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tvbsreads's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
This is the exact tempo and flavor of horror fiction that I really respond to. It has almost no pop-sensibilities. The corner of the genre it occupies isn’t simply “ghost story” or “murder tale”… but rather this deep, elemental, eternal horror. Folksy, acoustic, story-older-than-stories type stuff. However, the writing style never feels posh or kitschy or twee… it remains modern, clear, and it is a story very crisply and urgently told.
This is a book that is very much served in 3 parts. A pre-amble, the story within a story, and the climax/resolution. The bulk of the world building and narrative juice comes from the middle part. Which leaves the novel, as a whole, feeling a but unbalanced in a sense. That is to say, the framing device throws the pacing of it off in a peculiar way.
But the imagery and ideas are what the book is offering. And in that regard, it is a truly unflinching example of existential, cosmic, bone-deep horror. Not for the casual reader of popular horror, or the faint of heart.
This is a book that is very much served in 3 parts. A pre-amble, the story within a story, and the climax/resolution. The bulk of the world building and narrative juice comes from the middle part. Which leaves the novel, as a whole, feeling a but unbalanced in a sense. That is to say, the framing device throws the pacing of it off in a peculiar way.
But the imagery and ideas are what the book is offering. And in that regard, it is a truly unflinching example of existential, cosmic, bone-deep horror. Not for the casual reader of popular horror, or the faint of heart.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Alcohol, Sexual content, Suicide, Car accident, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Body horror, Child death, Death, Gore, Medical trauma, Murder, Animal death, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, Medical content, Mental illness, Emotional abuse, Cancer, Domestic abuse, Suicide attempt, Child abuse, and Injury/Injury detail
bookishraccoon's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Okay, so 1st off.. (I loved this book, but I need to get this off my chest)
Someone please tell me why the guy Howard in this really spent 150+ pages telling a story in a diner? This was supposed to be an eerie folk tale to scare away some new fisherman..
But in the book it was described as a story that took several hours to describe.. but this took way longer to get through as the reader, so it made this sequence unrealistic (not that this story was to begin with but anyways).
It didn’t help that this segment was smack in the middle of the book, which ruined the flow and was pretty jarring. There was some cool moments in this portion, but it seemed incredibly drawn out & honestly much longer than what it needed to be. It was pretty brutal for me to get through, to the point where I considered DNFing this. Who knows, if I didn’t have to read it for a book club I might’ve!
But I’m glad I forced myself to push through it! I enjoyed the book a lot overall, & adored the author’s writing style! There were a few eerie moments that genuinely creeped me out (and that’s hard to do). For the most part the flow was good, and the author knew how to keep the reader’s attention. I also liked the characters, & dug the ending!
In a nutshell, this book was a pleasant surprise & would love to read more from this author!
Rated this one
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - 4 stars
Someone please tell me why the guy Howard in this really spent 150+ pages telling a story in a diner? This was supposed to be an eerie folk tale to scare away some new fisherman..
But in the book it was described as a story that took several hours to describe.. but this took way longer to get through as the reader, so it made this sequence unrealistic (not that this story was to begin with but anyways).
It didn’t help that this segment was smack in the middle of the book, which ruined the flow and was pretty jarring. There was some cool moments in this portion, but it seemed incredibly drawn out & honestly much longer than what it needed to be. It was pretty brutal for me to get through, to the point where I considered DNFing this. Who knows, if I didn’t have to read it for a book club I might’ve!
But I’m glad I forced myself to push through it! I enjoyed the book a lot overall, & adored the author’s writing style! There were a few eerie moments that genuinely creeped me out (and that’s hard to do). For the most part the flow was good, and the author knew how to keep the reader’s attention. I also liked the characters, & dug the ending!
In a nutshell, this book was a pleasant surprise & would love to read more from this author!
Rated this one
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - 4 stars
Content Warnings
Moderate: Violence
Minor: Gore
abken's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Great cosmic horror book with a nice frame story with the narrator's story and the real story being in the middle almost as big as the main story. You can expect 2 fully fleshed out stories in this novel that are interconnected, but also very separate too!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Child death, Death, Gore, and Sexual content
dangerousaudino's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore
traa's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Cancer, Car accident, Child death, Death, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Violence
Moderate: Blood, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Suicide attempt, and Suicide
Minor: Medical trauma, Medical content, Fire/Fire injury, Incest, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, and Sexual content
billyjepma's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
"How could something sacred be bad?"
Like all good stories that take up the torch of cosmic horror, this is a slippery, unsettling, captivating descent into horrors too big to name. It's more literary than many of its genre peers but also leans into its genre more than any "literary" book would, which means it's essentially the ideal book for me. Langan is a helluva writer, pairing rich prose with dense descriptions that force you to submerge yourself in his storytelling if you want to keep the reins. The story-within-a-story structure of the book is a two-edged blade: its secret weapon and the one thing with the potential to hurt its impact. It was very much the former for me, as the two stories are less about the events that transpire and more about the ideas they confront. But in the same breath, I can admit that the third act, where the original story returns, is notably weaker than the material preceding it. The story moves so quickly in those final 80 pages that the revelations and developments lack the same teeth that the rest of the book uses so well. It still worked for me, though, as evidenced by the score above. There's an inevitability to it that feels appropriate for the scale and subject of the book, so while I would've happily read more, I appreciate how things ultimately unwound, too.
What might impress me the most about this book—which I'm obviously a fan of and will undoubtedly linger in my mind for quite some time—is how fluidly it embraces its influences while differentiating itself from them. Langan takes the horrific ideas of Lovecraft and pairs them with Stephen King's penchant for grief-stricken protagonists who are a hairsbreadth away from disaster, but the book is entirely Langan's front-to-back. The quality of his writing is superb, striking a delicate balance between poetic and needle-sharp that would also feel right at home read aloud by a campfire. The book also isn't that scary, at least not in a traditional sense, but is interspersed with a looming, impenetrable sense of foreboding that worms its way under your skin. I haven't lost sleep over scary stories since I was a kid, but I'd be lying if I said that—when preparing to go to bed—my mind didn't linger on the darkness Langan writes of here.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Car accident, Gore, Grief, Death, Blood, and Body horror
Moderate: Murder, Violence, Sexual content, Child death, Chronic illness, Cursing, Abandonment, and Cancer
Minor: Alcoholism, Vomit, Terminal illness, and Animal death
punkrockingnerd's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
It's a good folk horror novel, but it ended too abruptly for me. If there was a follow-up story/novel, I may change this rating, but the end just feels too much like the last scene in a horror movie where the main character gets attacked by the monster right before the end credits, ya know?
Content Warnings
Graphic: Terminal illness, Suicide, Car accident, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Death, and Dementia
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Animal death, Child death, Suicide attempt, Animal cruelty, Toxic friendship, and Cancer
crdjrose's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Violence, and Death
Moderate: Child death
midnightcomets's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
You cannot imagine the amount of love I have for horror books, and this year I read many of them. The most interesting thing is that I read this to see if it fit my Magnus Archives horror recs prompt for the Lonely, and it absolutely did. If you are a fan of horror stories, fishing, old tales and stories about grief and loss, this is for you, and you will enjoy it to the fullest.
P.S German is such a nice language for dark fantasy names and terms
P.S German is such a nice language for dark fantasy names and terms
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Cancer, Suicide, Body horror, Sexual content, and Gore
Minor: Incest
rosyhumbug's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Body horror, Violence, and Death
Moderate: Alcoholism, Car accident, and Cancer