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Grey Dog by Elliott Gish

Cover art for Grey Dog by Elliot Gish

Grey Dog by Elliott Gish

ECW Press, 2024

ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1770417328

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition, audiobook, audio CD

Buy:  Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

 

In 1901 Canada,  Ada Byrd, fleeing from a sex scandal and escaping from under her father’s thumb, takes up a position as a school teacher in the small town of Lowry Bridge. Things go well at the beginning: she is welcomed by the families, and makes new friends, such as Agatha, the minister’s wife. Ada goes to church, helps organize picnics and plays, and freely dances at one of the town’s festivities. She follows the town’s rules and their suspicions of the wild child, Muriel, and the spinster, Mrs. Kinsley, who the town considers a witch.

 

The civilized life she leads is in contrast to the dark woods surrounding the town. To get from the schoolhouse to the home she shares with her host family, the Griers, she must pass eerie woods that seem to be watching her every move. Time goes on, and the ordered and civilized life she leads starts to fade, as her past life comes back to haunt her and the town starts to reveal its secrets. Ada slowly breaks away from the rigid conventions of the town, and feels drawn to the wildness of the woods. She starts spending more time with town outcasts, Muriel and Mrs. Kinsley, and rejects Agatha and Mrs. Grier, the more accepted members of society.

 

Ada writes in her journal that there are many ways to be a good man, but only one way to be a good woman. The pressure of women being forced into specific gender roles breaks Ada, and you see her slow descent into madness as she breaks the bonds of civility. She’s not just refusing to shave her legs or wearing white after Labor Day. The book is a slow burn but at the end, it revs up like The Shining. It goes from psychological and paranormal horror to a slasher.

 

Even though it has feminist themes, Ada herself is somewhat self-hating of women and seems to take her trauma out on the women in the book rather than the men who hurt her. Grey Dog is well-written, and Ada’s descent is reminiscent of “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. This novel had so many themes, such as trauma, sapphic love, rape, birth, death, gender roles, and yearning that it is a haunting read that will have you thinking about it and running online to find out what others thought of it. I recommend it, though the ending might not be everyone’s cup of tea.

 

Reviewed by Lucy Nguyen

 

Posted on April 4, 2026 by , Reply

They Drink Our Blood by Lucy Leitner

cover art for They Drink Our Blood by Lucy Leitner

They Drink Our Blood by Lucy Leitner
Blood Bound Books, 2025
ISBN: 9781940250700
Available: Paperback, Kindle edition
Buy: Amazon.com | Bookshop.org

 

They Drink Our Blood is another engrossing tale from this author, and it demonstrates yet another facet of her writing style.  Leitner has already proven adept at dystopian satire with Outrage Level 10 and Bad Vibrations, as well as detective stories featuring the lovable, bumbling private investigator Thor Cole in The Girl With The Lollipop Eyes.  However, They Drink Our Blood is a darker, grimmer tale of vampires, and a possibly confused reality.  After the reader is done, they likely still won’t be sure if the overarching narrative was as it was portrayed, or simply the protagonists twisting the evidence to fit their own version of reality.

 

Taking place entirely in a small, somewhat run-down section of Pittsburgh, it seems that vampires have been living in the USA for years, and are now starting to come out of the shadows, as a few grisly murders around the country seem to attest.  Lisa is a thirty-something, struggling artist living in Pittsburgh, and the murders inspire her to try to do something to protect the people of her neighborhood.  She’s a fascinating character, as we watch her transition from painter to crusader, which alters her whole perspective on her own life.  Before the vampires, she never really had any doubt about what she was doing, and her paintings were her entire reason for being. Once she perceives a threat to her town, her outlook alters substantially, as she finds she may have found her actual purpose.  That means confronting the possibility that all the paintings she did were pointless, despite her telling herself for years that people simply didn’t “get it” when it came to her work. There are a few very good monologues from Lisa throughout the book that help illustrate the character’s uncertainty home in terms of her career choice, and it gives the reader something to ponder over as well, when concerning the overall purpose of art.

 

Lisa’s few friends and bar buddies in her section of town eventually buy into the idea that the vampires are real and a threat, and decide they need to do something to fight back.  That’s the point where the real skill in the narration comes in, as the evidence for bloodsuckers is rather ambiguous.  Lisa has an Uber passenger and she can’t see his face in the mirror?  Good evidence, but it was dark and he was wearing a hoodie.  Murders with a torn throat, and maybe some bite marks?  Sure, but this is the USA, and there are some real weirdos out there, as we all know.  Besides, the bodies weren’t drained, were they?  Or maybe the cops didn’t reveal that part?  Garlic and silver, classic undead repellents, are suddenly hard to find in the neighborhood, but the author wisely does NOT say if the rest of the country is the same way.  She keeps the focus on one little area, which keeps the level of uncertainty for the reader at a high level, as well as making the story theme much more believable.

 

Eventually, the story does build to a messy climax, but true to form, it doesn’t resolve the big question: were vampires present and making their move for domination, or were Lisa and her friends part of some sort of mass psychosis, where they saw what they wanted to see?  Was it real, or all in their minds?  Did they just need a scapegoat for their own humdrum, unfulfilled lives?  That’s for the reader to decide, as Leitner plays her cards close right through the end, and never gives it away.  Another well-done tale from an author who is proving to be a chameleon when it comes to writing.  Recommended.

 

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson.

Posted on April 2, 2026 by , Reply

Book Review: Sacrilege by Barbara Avon

Sacrilege by Barbara Avon

Self published, 2020

ISBN: 9798690309411

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

Buy:    Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

Sacrilege is a depressing psychological drama that takes you down, down, and further down.  There are no monsters or boogeymen in this one, just the mental demons that inhabit the characters.  It’s a pretty good read for those who prefer human interest/interaction stories.

 

Almost the entire story focuses on the two leads: wayward priest Cris Corelli, and Jules, the lady who owns the boarding house he stumbles into.  The author sets the tone right out of the gate: mentally, these two are trainwrecks, for various reasons.  As the story progresses, the death of someone close to both of them pushes Cris and Jules further down into depression.  They start drinking and drugging to numb the pain, only finding minimal comfort in each other.  However, it’s the best either of them can hope for, unless they somehow are able to use each other to pull out of their respective tailspins.

 

The stark manner in which the dialogue between Corelli and Jules is written is an unusual choice.  Often, books like this rely on fairly long and in-depth conversations, as a way to explain how the characters became, and where they are heading.  The author goes against the grain here, as most talks are fairly quick and clipped, not really revealing a lot about the characters.  Then again, maybe they don’t need to, the characters’ actions may speak louder than any lengthy dialogue in this case.  It’s an interesting choice for this type of book, and works reasonably well for the narrative, giving it a unique flavor.

 

I felt the “big reveal” at the end of the story was anticlimactic. You could tell it was supposed to be fairly important, due to Corelli’s actions after he discovered it, but it just didn’t seem like anything that should alter the story’s trajectory, or what the characters do for the rest of the book.

 

The bottom line is…this will appeal to a certain segment of readers.  If you enjoy depressing psychological dramas, this might work for you.  If your idea of horror is fast-paced, with monsters and supernatural craziness, then this probably isn’t your cup of black ichor.

 

 

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson

 

 

Posted on February 3, 2025 by , Reply
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