I confess that I had never read “The Fall of the House of Usher” until What Moves the Dead came out. (Other Poe, yes, but I prefer his poetry.) But I could not in good conscience review this novel without reading the story it is directly and explicitly commenting upon, and so to The Collected …

Dolly Parton, a woman who we can all agree is unequivocally herself (and her best self, at that), once advised to “find out who you are and do it on purpose.” I mention this not because Little Bird is about country singers or Tennessee, but because author Tiffany Meuret has so completely embodied this advice. …

I realized part of the way through A Mirror Mended, Alix E. Harrow’s follow-up to her 2021 A Spindle Splintered, that this was only sort of taking its inspiration from portal fantasy. Its true parentage, though? Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. A Mirror Mended doesn’t map on to any of the films perfectly, but the spirit …

“The crew of the Rosebud are, currently, and by force of law, a balloon, a goth with a swagger stick, some sort of science aristocrat possibly, a ball of hands, and a swarm of insects.” I can’t really improve on that first line and so I’m going to reproduce it for my own review, which …

With the news lately and the general condition of the world, I don’t think it’s any surprise to see the argument in fiction that the monsters are us. J. M. Miro, whose fantasy debut Ordinary Monsters is out on June 7, has his share of concern and pessimism about the world, but his story about a ragtag …

Being alive, my grandfather always said, is not for cowards. Neither is being dead, according to Isaac Fellman, who in his sophomore novel Dead Collections explores the life of a vampire struggling to reconcile the life he wants with the life he has. It’s a thoughtful and, yes, profound examination of vampires: their mythos, their …

Pages 114 and 264. Those are the only two spots I stopped in Book of Night, the first because I fell asleep mid-page, and the second because I was pissed at the universe. Book of Night should not end. It needs to keep going. Only forty more pages and then the long, cold wait for …

Horror is a fairly broad genre. Suspense and gore fall under its umbrella, the subtle and the explicit. Monsters both human and non-human, with and without motive, inhabit its works, and the architects of its worlds seek quite the spectrum of responses. Are you unnerved, or actively nauseous? Do you check under the bed for …

All good things must come to an end. It’s a cliché because it’s true, but less cliché is the truth that not all good things come to a good end. Fantasy buffs know all too well the disappointment of loose ends and failed character arcs. Therefore, fantasy buffs—rejoice! For The Discord of Gods is an …

This is a difficult time of year. Not quite winter and not quite spring, there are few holidays to celebrate and precious little opportunity to adjust to Daylight Savings if you’re in the U.S. Plus, you know, the many ongoing crises of the world. No wonder more people are complaining about reading slumps! To help, …