Staff Picks: Leave a Light On
by lucroe
As Halloween nears, here are some books that will get you in the spirit. So turn off all the lights, except one to read by, and enjoy reading a spooky tale.
Looking Glass Sound by Catriona Ward | Request Now
Wilder Harlow was never good at making friends until one summer in 1989 when he makes two. The three become obsessed with a local legend named Daggerman who would break into cottages and take Polaroids of sleeping children with knives to their throats. No killings ever occurred though. But then the three find a body which will change their lives and understanding of Daggerman. 30 years go by and Wilder is now writing his memoirs of that time, in order to try to make some sense of it. Haunted by hallucinations, he questions his own memory of events which leads to him to question is sanity. As a result, Wilder’s grasp on reality slowly slips through the book as memoir becomes fiction. This is a layered horror/murder mystery novel. Haunting and atmospheric, it's the perfect chilling companion as the summer winds down and the leaves begin to change. Beyond its spooky thrills, the book offers a thought-provoking exploration of authorship and our ethical obligations to the subjects of our narratives. Even after the final page, its unsettling impact lingers, refusing to let go.
Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror edited by Jordan Peele | Request Now
Film director and actor Peele brings together 19 Black authors to give their take on horror using the short story format. Well-known authors like N. K. Jemison whose story, Reckless Eyeballing involves a corrupt officer getting his due write fantastic stories alongside lesser known authors like Terence Taylor’s Your Happy Place. Taylor’s story takes place in a world similar to the Matrix movies in order to examine the ethical dilemmas of the profit-driven prison industry and the Thirteenth Amendment loophole that enables the exploitation of prison labor as a contemporary form of slavery. Other stories range from tales of a demonic blues player from Georgia to accounts of alien abductions. The narratives also span the spectrum from weird sci-fi to outright horror, varying in the intensity of terror. Inspiration from history, conspiracy theories, and folktales ensure that no two tales are alike. Many of the pieces also open up larger discussions about race relations, the Civil Rights Movement, and ancestry.
Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle | Request Now
Misha, a Hollywood star, receives an Oscar nomination and faces the challenge of killing gay characters, “for the algorithm,” as the execs at his long-running series tell him to do for the season finale. He refuses and becomes targeted by monsters from his horror movie days, and must risk his future to prevent the horrors from the silver screen from burying him. Keeping the reader at the edge of their seat along with bringing attention to issues such as queer erasure, corporate greed, and the use of AI in Hollywood is no small order but Tingle does a masterful job. It is an outstanding read with a great blend of horror and social commentary.
Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez | Request Now
Mariana Enriquez's Our Share of Night marks her debut novel translated into English, encompassing over 700 pages of horror narrative. The plot unfolds across several decades during Argentina’s military dictatorship, effectively utilizing the themes of political corruption and human rights violations as both a setting and an allegory for a different form of malevolence. Central to the narrative are Juan Peterson, a widower, and his son Gaspar, who are both mourning the loss of their wife and mother, Rosario. Juan strives to protect Gaspar, who possesses the ability to perceive and summon the afterlife, from the clutches of the Order, a murderous religious cult led by Rosario’s family. The Order is depicted as horrifyingly grotesque in their relentless pursuit of immortality. The story is set against the backdrop of Argentina’s Dirty War, a period during which a US-supported military dictatorship was responsible for the deaths and disappearances of tens of thousands of individuals in brutal and horrific circumstances. While the exact number of victims remains uncertain, estimates suggest at least 30,000 lives were lost. This historical context subtly enriches the novel’s fantasy elements while also serving as a veil, allowing the Order’s sacrificial acts against innocents to go largely unnoticed amid the widespread atrocities committed by the military junta.
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