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When The Reckoning Comes\u00a0<\/em>by LaTanya McQueen<\/p>\n Harper Perennial, 2021<\/p>\n ISBN-13 \u200f : \u200e\u00a0<\/span>978-0063035041<\/span><\/p>\n Available: Paperback, Kindle edition, audiobook, audio CD<\/p>\n ( Bookshop.org<\/a>\u00a0 | Amazon.com<\/a> )<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mira’s high school friend Celine invites Mira to her wedding, which will be held at the recently restored plantation where Mira’s ancestor Marceline was enslaved. The ghosts of the enslaved who were murdered during an unsuccessful rebellion return to haunt the wedding, with brutal, bloody results. McQueen does an amazing job recreating Mira’s memories of her childhood friendship with Celine, who is white, and Jesse, a Black boy arrested for murder who is released after Celine intervenes, and of describing the horrific things that were visited on the enslaved people on the plantation. The racism, brutality, and hopelessness are reminders that horror isn’t limited to the supernatural.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Nothing but Blackened Teeth\u00a0<\/em>by Cassandra Khaw<\/p>\n Tor Nightfire, 2021<\/p>\n ISBN-13 \u200f : \u200e\u00a0<\/span>978-1250759412<\/span><\/p>\n Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook\u00a0( Bookshop.org<\/a> | Amazon.com<\/a> )<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n When you are ridiculously wealthy and well-connected, and your fiance\u00e9 wants her wedding at a Heian-era haunted mansion, with the bones of a bride buried beneath, you make it happen. Wedding guest Cassie, our unreliable narrator, is disconnected and depressed, attending at the request of the groom, who is also her ex. Cassie is one of five people at the wedding: they all have the kind of entangled relationships that emerge from a small group dynamic formed in college, and attempting to summon a spirit in a haunted house the night before the wedding is not going to make it easier to get along. It’s been criticized for purple prose and lack of character development, but it is a wild, and vivid, ride.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Death of Jane Lawrence\u00a0<\/em>by Caitlin Starling<\/p>\n St. Martin’s Press, 2021<\/p>\n ISBN-13 \u200f : \u200e 978-1250272584<\/p>\n Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook\u00a0 (\u00a0Bookshop.org<\/a> |\u00a0Amazon.com<\/a> )<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Jane approaches Dr. Augustine Lawrence with a proposal of marriage. She wants security and is willing to work hard. They plan for it to be just a business deal: no questions, no love, and never a night spent in Lindridge Hall, his family manor. The best-laid plans can go awry, though: the two of them fall in love. Set in an alternate version of England that has elements of both the Victorian era and post-World War II, this starts out structured as a rather predictable gothic romance and ventured into the territory of occultism, as Jane, trapped in the house with the increasingly paranoid Augustine, is abruptly awakened into a world of magical ritual by occultist friends of Augustine’s. They then leave her to deal with Augustine and whatever is causing the disturbances in the house, untethered to reality. The narrative, which was relatively straightforward until then, became mazelike and hallucinatory.\u00a0 There’s significant body horror as well as blood and gore, so be warned. Readers who enjoy the version of occultism in this book might also appreciate Polly Schattel’s The Occultists.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A lot of wedding proposals happen on Valentine’s Day. A typical online search for “wedding horror stories” turns up stories of terrible things that happened at actual weddings, so it’s not that outlandish to discover that a number of recent horror novels have revolved around weddings. When The Reckoning Comes\u00a0by LaTanya McQueen Harper<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n