HALLOWE’EN SEASON 2020

October 31, 2020September 6, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

October is my best reading month. I’m a very seasonal, themed-oriented reader, and Hallowe’en, more than any other holiday, lends itself to these qualities pretty perfectly. I cut loose and read books that are a bit more fun than my usual fare, which makes it really easy to pick up book after book after book, something that I definitely don’t do in any other month of the year.

This particular Hallowe’en, however, felt a little off. It was to be expected considering, well, everything, but I guess I was just confident the holiday would lift my spirits up — it did during the harrowing aftermath of Hurricane María, after all. But as tragic as that event was, this pandemic is obviously so much worse and I foolishly ended up underestimating just how much it would affect my mood.

Add to that the fact that I decided to go all in on my bookstragram for Hallowe’en, wanting to put out pictures and reviews on a more or less consistent manner throughout the month. I succeeded, too, and I’m happy and proud I did it, but it was draining, and that sucked a bit of the fun out of it a bit.

I still ended up having a tremendous amount of fun, though, and I read a lot of damn fine books. I’m sad to see the spooky season go, but we all know that 𝖍𝖆𝖑𝖑𝖔𝖜𝖊’𝖊𝖓 𝖎𝖘 𝖊𝖙𝖊𝖗𝖓𝖆𝖑 anyway.

PUMPKINHEADS by Rainbow Rowell, Faith Erin Hicks

I first read this graphic novel by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks when it came out last year. It didn’t take much for me to love it. So much so that I decided I would start a new tradition of reading it at the beginning of every October from then on. Because while the month to me mostly means spooky, atmospheric books and vibes, it also means fresher, gentler nights spent in warm nooks and beds. I want to start the month with something just as cozy and pleasant, and you’ll not find a more comfortable, delightful — more autumnal — book than Pumpkinheads. ⠀
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I loved it just as much this time around. That’s usually the case with stories written by Rainbow Rowell. She writes charismatic, immediately lovable characters, and Josie and Deja, our titular pumpkinheads, are some of her most charming yet. I really fell for them both, and I finish this story always wanting to know more about them. I want to read about their past pumpkin patch adventures just as much as I want to read about whatever future they have. I want to know what they’re up to. ⠀
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Faith Erin Hicks’ art I’ve long been a fan of, and she brought her A game to this graphic novel. I love the world she’s drawn up here, which feels just as lush and warm and inviting as it did on my first visit. And colorist Sarah Stern (whom I failed to mention in my first review) has, in the opinion of this tropical, Caribbean boy, created the quintessential fall palette. This book is now pretty much what I picture whenever I think of the season. ⠀
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Pumpkinheads, for me, acts as the perfect bright, light entrée before the headier, spookier course lined up for the rest of the month.

THE BABYSITTERS COVEN by Kate Williams

The Babysitters Coven didn’t do it for me at all.⠀
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A shame, really. The novel has a promising premise (The Baby-Sitters Club meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and a strong, genuinely unsettling opening chapter. I was fully on board with it. But it unfortunately turned out not to be as fun as any of its initial inspirations, and any tension and mood set by the beginning quickly dissipates as the story turns from what seemed to be the start of a supernatural thriller into a prosaic high school pariah account. What little energy it regains as it slogs through the first act is again stopped dead in its tracks halfway through by an infodump sequence so egregious that it almost made me drop the book entirely.⠀
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It’s a story that wears its influences on its flowy, Stevie Nicks sleeves, too, something that, when done well, I tend to appreciate. Here, though, these inspirations only act as reminders to the reader that there are better stories out there, so why aren’t you enjoying them instead?⠀
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It’s also, bizarrely, not remotely as witchy as the title and the excellent cover make it out to be? I think there are only two mentions of witches and covens in the whole thing? The characters are more Eleven from Stranger Things and Charlie from Firestarter than they are the badass weirdos of The Craft, which is sort of what’s promised? Where was thy witchy goodness, book???

DEVOLUTION by Max Brooks

Reading Devolution by Max Brooks turned out to be a pretty physical activity for me. At numerous points I would put my Kindle down to pace relentlessly around the room for a while before picking it up again. At others I would alternate between tossing and turning in bed and just straight up yelling at the book. I read it in two days, finishing it with a seven-hour spree, and it kept me, quite literally, on the edge of my seat (or mattress, rather) the entire time. ⠀
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It was downright exhausting. And also a hell of a lot of fun.

The colony of Greenloop is a modern marvel. Situated between the Cascades in Washington, this eco-community boasts all the comforts of modern city living in the midst of all the rugged beauty of the wilderness. Each dwelling is a smart house, powered by sunlight and biogas. If there are technical issues, a signal is sent to a nearby town where technicians and specialists will go up in self-driving vans to do any repairing. High-speed internet is, of course, readily available, and the residents can simply telecommute to work. Supplies and groceries are delivered weekly by drones. It is, by all accounts, a techno-utopia. A proverbial paradise.

Until nearby Mt. Rainier erupts, and while the compound is far enough away from the volcano to be safe from the initial blast, volcanic mudflow soon blocks the roads, while ash and debris interrupt any internet access and mobile reception. The remote, isolated Greenloop community is cut off from the world, and its residents — affluent urbanites for the most part — find themselves wholly unprepared for the events that follow. They have only a week’s worth of groceries, no tools, no survival skills of which to speak, and winter is fast approaching… bringing with it inconceivable primal terror.
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Devolution is truly a wild, tense ride. In the vein of Jurassic Park, it’s a bloody — often gory — cautionary tale of human hubris. Of what happens when we convince ourselves we are masters of nature. Of the dangers of relying too much on the comforts of technology.⠀
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As in Brooks’ previous novel, World War Z, much of the horror comes not from the monster but from the notion of just how easily the systems that we depend on can simply just… fail. Not just automated, mechanized systems, either, but social structures as well. Civilizations, Brooks’ novels remind us, can crumble just as easily as computers. A prospect more terrifying than any monstrous creature.⠀
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Which isn’t to take away the spotlight from this book’s Sasquatch star. Bigfoot is properly terrifying here, and I appreciate how much effort and attention Brooks devoted to portraying it like an actual animal rather than some uncanny supernatural being. Any time you can inject some semblance of reality into your horror story will always make it that much more striking, and a creature that’s after you because it’s hungry rather than for any deliberately malevolent purpose… well, that just triggers some of our base, primal fears, from the time before we developed enough brains to fool ourselves into thinking that we somehow, through sheer will and determination, broke away from the food chain.⠀
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I had a great time with this book. And it definitely cements Max Brooks as one of my favorite writers.

SKELETON MAN by Joseph Bruchac

Joseph Bruchac is an honest-to-goodness storyteller. Not just in the sense that he is a prolific author, but that he still participates in the storied tradition of actually getting up in front of people and telling tales.⠀
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Prolific as he is, I only found out about him earlier this year, listening to an interview with Adam Gidwitz wherein he sang the praises of Bruchac (they co-wrote a book in the Unicorn Rescue Society series). I immediately looked him up and the first thing I found was an old video of him telling a story of “The Skeleton Man,” about a man so lazy that, instead of going out hunting for food with the rest of his tribe, he cooks and eats his own flesh instead, until he is nothing more than a skeleton. Still hungry, the Skeleton Man proceeds to eats the rest of his family as they return, until one of his nieces, with the help of some wildlife, stops him for good.⠀
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It’s a deliciously macabre story, and one that Bruchac tells with enthusiasm and delight to a crowd of mostly kids, who react with shock and glee in equal measure. I was captivated, watching this man telling this old Native American tale to a similarly captivated young crowd. I looked up his works soon after and was thrilled to find that he had written a full book based on this same Mohawk fable.⠀
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A modern retelling of the story, Skeleton Man follows Molly, a young girl who, after the mysterious disappearance of her parents, is forced into the care of an uncle she never even knew she had. The uncle keeps her locked in the room of his decrepit house, letting her out only for school and to eat, which he is particularly insistent she does. She soon realizes that her “uncle” may not be entirely human but an otherworldly being with sinister intentions.⠀
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I enjoyed reading this short novel as much as I enjoyed Bruchac’s telling of the original story (which you should definitely look up). This contemporary rendition reads like a refined R.L. Stine, in the sense that, while ostensibly written for a young audience, it never talks down to them, and certainly does not shy away from the shuddersome aspects of this spooky tale.

Skeleton Man is also a celebration of the strength of women, in particular Native American women. Bruchac dedicates this book to “all the young women who have yet to discover the courage that lives in their hearts,” and then, in the acknowledgements, he goes on to note just how deeply and how often strong women feature in traditional American Indian stories, a sharp contrast to the more commonly patriarchal European fairy tales.⠀
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Bearing that in mind, and the fact that I read this on Indigenous Peoples’ Day, I feel it’s important to recognize the current epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women presently plaguing North America. I include some pertinent links, and encourage you all to read up on this tragedy and to please consider donating to relevant charities.

CLOWN IN A CORNFIELD by Adam Cesare

In the aftermath of her mother’s death, teenager Quinn Maybrook and her father are looking for a fresh start. They decide that moving from Philadelphia to the rural town of Kettle Springs, Missouri might just be exactly what they need. Instead of finding peace and quiet, however, they encounter a town brimming with tension between the older and younger generations, each side blaming the other for the community’s recent misfortunes. A conflict comes to a head during a high school party, where someone dressed as the town’s mascot — a forlorn looking clown — drops by for a homicidal visit. What follows is a confrontation between the cynical-yet-idealistic adolescents of the town and this sinister symbol of stagnant traditions — a fight that will not only determine their own survival but that of Kettle Springs itself. ⠀
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Adam Cesare knew exactly what he was doing when he called this Clown in a Cornfield. It’s as evocative a title as you can get. So much so that you don’t even have to mention the book’s genre; our reptilian brain simply knows.⠀
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HarperTeen knew exactly what they were doing, too, when they tapped artist Matt Ryan Tobin for the cover art, which, down to the color scheme and font, evokes everything from Zebra imprint’s line of horror in the seventies; to the Point Horror series in the nineties; up to more recent properties like Stranger Things. Mainly, though, it brings to mind the work of Stephen King — it’s a horror book about a killer clown, after all. The expectations have been set. You know exactly what you are getting into.⠀
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Except you don’t. Not quite. You do get a consummately creepy novel about a clown on a killing spree, to be sure — and it succeeds at being an excellent one at that — but you also get a story that features sharp social commentary that is all too relevant in our current landscape. That it manages to do so without feeling heavy-handed, and without letting it get in the way of, well, all the gory fun, speaks volumes of Cesare’s deft writing. This is a quick read, fun and riotous on the surface, with a lot more beneath if you care to look. Bodies in the basement, as it were.⠀
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It’s a story that’s dressed up in classic horror garb: from the setup to the premise to its euphoric exploration — and subsequent subversion — of established tropes. It’s all meant to feel familiar. What sets it apart, though, is that beneath that vintage veneer lies a thoroughly modern narrative about prejudice and hate; generational conflict and social strife. All the tensions of present-day dramas — which Clown in a Cornfield cuts right through, purposefully and methodically, with a circular saw.

HARROW COUNTY VOL. 3: SNAKE DOCTOR by Cullen Bunn, Tyler Crook, Various

Harrow County by writer Cullen Bunn and artist Tyler Crook follows Emmy Crawford, a humble young woman who finds out she is the reincarnation of an infamous witch who was executed by the residents of Harrow after letting loose countless uncanny creatures — called haints — that went on to wreak havoc on the province. Feeling shunned from her peers, who fear retribution, she concentrates her efforts on demonstrating just how different she is from her past wicked aspect. The series progresses more or less with a monster-of-the-month format that is interspersed with a higher, more elaborate arc regarding Emmy’s power and identity. ⠀
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I read the first two volumes of this series a couple of years ago for the Hallowe’en season and enjoyed them quite a bit. I failed to keep up with the comic, though, which meant that when I picked this ensuing volume I had a little trouble recalling what the actual story was about. But it’s a testament to Bunn’s writing that I felt caught up relatively quickly, pertinent details gleaned through context and dialogue. It helped, too, that this third volume (titled Snake Doctor) consisted mostly of standalone stories, with more of a focus on the secondary characters (the ghastly-but-sweet Skinless Boy, a haint and Emmy’s familiar, who gets an origin story of sorts here; and Bernice, her beleaguered best friend, who seems to be getting a larger story of her own in her dedicated issue). I had no problem getting invested once more in the characters and enjoying this set of issues.⠀
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Harrow County is a gorgeous comic, with art and writing that is decidedly, deliciously lush (Crook handles the bulk of the art, but this volume also features the work of guest artists Carla Speed McNeil and Hannah Christenson who do a great job of shaking things up, visually speaking) and a tone that’s as ominous as it is welcoming (which I attribute to dialogue that just drips with congenial Southern charm). I hope to pick up the remaining volumes of the series soon, as it exudes a most appropriate atmosphere for the spooky season.

MURDER HOUSE by C.V. Hunt

C.V. Hunt writes a kind of horror I don’t typically go for. I tend to prefer scary stories that focus on atmosphere and carry more of a mischievous sense of playfulness. Hunt’s tales lean decidedly into the dark and gritty end of the spooky spectrum, featuring troubled, wretched characters who have been already put through the wringer of life before the horror that is to befall them even knocks on their door, as it were. Bleak stories about bleak people that, more often than not, end in a bleak manner. There’s a certain mindset I have to be in in order to properly appreciate this kind of fiction.
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A mindset I must have been in when I read this slim novella recently because, while certainly dark and despondent, I found myself thoroughly compelled by it.⠀
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Murder House follows Laura and her partner Brent as they move into a run-down house in a run-down part of Detroit. The building was the infamous scene of a particularly grisly set of murders about which Brent, a down-on-his-luck writer, is doing a book. Struggling financially, Brent convinced his publisher to let them live rent-free in the dilapidated digs during the writing process. Laura’s not too thrilled about the arrangement: for one thing their relationship is not at its healthiest point (to put it mildly) and she’s not certain it can survive the stress of maintaining a wreck; for another, the place itself just fills her with dread. She tries to be a supportive partner, regardless, but the inherent creepiness of the house soon begins to get to her. It eventually gets to Brent as well, and their already turbulent life threatens to veer entirely off the rails.⠀
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I really admire how Hunt works with the haunted house aspect of the story. One of the primary plot points has to do with Laura having to stop buying her psychiatric medication in order to save money, (one of a handful of details that help make this story feel so grounded and real). She feels the effects of their absence at various points throughout the novella, which vary from mood swings to downright hallucinations. Hunt allows enough ambiguity here to make the reader question whether all the strange sights and sounds our protagonist keeps experiencing are the product of a haunted house or a haunted mind instead. Not a novel conceit by any means, but I appreciated Hunt’s empathetic approach to it: at no point does it feel exploitative; at no point does it feel as if mental health issues are being used for cheap thrills.⠀
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The characterization here is notably strong, too. Brent and Laura both feel like real people — painfully so at times, with all their flaws and vulnerabilities. Laura in particular I found very well-realized, and the battles she’s fighting (both inner and outer) make her immediately endearing. You want her to get out of this horror story — out of this toxic relationship, out of this cursed house — relatively safe and unscathed. Murder House has other plans for our heroine, however, and it demands we bear witness.

THE SOUTHERN BOOK CLUB’S GUIDE TO SLAYING VAMPIRES by Grady Hendrix

In the close-knit community of Charleston’s Old Village, Patricia leads a very sheltered and stale sort of life. Kept busy by her role as housewife and mother of two, she spends her days doing the countless crucial but uncelebrated things mothers often do in order to keep their families and homes afloat, but she still can’t help feeling unfulfilled and constrained. Her only outlet is the monthly book club she attends with a handful of other women in the neighborhood, wherein these prim, genteel Southern women read garish books full of murder and morbidity — books from which Patricia gets the kind of thrills she finds lacking in her small corner of the world. But she gets more than she wishes for one night after she is suddenly attacked by a deranged, elderly neighbor, an aggression that leaves her both physically and mentally scarred. Her protective bubble has been burst, and she senses that something evil and wretched has crawled its way in. Which is when the charismatic, handsome figure of James Harris descends upon the town, bringing with him desire and dread; disruption and upheaval; and more frisson than Patricia could have ever hoped for or wanted.⠀

There are so many things I enjoyed about The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires, the latest from Grady Hendrix: what it brought to vampire lore, with James Harris being something halfway between the vampires in The Strain and Interview with the Vampire; how the vampire, in a sleek reversal of conventions, seduced not the women but their husbands, sweet-talking and stirring them into friendships and partnerships; how it’s told more as a thriller than a straight up horror novel, with the monster behaving like the serial killers the book club love reading so much about; how it condemned the casual, rampant misogyny of the men (in a book full of skin-crawling scenes featuring rats, cockroaches and other pests, the segment with the men shamelessly, relentlessly gaslighting and berating their wives stands as one of the most vile); how it provoked sympathy for Patricia, our persevering protagonist, right from the outset. Mostly I loved that Book Club, like every Hendrix book I’ve read so far, packed quite the emotional punch. ⠀
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It’s not without its faults, however, mainly in regards to Hendrix’s handling of race, which leaves a lot to be desired. In many ways, this is a book about white supremacy (with Harris standing in as its ultimate symbol: a literal life-draining, racist, misogynist, uncompromising white man), about how the actions and inactions of a handful of wealthy white folk have great, detrimental effects on the marginalized communities around them. In the author’s note Hendrix writes about this book essentially being written from the point of view of his mother, who was a member of such a community, and that is a valid and interesting angle, but it also means that the harrowing experiences of Black people are perceived through the perspective of a privileged white Southern woman, and in a horror book where the bulk of the horror occurs to the mostly undepicted, unseen Black characters… Well, the optics aren’t great, to say the least.

To Hendrix’s credit he does try to acknowledge this problematic aspect near the end of the story, where the women of the book club recognize the consequences of their selfish actions — but it feels a little tacked on, and even then it comes accompanied with a hint of white saviorism. Again, not great. It’s a shame, really, as Mrs. Greene, the only major Black character, is terrific, and the story would have greatly benefited from being told, at least in part, from her perspective. Although it could be argued that the final confrontation is mainly told from her point of view, which slightly redeems her diminished role, as it is a gory, gruesome, and wholly gratifying affair.⠀
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Still, the horror novels I tend to appreciate are those that have something to say, even if they stumble while delivering their gospel. The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires has a hell of a lot to say, and it does stumble, and it’s a grand, boisterous, bloody spectacle all the same.

BEHIND YOU: ONE-SHOT HORROR STORIES by Brian Coldrick

Behind You is basically artist Brian Coldrick going, “New Yorker cartoons but make ‘em spooky.” Single illustrations accompanied by a short piece of text and can range from the morbidly amusing to the downright unsettling. Coldrick has been at it for a while (I remember when his work was being shared around Tumblr a few years back) and has, according to Joe Hill’s introduction, “refined and purified the entire idea of Horror into a single, vital idea,” which, you know, coming from Stephen King’s progeny is high praise indeed. As far as I can tell, the series is still going, and this volume collects just a select handful of these creepy cartoons.⠀
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The illustrations are, of course, the centerpiece, but the short text preceding them do a lot in terms of mood-setting and suggestion. They act almost as prompts: descriptive enough to tell at least part of a story, but simplistic and vague enough to let your mind entertain (or, depending on your disposition, torment) itself by thinking up the myriad of ways the scenes could play out. It’s almost as if you are the co-writer of this peculiar collection, which is an aspect I really enjoyed.⠀
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The series is very much an online thing, however, and you’ll definitely get more from it if you have more than a passing knowledge of internet culture as a lot of the images here draw from content cultivated from memes and creepypastas (Slender Men, naturally, are abound). A lot of the images online are subtly animated, too, which add to the tone, and that element is obviously lost here in this static form.⠀
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Behind You is a quick, fun Hallowe’en read, and you are sure to find an image that lingers in the back of your mind, especially if you read this alone in the small hours of the night. But I’m just assuming here because I definitely did not do that.

WELCOME TO DEAD HOUSE by R.L. Stine

Welcome to Dead House follows siblings Amanda and Josh as their family moves to the small, quiet town of Dark Falls (subtlety was never Stine’s specialty), to live in an old house their father has inherited from a previously unknown relative. In no time at all Amanda starts to experience weird things: she keeps seeing strange kids around the house, and hears mysterious giggling and whispering coming from her room at night. She’s soon convinced their new place is haunted, which her family thinks it’s only anxiety brought about by the move. But there’s also the fact that her usually easygoing dog gets agitated around the house, and seems to mistrust every single person they meet in town….⠀
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No Hallowe’en is complete for me without Goosebumps. I’ve been slowly making my way through them for the last couple of years, having never read the books when I was kid. This was my first time reading Welcome to Dead House, the first book of the series, an it is an auspicious beginning at that. It’s certainly darker than most other Goosebumps book I’ve read thus far, which never really strayed too far from relatively innocuous territory, whereas Dead House goes for that PG rating from the get-go. We are, after all, promptly treated to a sequence featuring a mostly skeletonized family, complete with bits of flesh still dangling from their bones. It’s a surprisingly gruesome book, all things considered, especially towards the end, which genuinely caught me by surprise. Stine is definitely not afraid to go hard. I was a fearful, finicky child and probably wouldn’t have enjoyed this kind of thing back then, but my present adult self certainly appreciates it. It’s very much a Goosebumps book at its heart, however, which means despite the macabre coating it’s still goofy and fun and a little schlocky.

The narrative itself does feel more streamlined when compared to later books in the series, where the stories tend to be a bit looser and meandering. But mostly I like how it seems like Stine had the structure (the skeleton, as it were) pretty much all worked out since the start of the series, chapter-ending cliffhangers and all. Goosebumps, after all, almost wasn’t even series, since it didn’t really sell until kids started getting a hold of them in school book fairs and went on to spread them around through word of mouth, causing a wave that would keep Goosebumps afloat through most of the nineties. Talk about coming up with such a winning formula from the outset.

AUTUMNCROW by Cameron Chaney

An old man laments the loss of an old flame when he hears the siren song of the sea. A widow builds a jack-o’-lantern effigy for her dead husband in the hopes of seeing him one more time. A strained relationship between siblings has uncanny, burning consequences; while all the way across town a lonesome boy makes friends with graveyard ghouls. There are faces in the forest and visitants from space; whispers in the wind and chattering in the cornfields. There’s something in the soil of the valley, folks say, that attracts all manner of curious folk and odd happenings to it like a magnet. The locals long accepted the quirks of their community and stand by it, but they still offer up a warning to visitors: tread carefully — there are monsters here. ⠀
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Welcome to Autumncrow, Cameron Chaney’s first collection of short stories that is nothing if not an absolute treat. It’s also pretty much the perfect read to cap off the spooky season. Do not be tricked by the cover and the catchline like I was, though — I went in expecting only a quirky compilation of Hallowe’en-themed tales, and while we certainly do get a taste of that with some of the selections, most of these fictional offerings are rather straight up, honest-to-goodness horror stories, with all that entails. Chaney explores different aspects of the genre with evident glee, while simultaneously running the reader through the gamut of emotions: joy and melancholy; delight and dread; playfulness and solemnity — often all at once, and often all in the same story.

Taken as a whole, however, Autumncrow is also essentially an examination of grief and loneliness. Most of the stories feature protagonists who are, in some way, looking to belong — to some place or to other people or to themselves. “Follow me in,” is a refrain that’s repeated throughout the collection, by various people and entities (and perhaps by the town itself). Some characters heed this call willingly, others are a bit more hesitant, some are even forced — but all of them can’t help but feel the alluring pull of the valley.⠀
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Which brings us to the setting: Autumncrow may not be the Halloweentown I expected it to be, but it is undeniably a far more interesting place. Chaney wisely plays it vague with the history of the place, leaving a lot to the reader’s imagination while still offering up enough particulars to make the town feel lived-in and, despite the paranormal phenomena, real. And like every real place, it is depicted as being sometimes dangerous, sometimes beautiful, sometimes just simply… there — but always, always alive. I would love to read more stories in this setting. Autumncrow Valley is the very same October Country Bradbury so fervently celebrated. ⠀
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I was highly impressed by this collection. It’s well worth the read.

THE OKAY WITCH by Emma Steinkellner

October 31, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

I began my Hallowe’en reading as gently as possible with Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks. I’d figured I’d finish it the same way, and Emma Steinkellner’s The Okay Witch seemed liked the perfect — and perfectly pleasant — bookend.

This middle grade graphic novel tells the story of Moth Hush (the best name), an upbeat but lonely teenage outcast growing up in a small, tight-knit colonial town, who, shortly after turning thirteen, finds out she comes from a long line of witches. Her mother has eschewed magic, however, and is unwilling to talk to Moth about witchcraft, preferring to leave history behind. This is, of course, not acceptable to our teenage protagonist, who is only too eager to find out more about the thing that might make her feel like she belongs. Her exploration into the past mostly spells out trouble, though, and soon stirs up old grudges and grievances.

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Kiki’s Delivery Service is my favorite Studio Ghibli movie (and also, if we’re being honest, probably my favorite film full stop). I love pretty much everything about it: from the story to the setting to the oh-so-lovable characters. It’s a movie that perfectly showcases the kind of everyday, commonplace courage that Miyazaki is so fond of portraying. I got major Kiki vibes from The Okay Witch and that was the main reason I picked it up. And there are similarities, to be sure: they are both endearing and intensely charming stories about young women trying to figure out where they fit in the world. The Okay Witch does its own thing with the premise though, and tells an effective story about prejudice — and, indeed, pride — with characters who deal with the haunted past in varying ways: the townsfolk, who hold it to the highest regard; the witches, who endured years of bigotry and persecution, and understandably wish to leave it all behind; Moth’s mother, Calendula (another best name), who believes in change above all.

And then there is Moth, prepared to push the bad aside, yearning to embrace the good, and perfectly willing to build a better world out of it all. And, like Kiki — one of her literary predecessors — she’s got the kind of courage to deliver it to us, too.

WE SOLD OUR SOULS by Grady Hendrix

October 27, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been reading a lot of stories lately that are more fun than scary. More spooky than horrifying. It’s what I prefer, usually. When I pick up a book, I’m looking for a certain mood and atmosphere rather than anything more visceral. As we get closer to Hallowe’en, though, I start feel that it itch for proper horror, waiting eagerly to be scratched. That’s when I turn to Grady Hendrix, a writer that I know will, like any UPS worker worth their soul, always deliver.

We Sold Our Souls is the story of Kris Pulaski, a former rock star living out her dull and dreary middle age existence as a night clerk in a cheap chain hotel. Kris was the lead guitarist in Dürt Würk, a nineties metal ensemble that never quite made it thanks to the machinations of lead singer, Terry Hunt, who, at the expense of the rest of the group, went on to fame and superstardom. After meeting with another down-on-his-luck bandmate, Kris soon finds out the true circumstances behind Hunt’s meteoric rise: he met the devils at a crossroads and sold the souls of his friends. Fueled by rage and a desperate desire to just understand why, she lights out towards Hellstock ’19, a festival headlined by Hunt that will ostensibly serve as his farewell show, only Kris is certain there are far more depraved designs at hand.

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This is a novel with a recognizable enough premise to be sure, but as the saying goes, still waters run deep, and the sheer amount of themes explored in this novel is enough to take one’s breath away: social class and poverty; conspiracies and mainstream mores; sexism and misogyny; fandom and toxic tendencies; art and commercialism. It is epic and overwhelming in scope, but much like his legendary namesake, Hendrix plays these themes on his guitar with a skillful, experienced hand.

Which bring us to the music.

I always get a kick out of a stories that make me appreciate a subject matter or a subculture in which I hold next-to-no interest. I’m not very into hardcore rock music. I enjoy a handful of songs and bands but, despite my uncle’s best efforts, I’m just not anywhere close to being a metalhead, nor do I have any interest to be. But I’ll be damned if this novel didn’t have me nodding along to the music it was making me hear in my head.

Kris put her fingers on the second fret, strummed, and while the string was still vibrating, before she could think, Kris slid her hand down to the fifth fret, flicked the strings twice, then instantly slid her hand to the seventh fret and strummed it twice, and she wasn’t stopping, her wrist ached but she dragged it down to ten, then twelve, racing to keep up with the riff she heard inside her head, the riff she’d listened to on Sabbath’s second album over and over again, the riff she played in her head as she walked to McNutt’s, as she sat in algebra class, as she lay in bed at night. The riff that said they all underestimated her, they didn’t know what she had inside, they didn’t know that she could destroy them all.

And suddenly, for one moment, “Iron Man” was in the basement. She played it to an audience of no one, but it had sounded exactly the same as it did on the album. The music vibrated in every atom of her being. You could cut her open and look at her through a microscope and Kris Pulaski would be “Iron Man” all the way down to her DNA.

It speaks a lot as to Hendrix’s writing. This heavy metal horror novel is written with such earnestness and fervor that not only do you hear the music being described in the page, it makes you feel it as well. Which is the most important thing: music means nothing without a listener, just as story means nothing without the reader. We must feel what the character feels. In this particular instance, we must hear what the character hears as well. It’s a rough tune, but the message behind it is as sweet as anything.

The blues were about the pain and struggle of living inside Black Iron Mountain. Metal showed you a door.

I first became familiar with Hendrix’s work a couple of years ago with his New Wave throwback My Best Friend’s Exorcism, a book I started because of a Stranger Things-induced eighties binge and finished with a fierce love for the story it told and the characters within it. My experience with this book was similar: I expected it to be good and to enjoy it, but the premise wasn’t one that initially grabbed me. I finished loving it, wholly and completely. Loving the story’s message of hope in defiance of all the horrific, hopeless things that happen within. Loving what it had to say about the importance of creativity and art, and how the human soul truly resides within those concepts.

“Souls are the best part of us,” JD said from the shadows. “Our passions, our dreams. We sell them and lose our creativity, our songs, our spark. We can no longer imagine anything bigger than what’s in front of our faces, we can no longer dream of a better world than Black Iron Mountain.”

At the end, though, what I loved most about We Sold Our Souls was Kris, our indomitable, vulnerable, metal-as-all-hell protagonist. The woman with the axe and the iron will. “A girl with a guitar never has to apologize for anything,” is a refrain repeated throughout the novel. Kris embodies that conceit perfectly, and I already miss reading about her.

KIM HUNT: What’s it like to be a woman in a metal band? Do you face any problems when you’re touring? Is it harder to get fans to respect you? And what about the image of women metal portrays? Do you think heavy metal creates positive role models for women?

KRIS PULASKI: I don’t know about all that. I just want to play.

— 101.7 WFNX, “FNX Weekends”
March 23, 1994

THE OWLS HAVE COME TO TAKE US AWAY by Ronald L. Smith

October 17, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

This book disappointed me, but only because the premise and its astounding cover (and its rad title) created expectations so high that they couldn’t possibly be met.

You see, as much as I enjoy books about proper spooky things like ghosts and ghouls, the stories that terrify me the most are ones about aliens. And that’s primarily because I’m not much of a believer in the supernatural. I don’t think scary monsters and sprites actually exist. Extraterrestrial life, though? Um, yeah. And extraterrestrial life paying us visits? Well… still not much of a believer there, either, but it’s certainly not outside the realm of possibility. And if there is even a small chance… well, that creates enough of a suspension of disbelief in me to be able to generate a good and proper scare.

It’s the implication of it all, I think. Either these things are actually happening in real life, or they are happening entirely in people’s heads. Your opinion may differ, but it’s the latter possibility that I find most disquieting. Monsters from outer space are peculiar in that regard. Because, in the general opinion at least, the people who witness and believe in them tend to be considered… not mentally well. Ghosts and demons? Well, obviously you are in need of spiritual help. Aliens? You probably need medication. It’s a little unfair, and more than a little problematic, and that’s an aspect that is explored in Ronald L. Smith’s The Owls Have Come to Take Us Away, the story of Simon, a biracial boy growing up in a military base, whose main preoccupation in life happens to be aliens — Gray aliens, to be specific (a fear that originates with Whitley Strieber’s book Communion, which I can identify with as that book also absolutely terrified me). It’s a worry that erupts into full-blown fear while on a camping trip with his parents, where he goes through an experience that he believes to be an actual alien abduction.

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Belief is the key term here. His parents — a doting and overly-concerned mother and an emotionally distant, callous father — soon find out, quickly assume the problem to be a psychological one, and he is promptly sent to be checked out by a doctor. And this constitutes the main conflict of the story: did this all happen to Simon in real life, or was it all inside his head?

Does it matter either way?

It’s an interesting and promising premise, but one with which, unfortunately, Smith doesn’t really do a whole lot. There are a lot of themes to be discussed within it, ranging from the importance of mental health awareness all the way up to toxic masculinity and its effect on young men. These topics are touched upon in the story, but only — frustratingly — on the most superficial of levels.

And I get it — this is a middle-grade novel, which can present a number of restrictions: from the way you write about certain topics to just how much you can discuss them without losing the interest of the younger audience. Writing about serious subjects well in children’s fiction demands a delicate balance, but it’s one I’ve seen struck successfully before, and often enough to not feel let down when coming across a story that doesn’t seem entirely willing to make the effort.

Which isn’t to say there aren’t any redeeming qualities in the story. Smith’s writing is economical and immediate. And while I don’t think he delved into the themes as much as he could have, he does allow us to view them through a more traditionally fantastical lens, with a story-within-a-story that is ostensibly being written by Simon, excerpts of which are peppered throughout the novel, and the writing for it is lavish and lofty and impressive. The metaphoric meaning behind it is not entirely subtle, but I found it to be an effective device, and these extracts were my favorite part of the story. I wouldn’t mind if Ronald L. Smith pulled a Rainbow Rowell and built an entire book around this nested narrative.

Smith also writes characters that are honest and compelling. His protagonist, especially. It’s easy to love and feel for Simon, who spends most of this story smothered and trodden — by the adults around him, by the aliens he believes are invading his life. In the end, Simon is just someone who wants to be seen and heard. Someone who just wants validation. The story gives it to him, and I can’t fault it for doing so. Because kids like Simon need spaces to breathe — spaces where they can just simply exist — and they deserve more stories that can provide that for them.

THERE ARE MONSTERS HERE by Cameron Chaney

October 13, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been following Cameron Chaney on social media for a while now. At first it was mostly because of his enviable library, but I’ve come to really enjoy the content he puts out. His books reviews are honest, informative, and concise. I like his earnest and infectious excitement for “all things spooky,” as he says in his videos. And I’ve read enough of the work that he reviews to realize that he knows a good story when he comes across one. What I didn’t know was that he could write one as well.

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I’m always a bit reluctant to read something written by people who are mostly known for their work in another medium. There’s an ingrained bias that you have to push against — and I was glad that I did so here. With There Are Monsters Here, Chaney has written an effective gut-punch of a story, full of both heart and horror. It’s a story about a family that is haunted, in every sense of the word, by monsters, and how each member responds to that fact. The story is a compelling one, with characters that feel real and very quickly grow on you, and the threats they face feel menacing and immediate, which is always what you’re looking for in short fiction.

The only real issue that I had was that I felt the writing relied too heavily on metaphor at times. That being said, this is still a compact and concise story, with prose that is clear and sincere, and I wouldn’t hesitate to read this author’s work again.

GHOSTS by Raina Telgemeier

October 6, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

Ghosts is the story of sisters Maya and Catrina (Cat) as their family moves to the fictional Northern California town of Bahía de la Luna. The move is spurred not only by their father’s new job, but also because of Maya’s health. She has cystic fibrosis, and the salty air that blows in from the sea, it is thought, might benefit her. The sisters soon discover that the coastal city is host to a large population of ghosts, however, and the story is informed by their individual reactions to this revelation.

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This was a bit of a bittersweet read for me as this was the first of Raina Telgemeier’s books that I didn’t just completely and utterly loved. Don’t get me wrong, I still liked it well enough. Like the rest of Telgemeier’s work, it’s a charmer of a read, full of lovely and relatable characters, and bursting at the seams with gorgeous artwork.

And it’s the art that I found most engaging. This is, I believe, Telgemeier’s strongest book in terms of artwork. Given that this story deals with the Day of the Dead this shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, seeing as how Mexican culture is such a veritable wellspring of visual inspiration.

Setting is something in which Telgemeier particularly excels at, and Bahía de la Luna (based on the actual Northern California town of Half Moon Bay) is her most realized and beautiful one yet, full of detail and character and atmosphere. She is helped here with colors by Braden Lamb, who delivers with a palette that is somehow both morose and upbeat, which is, again, appropriate for a story dealing with the Day of the Dead.

I don’t celebrate Día de Muertos, so I can’t judge as to whether or not Telgemeier did an admirable job representing the holiday, although the back matter of the book mentions all the research material that Telgemeier went through while producing the book, and it seems fairly cohesive. It also talks about the research done into properly representing cystic fibrosis, something which I believe she did accurately and respectfully. This aspect of the story, however, informs the main issue I had with it, which is Maya’s characterization. Maya begins the story as a great character, quirky and optimistic and full of life. But she very quickly pushed to the sidelines of the story, straight into tropey territory, and spends the latter half of the book mostly as a source of motivation and inspiration for her sister. It’s a decision that rubbed me the wrong way, and left me thinking that maybe the story should have been hers to tell all along, with Cat as the supporting character. Middle grade and young adult novels are still full of differently abled characters whose stories are told by their able-bodied peers, and this is something that we should work harder to change.

That issue aside, I did love how all the elements of the story tied into the theme of breath: ghosts cannot talk unless they are given breath by a living person (usually in the form of a kiss, which is just charming); Maya’s cystic fibrosis makes it difficult for her to breathe, and she needs the aid of medical equipment; Cat herself is dealing with anxiety, which often manifests itself into her being often short of breath; and of course, the wind is forever gusting in from the sea, breathing life into the story.

I’ve completely fallen in love with Raina Telgemeier’s books, regardless of small gripes. She’s doing important work, and I will happily read anything and everything that she puts out.

DEAD VOICES by Katherine Arden

October 5, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

I’ve read enough middle grade horror to know that a lot of the books within the genre are mostly harmless, spooky fun. There are a lot of conspicuous exceptions, of course, but for every Coraline there are at least a hundred Goosebumps (and, look, I love Goosebumps as much as the next reader, but let’s be real — it’s mostly goofy and schlocky fun).

Katherine Arden’s books fall more towards the Gaiman-end of the spectrum. There’s still no “real” horror here, but what Arden does deliver — and in abundance — is atmosphere. Which is fine by me: the spooky stories I find most effective are those defined by ambiance rather than terror — and Dead Voices, the second book in the Small Spaces series, has ambiance to spare. Arden’s language is beautiful, her descriptions chilling and commanding. There are passages here so vivid that I could almost feel the New England cold down in my bones (which is — as I mentioned in my previous review for Pumpkinheads — quite the feat when you consider I live on a Caribbean island in the midst of one of its hottest years on record).

A follow-up to last year’s excellent Small Spaces, Dead Voices sees our trio — principal protagonist Olivia, stoic and reliable Brian, and bubbly-but-insecure Coco — and their respective parents on their way to a skiing trip to a local Vermont mountain. They are soon overwhelmed by a particularly strong snowstorm however, and find themselves stuck inside the vast and newly renovated lodge in which the are making their stay.

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Arden has mentioned in interviews that one of the main inspirations for this story is The Shining, which should give you some idea of what is to come.

As I mentioned above, mood and setting are what sets this story apart, but it also features charming, believable, and resourceful characters, and it’s very easy to root and feel for them. Particularly great is Ollie’s father, Roger, who had a small part in Small Spaces but a much expanded role in this book. A widower trying his best to raise a daughter as a single parent. A cook and lover of puns. Someone trying to kindle a relationship with someone new while still grieving an old flame. His is a realistic, rounded, and sympathetic portrayal, and a welcome breath of fresh air in a genre where parents are mostly absent or absent-minded.

Lyrical and atmospheric, Dead Voices is a worthy sequel, and a great Hallowe’en read.

PUMPKINHEADS by Rainbow Rowell, Faith Erin Hicks

October 1, 2019October 4, 2024 ~ Ricardo ~ Leave a comment

Rainbow Rowell has made me cry. Yet again. I’ve read enough of her work for this to be expected, but everything about Pumpkinheads — her first graphic novel with the inimitable Faith Erin Hicks — sounded to me like it was just going to be a cute, fun romp.

And it was, you know? Pumpkinheads is the story of Josiah and Deja, two high school seniors who’ve spent the last couple of years working at their local pumpkin patch every Fall. Theirs is a seasonal friendship, but the bond they develop is strong and they consider themselves best friends. This is their last season working together, and once it wraps up they will both, for the last time, go their separate ways, towards college and new lives. So Deja is determined to have their last day (their last Hallowe’en together) be an adventure. “Friends,” she says at one point, “don’t let friends live small lives.”

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Pumpkinheads is charming and adorable and the most fun, gentle read. As are most of Rowell’s stories. And like most of Rowell’s stories, it isn’t just any of those things. There’s always more. And there’s a lot of heart and soul in this graphic novel. A lot of true things about friendship and relationships and what it means to leave people and places behind. And quite a lot of Autumn. This is probably the most Fall book I’ve ever read. I could feel it wrapped around me like a light sweater, could practically smell the crisp October air. Quite the feat considering I live in Puerto Rico, and have never actually come across a proper, Midwestern Fall.

All of this is beautifully conveyed by Faith Erin Hicks’s beautiful, beautiful artwork. She’s drawn up a gorgeous and warm, welcoming world into which I desperately want to jump.

Hicks deserves a lot of recognition in terms of the story, too. The book’s back matter includes a conversation between the authors which makes note of the fact that the script Hicks received from Rowell was more screenplay-like in nature, lacking a lot of the beat-by-beat description that is usually found in most comic book scripts, and it was up to her to break down the panels and figure out the pacing of the story. A job she did marvelously — this is a fulfilling but very brisk read. (“There is a lot of skill,” Hicks says, “behind a ‘quick read.'”)

Hicks ends the same conversation with the following: “In the beginning, you’re trying to get to know them, who they are and how best to draw them so their personalities come through, visually. And by the time you’ve drawn the last page in their graphic novel, these characters are your best friends.” This is, of course, in reference to the drawing process, but it also perfectly encapsulates the experience of reading the story of these characters. You pretty much like Josie and Deja from the get-go, but you love them by the end. And then you understand, quite perfectly, just why they are so loathe to say good bye to their pumpkin patch.

I loved this book.