connorjdaley's reviews
1154 reviews

Sinophagia: A Celebration of Chinese Horror by Xueting Christine Ni

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Thanks so much to NetGalley, Solaris, and Tantor audio for the ARC. The narration by both Emily Woo Zeller and David Lee Huynh were great!

This is a celebration of all things Chinese horror, which is fantastic. As this is audio, and I was listening at work without accompanying text, it was hard to note any of the story titles themselves, as they were in Chinese! But there were a few that stood out to me. The editor does a great job of adding notes and translations, however how some of them would pop up as footnotes right in the audio did add a slight layer of confusion for me, as they would repeat the Chinese phrase multiple times before commenting on it. It’s both necessary to define the terms used, but also took me out of the stories a lot. 

One story that stood out was a mixture of ghost story, as well as a commentary on the pricing crisis on land that’s happening. An entire housing complex, which our main characters were not aware of when moving in, is mostly being used to house the ashes of the dead. While awake one night, a boyfriend finds a coin in the mouth of his girlfriend, a token used to help the dead. He freaks out and of course they desire to move. The twist that followed was not one I was expecting, and it was well done for something so short. The commentary on land, taking care of loved ones, and placing them to rest, reminded me of this year’s Korean film Exhuma. 

Another I particularly enjoyed found a man and woman waking up inside an apartment. With no way out, they are trapped, and as their kidnapper knocked them out, they don’t even know where. Through various phone calls, the person on the other line offers them ways out through various tasks or tricks. I listened to this story right after watching Saw II and the comparisons cannot be understated. While there are no contraptions, the life and death possibility of being trapped, as well as the choices to save each other, does have a kind of Jigsaw feel with the person on the other end of the line. It also feels very reminiscent of those earlier 2000s movies where all the trapped person has is a phone.  

Otherwise, with this being kind of mixed, as it includes short stories, novelettes, and novellas, I did struggle a bit with the different lengths, as sometimes I’d get used to a specific voice and then the story would promptly end. Then you’d start all over. I feel like collections of all shorts are a bit easier, but there were none that I disliked! As the editor notes several times throughout, some of these were what would be considered very Classical Chinese horror…which kind of felt like differing stories with the same ending of, “they were dead the whole time!” Not really displeasing, but I think it’s why I enjoyed the ones that differed the most. 

Progeny by Kenya Moss-Dyme

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Thanks to Truborn Press for the e-ARC, I’m glad for this spooky read! 

With the son’s name being Craven, and the way the story opened, I really thought this was going to be some kind of modernized werewolf story. I’m not entirely sure why, but that was the first thought that hit me. It’s not, and I happened to like the direction the story took. 

Leo is the daughter of one of Paul’s closest patients. So when something goes wrong, his wife thinks it’s only right that they take him in. The eight year old has some real quirks to him, and it’s a learning curve for the entirety family. He’s obsessed with death, recruiting a small army of roadkill and dead animals. He keeps them in a backpack, and plays with them like toys. However, when he does, strange things happen, and they even seem to move… 

It’s not just Craven having a hard time adjusting to this new life change…frankly there’s something off about Leo and his parents just can’t see it. He tries to reach out and make the brotherly connection, but it doesn’t work, doesn’t last, and things go wrong from there. I even liked how Leo speaks in a way that’s not usual for a child to his adoptive father, really adding to that layer of other. 

While this is short, it does do a solid job of building an atmosphere of paranoia, and Craven seems to be the only one noticing that there’s something wrong with Leo. It could be Paul’s blissful ignorance, his wife’s plotting, or something else entirely that’s keeping them blinded to it. But will they catch on only when it’s too late? The later, more demonic, parts of this book brought to mind scenes from Paramount’s Evil, which I loved. 

The examination of familial ties is really well done, and although I wish this had a wider, more in depth ending, the story really is about that examination overall. The ties that bind them are also part of the problem, dragging them down. This family’s legacy is anything but normal. 

Nightmares from a Desk by Willie Robert Heredia

challenging dark mysterious sad tense fast-paced

4.0

I’ve had this paperback for a while, so I decided to get to it as a spooky season read, as well as a Hispanic Heritage Month read. 

The first story, The Crossing Guard, is also available separately as a kind of sample to the author’s writing. There is something off about Val the crossing guard. Eric has taken notice, and he feels certain. She’s doing something funky to the water bottles she offers out to the school kids. But when she catches him trying to destroy them, he quickly blames another passing kid. Safe for the moment, but no less culpable. 

It read like a Goosebumps short, like something from Tales to Give You Goosebumps or even the newer series Stinetinglers. It even has the kind of classic cliffhanger ending you’d expect. I look forward to the sequel story. 

While many of these shorts read like the author’s version of Goosebumps, they do range from middle grade characters/feeling to adult reads. Some of which are definitely more extreme too. One of my favorites is a story about a break in that’s mixed the feelings of slashers/The Strangers vibes with those of the more mysterious and ancient ritual tropes. Think home invasion times un-killable killer. It allowed for some really interesting twists, and even got my own creative ideas flowing honestly. 

From monsters to aliens, theme parks to bugs, magic napkins and evil lies, Heredia knows his way around some horror tropes. And this collection has a fantastic set of story headers. 

There’s also a great deal of diversity present in these stories that I feel as if you don’t exactly see elsewhere. That remembrance to include others. If it wasn’t the main character, it was a named character that was involved. And I thought that was perfect for Hispanic Heritage Month.  

Model Home by Rivers Solomon

challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Thanks to NetGalley, MCD books and Macmillan Audio for the ARC. Unfortunately, I’m really not sure which way I’m leaning on this one. 

For starters, this was not at all what I expected, and it was not at all what I was looking for. While that’s not the fault of the book, it did hinder my enjoyment throughout. I find the blurb to be quite misleading, as it continually questions if things are supernatural, demonic, possessive. That’s not really what this is about. There are hints, or even outright comments, but it’s something all its own. 

Now that the novel is out, and it’s getting into spooky season, it’s worth noting that this is not a haunted house story. At least not the Halloween month-style most readers will be looking for. One of the things I enjoyed the most, which I assume is what they meant by ‘a new kind of haunted-house story’, is that the novel is really pushing the idea that a house can be haunted in way more ways than the paranormal. With that concept it’s really pushing those bounds with its themes. 

After the death of their parents, Ezri is forced home to Texas to meet with their sisters to finalize things. While each and every occupant of the house suffered, Ezri’s journey through childhood was the darkest. Perhaps that’s why they fled all the way to England. They’ve always been different, and that’s also a huge portion of why. The author labeled them as trans, although with their desire to be and broadcast as both at different times, I did wonder if the term gender-fluid was more accurate (but I don’t know). Either way, the author does make a point to showcase their experience and traumas as different, and that stood out much more to me than most of the commentary on race, even though a huge part of the plot is them being the first black family in an all white neighborhood. However the woman in the beginning saying “so articulate”, really led right off with how the book would commentate. And from the author of The Deep, you shouldn’t be surprised there. The twist at the end also hit in a kind of Get Out way that I will not spoil. 

One this that took me 100% out of the story multiple times, is that the blurb mentions upper-middle class, but then the parents actions clash with that, and then there’s also all the kids feeling like their parents were frugal and they didn’t know they had money? Right in the beginning, a neighbor mentioned wanting the house but picking a different one, the mother insinuates that it was because the woman could not afford their house. The house is commented on as being large, and inside an entirely gated community. The mother’s tastes for furniture are expensive, even imported foreign pieces. They comment on the fact that the father HAD to have a $100,000 tv. In one pivotal scene, that showcases the mother in a particularly good mood, she wants to take them to a dinner to celebrate good news. It is remarked upon that they are not dressed for that kind of restaurant. So, instead of going to change, the mother buys every single on of them a brand new outfit. Head to toe to be able to go to the fancier dinner spot. Then one sibling asks if they can ice skate after dinner at the mall too and the mother says of course. Then in the present day portion of the novel, the family is astonished to hear that they were set to receive over a million dollars prior to liquidating anything else. I’m sorry, and maybe it’s just my lower middle class upbringing catching all the surprise here, but that sounds like an incredibly wealthy family, not one breaking into the upper middle class? 

As one of four siblings, there were also some very odd things the siblings did together that stood out to me, but maybe that’s just my family dynamic? Like cuddling together in bed as adults, comments on wanting to lick tears away, as well as some questionably off massaging. Maybe this was another layer to show reactions to the trauma, but it took me out of the story a bit too much. 

But at one point towards the end, someone’s reading The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, and I felt that the novel’s name drop was a really good choice as this is kind of an amalgamation of that book with the idea of a haunted house. All in all, some things in this that I really liked, and others that detracted from them. 

A Stitch Between Worlds by Frasier Armitage

adventurous challenging hopeful inspiring mysterious fast-paced

5.0

Thanks to the author for the e-ARC! This short story collection was a lot of fun. 

Investation is the story of a man that invested his inheritance into purchasing a solar system. One way out of the way, but with the hopes of wealth sometime in the future. That sometime happens to come up much faster for them than expected, and with wealth comes problems. This felt kind of like Childhood’s End, just somewhat flipped, and taken to its extreme. 

Rememory is a futuristic story, taking place in what felt like a Blade Runner-esque Japan, where memory has become the only form of currency. And just like with dollars and cents, where there’s profit, there’s always someone wanting more. The rich covet, investing in people who are referred to as Hard-Drivers, aka those kept safe like a piggy bank of others memories. This has some thriller notes that were reminiscent of the film In Time, and some of the more scifi notes involving memory recall/replay that are hit upon in the movie of the same name, Rememory. 

The Hunter Remains reminded me of The Land Before Time or the book Hunted, in that the author here has personified dinosaurs. Their is still a hierarchy of hunters and pray, but they have thought throughout. Unlike the two examples though, this is kind of an adult, violent, dinosaur-fueled Noah’s Ark. 

Good As Gold features the city, New Yesterday, which is also the name of one of the author’s novels. So I can only assume this is related, which is exciting, as this was an awesome concept. A city where anything can be ‘retrograded’, any past can be rewritten. This is a bank robbery gone wrong in a shifting personal perspective that felt very a la Inception. 

Dragonpiercer is an interesting one. A man and his helping lover create, at long last, a potion with the power to change him into dragon. It’s a dream he’s been chasing since birth. It’s somehow both super scifi and fantasy as one. Both castle Dracula vibes and monster Frankenstein. 

The Forgotten Melody is a real quick one. A musician and a beautician seek to awaken statues with a partially stolen song. 

Postcards From Another World was one of my favorites! It reminded me of my friend’s release, I Tried Calling, in that it features a story entirely told through transcriptions. This was a quick scifi read, but it dealt with parenthood, loss, grief, and finding peace again. 

Hear No Evil is a fantastic supernatural/superpower story that meshes with detective crime! An officer that can collect evidence through unusual means is caught in the web of the wrong person. All I can say is that I want a full novel of this asap. 

The Caretaker is the story of a silicon based copy of military persons given to their families to help with the distance. The story has the war taking place off world, so assumably quite far. Very reminiscent of The  Black Mirror episode, Be Right Back, with notes of Detroit Become Human and A Sorrow Named Joy by Sarah Chorn. With an ending that made me wish it was only the beginning. 

Skybound is another story that’s more than likely novelette length. It is an eco-scifi/horror that’s a little too near-future for me. The destruction of the planet is worse than ever, and by 2030, weather is uncontrollable. Kind of like the scientists of today, they look to space as the answer. Reminiscent of statements made by Elon Musk, and the film Interstellar. 

A Stitch Between Worlds isn’t exactly a sequel story to Rememory, but it is kind of an adjacent one. An agent is pulled off of investigating Felix and Jock to work a new case. This case involves a man that can seemingly create dreamscapes that appear to be real. The only problem is, they just might me. This was a really awesome way to wrap up the entire collection, interlocking each. 

All in all, I absolutely loved every single story included in this collection. Strong writing, well thought out concepts, and super fast paces. This might be one of my favorite collections I’ve ever read.

Ted's Score by Daniel P. Coughlin

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

4.0

I was contacted by a publicist and offered a physical ARC. I’m glad I said yes! I believe this release is a reissue from Hellbound Books. 

The novel focuses in part on Ted. Ted’s mother was a real piece of work, and although his time in the military most likely exasperated things, she was the crux to his unhinging. Now, Ted has an insatiable hunger, the drive to kill. These are what Ted calls his score. One couple, a particularly important score for Ted, is one of the town’s greatest unsolved mysteries. One that the local police took into their retirement even. And I loved that the marketing used the ‘newspaper’ clipping of it as the book wrapping. Ted’s got quite the long list of kills, making him one hell of a serial killer. 

The other focus, is on the Benton family. Especially the daughter Jules and her boyfriend David. I originally thought this was a kind of unique way to set up a final girl, but this isn’t your typical slasher. Jules and David have been talking about when and how to do it for the very first time, and when David’s parents go away for a week, the timing seems perfect. The chaos that ensues after is almost endless. Deceit, cheating, lies, and sneaking around lead them on a path of their own destruction. A path that may lead right to an elderly Ted. 

Now one thing that I can’t really tell if I liked or not, was the incredible amount of sex in the story. The author does pretty well with having it present, while not making the reading all that X rated, which for me is a plus. My issue is that it’s so constantly present that it bleeds into everything. Ted’s disgusting perversion, teenagers (Jules and David especially, and even the Benton parents. And while that’s certainly fitting for those old school slashers, it just made it feel like there was no destination between anyone or the different arcs. But I’m not saying I dislike it, because part of me wonders if it was in itself a commentary of that. 

There were a few moments, like with Ted and his mother and then again later in the novel where I felt like we were getting into something that felt almost like it could be Dexter: New Blood-ish. Not to mention Ted’s drive certainly has a ‘dark passenger’ feel to it from the very beginning. And while I wished that this truly did come to pass, I enjoyed the ending the way it was. No one is safe. And no one can ever truly know the depths that they’re willing to go until they get there. Three different incidents, and three differently viewed types of evil. 

The Crossing Guard by Willie Robert Heredia

fast-paced

4.0

There is something off about Val the crossing guard. Eric has taken notice, and he feels certain. She’s doing something funky to the water bottles she offers out to the school kids. But when she catches him trying to destroy them, he quickly blames another passing kid. Safe for the moment, but no less culpable. 

This was quick and enjoyable. It read like a Goosebumps short, like something from Tales to Give You Goosebumps or even the newer series Stinetinglers. It even has the kind of classic cliffhanger ending you’d expect. 

This is available in the full collection Nightmares From a Desk, but for $0.99 this is a great sample of the author’s work if you’re on the fence. 

The Ultimate Spider-Man by Stan Lee

adventurous hopeful tense fast-paced

4.0

The audio done by Thom Rivera is well performed and I think he’s a good voice for Peter and Spidey. 

Personally I love Spider-Man, but I didn’t grow up in a comic book household. So for me, my first Segway into it was the 90s animated series. And then I became a mega fan when Tobey took on the role. 

This collection starts with a pretty awesome novella that covers the origin story. Peter is bitten by an irradiated spider that has been causing some problems inside Dr. Otto’s mechanical arms. While not so different from many of the other versions, I like the idea of one of his greatest enemies having a direct connection to creating his alter ego. The accident that ensues also inadvertently creates Doc Ock. Then in a very similar sequence to the Sam Raimi movie, Peter creates this alter ego in hopes of stopping the burglar that killed his uncle Ben. I’ve always like the idea of finding new strength and immediately wanting revenge, but then becoming this superhero that’s arguably the most genuinely ‘good’ out of all of them. This “good guy” version is kind of what they seem to be doing with Tom Holland’s portrayal. 

The other stories are collected like an anthology. I liked and disliked some of them, but nothing stuck out as particularly bad. Mostly they felt like they belonged to a bigger piece, which made them kind of seem like they were always missing something. I did enjoy a story where Mary Jane asks simply for five more minutes, just for Peter to be told by a police officer that he was five minutes too late to save someone. A really good short on the idea of time and how particularly hard it would be to be a hero and also try to have personal life. 

A Slow Ship to Oblivion by Jake Theriault

adventurous challenging mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

Absolutely love this cover, and when I came across it on Twitter, I was stoked to find that I already owned it. So I decided to give it a read. 

The Cradle of the Sky is humanity’s last hope. Thousands of years ago, humans set sail to the great beyond in the far flung hopes that they could one day reach a new home. A planet that could sustain them the way that earth had. The earth they had destroyed. 4000 years into the 6000 year journey, and things are maybeee not going so great? 

Due to the need of everyone having a specified role on the cradle, life has fallen back into work related castes. Jett Dresden, part of the hull repair crew, makes a shocking discovery that leads her to find out a secret that the navigation caste wants hidden. A little chaos ensues…  

I enjoyed that while this is a dystopian twist to the utopia chasing tale, there was still goodness within the story. Jett’s father and sister are still with her. Their food allotment includes fresh produce, as well as a great scene talking about garlic. Jett even has her own room. And even though the cradle is hurdling towards something they didn’t expect, Jett doesn’t despair and tries to envision solutions. She ended up being a very powerful personality for a main character in such a short number of pages. 

I also enjoyed the author’s decision to include different kinds of Christianity. With the tagline of ‘God Does Not Want Us here,’ I’m glad he didn’t just give us a straight forward force-feeding of the Bible. This is 4000 years into their travels, and there are new sects that you’ve never imagined. I thoroughly enjoyed this. It’s not always about the destination, it’s about the survival. 

House of Bone and Rain by Gabino Iglesias

challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Knew I wanted to get to this while it was still new. After reading The Devil Takes You Home and getting a feel for the author, that desire only went up. Also nicely fit as a Hispanic Heritage Month read! 

This is a revenge story like no other. A group of friends seek revenge after one of their mothers is murdered. These childhood friends stick together no matter how dark and dangerous things become. No matter how many twists or lies become uncovered. As I am coming to gather is the author’s signature, this book is anything but just a revenge story. Multilayered and devastating, their devotion to each other will have you recalling childhood friendships that seemed so unbreakable, and have you thankful things never came to this. 

One thing that seems a constant, is that no matter where the author takes us—in this case Puerto Rico—his writing has this razor sharp edge to it, that is both poetic and devastating. As with his other novel I’ve read, this book has huge dialogue sections mixed with Spanish and no translation. This unerring stance is his stamp of authenticity that will keep me coming back for years to come. I do not speak Spanish, and as I was listening to the audio while working, I am not in the camp of people translating for themselves as they read. Especially as I do not have any text. I just love this idea that there’s three experiences out there for every book he writes. No translations, translations while reading, and Spanish speaking. The fact that I can find so much to enjoy while not knowing chunks of dialogue is such a success to me, and makes me want to experience it in other ways. 

And as these friends get deeper and deeper into this revenge plot, the further they’re forced to go is also getting deeper. Iglesias does so much with violence that I never knew was even possible. These bouts of hyper-violence are so dark and shocking, but still so layered into how everyone processes them, that they further the plot too. Each friend feels differently, will do something differently. But they’re together til the end, right? The author uses this shock value to further hammer home his themes. 

As a hurricane blows in, the author uses it as the perfect curtain to draw over everything and add in a bit of mysticism and supernatural. And while metaphoric in itself, it’s also a shockingly creepy twist all on its own.  

“All stories are ghost stories, and some stories turn us into ghosts.”

How far would you go for revenge? Would you up the violence, the depravity, to reach your goal? Would you let it whittle you away until there was nothing left?