Book Review: Bury Me Cold & More Last Words by Jacob Steven Mohr (2025)
Quill & Crow Publishing House
Before Bury Me Cold, I was not especially familiar with Mohr’s work in fiction. I’d caught a stray short story here and there, and wrote an advanced review of his excellent editorial debut, Dead Letters: Episodes of Epistolary Horror (to which he is also a contributor). I regarded him as one of those young authors who had surmounted the early hurdles of publishing and seduced enough gatekeepers to find regular space for his work, but was ultimately yet to produce something that demanded wider attention and thus separate him from the healthy pack of promising young horror fiction talent around today.
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.
The weird thing is, I’m not sure Mohr has a truly distinctive style–or at least one that can be identified at this time. However, he injects the impression of a well-developed style into every story, and as much as I want to make a tortured analogy about a multi-instrumentalist musical performer here, suffice to say that this is quietly one of the most impressive elements of his work: when he writes a thriller, a crime story, body horror, or a coming-of-age-beneath-the-shadow-of-dark-gods story, each feels like it was written by a writer who has decades of success in that space. I’d love to see his Gene Wolfe impression.
I read an excessive amount modern horror fiction…and I’m not sure I can identify this versatile-voice quality in anyone else working today. Congrats, Jacob, you’re a weirdo.
Alas, I can feel your modern screen-addled attention waning, so I’ll get on to the part everyone actually cares about: what I thought of the particular stories. Below are my thoughts on the standouts from this very strong collection, and what you have to look forward to if you pick it up:
Empty Shells on a Cold Shore (and no, autocorrect, for the forty-second time, I don’t mean ‘cold sore.’)
Marine biology students walk the shore at night, tracking sea turtles from past migrations. Then, they find a human body washed up on the sand, it’s the least horrifying thing they’ll see that night.
This is a near-perfect opening salvo for the collection, as it is short, memorable, and creative without upstaging the excellent stories that immediately follow it. A perfect appetite-whetter, and a fine example of Mohr’s ability to set up a situation and abruptly subvert all of the expectations that come with it.
Bury Me Cold
Mohr shows off his love of–and talent for–epistolary horror in this turn-of-the-century story in which a doctor, preacher, and sheriff are urgently summoned to a remote ranch in the dead of winter. While their mutual friend, the recently-widowed Ike Munson, is absent from his home, there’s plenty to keep the trio’s attention until his anticipated return.
While the setting and setup are more conventional than most other stories in the collection, I think this tale exemplifies Mohr’s ability to craft something exceptional from familiar elements, and after nodding toward what most readers likely expect to come next, take things in a wholly different direction while putting an extra creative layer on the story as a whole. Cryptic and non-descript? Yeah, I really want you to read this one without much of an idea of where it goes. Deservedly the titular entry in this collection, this is one of those stories that other authors will wish they had written. I sure do.
Color on the Lure
The discovery of a nine-armed giant squid drives a man to secure a job guarding the aquarium where it resides, and he recognizes there is far more to this creature than an extra appendage. Precisely-written, mysterious, and obliquely unsettling, I reread this story several times, finding a new wrinkle with each return. If you really like the modern style of short fiction, this one is for you.
The Judgment
A bizarre dark fantasy chronicle, this story exemplifies Mohr’s ability to cast large shadows from tiny figures. An old god and a new one wrangle through the pieces they’ve placed on the board. I really loved how this one shaped up across multiple arcs, and it captures the best thematic vibes of Dark Souls and Dungeons & Dragons. Maybe not for everyone, but if you like dark fantasy, it’s an exceptional find.
Threads for Flies
Step brothers discover a mysterious, cobweb-covered house on Google Maps, and despite the fact that there’s nothing there in the physical world, they continue to pull the thread. Highly original and wonderfully creative, this story shows off Mohr’s ability to blend King-era haunted house mysteries with Gen Z creepypasta components. While this wasn’t my favorite story, I think it really shows off Mohr’s creativity.
Bag Work
A gritty little tale about a boxing trainer who caught wind of foul play in the ring, and is going to take his revenge. Really clean, efficient short story that would fit well in any collection. It’s got shades of Cormac McCarthy and Dennis Lehane.
Only Bodies Wanted
This one plays out like a top-tier episode of Black Mirror: people can have clones of themselves created, called NCBs—non-citizen bodies—to do menial jobs like fast food prep or package delivery. It’s like the natural endgame-capitalism equivalent of gamete donation, the catch is you might see yourself washing dishes or pumping gas during a night out. In this case, the main character, Daphne, has five NCBs, only they keep turning up dead…
It Doesn’t Give Anything Back
A touching story with heavy King vibes about a widower and his taciturn eight-year-old son who are taking their annual trip to the beach. Their retreat is abruptly interrupted by the presence of a dead sperm whale that has washed up just outside of their hotel. This one starkly contrasts with stories like “Color on the Lure” and “Bury Me Cold,” it's a heavy, dark tale about an evil more evocative than tangible.
I’m torn between this and “Bury Me Cold” as my favorite entry in the collection, and that in itself is a sharp testament to how capable Mohr is shaping up to be as a writer, as the two stories have nothing in common from a literary sense. It’s a great way to wrap the collection.
Final Thoughts, or “A bad miracle’s fallen here with the new snow”
Bury Me Cold is an exceptional collection, and not simply because the stories contained within are of a superb quality; the sheer breadth of voice and degree of versatility make Mohr and infinitely readable author. Whatever you like, he’ll serve it up to you, and likely with a wrinkle or twist you will appreciate but not expect. He mangles the realistic and the surreal, presenting each as smeared palette that is nonetheless aesthetically pleasing.
Despite the diversity of its themes and stories, what holds the collection together is Mohr’s ability to, like ink spilled into water, abruptly birth discomfort from the mundane, and to develop a rich, chameleonic voice over a short span. Couple this with his and natural creative instincts, and you have a superb collection. Not a single story in this Bury Me Cold misses, and if you couple this with the idea that there’s minimal thematic or situation overlap, that’s a truly impressive feat.
Score: 8.9
Strengths
Remarkably versatile set of stories, each written in a distinctive voice that fits the subject
No duds–I genuinely liked every story here, and that’s rare
Succeeds as horror; succeeds as literature
Weaknesses
Due to the sheer scope of themes and modes, some readers may not find enough of what they are looking for, especially if they have narrower tastes (booo, you, reader)
Bury Me Cold will be released on January 17th, 2025. You can purchase it on Amazon, or directly from the publisher.
You may also like: Dead Letters: Episodes of Epistolary Horror, The Children’s Horror
