Being a sugar baby isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. After a failed art career and a failed relationship, Baby has lost her way. She’s adrift in the post-Y2K, pre-Facebook world and stuck in her Florida hometown, selling stolen goods online and working as a sugar baby. Even though she’s hustling hard, there’s still never enough money to pay the bills, and her long-suffering roommate is ready to put her out on the streets. One night after a bad date with her sugar daddy, Baby is assaulted by a mysterious woman in a parking lot. The attack leaves her disoriented and exhausted, so Baby takes to her bed to lie there and rot, like, for real. With every passing day, Baby’s looks and health decline in strange and horrific ways. Soon, it becomes apparent that the strange woman who assaulted her had something to do with her declining state. Baby needs to find her attacker, reclaim her life and her beauty, and get her shit together once and for all. But at what cost?
Bed Rot Baby is a pink horror meditation of self-discovery through self-destruction, and the real cost of self-image, self-esteem, and beauty.
GRADE: A
REVIEW:
Bed Rot Baby is a strange, stylish little gem, eerie, satirical, and surprisingly tender. Wendy Dalrymple offers a fresh and unsettling take on themes of immortality and beauty, exploring what happens when the desire to stay young and untouched by time turns obsessive.
Rather than leaning on the usual tropes, Dalrymple injects the story with biting social commentary and dark humor. The idea of eternal youth is twisted into something claustrophobic, even grotesque, and the result is a story that feels both modern and mythic. It’s a clever reflection on sugar baby culture, the commodification of beauty, and the way society rewards women for staying small, still, and pretty forever.
The writing is sharp and compact, the tone shifting between dreamy and disturbing in all the right ways. It’s not a long read, but it lingers.
If you’re into offbeat horror with something to say, especially about the cost of being “perfect” forever Bed Rot Baby is well worth your time.
*Thank you so much to NetGalley & Quill & Crow Publishing House for a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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She was suddenly nothing more than a broken tree branch set adrift in whitewater rapids, a mere pebble tossed from the top of a waterfall.
PLOT SUMMARY:
Evil waits for the unsuspecting in the small town of Henley’s Edge, Connecticut after a recent string of unexplained disappearances.
Lives are interwoven and transformed forever when pacts are drawn, deals are made, and when hatred is left unrestrained.
Some will succumb to the darkness that lurks in the cellar of Mr. Heart Crowley’s home, others will resist, and some will face a truly remarkable being—creator of tides, vessel of infinity, eater of darkness.
GRADE: B
REVIEW:
I’ve read all of Eric LaRocca’s novellas and short story collections so far, and his debut novel doesn’t disappoint. It delivers on all the things we’ve come to love about his stories: lush, baroque writing, extreme gore and violence, and characters that you can’t help but root for. This novel opens with a banger – extreme violence and blood from the get-go and kind of sets the dark mood that hovers over the entirety of this novel. We follow two characters, Ghost – a recent widow, and Malik a Muslim gay policeman. Their destinies with intertwine in ways that they can’t imagine. Meanwhile, their disappearances are occurring in this small New England town, and violence prevails in ways that one would hope to never have to encounter. There were a lot of things that I enjoyed about this novel but it feels like not enough time was dedicated to those things that I found compelling (the mystery of the disappearances, what exactly happened between the Prologue and now the present, and who was the little ghost haunting Ghost?). Also, I wasn’t sure if character names were supposed to be homages to current horror authors (I couldn’t help but feel this way when Gemma, Hailey, and Piper were introduced and suddenly I made the connection to Gemma Amor and Hailey Piper. Was this intentional? Was it a coincidence? Maybe both? Who knows?). But my biggest gripe is the ending (yes, I do like that there was a “happy ending” of sorts) however, it felt kind of rushed and the proverbial “bad guy” was easily disposed of. I guess I was hoping for a lengthier and bloodier battle, but most of the horrific acts were actually committed by a human rather than a paranormal entity (and maybe there’s a lesson in that that humans are more monstrous than actual monsters?). What I will say, is that I did read this novel rather quickly, so I was invested in the story very much. Maybe because this book felt more like cosmic horror (which isn’t a sub-genre I generally like much) I didn’t enjoy the later portions of this novel as opposed to the first 75% of it. But if you do enjoy cosmic horror, then I can see you really liking this one as it does explore some interesting themes about creators, creations, and spirituality.
I recommend this to readers who love dual POV done well, small-town horror, cosmic horror, and novels that aren’t overwhelmingly long.
*Thank you so much to Clash Books and the author for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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Here’s to the lengths one might go to for everything.
With dark fiction from J.A.W. McCarthy, Avra Margariti, Marisca Pichette, Stephanie Ellis, Christina Wilder, Donna Lynch, Katie Young, Scott J. Moses, Angela Sylvaine, tom reed, Cheri Kamei, Shane Douglas Keene, J.V. Gachs, Tim McGregor, Emma E. Murray, Nick Younker, Jennifer Crow, Joanna Koch, Lex Vranick, Laurel Hightower, Eric Raglin, Eric LaRocca, Daniel Barnett, Bob Johnson, Simone le Roux, Hailey Piper, Bryson Richard, Jena Brown, and Christi Nogle.
Grade: A
Review:
This anthology has some really excellent stories that explore the theme of what are the lengths you’d go to for something you really want? Of course with horror, the lengths are very extreme and sometimes very gory. Here are some of my fave stories from this collection (in no particular order):
“Mos Teutonis” by Bryson Richard: A beautiful tale of lust and lunacy, so dark and seductive.
“The Thread That Dreams Are Made Of: by Hailey Piper: I’m a total whore for fairtytales and fairytale retellings so I’m so here for a Rumpelstiltskin and Sleeping Beauty mashup.
“Silver Dollar Eye” by Laurel Hightower: This story pretty much sums up all the reasons why I’ve never meddled with the afterlife, some things are best left unknown.
“Ella Minnow” by Nick Younker: This story is the brutal tale of the lengths a father will go to in order to find out what happened to his missing daughter. The ending blew me away.
“Blood is Thicker,” by Angela Sylvaine: I’ve had the pleasure of having this author in two of my own anthologies, so I was excited to read a new story from her. I loved this tale of two twin sisters who will go to extreme lengths to succeed as painters.
“The Witch of Flora Pass,” by Scott J. Moses: This was one very creepy and dark story that now left me wary of rivers.
“With Animals,” by J.A.W. McCarthy: This story truly explored the extreme lengths someone would go to for a friend. Very gut-wrenching.
“Moira and Ellie,” by Marisca Pichette: In this story, almost every child has an imaginary friend for a limited amount of time and when you find out how and why these imaginary friends exist, it’s very chilling.
There are many more stories in this anthology that I thoroughly enjoyed, and those above are only a couple that stuck with me long after reading them. It’s a very well put together anthology and I truly recommend it for anyone whose a fan of horror and especially of indie horror.
*Thank you so much to the author for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
Short Q & A with Author
What made you select the particular theme you chose for the anthology?
I remember finishing Laurel Hightower’s CROSSROADS, and thinking, “How has no one done an anthology around this topic before?” When I got serious about the idea a couple months later, I already knew I wanted Laurel to introduce What One Wouldn’t Do.
A lot of the short stories selected deal with grief – same as your personal short story collection Hunger Pangs – why do you lean towards grief horror more than other subgenres?
You know, that’s a good question. Why do any of us write what we do? I think it’s just in us and that’s that. That said, I’ve always graduated toward the sadder things in life, and think that they, along with bittersweet endings, can shed the most light and hope on the things we’re afraid of or have yet to face.
Which horror authors have got you really excited about their work right now? Any cool books you’ve read this year that you may want to recommend?
Such a tough question, but here goes. A few authors I think deserve more readership are Eric Raglin, J.A.W McCarthy, Joanna Koch, and Daniel Barnett. They’re all astounding to me, and I highly recommend Raglin’s Nightmare Yearnings, McCarthy’s Sometimes We’re Cruel, Koch’s The Wingspan of Severed Hands, and Barnett’s Nightmareland Chronicles.
What are the pros and cons of being an editor for an anthology?
Pros: Reading tons of great submissions, discovering so many writers I really dig, having complete control of the project, and sending acceptances. And honestly, you learn so much about the submission process when you curate an anthology. Great stories are rejected all the time because they just don’t fit with the flow which forms as you read through the slush, or for example, say two stories have similar themes, monsters, and tone. To have both would be redundant, so one has to go, even if it’s amazing. It taught me a lot about rejections with my own work and that there are far more reasons a story gets rejected than it’s quality. Cons: Sending rejections is the worst. Period. Also, wading through the subs that didn’t bother to follow the guidelines. Quick tip: from my experience on this and the 423 submissions I got for WOWD, those who followed the guidelines we’re already ahead of the 30% that did not. That’s a pretty huge percentage when you think about it, yeah? Another con was that in me self-funding this project in its entirety, I didn’t have the resources to buy all the stories I would’ve liked. The spirit was willing, but the wallet was weak.
Are you currently working on any new projects?
I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus from writing these last months, but have stories publishing this year in various venues and more on submission. I’m thinking I’ll either keep adding to my sophomore collection or toss around this idea for a novella I’ve been sitting on. Thanks for having me, Azzurra. As per usual, you rule.
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The Inkblotters 