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Book Review: Tome by Ross Jeffrey

cover art for Tome by Ross Jeffrey

Tome by Ross Jeffrey

Independently published, 2020

ISBN-13 : 979-8647504074

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition ( Amazon.com )

 

Ross Jeffrey has penned a thrilling, brutal Stoker finalist that pulls zero punches yet has the class of a Ketchum story.  Juniper Correctional facility, a blight on human’s blistered history, has long housed the worst of the worst, the people who operate below the level of human beings.

The story belongs to pair of characters who are both steered by Juniper, the machine that churns and spits out souls: Warden Fleming sits on one end of the spectrum, hoarding secrets that boil beneath the prison surface, and Frank Whitten, a guard who refuses to give up the last strand of light within him.

The story spirals inward up on itself, devouring everything in its path. Juniper is pure hell incarnate, infesting its inmates, guards, and others with a darkness that is more pitch than anything supernatural. It’s not for the squeamish: Jeffrey aims for the jugular, without much subtlety, yet somehow, still manages to build an effective, claustrophobic atmosphere to constrict our deepest insecurities. Juniper as a setting becomes the main character between the pages, an effective and frightening tool that likely scored this nomination.

For fans of brutal, effective horror, with echoes of Edward Lee, Richard Laymon, and Jack Ketchum, Tome will not disappoint. Recommended.

 

Contains: Extreme gore and violence, body horror, racism

 

Reviewed by David Simms

Editor’s note: Tome is a nominee on the final ballot of this year’s Bram Stoker Award in the category of Superior Achievement in a First Novel. 

Posted on May 16, 2021 by , Reply

Book Review: You Know It’s True by J.R. Hamantaschen

cover art for You Know It's True by J.R. Hamantaschen

You Know It’s True by J.R. Hamantaschen

Self-published, 2021

ISBN: 9798706071196

Available: Paperback, Kindle  ( Amazon.com )

 

A more fitting title for this collection of short stories would be The World’s Absolute Weirdest Tales.  These aren’t just out of left field: they leave left field, clear the Green Monster and land somewhere beyond Lansdowne St.

 

Readers who prefer stories that move from Point A to Point B in a  straightforward fashion will find that those are in the minority, although the ones included are real barn-burners.  “Short Bloom”, “Grab More Knives”, and ‘”More as a Keeper” are phenomenal, the only real letdown being that the last of them ends right when the story cranks into overdrive.  “Short Bloom” features an Earth where tiny holes open anywhere on the ground at random, and a fiber-thin appendage protrudes and painfully kills any living thing.  “Grab More Knives” is a brilliant and ironic look at what happens when people who justify vandalism and harassment under the guise of activism for a cause get a freight-load of payback, all due to a simple misunderstanding.  It’ll make some readers cheer, and others cry.  “More as a Keeper” is a look at what happens when the dead in purgatory get a chance for revenge.  It’s outstanding, and these three stories alone could probably justify the purchase of the book.

 

The other stories are more likely to appeal to fans of non-traditional stories, as some of them feel more like in-depth sketches or portraits of an individual.  The stories in this mold have a fully-developed character backstory, but then the actual story ends quickly, often with little resolve, and sometimes making no sense at all.  “Sad Life” is a good example.  Set at a wedding, it details a woman’s failed attempts and lack of desire for a standard relationship.  It’s well-written and detailed,  but then her face splits apart and the story ends.  This is what you have to enjoy to really like this book– excellent buildup, but a sometimes incomprehensible ending.  The stories “Night Devours My Days” and ” I Should Have Been a Pair of Ragged Claws/Scuttling Across The Floors of Silent Seas” also fall into this category.  The prose is solid, but the style may not be for everyone.

 

The last two stories, “It’s Always Time to Go” and “Beholden to the Past” are excellent ones that combine the above two story types.  “Beholden to the Past” is also notable for its unusual plot.  A college student has a serious addiction to whacking off, often to live online porn.  The catch?  When he has an orgasm, the person he was fantasizing about and/or watching dies.  It doesn’t get stranger than that, and seems a fitting final story for a very strange collection.  Overall, this book has a lot to recommend it, but enjoyment will depend greatly on the reader.  You Know It’s True defies categorization: there’s nothing else out there like it. Recommended for fans of unusual writing.

 

Contains: profanity, gore, murder, violence, sex, body horror, miscarriage, necrophilia, suicide, self-harm, and large doses of utter lunacy

 

 

 

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson

Posted on May 14, 2021 by , Reply

Book Review: Bent Heavens by Daniel Kraus

cover art for Bent Heavens by Daniel Kraus

Bent Heavens by Daniel Kraus

Henry Holt & Co., 2020

ISBN-13 : 978-1250151674

Available: Hardcover, paperback, Kindle edition, audiobook (  Bookshop.org | Amazon.com )

 

Liv’s father disappeared for four days and returned with vague memories of alien abduction. Becoming more and more erratic, he lost his job and retreated to the shed in his backyard where he built weapons and vicious traps around his house in case the aliens returned. Liv’s childhood friend Doug, neglected by his own parents and ostracized by other kids, adopted Liv’s father as a mentor, helping him with designing and building the traps, with Liv reluctantly along for the ride.  After Liv’s father disappears a second time, Liv and Doug make a ritual out of testing the traps every Sunday to make sure they still work. And at the beginning of her senior year of high school, Liv finds an alien in one of the traps, and she and Doug are determined to find out from the alien what happened to her dad.

Liv has worked to distance herself from her father’s bizarre behavior, making new friends and the cross-country team, but she is a hot mess, with grief and anger balled up inside her without a healthy outlet. Doug has no one holding him back. Having the alien in their power, hidden in the shed, leads to violence, and, as Liv begins to have doubts, complicity. There are explicit scenes of body horror and torture in the book. Seeing her inability to escape participation once it has begun is horrifying.

This is a painful book to read. Kraus shows how human monsters are made in visceral and grotesque detail. Kraus refers to a CIA report on “enhanced interrogation techniques” at the end that I am sure informed the events of the book. The book is made even more painful and heartbreaking by the reveals at the end.

While Kraus does a superior job with the plot focused on Liv, Doug, and the alien, other parts aren’t as strong. The book takes awhile to get going, secondary characters’ motivations are unclear, and parts of the plot don’t make sense.  Still, he has written a powerful and deeply disturbing horror story and condemnation of government secrecy, torture, and complicity.

 

Contains: explicit body horror and torture, violence, sex, alcohol abuse, bullying

 

Reviewed by Kirsten Kowalewski

Editor’s note: Bent Heavens is a nominee on the final ballot for this year’s Bram Stoker Awards in the category of Superior Achievement in a Young Adult Novel. 

Posted on May 11, 2021 by , Reply
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