Bury Me Cold is not the book that puts Mohr on the awards map and primes him for mainstream success, but it is a publication that gives me full faith that, if he keeps hustling and honing his craft, he’ll produce that pivotal work very soon. I struggle to think of another collection from a single author that shows such thematic and narrative versatility while also being so consistently and captivatingly original. The stories in Bury Me Cold are not only uniformly strong, but diverse in their strengths, and Mohr’s ability to impart a well-developed voice to what is a very diverse array of fiction left me deeply impressed.

…it’s an excellent work that puts the gristle back into horror, telling straight-up dark stories where the shadows are always growing and the evil in the world doesn’t hide for long. I can’t wait to read more Greg Chapman

Haven is a mindfully-written and masterful haunted house story that uses its characters to their full effect. Once you’ve gotten to know the Bakers and seen them to the crossroads where redemption and despair intersect, the mysteries inherent to Aunt Gussie and her strange old lakehouse reach out and drag them along another route entirely. Equal parts Shirley Jackson and Joyce Carol Oates, Haven succeeds at being both human and haunted, and Mia Dalia has made an immediate fan out of me.

This Thing is Starving is a deeply impressive debut, and a remarkably powerful and well-constructed narrative about the hardships visited upon women. Told through the eyes of a house full of ghosts and a threadbare family, Aislin does an excellent job of connecting the reader with the characters, and a major strength of the novel is how real it makes their pain and discomfort visible without being indulgent or exploitative.

Right out of the gate, I loved the tone of the book. The prose is crisp, always a touch playful or glib, and much of the more mundane happenings are clearly drawn from or inspired by the author’s real world experiences. I’ve occasionally written about how the word ‘fun’ is a near-pejorative in literary reviews, but as someone who reads a ton of dark fiction, I really enjoy when something in the genre also makes me laugh. The Fatal Mind flirts with being cozy at times, but never quite crosses that line, and would probably serve as an excellent title for the horror-curious to explore the genre.

Silence In The Basement is nonetheless an smart and effective horror-thriller with strong moments of tension and a consistent, immersive voice. It’s an incredibly promising debut, and genuinely fun read from an author who seems to have all of the tools to find success.

Datlow’s newest anthology, Fears: Tales of Psychological Horror, considers the aspect of dread and its influence on our mental state as we experience the world around us.

The novel is the best I’ve read in some time, marrying the strongest elements of Ramsey Campbell’s and Shirley Jackson’s respective styles together in what is very nearly a perfect horror novel. It is one of those novels where you become very conscious of the dwindling number of pages remaining, and when the story ends, you spend hours mulling over the mysteries that remain.

The Children’s Horror reminded me of the incredible power of a child’s mind to steamroll borders … All in all, it’s a fantastic collection, and I think very promising step up for Patrick Barb.

…this is the finest piece of literature to ever come out of the state of Alabama. Backwaters: 12 Murky Tales is a gloriously tumescent chimera of Southern Gothic hallmarks, obsessively-described body horror, and bizarro-absurdist humor which despite its myriad components, comes out exceptionally coherent and expertly paced.

The core elements of reality TV make great grounds for horror. Questionable motives, real-life situations, narrative arcs, as well and and the winner-take-all nature of the format, really make it an ideal backdrop to get creepy and/or murder-y. In this case, the show is one where a bunch of pretty women compete to marry a very basic Midwestern white dude, though some of contestants may have ambitions beyond making the handsome farmer-pilot from Iowa as happy as a Texas Roadhouse gift card.

Echo is a very solid novel that carries many moments of genuine creepiness. While the story meanders a little bit in the middle, with Sam chasing down a few too many dead-ends and red herrings for my taste, but the ambitious central narrative and excellently-written characters make this something to overlook.

I like Clay McLeod Chapman because he's always excited to tell his story. There's a pervasive energy in his writing that keeps readers immersed, and a palpable stylistic enthusiasm that just makes for infectious reading. He’s never just writing a scene, just recounting events, but constantly spinning the tale, letting the roots already laid down dig a little deeper into the reader’s mind even as he describes the new growth in the current chapter. He sells his narrative very easily, and be it some trick of his style or Satanic super powers, I never fail to sink into the initial narrative arc of a Chapman novel. 

The Croning features one of the most memorable opening chapters I’ve encountered in recent memory: a grimly whimsical (and slightly horny) retelling of Rumpelstiltskin, in which a royal spy tracks the fabled bargainer to a hinterland and finds that his quarry serves an esoteric deity called Old Leech. The strange god is a primordial cosmic entity who exists in some unknowable outer darkness but regularly makes their presence felt on Earth. The spy returns to his queen with the dwarf’s name, but when the fated day comes round, the hard-won knowledge has no effect, and the imp takes the queen’s child and then brings her and the spy to a bloody end.

In All the Fiends of Hell, Nevill launches his horror show on page one, spending little time on the events that preceded the apocalypse in either reference or return. The new world is ominous and still, and those that dwell in it are ill-equipped to parse the mysterious dangers that confront them. Nevill's hallmarks are here: the steady, introspective, reflective nature of his protagonist; the immutable and almost incomprehensible creatures that defy ready visualization; the escalating helplessness of those pitted against them…

The Rain Artist excels in juxtaposing a horrific vision of the future with instances of resonant beauty that serve to keep the story interesting and showcase the author’s impressive and instinctive understanding of human experience. The writing is strong enough to outpace the imperfect plot, effectively drawing the reader into its unique perspective until the world of The Rain Artist feels dangerously close to our own.

Slewfoot is a wonderful tale that lives to subvert expectations, feeling more like a darkly whimsical fable than a horror novel, and tinged with elements of legal drama and romance which round out a remarkably original novel. Brom's vision, patiently revealed, is one of depth, promise, and refreshing originality among the wider fiction about this historical period. Though ready for a popular audience, this novel touches literary elements, wisely and thoughtfully engaging the topics of belief, faith, trauma, and belonging. 

‘Billed as ‘found fiction,’ this collection elects to shape the narrative format rather than the thematic content of the stories within, presenting each entry as material records detailing separate (mostly horrific) narratives that are preserved in 9-1-1 calls, oral history transcriptions, police reports, forum posts, video game walkthroughs, SMS texts, as well as more familiar literary staples like journals, letters, and newspaper clippings.’