A host of sublime writers and settings create an entertainingly macabre collection.
This dark anthology explores sinister legends and harrowing mythological creatures spanning the Western Hemisphere.
According to documents that open this book, the enigmatic and decades-old Umbra Arca Society has long compiled myths and legends. Though some question the organization’s very existence, it has allegedly archived a book “for each corner of the world.” This anthology, however, focuses on the Americas with a series of moody poetry and short fiction. Most of the entries follow a traditional format—a hero confronts an otherworldly, typically vengeful being or something equally heinous. But the spotlight shines brightest on the myths and legends themselves, originating from various locales. These include monstrous dogmen in Ohio (Tim Waggoner’s “God Spelled Backward”), the bogeymanlike Sack Man in São Paulo (Josh Malerman’s “Door to Door”), and a heart-eating female demon in the Yucatán Peninsula (Julia Rios’ “Xtabay”). Recognizable characters crop up, such as sea and lake monsters or the tooth fairy in Annie Neugebauer’s spine-chilling “You Ought Not Smile as You Walk These Woods.” Other less-familiar tales prove just as fascinating, from raining fish in Honduras to the colossal “devil whale” in Jeanne C. Stein’s Colombia-set “Diablo Ballena.” An array of talented authors elevates this collection with indelible prose. Christina Sng, for example, delivers a series of creature-laden poems based in Mesoamerica and South America. In “The Massacooramaan,” she writes, “We reached Georgetown by morning. / It was empty / But for the dead bodies / Crisp under our Guyanan sun.” Editors Bissett, Dodge, and Viola stylize the book like an archive and include email correspondence, handwritten notes, photos, and sketches. Bissett and Dodge also contributed several Umbra Arca “case files,” detailing phenomena like mermaids in Mississippi and unexplained ghost lights in Saskatchewan, Canada. Meanwhile, Lovett’s complementary artwork, whether of grotesque, menacing creatures or dreamlike imagery, simply astounds.
A host of sublime writers and settings create an entertainingly macabre collection.Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-73659-643-2
Page Count: 440
Publisher: Hex Publishers
Review Posted Online: Nov. 22, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A beautiful meditation on queer identity against a supernatural backdrop.
Three women deal very differently with vampirism in Schwab’s era-spanning follow-up to The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue (2020).
In 16th-century Spain, Maria seduces a wealthy viscount in an attempt to seize whatever control she can over her own life. It turns out that being a wife—even a wealthy one—is just another cage, but then a mysterious widow offers Maria a surprising escape route. In the 19th century, Charlotte is sent from her home in the English countryside to live with an aunt in London when she’s found trying to kiss her best friend. She’s despondent at the idea of marrying a man, but another mysterious widow—who has a secret connection to Maria’s widow from centuries earlier—appears and teaches Charlotte that she can be free to love whomever she chooses, if she’s brave enough. In 2019, Alice’s memories of growing up in Scotland with her mercurial older sister, Catty, pull her mind away from her first days at Harvard University. And though she doesn’t meet any mysterious widows, Alice wakes up alone after a one-night stand unable to tolerate sunlight, sporting two new fangs, and desperate to drink blood. Horrified at her transformation, she searches Boston for her hookup, who was the last person she remembers seeing before she woke up as a vampire. Schwab delicately intertwines the three storylines, which are compelling individually even before the reader knows how they will connect. Maria, Charlotte, and Alice are queer women searching for love, recognition, and wholeness, growing fangs and defying mortality in a world that would deny them their very existence. Alice’s flashbacks to Catty are particularly moving, and subtly play off themes of grief and loneliness laid out in the historical timelines.
A beautiful meditation on queer identity against a supernatural backdrop.Pub Date: June 10, 2025
ISBN: 9781250320520
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: March 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
