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Book Review: The Empire of the Moon and Stars and Other Stories by Simon Bleaken

cover art for Empire of the Moon and Stars and Other Stories by Simon Bleaken

The Empire of the Moon and Stars and Other Stories by Simon Bleaken
Independently published, 2025
ISBN 979-8343998535
Available: Paperback, Kindle edition
Buy:  Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

 

The Empire of the Moon and Stars is an interesting mix between horror and science fiction, independently published by a writer who is definitely worth watching – and reading.

 

The title story “The Empire of the Moon” is a fine example of what I mentioned above, namely an extremely disquieting mix of horror and science fiction. Another standout is “Anarred Asylum”, a very dark story where madness and supernatural merge. Admittedly, suspension of disbelief is hard to maintain throughout the whole tale: however, it remains a powerful journey into horror. “Ocean Song” is yet another strong, quite horrific piece, revolving around the invasion of deadly parasites coming from the sea.

 

I won’t even try to describe what happens in “A World Behind Glass”. It will suffice to say that it has all the features of a nightmare, where anything bad can happen and no explanations are required.

 

“Final Words” is an atmospheric piece, revisiting the secrets surrounding the elusive Robert Chambers book, The King in Yellow, while “The Breath of the God” is a claustrophobic example of “archaeological” horror.

 

The final section of the volume, called “Echoes of the Future”, is extremely oriented toward science fiction. Readers looking for an author who can write both horror and science fiction will want to check this collection of stories out.

 

 

Reviewed by Mario Guslandi

Posted on December 17, 2025 by , Reply

Book Review: The Wishing Pool and Other Stories by Tananarive Due

The Wishing Pool and Other Stories by Tananarive Due

Akashic Books, 2024

ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1636141794

Available: Paperback, hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook

Buy:  Bookshop.org |  Amazon.com

 

The Wishing Pool is a brilliant collection of of horror and Afrofuturistic short stories centering Black characters, Tananarive Due’s first short story collection since Ghost Summer. While it’s mostly reprints, there are a few stories that only appear here, and the majority of readers will find plenty of work new to them.

 

The collection is divided into four sections: “Wishes”, “The Gracetown Stories”, “The Nayima Stories”, and “Future Shock”.

 

“Wishes” includes “The Wishing Pool”, a heartbreaking story in which Joy, desperate to restore her father from his dementia, makes a wish on the wishing pool, despite knowing it might have unpleasant consequences,  “Incident at Bear Creek Lodge”, which won the World Fantasy Award, and “Dancing”, in which  Monique, her recently deceased grandmother’s caretaker, is forced to dance to death after internalizing her thwarted dream to become a ballerina, among its six tales.

 

“The Gracetown Stories” includes five stories, all involving individuals from the fictional Gracetown, Florida, where racism, Florida weirdness, and the supernatural combine. Gracetown first appears in Ghost Summer, and the Gracetown School for Boys is the setting for Due’s Stoker-winning novel The Reformatory. Due does a great job creating an atmospheric Florida setting, laced with terror. in “Last Stop on Route 9”, Charlotte and her 12 year old cousin Kai drive out of a mysterious fog and pull over to a gas station to ask for directions… which could be the last thing they ever do. “Rumpus Room” follows a single mother who has lost custody of her daughter after she takes a job working as  housekeeper, living in an unattached “rumpus room” that used to belong to her employer’s deceased daughter. There’s something disturbingly wrong about the room, though… Due does a great job creating an environment of uncertainty, dread, and panic.

 

“The Nayima Stories”  are a pair of stories that follow Nayima, immune but a carrier of a plague that has caused mass deaths. “One Day Only” takes place during the plague, with survivors staking their places in an abandoned Malibu until they’re forcibly moved, taking a moment to come together. “Attachment Disorder” takes place after a vaccine has been discovered…. but that hasn’t made things easier for carriers. Due’s world-building is fantastic- you really feel like you are inhabiting Nayima’s world.  “Future Shock” contains three additional plague and post-plague stories, unrelated to Nayima’s world, taking place in the future. “The Biographer” is a disorienting story about Olivia, an elderly screenwriter whose prescient movie about a global plague made her famous, who has been assigned a very strange Biographer to tell her life story.

 

Short story collections usually have misses as well as hits. The Wishing Pool is the rare collection where every story is outstanding, Highly recommended.

 

Reviewed by Kirsten Kowalewski

Posted on September 20, 2024 by , Reply

Book Review: A Darker Shade of Noir: New Stories of Body Horror by Women Writers edited by Joyce Carol Oates

Cover art for A Darker Shade of Noir edited by Joyce Carol Oates

 

A Darker Shade of Noir: New Stories of Body Horror by Women Writers

Edited by Joyce Carol Oates

Akashic  Books, 2023

ISBN: 978-1636141343

Available: Hardcover, paperback, Kindle edition

Buy:  Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

 

 

A Darker Shade of Noir: New Stories of Body Horror by Women Writers  disturbs the imagination and makes horror reality. Writers Megan Abbott, Margaret Atwood, Aimee Bender, Tananarive Due, Elizabeth Hand, Cassandra Khaw, Sheila Kohler, Aimee LaBrie, Raven Leilani, Lisa Lim, Joanna Margaret, Valerie Martin, Joyce Carol Oates, Lisa Tuttle, and Yumi Dineen Shiroma offer many strange, twisted stories that attest to the diversity of approaches to the genre.

 

Editor Joyce Carol Oates divides these little masterpieces into three sections: “You’ve Created a Monster,” “Morbid Anatomy,” and “Out of Body, Out of Time.” Aimee Bender’s story “Frank Jones” opens the book with the weird creation of a skin tag doll that should not have been taken to the office. Margaret Atwood delves into female anatomy through a snail who suddenly becomes a woman customer service rep in “Metempsychosis, or The Journey of the Soul.” And then we find a new wife, in ““Sydney” by Sheila Kohler, who finds herself in a shocking sexual situation with a gender-bending robot when she ventures into a part of her home that is designated as off limits by her husband.

 

There are often very surprising developments in these stories. In “Concealed Carry” by Lisa Tuttle, Kelly, fresh from London, finds out that there is a strict moral code in Texas that is enforced in a way she could never imagine.  In “Malena” by Joanna Margaret, Laura, who makes sculptures of women with missing body parts, discovers that the artistic “gift inside her” is also literally inside her. In “Dancing with Mirrors” by Lisa Lim,   a beautiful woman addicted to mirrors hides spectacularly murderous veins..

 

In addition to being entertaining, these writers are not afraid to tackle serious issues. “Dancing” by Tananarive Due and “Breathing Exercise” by Raven Leilani grapple with the impact of racism on the mind, body and soul.. Aimee Labrie in “Gross Anatomy”, and Cassandra Khaw in “Muzzle”, deal with physical violence against women. These are stories that head straight to the heart of the matter without becoming entangled in politics and platitudes.

 

Readers truly benefit from iconic writer Joyce Carol Oates’s expert shaping of this excellent collection of stories. There is not one dull moment in this book, and beginning the next story is like the start of a new and darker adventure.

 

Reviewed by Nova Hadley

 

 

 

Posted on April 23, 2024 by , Reply
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