Mother: Tales of Love and Terror Edited by Christi Nogle and Willow Becker

 

Mothers protect, nurture, love, and adore...but what if they are more than just their title? In these 33 stories and poems, we examine what motherhood is and explore mothers of all kinds. With over 300 pages of horror, dark fantasy, science fiction, and poetry, we introduce the motivations and compulsions that make up a mother—both good and evil. Whether they are robot mothers, evil stepmothers, or sociopathic mothers-to-be, these stories will illuminate what's really going on inside of that woman we think we know so well...Mother.

 Has there ever been such a paradox as a mother? A woman who gives of herself until she has nothing left, and then gives some more.

Unfortunately, not everyone is cut out for motherhood, and some you will meet in this book have nothing to give but ugliness, evil and violence.

Powerful stories, poems and illustrations with the theme of motherhood fill these pages. Motherless children and childless mothers abound. But you won't find any Carol Brady or June Cleavers here. Mothers in these stories give life, take life, and ruin lives. There is ugliness and violence in these stories of the bonds of motherhood and of severing those ties. Fathers don't play much of a role in these tales, but occasionally an unusual father results in an exceptionally special child or even a litter of them. Some of my favorite stories involved very strange children.

If you are a fan of dark and weird fiction this anthology is for you. 

4 out of 5 stars

My thanks to Weird Little Worlds

Get a copy

Contents

“The Sire,” by Steven Rasnic Tem
“Last Leaf of an Ursine Tree,” by Hailey Piper
“Of a Thousand Arms and More,” by Ai Jiang
“Passed,” by Elizabeth R. McClellan
“Mother Made Cake,” by Nicoletta Giuseffi
“Puerperium,” by Donyae Coles
“Pelican,” by Gemma Files
“Fracture,” by Mercedes M. Yardley
“When Auntie’s Due,” by Sarah Read
“Vé’otsé’e (Warpath Woman),” by Shane Hawk
“Stone’s Blood,” by Nick Bouchard
“Shields,” by Christina Sng
“The Bone Child,” by Ryan Cole
“The Wives of Tromisle,” by Dan Coxon
“Duties Terrible and Dear,” by John Langan
“Worry Dolly,” by Nadia Bulkin
“(sub)Maternal Instincts,” by K.M. Veohongs
“720º,” by Steve Toase“Number ONE,” by Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito
“Here in the Cellar,” by R. Leigh Hennig
“She’s Untouchable,” by Renee Cronley
“Lida’s Beach,” by Stephanie Nelson
“Instruments of Bone and the Flesh Songs They Create,” by Nikki R. Leigh
“Transformative Love,” by Tehnuka
“The Withering Depths,” by Todd Powell
“Waiting for Mother,” by Brian Evenson
“Unchild,” by Jonathan Louis Duckworth
“Take Care,” by S.P. Miskowski
“Mother Trucker,” by Wailana Kalama
“The Last Sin,” by Gabino Iglesias
“Jacob’s Mother,” by Katie McIvor

The Moore House by Tony Tremblay

 

Three excommunicated nuns, Nora, Agnes, and Celeste, join a paranormal unit sanctioned by the Catholic Church, in the hopes for redemption in God's eyes. As empaths, their jobs are to verify reports of demonic possession, and when their boss, Father MacLeod, is persuaded to investigate a house in a small New Hampshire town, the three women are chosen to assess these claims. Goffstown police files detail numerous extraordinary occurrences at the Moore house, including seven gruesome, unsolved killings. For this reason, the three empaths are instructed to not enter the dwelling, but to employ their abilities while circling outside the house. Nora, Agnes, and Celeste proclaim it free of supernatural forces, but they are wrong...dead wrong.

The three women discover their presence is part of a larger plan. The Moore House is not only possessed, but it soon possesses them, forcing them to relive the sins that had resulted in their excommunications. Their belief in God and redemption dissolving, they become pawns in a demonic scheme, a means to an end, in which Father MacLeod is their only hope. But Father MacLeod has made his own deal with devil, and the devil is ready to collect.

Normally the reviews I post are of books that are recently published or are about to be published. Today I have a quick review for a book that I have been meaning to read for years.

A team of excommunicated nuns are sent to confirm or rule out a demonic presence in an old house with a dark past.

The Moore house has been the scene of multiple deaths. It stands alone and abandoned but perhaps not empty. From the opening scene, I knew this was going to be a terrifying tale. 

Religion and redemption play a huge part in the back story of this team of women and the priest who sent them.

The characters are complex and not always likable, but just like real life, they have their good and bad points.

There were a few minor things that irked me, one of which was a paragraph where a character was called by the wrong name enough times to momentarily confuse me, which pulled me out of the story. 

Overall this was a good novel and If you like religious horror this is for you. It's a clever tale of revenge not only from beyond the grave but beyond the gates of hell. Visit the Moore house for a deadly, demonic good time.

Get a copy

About the author

Guests by Kealan Patrick Burke

 After the death of the woman who raised him and the realization that the girl he loves will never love him back, young Mark Callahan decides it's time to leave the small harbor town of Miriam's Cove for good. All that remains is one last shift at The Windcrest Hotel, a seaside resort that has seen better days.

Tonight, with a ferocious winter storm bearing down on them, there are few staff and fewer guests, until a last-minute booking takes everyone by surprise. There's a small yellow tour bus bound for The Windcrest and soon the hotel will find itself under siege by something much worse than the storm.

Mark is grieving the loss of his grandmother when the decision suddenly hits him that it's time to leave town. Grandma was the only reason he stayed so long, and the woman he is in love with has no idea how he feels because she's in love with someone else. What's worse is that she and her boyfriend are his co-workers, and it's just too painful to see them together every day. With nothing to keep him, he decides that this will be his last night at work. When we first meet his boss it made me wonder how he managed not to quit sooner!

It should have been a slow night at the hotel, what with the bitter cold and the snowstorm on the way. But some last minute travelers are booked in for the night. A group of sickly-looking elderly people have chosen this night to book their stay. They've come from a nursing home but the hotel workers are told they don't need any supervision or anyone to take care of them. 

Things get creepy-immediately upon their arrival but with the snow piling up and the phone service knocked out there really is no escape and no help is coming.

This was a quick and creepy read that explores death, grief, love, and what one may or may not be willing to do for a second chance at life.  The cast of characters is small enough to get to know everyone, and they are unique and unforgettable which, makes it easy to keep track of who they are. Winter storms are one of my favorite settings for horror novels. That claustrophobic sense of being trapped with no way to get help just gives me the heebie-jeebies every time. There were also some words of wisdom about grief and mourning which really hit home with me.

5 out of 5 stars

About the author

Get a copy

Conjuring the Witch by Jessica Leonard

 

There are witches in the woods.

These are the words the reverend of the Lilin Assembly of Our Lord repeats to his parishioners each week. Steve and Nicole Warby think it’s just a metaphor, until Nicole takes a walk in those woods and comes back changed. Something came out of them with her, and the simple small-town life they’ve always known is forever altered when they discover the dark secrets buried deep and those intent on keeping them there. Fearing for his wife’s sanity, and his own comfortable status in the church, Steve is unsure if he wants to help or ignore the problems. The reverend believes there are witches in the woods, and he thinks Nicole is only the most recent.

Conjuring the Witch is a dark, haunted story about what those in power are willing to do to stay in power, and the sins we convince ourselves are forgivable.

Are there witches in the woods? Or has the reverend twisted religious dogma to his own interpretation for his own agenda? That is the question to be answered in this stunning work of horror fiction by Jessica Leonard.

Nicole Warby is searching for her niche in this world. She wants to make her husband happy and fit in with the church ladies, but she is pretty sure there must be more to life than cooking and cleaning and being submissive to her man as the reverend constantly preaches.

Her husband Steve is a sort of go-along to get along kind of guy. He wants his wife to be happy but he is also sometimes embarrassed by her behavior. 

As much as they are warned about the woods, Nicole feels something pulling her towards them. Sure they are a little dark and spooky but just maybe they have a story to tell.

Nicole is not quite the same after her venture into those woods and the congregation will never be the same either.

I loved this book! I loved Nicole and her refusal to just bow down to hypocritical oppression. The reverend gave me the creeps from the start. I could almost picture him as a smarmy sort of salesman pitching himself as speaking for God, and telling people how to run their marriage as if he had a clue about how marriage works. I can't say that it was a big surprise to find out what is really in the woods, but I didn't need it to be a shock in order to enjoy this atmospheric story. It spoke to me on so many levels.

5 out of 5 stars.

My thanks to Ghoulish Books.

About the author

Get a copy

Wily Writers Presents Tales of Foreboding Edited by ES Magill and Bill Bodden

 

Foreboding—the feeling that bad, or evil, awaits us at some point in our future, distant or near.

It’s like a pressure at the back of your brain, a whisper that it can all go terribly wrong. The sense of foreboding reminds us the bad is coming—but we don’t know exactly when.

Here are 14 tales where evil is nosing the chinks in the lives of the unsuspecting, searching for a way in and ready to wreak havoc. But these are no ordinary sufferings and miseries: cults, mythical forest creatures, elder gods, psychic powers, murder, parallel universes, monsters, death, nature gone awry, zombies, ghosts, and husbands.

In these 14 tales, things don’t bode well:

 

Nature figures out how to take a sinister upper hand in Bill Bodden’s “When to Let Go.”

“Coffin” by Alison J. McKenzie asks the question ‘can you exist without being alive?’

Jennifer Brozek explores the difficulty, and danger, of trying to understand one’s own mind in “A Test of Vigilance and Will.”

In “Jenny” by Lee Call, curiosity and love possess their own perils, but when they cross paths...

Yvonne Navarro’s “Meet Me On the Other Side” delves into an alternate world and explores love and sacrifice in the face of an impending apocalypse and libidinous beasts.

Which is worse—a natural disaster, a monster, or a husband—is the question at the heart of Allie Yohn’s “In the Very Air You Breathe.”

"Frostlings" by Chris Marrs gives us the definitive answer about family and love—and mythical creatures.

“Still Life With Shattered Glass” by Loren Rhoads exposes a morbid hobby, and where it leads.

Joan De La Haye’s “Getting Rid of Charlie” examines that father-daughter bonding time is very important—and can come in an aberrant form.

In “A Spectacle of a Man” by Weston Ochse, one man finds that better living can come from the Elder Gods, but it’s not going to be pretty.

“Purgatory” by Angel Leigh McCoy warns us how one mistake can last forever and forever and forever...

S.G Browne’s “Lower Slaughter” reveals how thin the veneer of reality is—and that making the bus on time is crucial.

E.S. Magill’s “Los Necrocorridos” proves that love can exist in the most horrific conditions, even in the zombie apocalypse.

These delightfully dark tales have something to offer every fan of horror or dark fiction. Tales run the gamut from mysterious towns, supernatural storms, otherworldly creatures, sex and drugs and rock and roll. 

Among my favorites were

Lisa Morton’s High Desert in which a woman comes to regret a visit to an abandoned cult compound in the desert, S.G Browne’s Lower Slaughter in which a vacationing couple veer off the beaten path on their last day before they head home. Coffin by Alison J. McKenzie was probably the most unique story about a young man with Cotard's syndrome and the brother who mistakenly thinks he can help him snap out of it. A children's story becomes a nightmare for a grief-stricken woman in Frostlings.

There are lots of spooky moments and of course a general sense of foreboding throughout. 

4 out of 5 stars

I received a complimentary copy.

Get a copy

Coffin Shadows, by Mark Steensland and Glen Krisch

 12 years ago Janet Martlee’s infant son died under mysterious circumstances. Consumed with grief and anger, she ran away to start again...

Yesterday, a12-year old boy with dead eyes appeared in her classroom, begging for help. But Janet doesn’t believe in ghosts...

Today, her psychiatrist tells her she must return home to confront her past and uncover the mystery of what happened...

Only some questions don’t want to be answered. And some answers hide in the shadows...

Life seems to be going pretty well for Janet, although she is struggling with her feelings about her pregnancy due to the traumatic loss of her first baby. She's in a stable relationship, has a good job, and a best friend who would do anything for her. 

Everything in her life would be perfectly rosy if not for the parts of her past she can not remember and the sudden appearance of what looks like the corpse of a 12 year old boy that is watching and stalking her. 

Her therapist tells her she must return home, to her parents from whom she has been estranged for years, in order to seek out the truth about what happened to her baby. The therapist believes that confronting her past will rid her of these visions of a dead child.

This was a fast-paced, chilling read in which some secrets are horrifying but uncovering them can be deadly. The suspense kept my blood pounding but the shocking climax nearly stopped my heart! There is an old expression "You can't go home again" but maybe what is really meant by that is don't go back if you were lucky enough to escape the first time.

5 out of 5 stars

My thanks to Cemetery Dance

Available for pre-order

More books by Glen Kirsch

More books by Mark Steensland

MIDNIGHT UNDER THE BIG TOP edited by Brian James Freeman

 Midnight Under the Big Top: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Magic

edited by Brian James Freeman

Cover artwork by Ben Baldwin
Interior Illustrations by Glenn Chadbourne

About the Book:
Venture inside Midnight Under the Big Top, where your wide eyes and pounding heart will discover: 

• the world's grandest tales of murder, madness, and magic set in and around the circus by renowned storytellers such as Stephen King, Joe Hill, Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, Neil Gaiman, Kelley Armstrong, Robert McCammon, Tananarive Due, Lisa Morton, Heather Graham, Richard Chizmar, Billy Chizmar, Amanda C. Davis, Nayad Monroe, Jeff Strand, Amanda Downum, Robert Brouhard, and Dominick Cancilla!

• the World's First-Ever Poetry Intermission featuring Norman Prentiss, G.O. Clark, Marge Simon, Bruce Boston, Robert Payne Cabeen, David E. Cowen, Alessandro Manzetti, Christina Sng, Stephanie M. Wytovich, K.A. Opperman, Ashley Dioses, and Terri Adamczyk!

• and for the grand finale, Josh Malerman, author of the New York Times bestseller Bird Box, will introduce you to Dandelion Andrews, a very unusual man who hasn't seen daylight in three months because he's digging a hole destined to become a most unusual carnival house of horrors!

These death-defying tales aren't for the faint of heart, but they are perfect for the long lost child deep inside of you who instinctively understands you should never trust a circus clown.

Welcome to the dark side of various carnivals and traveling circuses.

 Midnight Under The Big Top is a feast for the senses, featuring gorgeous artwork, dark poetry,  grim stories, and one novella. 

Some of the stories were familiar to me. I'm not sure if I have read them elsewhere but I did see Joe Hill's Twittering From The Circus of The Dead on tv when it was made into one of my favorite episodes of Creepshow. The classic story The Black Ferris by Ray Bradbury is included which was later turned into Something Wicked This Way Comes, and also an episode of the tv series Ray Bradbury Theater. 

Excited kids blow off their last day of school when the carnival comes to town in The Girl In The Carnival Gown by Kelly Armstrong There's something more wild and twisty than a roller coaster going on in this one.

Josh Malerman's novella Dandy is a dark and claustrophobic tale of a girl who wishes she had not gone into the fun house alone. It had me nearly hyperventilating.

All this and more awaits you at Midnight Under The Big Top.

Grab your tickets and get in line 

4 out of 5 stars

My thanks to Cemetery Dance