looks like the perfect escape. But no sooner than he’s moved in does the strangeness begins. His sleep is disrupted by late, all-night parties and strange noises that sound like somebody is walking across his roof. His neighbors seem a little too invested in his life and punctuate their concerns with strange phases, like the oft-spoken “By the moon’s eye.” And then Katherine, another widower who may be suffering from dementia, appears on his doorstep warning him about the worms and insisting he leave Fairview while he still can.

Slowly but surely, the oddities begin to pile up, and author Todd Keisling does a sublime job of ratcheting up the tension and creeping paranoia that provides The Sundowner’s Dance with a pervasive sense of dread. Obviously there’s more going on in Fairview Acres than meet’s the eye. The community itself is built in the bowl of a meteor’s impact crater, with the meteor itself a prominent feature on display at the heart of Fairview. And then there’s the nightly parties and the mysterious drink the revelers consume, a concoction they refer to as a “potion.”

The Sundowner’s Dance reads like a lost episode of The Twilight Zone by way of The Prisoner, seamlessly mixing cosmic and cult horror and topping it off with a thick dose of small-town conspiracy vibes. Keisling perfectly paces the plot, slowly revealing the various aspects behind these horrors and the history of Fairview Acres in a way that keeps the pages effortlessly turning.

While those mysteries are intriguing on their own, they’d be nothing without Jerry and Katherine, and the bond that forms between them. Personally, I found a hell of a lot about both these characters to be relatable, and much of what they went through felt incredibly familiar, at times uncomfortably so. There’s a raw honesty to the way Keisling writes about depression, anxiety, and dementia that make it clear these are all topics he’s personally experienced or has otherwise impeccably researched. I know from following Keisling across various social media sites that he’s personally acquainted with depression and anxiety. I’m not sure how much he’s dealt with elder care and coping with a parent’s dementia, but I suspect based on what I’ve read here that he certainly has more than a passing familiarity.

Like Jerry and Keisling, I’ve also suffered from depression and anxiety for the bulk of my life. Although Jerry didn’t realize what he was dealing with mentally and emotionally until he was in his fifties, it wasn’t until Abby entered his life that he had a support system to help him cope and to encourage him to see a doctor and find better living through chemical assistance. So much of Jerry’s story not only rang true but mirrored so many of my own experiences and thoughts, from being an introvert seeking solitude to realizing the simple truth that I probably wouldn’t still be alive if not for my wife’s love and care. “Abby had made him feel strong and capable,” Keisling writes, “had cheered him on when the chemicals in his brain were hellbent on destroying him from the inside.” I’ve lost count of how many times my own wife has done this for me, and I can only imagine how lost I’d be without her. Keisling captures these feelings of being so lost and adrift at sea eloquently and accurately.

I lost count, too, of how many times I nodded in recognition at Keisling’s portrayal of dementia and the reactions of those left to cope with an afflicted loved one. Dementia’s a terrible, frightening ailment, and Keisling is spot-on in his description that it can steal “a personality, a soul, and left a stranger in its place,” in addition to robbing one of their dearest memories and leaving them confused, lost, paranoid, and angry. Dementia turns the person you once knew so well into a radically twisted stranger. One character recollects to Jerry about a time their dementia-addled father pulled on a gun on them, not recognizing him and convinced he was there to steal the old man’s stamp collection. Although my own father was unarmed, I couldn’t help but recall the time he was convinced I had come home to kill him and steal his silverware, and then, just as fast, mistook me for somebody else entirely. On another occasion I was peppered with questions because he thought I was his long-deceased brother, and then ranted at because he was convinced his various illnesses were the result of a conspiracy between Russia, China, and Al-Qaeda. My dad never warned me about worms, or that the moon is watching, like Katherine does, but Keisling’s handling of dementia certainly rang uncomfortably true with my own lived experiences.

Is there a more fitting topic for horror than the process of human aging? Of the tortures and transformations once must endure, or to bear witness of in others? Of the losses one accumulates across a lifetime until you’re left alone with only your grief and your memories? And that’s not even getting into the abuse and exploitation of the elderly, and how growing old and frail and ever-more reliant on others makes one a ripe target for predators and scam artists, a topic that lies at the heart of The Sundowner’s Dance. Granted, the predatory relationship here is far more Lovecraftian than the poorly worded emails from Nigerian princes offering grandma a huge inheritance if only she responds with her SSN, and at least twice as insidious.

A lot of what makes that danger work so well here is just how grounded it all is. Fairview Aces and its inhabitants feel familiar. We all know that nosey neighbor, and we’ve all dealt with the disturbances they can bring, from loud music and late-night parties to shooting off fireworks until 1:00 AM on New Year’s without a care in the world about how their actions might affect those around them. We know the greed and ego and selfishness of these types of communities and the people in them. Jerry and Katherine, they feel real, and their growing friendship is natural and naturally charming. They’re not just characters on the page, but familiar faces with stories we can relate to. The narrative is informed by so much real-world, lived-in experiences, not to mention earnest tenderheartedness, that we can’t help but go along for the ride once Keisling starts to unearth the dark, rotten underbelly at the core of this piece of Americana and expose it in the moonlight. And that moon’s eye everybody speaks of? Well, as Tom Cullen might say, M-O-O-N, that spells trouble.

Jennifer Plummer and the Divine Flesh have exactly three things in common:

 1) they’re trapped inside Jennifer’s body; 2) they despise each other; and 3) they’re in love with Daryl Plummer, Jennifer’s ex-husband. But when Jennifer takes an experimental wonder drug to free herself from the Divine Flesh’s control, it only makes things worse. Expelled from Jennifer’s body, the Divine Flesh can now “love” everyone in existence to death, which in this case, means being assimilated forever into the beast. With time running out, it’s somehow up to Jennifer and Daryl to save the universe from complete and total destruction. Can a dysfunctional drug mule and an electrician from rural Idaho stop the cosmic abomination before it’s too late? Jennifer thinks, maybe.

Ichor-dripping, tendon-snapping and mayhem-filled, Drew Huff’s “The Divine Flesh,” is, like the rest of her work thus far, ambitious, bizarre, intoxicating and whilst fantastical in many respects, all too relevant. Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde,” turns cosmic in this hallucinatory yet philosophical, and gloopy epic. Huff comments on addiction, automatism, and the engineering of pain and suffering, Drew is an author who is doing something different- and I like it. “The Divine Flesh,” (D.F for short) will love you, assimilate and mutate you, turn you to ash. Take a deep breath, allow it to embrace you with loving tendrils and prepare to be swallowed whole by “The Divine Flesh,” March 3rd- Dark Matter Ink- prepare to be unmade.

We follow Jennifer Plummer. She is an addict, and whilst technically still married, doesn’t talk to her husband Daryl. To be fair to him, her drug trafficking could be viewed somewhat as a turn-off, especially considering it’s dragged him into all sorts of legal trouble, but to be fair to her, she’s sharing her body with a cosmic horror Goddess. One who despises her, loves her husband, and is unleashed every time Jennifer dies (which happens a whole lot). The havoc “The Divine Flesh,” wreaks when contained is earth-shattering- could you imagine how dire the consequences would be should she be released? Expelled? Free to destroy, mutate and love unchecked? That would be very, very bad. 

Before we dive head first into some of the themes, we should touch on the writing. “The Divine Flesh,” is a book that pulses, squirms and mutates, it beats and throbs with a disturbing vitality. Huff’s signature stream of consciousness style writing is a divisive one, but here especially it works fantastically. The plot (in all its unhinged beauty) flows with an infectious cadence. It is horror at its most viscous, experimental and strangely beautiful. Fans of the lyrical prose of authors like Joe Koch, Kathe Koja, and Sofia Ajram may find themselves a new favourite in Huff. 

The body horror can only be described as an assault. A visceral invasion of the mind and body. But carnage aside, the single most scary aspect of this book is the lack of control the protagonist experiences. I feel an anecdote brewing. This year, whilst already suffering sun-stroke, I took one too many sea-sickness tablets on a ferry, and for the duration of that ride I was hot, uncomfortable and drifting in and out of consciousness. I was lucid, aware that I wasn’t functioning quite right, but not quite in control enough to do anything. Ask for water, open a window, wave over a staff member. I felt trapped, just observing a dull looping film (one that followed the back of the seat in front of me). That sense of helplessness is a terror that Huff amplifies and exploits in part 1 of the novel. When “The Divine Flesh,” takes over Jennifer’s body, Jennifer is systematically dismantled, she shuts her senses off one by one. Jennifer knows that her cosmic eldritch goddess counterpart doesn’t play nice, she knows she’ll wake to a massacre she had no say in. As opposed to the massacre itself it is the knowledge that something else is moving her limbs, speaking in her voice, fucking her husband. I believe this, ultimately, to be a grim, cosmic metaphor for addiction. The forced surrender of autonomy, the utter horror of watching yourself make choices you didn’t choose, and may live to regret. 

In one particularly fever-dreamish passage, told from the perspective of “The Divine Flesh,” we travel back to the dawn of time. There is nothing. We are forced ultimately to reckon with the fact that the majority of the anguish that is suffered is not the fault of some cosmic force, or unavoidable disaster. The worst of human suffering is not an inevitability, but designed, perpetuated, tolerated. Elected? In conjunction with various other aspects of the story, ones which I can not find the clarity, space or ability to explain, “The Divine Flesh,” and the loss of automatism it explores on a macro scale, feels particularly apt today.
Grotesque and magnificent, this book will seep into your skin, filter into your bloodstream and rewire your neurons. I’ve never been one to lie to you, it is a difficult time- you’ll have questions, you’ll probably get confused, it’s a book that makes you work hard and think harder, but, if you’re willing to do that, then you’ll love “The Divine Flesh,” and it will love you back.

Synopsis

The red night of bells heralds global catastrophe. Annihilation on a biblical scale. Seeing the morning is no blessing. The handful of scattered survivors are confronted by blood-red skies and an infestation of predatory horrors that never originated on earth. An occupying force intent on erasing the remnants of animal life from the planet. Across the deserted landscapes of England, bereft of infrastructure and society, the overlooked can either hide or try to outrun the infernal hunting terrors. Until a rumour emerges claiming that the sea may offer an escape.

Ordinary, unexceptional, directionless Karl, is one of the few who made it through the first night. In the company of two orphans, he flees south. But only into horrifying revelations and greater peril, where a transformed world and expanding race of ravening creatures await. Driven to the end of the country and himself, he must overcome alien and human malevolence and act in ways that were unthinkable mere days before.

Review

There’s something about end of the world fiction that really butters my croissant. Considering it’s a pretty depressing subject – the end of all life on Earth as we know it, usually by means both terrifying and painful – but the idea of it has always fascinated me. Obviously, I hope that I never live through an apocalypse event (hopefully I live to be 100 years of age, with all my books, loved ones, and a life well lived behind me), but I find reading about them to be very exciting.

Now enter All The Fiends of Hell, the latest offering from British horror master Adam L. G. Nevill, author of The Ritual and No One Gets Out Alive (both also with major motion picture adaptions), plus many other creepy novels. In this, his ode to H. G. Wells’ War of the Worlds, we follow Karl, an ordinary, unremarkable man as he navigates a world bereft of its inhabitants, now set adrift on a lonely planet with only the sick, infirm, or overlooked left behind.

We begin on the night of the Red Bells, in which Karl, in the throes of feverish delirium, witnesses the mass extinction of life on Earth in what can only be described as a truly haunting depiction of Rapture itself. This first scene does so much to set the tone, with Nevill’s descriptions of a night-time country landscape bathed in crimson, as people and animals alike begin to ascend into the sky towards black alien obelisks. The thought of one minute being tucked up in bed snoring away to suddenly watching your neighbours and a few cows floating up to the heavens is really terrifying (an idea that I bounced around for a story of mine that I have yet to write; its the thought that counts!), and Nevill’s depictions and imagery is top notch. Throughout the book, we get a look at the creatures that stalk the remaining people left on Earth, all of who are detailed and vivid, yet have that Lovecraftian kind of unimaginability to them. The red sky that starts in the north before slowly yet unstoppable encroaching south creates an atmosphere of pure unescapable dread, and ghastly totems left behind by the invading aliens are properly gruesome. We never dwell on the “how’s” and “why’s” of the grander scale of the problem (why has this happened? what’s causing the red sky? are they aliens, angels, or something else entirely?) which lends to the cosmic horror that permeates throughout, but I am glad of this because it’s the personal journey of Karl that makes this story so good.

Our protagonist, Karl, is very much an “every man”, in the sense that in life – at least, prior to the apocalypse and to his own thinking – he was man of no real worth. Failed marriage, no kids, no career. Nothing truly of note. His transformation throughout the 340-ish pages is great, as he is constantly put into situations that test him and keep his journey of survival really engaging, alongside his protection and growth with the two child characters who he comes across and bonds with early on. I think some authors have a hard time writing child characters without making them just seem like obstacles for our main characters to overcome (or these kids are just annoying and constantly in the way), but the siblings Jake & Hayley are believable, well realised young people that have found themselves stuck in this new hell.

There is also Bob. Bob, for me, reaches the same echelons of characters I really, really hate, but in the best possible way. Umbridge, Bev Keane, Mrs. Carmody; these are characters I have hated because I find them irredeemably despicable for multiple reasons, and Bob easily joins them and many others in this exclusive club.

Whilst I don’t often think on themes or allegories too much (especially when I could be talking utter shite), in my eyes this was very much an allegory for the COVID pandemic, especially how it felt in the UK. The desolate, quiet streets once packed with life; only the well being moved onto a new normal, whilst the elderly, the sick and the forgotten are left behind; the constant lingering threat of something then unknown stalking you. The fact that a mystery fever also causes those who would have normally been in perfect health to be left on Earth also makes me feel like this is Nevill’s way of working through that truly shitty period.

To add, you’ll also find an essay at the end of the novel, which is Nevill talking about his thoughts, inspirations and ideas for this book. It’s a really cool essay, definitely make sure you read it after finishing this story.

This was my first Adam Nevill book (I have watched The Ritual before and have since read The Vessel and Wyrd), and it was a gripping, chilling experience, everything I want from an end of the world story. I look for good characters, a gripping narrative, a unique and exciting apocalypse that I can have nightmares about; All The Fiends of Hell has all of that and more in spades!