Alma Katsu has built a solid reputation as a writer of historical horror fiction. With Fiend, her latest novel, Katsu shifts gears, crafting a work set in present day. The publicity blurbs describe it as Succession mixed with the supernatural, and it is refreshing to see such truth in advertising. Of course, the premise of the popular television series, an obscenely wealthy family’s misuse and abuse of power, is not new. More dramatic takes can be found in theatre, with examples such as Shakespeare’s tragedy of King Lear, and two of the great Lillian Hellman’s plays: The Little Foxes (1939) and its prequel, Another Part of the Forest (1946) which…

The 1990s was a fertile period for crime-fighting bloodsuckers. Author Tanya Huff wrote a themed sequence of books under the umbrella caption of The Blood Books (1991-1997.) Adapted in 2007 for CBC Television as the short-lived Blood Ties, the stories partnered a police detective with a vampire. Another Canadian TV production, Forever Knight, aired from 1992-1996. In this case, the vampire was himself a police detective. I have always preferred fictional private eyes over their counterparts on the force, which is why I was drawn to P.N. Elrod’s 1998 novel A Chill in the Blood. The book is the seventh in a series referred to as The Vampire Files, which stars PI Jack Fleming, a former journalist…

Resurrection and horror fiction have a long history. It’s hard to keep a good theme buried. The longevity of Frankenstein along with certain writings of Poe, and subsequent famous resuscitations of “The Monkey’s Paw” such as Pet Sematary, demonstrate that bringing back the dead is in an everlasting state of revival. The Unkillable Frank Lightning by Josh Rountree is a hybrid riff on the Universal Studios movie interpretation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Like Rountree’s previous novel, The Legend of Charlie Fish, which was based on Universal’s Creature from the Black Lagoon, the narrative uses the Old West as a partial backdrop. The reckless violence of the locale and era works quite well atmospherically for a tale of gore and…

Digging into bookshelves is a bit like archaeology. There are treasures to be found among the double-rows of volumes. On the most recent excavation, I unearthed a jewel from the past: Dark Gods, a collection of four novellas by T.E.D. Klein. Klein’s prose is insightful and delightful. It delves into the basics of fear, that awareness of something terrifying lurking close by, while knowing that all the introspection in the world can’t keep it at bay. A jaundiced sense of humor, a witty riposte, a philosophical outlook, or an acknowledgement of the malevolent adversary are shabby temporary defenses. Excellently establishing mood is another Klein characteristic. Consider, for example, this atmospheric…

Writer Stephen Graham Jones has quite a following. He is highly regarded by reviewers and readers for his prose and application of his Native American background into his works. His novella Mapping the Interior helped to put him on the map, so to speak, courtesy of a Bram Stoker Award in the category of Long Fiction. First published in 2017, the Tor Publishing Group has just reissued it under its Nightfire banner. That gave me the opportunity to read the book for the first time and rectify a past omission. In its 96 pages, there is much psychological and sociological insight about American Indian culture. But at its heart, the…

White Line Fever by KC Jones is an ode to Stephen King. There are multiple references in the novel to several of King’s works, ranging from a vehicle referred to as “The Silver Bullet” to Stanley Kubrick’s film version of The Shining. Thematically, White Line Fever is primarily a love letter to King’s classic It, a book that focuses on a group of friends traumatized by events that happened in their youth. In Jones’s narrative, four gal pals in their thirties embark on a road trip aimed at bolstering the spirits of the brokenhearted protagonist. She carries the most emotional baggage, but each of the friends has unresolved personal demons.…

Recently, I saw two films that fall into the hybrid horror category. Both The Substance (2024) and Companion (2025) weave satire and searing social commentary into their very graphic over-the-top horror narratives. The novel Follow Me, written by Elizabeth Rose Quinn, reminded me of those movies. The book is similar in tone and snark. Its plot zeros in on the rabid desire to be a social media presence. The focus is on pressured young mothers, who feel isolated and undervalued, succumbing to the allure of being deemed an influencer. Like the two films I mentioned, things get taken to extremes. Author Quinn serves up so many quotable quips that it…