Book Review: What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher (2022)
Tor Nightfire
(This review contains spoilers.)
I had no intention of reviewing this novel. It was meant to be a brief sojourn away from criticism, a two-hundred-page break from my reviewer’s eye where I could just take in the story without wondering what–if anything–I needed to say about it.
However, What Moves the Dead is a distinct example of a new style of popular literature that I can’t help but linger on and pick at like the proverbial scratch on the roof of the mouth. Something about these titles feel incongruent to me, uncomfortable, and I need to engage why that is.
These new novels—increasingly common in horror—cast off or ignore developmental mainstays that were indispensable ten or fifteen years ago. They don’t care to be deeply original, possess a complex plot, or even be memorable beyond a few starred. They prize social commentary, both with and without qualifications, and sharp, silky prose. These books are filled with two types of characters: the intriguing mains, capable engines all, and shallower figures that these paragons play off of.
There are many fine things I can say about the novel; its prose, characters, and structure are all more efficient and effective than other novels to which I might compare it, and yet I struggle to say that I appreciate it as a complete work. There is something in me that wants to cling to the old models of assessment, that wants to demand long interior monologues that yield character development so thick I can stroke a thesis out of it. I want intricate layers of plot that only fully reveal themselves when the irrelevancies of chapter three interlock with the peripheral strangeness in chapter five. In short, my brain wants me to demand a vision very unlike the one Vernon gave, and that way lies damnation as a reader and a critic.
This is not the first time I’ve struggled with this new wave of literature, but Ursula Vernon is the first author who made me so acutely aware of it. In a way, this review is a much about that as her novel, and for that I apologize.
A Classic Retold
What Moves the Dead is a retelling of Edgar Allen Poe’s short story, The Fall of the House of Usher, with T. Kingfisher keeping the bones of the original story and grafting in her own macabre and uncanny brand of weirdness. For those who care, it stays quite faithful to the original, with Vernon’s creative flourishes developing what Poe wrote rather than erasing them.
For those unfamiliar with the story, a friend of old receives a letter requesting help from the Ushers, and arrives to find both the grand manor home and its occupants in an advanced state of decline. There’s a series of ghastly developments and escalations, and the story concludes with the narrator escaping as the House of Usher collapses. There’s a bit more to it than that, but you now know enough to appreciate What Moves the Dead.
It is in the recharacterization of Poe’s nameless narrator that Vernon finds her richest creative vein, as Alex Easton, a war veteran from the fictional country of Gallicia (not to be confused with Galicia in Spain, as I initially read it), serves as both an incredibly realized character and an engaging foil for the declining Ushers, Roderick and Madeline. Easton has a wonderfully acerbic wit coupled with a chief investigator’s penchant for investigation and level-headedness, and this makes them a standout lead. Beyond these there is Denton, a baffled American medical doctor who has failed to combat Madeline’s diminishment; Edgar, Easton’s curmudgeonly footman and friend; and Eugenia Potter, an English mycologist who has ventured to the Usher estate to study the rampant fungal growth around the lake.
There are peripheral explorations of Alex Easton’s non-binary sexuality, and readers can infer they were likely Madeline’s lover at some point. These aspects are present without being belabored, and Vernon seems to trumpet no explicit message on this but acceptance, letting the original gothic story drive the plot. It’s an atmospheric and engaging transposition of Poe’s period that also represents the literary values of our time, and Vernon does it far more effectively than other authors who have recently gained popularity in the genre.
Upon arriving at Usher’s estate and observing the rampant fungal growth around the tarn (lake) which abuts the mansion, Easton acquaints themself with other characters and sets about quietly getting to the bottom of Madeline’s sickness through investigation and subtle interrogation of the other characters. The land around the Usher household is always heavy with gloom, and a breed of unsettling, lethargic hares populates the wilderness around the lake. When Easton catches Madeline sleepwalking and unable to communicate beyond a few words, they connect her malady with that of the hares, and proceeds to hunt one in hopes of learning more about the affliction.
Only when she shoots it and destroys half of the creature’s head, it fails to die, instead rising to regard them silently with its remaining eye. It’s all wonderfully unnerving and macabre, and serves as a warning to the reader as to how dark we’re going to go.
All of this is wonderfully conveyed through Vernon’s top-tier writing, which carries the efficiency and intentionality of a dancer’s movements. Not a word is wasted, awkward, or grasping, and the dialogue flows in the natural cadence of each character.
The Weight of New Growth
This is arguably the best-written novel I’ve consumed this year, and for this attribute alone I will seek out further Vernon’s other work. But What Moves the Dead has some key weaknesses that even Vernon’s near-peerless writing can’t save.
First, Vernon aimed to turn a short story into a full-length novel without altering or expanding its core plot. While staying true to the source material is something to applaud in certain instances, I believe this has worked against her here, and the book is ultimately too uneventful to feel satisfactory despite its modest length: Easton shows up at the Usher estate, and despite the elegant and tightly-scripted progression, they kind of just stumbles along until the mycologist puts the pieces they have found together. It feels a bit from-the-sky, and I wanted Alex Easton to have a moment of brilliance that matched that of their conception.
Second, as the reader likely expects by the point at which it is revealed, Madeline has fallen victim to the fungus around the lake which carries a perceived sentience and reanimatory property. When she dies and subsequently makes a wonderfully ghastly reappearance to murder her brother, we’re left with very little to consider as the novel closes. Much like a gothic short story, it ends on a dark note but doesn’t give us much in the way of lasting impact or consideration. The story carries no twists, no misdirections, and plays out like an old house finally falling down: storm and trauma for a moment before it is now and forever stilled.
Vernon notes in her afterword that she wanted to explore the character of Madeline, who is only briefly mentioned in Poe’s tale, and the two women taking center stage through much of the narrative makes this feel like an apt and interesting retelling for the modern period. I respect Vernon’s choice to keep the plot as Poe wrote it, but feel she missed out on something truly noteworthy by not making this even more her own story.
I can’t help but wonder what could have been if she had elected to make Madeline the primary perspective character and played things out from there. We may have missed out on or experienced a diminished Alex Easton, the novel’s beacon, but it would have taken the novel from retelling into reimagination territory, and I personally will always take the latter over the former. Further, seeing the perspective before and after Madeline’s ghastly transition is fertile creative ground, and I’m sad we didn’t walk there. C.S. Lewis’s greatest novel by far is Till We Have Faces, wherein he retells the Cupid and Psyche myth from the perspective of Psyche’s homely elder sister, and would have loved to see something like that here in Vernon’s extremely capable hands.
As I’m sure many of you do, I cringe at the very idea of telling an author ‘you should have written this instead!’ but my comments come solely from that of a reader dreaming of a novel I won’t get to read; I’m not faulting Vernon here in the least.
I think this novel will receive the highest praise from many readers, even if I’m ultimately not among them. In the afterword, Vernon heaps plaudits on Mexican Gothic, a book I found underwhelming and flat for many of the things I’ve criticized here (though Gothic lacked the sharp characters and prose to counteract these). These novels are straightforward and layerless; solidly constructed but ultimately doing nothing we as long-time readers don’t know intimately.
In both cases, my dissatisfaction may simply be indicative of my aesthetic ignorance to the changing tastes of the reading public. Some will regard me as choosing to mewl about things like overly simple plots and one-dimensional characters rather than appreciate this new literary wave that prizes sharp prose and readily digestible social commentary. I’ve often been underwhelmed by books the industry crows about for the past decade, choosing less successful authors and older texts as the captives of my leisure. I’m willing to recognize that the disappointment I feel with these new novels may be distinctly and uniquely my own.
What Moves the Dead is an exceptional novel that shows its strengths in the areas that both critical literary circles and the reading public value. However, its roots are in the pulp publications of yesteryear, and for better or worse, these hold firm when tested by the winds of the modern reader.
[EDIT: I absent-mindedly misgendered Alex Easton in an earlier version of this review, and apologize for my oversight. The grammar of identity is perpetually evolving, and sometimes the outdated muscle memory of writing kicks in without my awareness. I did not intend to dismiss or devalue anyone, and wholly support the rights of individuals to define their identity and gender as they see fit, and am happy to use the preferred terms of those I engage with. Sorry Alex Easton.
I have corrected the error, and appreciate the anonymous person who brought it to my attention. Even if they were super disingenuous and nasty about it.]
Verdict: 6.8/10
Strengths
Top-shelf prose
Well-written, lively main character
In horror, there are no better shoulders to stand on than those of Edgar Allan Poe
Smartly executed body horror
Weaknesses
Simple plot, though faithful to the short story
The first half of the novel is rather plodding
No surprises for the reader
Leaves us wanting to know more
You can purchase What Moves the Dead at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Target, or preferably, through an independent bookstore in your community.
You may also like: Mexican Gothic, Edgar Allan Poe, Ghost Eaters
