...the Soul of Wit - Latest Short Reviews

Further reads from the past month; a little poetry, a little Gothic and lots of food for thought.

Kanley Stubrick by Mike Kleine

"The sky was the color of meat."

What drew me to this book was clearly the striking title and cover as well as a recommendation from my friend Janie. I didn't know what more to expect. In the end, it felt like reading a dream diary in unrhymed verse form, maybe a sort of screenplay, enriched, on a closer look, with caligramms and word plays, featuring archetypal characters.

A man travels all around the globe to find his girlfriend who went missing after losing one of her shoes. He travels and does oddly specific things to find her, and ends up in places.
Very enthralling read in its own, off way.

The Exorcist's House by Nick Roberts

“You demonic piece of shit!”

A solid horror story about a family moving into a farm house, surprisingly finding out that it used to belong to an exorcist and starting to experience scary things. Really scary things.

There was always some part of this book that didn't speak to me, above all, I found the characters not really appealing. On the other hand, there were some genuinely frightening moments here and it's well-written too.

I listened to the audiobook and the performance of narrator Spencer Dillehay was amazing, he seriously gave me the chills while impersonating a certain evil character.

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher

When T. Kingfisher made her entrance into the wonderful realm of adult horror with The Twisted Ones a couple of years ago and I picked it up, my first reaction of great joy and eagerness turned into frustration and weariness with every turning page. You see, the main character in that one is a joker, every second sentence coming out of her mouth is her cracking a joke about the (sometimes really nicely terrifying) situations she finds herself in, spoiling all tension and suspense. And after a few dozens of pages that character really started tiring me, became too much to bear and sheer insufferable - I like my horror serious. So an otherwise perfectly good book was ruined for me and having decided not to read any more of her books, I contemplated Kingfisher's unstoppable rise in above mentioned realm with incredulity.

Fast forward to today, and here I am writing a review for What Moves the Dead by the same author, and even though it's not like I have nothing but praise and glory to express, I ended up really really liking this book. A modern re-telling of Poe's classic short story “The Fall of the House Usher”, which I yet have to read, What Moves the Dead offers a really unsettling atmosphere, creepy hares (the second book I've read this year that features cursed bunnies), a very gothic house and environment, a super compelling antagonist and finally a main character who knows when to shut up.
What more could I ask for?

Full Immersion by Gemma Amor

This review is originally written for and will appear in the Otherland newsletter.

Every now and then comes a book I can’t recommend with a good conscience. That this book is, of all things, a much-praised work with stellar ratings all over the internet, a book about an important issue, postpartum depression and the devastating effects it can have, is unfortunate and a shame for me, but it is as it is.

Please be aware that this book treats all kinds of triggering subjects.

A woman, Magpie, applies to a new, revolutionary kind of therapy with a touching letter about how she feels, how she leads her life with the crushing weight of ever-present suicidal thoughts. The therapy consists of virtual reality sessions in which Magpie will go through various life situations with her therapist and hopefully find the root of these thoughts and then treat them accordingly. To this purpose she is strapped to a floating VR device (I imagined the device much like the one in the film The Cell (2000) by Tarsem Singh which has a similar concept of treating the psyche of a patient through VR technology), next to a room where technic staff monitor her progress. The book actually consists of short chapters alternating between Magpie’s experience and tech-guy Evan and his boss commenting in the next room. As it is, not everything goes according to plan and while Magpie discovers her powers in this strange environment where she is being followed by a stick figure, questions are raised about the intentions and methods of the psychiatrist.

 OK, let’s see. The premise, the intention and to a certain point the setup are in fact dapper and even exciting. Within the first quarter, though, the story starts to clog and meander, so much in fact, one might think that all this would have been a much better short story or novella, short and succinct. But not even a shorter form could even out some of the more problematic sides of the book which emerge later in the story and are impossible to cite here without spoiling the whole thing, as it is its punch line, in a way. Let me just say that throughout the story Magpie becomes more and more submissive to a certain intrusion and accepts things done to her to face her trauma that are in fact outrageous to the point that I thought the whole book is actually a parody, a satire, but it is, ultimately, meant seriously and that disappointed me.

There is another suggestion in this book which leaves a bad taste – I firmly believe that professional therapy can (it does not have to, but it can) help people with their mental issues. Certainly, help from family and friends plays an important role in the mental well-being of a person, but no self-help book written by lay people, no story suggesting the treatment of trauma by people who have not been professionally trained to do so, can do what a professional third person can. You don’t let your husband or mother treat your fatty liver, so why should they be able to treat mental issues? Although Full Immersion raises questions in this sense, I’m not sure I like what it ultimately suggests.

Well, all in all this was a bummer for me and indeed, I do feel bad because it is a deeply personal book written from the heart. I still think it might appeal to you if you’re interested in said issues of postpartum, motherhood or therapy approaches. Maybe I am majorly missing something? Read it, not because I recommend it, but read it and convince me otherwise, if you will.

White Horse by Erika T. Wurth

After being given a bracelet that supposedly can heal, American Indian metalhead Kari starts seeing the ghost of her dead mother and researching what happened to the woman who died after having left her daughter and because of whom her father became sick. Kari hates her but she also finds that she is much like her in various ways. Maybe she will find healing after all?

Book takes some time to come into its own, maybe a little too much time. After a little over the half way mark all story lines and strings start coming together and once they do it's hard to put down. We had a Shine&Shadow discussion on this book and when I told that the interesting point in a book is for me always the monster, a book friend suggested the real monster is in the first half, the part that for me seemed a little dragging, the part that addresses real-life horrors of the life of indigenous women in the US. I can only salute such a statement and maybe fret a little upon the fact that I didn't recognize it here. A very rewarding read.