Dark & Twisted Books
1The End of the World As We Know It: New Tales of Stephen King’s The Standedited by Christopher Golden and Brian KeeneHome Base: Massachusetts and Pennsylvania
Author’s Take: “The Stand is my desert island book. Readers don’t simply turn the pages – we inhabit the story. And I knew if I felt that way, a lot of other writers must as well.” –Christopher Golden
Favourite Line: “He’d heard it labelled all sorts of things: tube neck, superflu, choking sickness, Captain Trips. They could call it whatever they liked, but it all amounted to the same thing. The end.” –from Lenora, a short story by Jonathan Janz
Review: Since its first publication in 1978, The Stand has been widely regarded as one of Stephen King’s finest books. Lauded by critics and adored by readers, it has sold millions of copies and been adapted for television twice. The Stand (The Complete and Uncut Edition) (1990) is also King’s longest novel to date.
That’s not to say that fans don’t want more of The Stand’s post-apocalyptic landscape – where a weaponized virus, known as the superflu or Captain Trips, escapes from a military facility and, in short order, infects and kills 99 percent of the population. Enter The End of the World As We Know It, a new anthology edited by Christopher Golden and Brian Keene, which calls on three dozen of today’s finest genre writers to join the party. The resulting short story collection is a glorious labour of love, with gifted writers – including Caroline Kepnes, S. A. Cosby and Nat Cassidy – paying homage to King’s vision while putting their own small stamp on it. One doesn’t even need to have read the original to thoroughly enjoy the collection. Although, I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t want to read The Stand – or re-read it before reading The End of the World As We Know It. –Robert Wiersema
Home Base: Massachusetts and Pennsylvania
Author’s Take: “The Stand is my desert island book. Readers don’t simply turn the pages – we inhabit the story. And I knew if I felt that way, a lot of other writers must as well.” –Christopher Golden
Favourite Line: “He’d heard it labelled all sorts of things: tube neck, superflu, choking sickness, Captain Trips. They could call it whatever they liked, but it all amounted to the same thing. The end.” –from Lenora, a short story by Jonathan Janz
Review: Since its first publication in 1978, The Stand has been widely regarded as one of Stephen King’s finest books. Lauded by critics and adored by readers, it has sold millions of copies and been adapted for television twice. The Stand (The Complete and Uncut Edition) (1990) is also King’s longest novel to date.
That’s not to say that fans don’t want more of The Stand’s post-apocalyptic landscape – where a weaponized virus, known as the superflu or Captain Trips, escapes from a military facility and, in short order, infects and kills 99 percent of the population. Enter The End of the World As We Know It, a new anthology edited by Christopher Golden and Brian Keene, which calls on three dozen of today’s finest genre writers to join the party. The resulting short story collection is a glorious labour of love, with gifted writers – including Caroline Kepnes, S. A. Cosby and Nat Cassidy – paying homage to King’s vision while putting their own small stamp on it. One doesn’t even need to have read the original to thoroughly enjoy the collection. Although, I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t want to read The Stand – or re-read it before reading The End of the World As We Know It. –Robert Wiersema
2Murderlandby Caroline FraserHome Base: New Mexico
Author’s Take: “I wish I could tell you that I had a grand scheme, but the project evolved more organically, not to say chaotically.”
Favourite Line: “Many horrors play a role in warping these tortured souls, but what happens if we add a light dusting from the periodic table on top of all that trauma? How about a little lead in your tea?”
Review: Murderland, the stunning new non-fiction title from Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Caroline Fraser (Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder), began with a question often asked by residents of the Pacific Northwest: “Why are there so many serial killers here?”
Fraser posits, it might be the environment.
No, not the endless days of winter rain, the dark shadows, the constant feeling of gloom and damp (though, to be fair, those may be a factor). Rather, over the course of Murderland, the author traces connections between the rise of serial killers in the second half of the 20th century with the history of the Asarco copper smelter in Tacoma, Washington. While the smelter was opened in the late-19th century, its production spiked in the years following the Second World War. The plume from its smokestack – which carried lead, arsenic and other heavy metals – enveloped more than a thousand square miles. When the plant closed in 1985, the site was an environmental disaster zone and is now a Superfund clean-up area. Such heavy metal exposure has been linked to increased aggression and impulsivity in children, coupled with changes to personality and behavioural traits. Killers like Ted Bundy and Gary Ridgway grew up under that Tacoma plume.
The book is a compelling, enraging and, at times, a poetic examination not just of crime rates and lead counts, but of Fraser’s own coming of age in the region. She dives into the menacing quirks of geography, the cost of unexamined progress – including the Mercer Island Floating Bridge, which seemed designed to kill – and the clusters of violence found in the shadows of other Asarco smelters (like the one near Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, where more than a thousand unsolved murders of young women occurred in the 1990s). Murderland offers up non-stop, surprising facts and theories and will haunt you long after reading. –RW
Home Base: New Mexico
Author’s Take: “I wish I could tell you that I had a grand scheme, but the project evolved more organically, not to say chaotically.”
Favourite Line: “Many horrors play a role in warping these tortured souls, but what happens if we add a light dusting from the periodic table on top of all that trauma? How about a little lead in your tea?”
Review: Murderland, the stunning new non-fiction title from Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Caroline Fraser (Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder), began with a question often asked by residents of the Pacific Northwest: “Why are there so many serial killers here?”
Fraser posits, it might be the environment.
No, not the endless days of winter rain, the dark shadows, the constant feeling of gloom and damp (though, to be fair, those may be a factor). Rather, over the course of Murderland, the author traces connections between the rise of serial killers in the second half of the 20th century with the history of the Asarco copper smelter in Tacoma, Washington. While the smelter was opened in the late-19th century, its production spiked in the years following the Second World War. The plume from its smokestack – which carried lead, arsenic and other heavy metals – enveloped more than a thousand square miles. When the plant closed in 1985, the site was an environmental disaster zone and is now a Superfund clean-up area. Such heavy metal exposure has been linked to increased aggression and impulsivity in children, coupled with changes to personality and behavioural traits. Killers like Ted Bundy and Gary Ridgway grew up under that Tacoma plume.
The book is a compelling, enraging and, at times, a poetic examination not just of crime rates and lead counts, but of Fraser’s own coming of age in the region. She dives into the menacing quirks of geography, the cost of unexamined progress – including the Mercer Island Floating Bridge, which seemed designed to kill – and the clusters of violence found in the shadows of other Asarco smelters (like the one near Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, where more than a thousand unsolved murders of young women occurred in the 1990s). Murderland offers up non-stop, surprising facts and theories and will haunt you long after reading. –RW
3Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soilby V. E. SchwabHome Base: Edinburgh, Scotland
Author’s Take: “I wanted to write a love letter to Anne Rice.”
Favourite Line: “Careful. In nature, beauty is a warning. The pretty ones are often poisonous.”
Review: Like many readers, I first became aware of V. E. Schwab with her 2020 novel The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue (which was a long-term New York Times bestseller), and proceeded to familiarize myself with her voluminous previous work. To say that fans are excited about her new novel, Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, is an understatement. And they will not be disappointed.
With Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil – a multicultural lesbian historical vampire epic – Schwab seems to have created her own genre. The novel follows three female characters over 500 years of history: starting in Spain in the early 1500s; then London in the early-19th century; and, finally, at Harvard in Boston in 2019. Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil features powerful storytelling, moving between its characters and through time with such ease that it feels almost casual and unplanned, until, partway through, an unseen narrative trap snaps shut, propelling the second half of the book in a headlong rush. It’s a beautiful, dizzying, sensual and brutal read. And while 500-plus pages might seem a bit daunting, I would have happily read a few hundred more. I didn’t want it to end. –RW
Home Base: Edinburgh, Scotland
Author’s Take: “I wanted to write a love letter to Anne Rice.”
Favourite Line: “Careful. In nature, beauty is a warning. The pretty ones are often poisonous.”
Review: Like many readers, I first became aware of V. E. Schwab with her 2020 novel The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue (which was a long-term New York Times bestseller), and proceeded to familiarize myself with her voluminous previous work. To say that fans are excited about her new novel, Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, is an understatement. And they will not be disappointed.
With Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil – a multicultural lesbian historical vampire epic – Schwab seems to have created her own genre. The novel follows three female characters over 500 years of history: starting in Spain in the early 1500s; then London in the early-19th century; and, finally, at Harvard in Boston in 2019. Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil features powerful storytelling, moving between its characters and through time with such ease that it feels almost casual and unplanned, until, partway through, an unseen narrative trap snaps shut, propelling the second half of the book in a headlong rush. It’s a beautiful, dizzying, sensual and brutal read. And while 500-plus pages might seem a bit daunting, I would have happily read a few hundred more. I didn’t want it to end. –RW
4The Bewitchingby Silvia Moreno-GarciaHome Base: Vancouver
Author’s Take: “I wanted it to really be about that awful feeling of dread and of danger. This being something that is authentically going to keep you up at night.”
Favourite Line: “But a bewitchment, that is a different tale. It is a campaign, a siege. Thus, other measures must be taken. How do you bewitch someone?”
Review: Since the publication of Mexican Gothic in June 2020, a new novel by Vancouver writer Silvia Moreno-Garcia has become as much a part of my summer as baseball is for others. And since each novel from Moreno-Garcia is so powerful and so distinct – she shifts effortlessly between horror, noir, the gothic, pastiche and countless other genres – I remember exactly where I was when I read each book.
For the record, I read the latest in a small trailer in rural Newfoundland, during a brutal heat wave. I may have felt like I was dying, but I hung on every word.
How can you resist a novel that begins with the line, “Back then, when I was a young woman, there were still witches”? This is how Nana Alba starts her bedtime stories for her granddaughter, Minerva. And while it will come as absolutely no surprise that The Bewitching concerns witches and curses, the author builds a world, interlocking Nana and Minerva’s lives, that offers so much more.
The novel is an engrossing blend of historical fiction, horror and dark academia – Minerva attends college in New England – and if you’re a fan of the secrets held in old manuscripts, of folkloric stories coming to life or of compelling storytelling in general, you’ll feel at home here. For the record, I think this may be my favourite of Moreno-Garcia’s novels. Long after the heat wave had passed, the book still burned bright. –RW
Home Base: Vancouver
Author’s Take: “I wanted it to really be about that awful feeling of dread and of danger. This being something that is authentically going to keep you up at night.”
Favourite Line: “But a bewitchment, that is a different tale. It is a campaign, a siege. Thus, other measures must be taken. How do you bewitch someone?”
Review: Since the publication of Mexican Gothic in June 2020, a new novel by Vancouver writer Silvia Moreno-Garcia has become as much a part of my summer as baseball is for others. And since each novel from Moreno-Garcia is so powerful and so distinct – she shifts effortlessly between horror, noir, the gothic, pastiche and countless other genres – I remember exactly where I was when I read each book.
For the record, I read the latest in a small trailer in rural Newfoundland, during a brutal heat wave. I may have felt like I was dying, but I hung on every word.
How can you resist a novel that begins with the line, “Back then, when I was a young woman, there were still witches”? This is how Nana Alba starts her bedtime stories for her granddaughter, Minerva. And while it will come as absolutely no surprise that The Bewitching concerns witches and curses, the author builds a world, interlocking Nana and Minerva’s lives, that offers so much more.
The novel is an engrossing blend of historical fiction, horror and dark academia – Minerva attends college in New England – and if you’re a fan of the secrets held in old manuscripts, of folkloric stories coming to life or of compelling storytelling in general, you’ll feel at home here. For the record, I think this may be my favourite of Moreno-Garcia’s novels. Long after the heat wave had passed, the book still burned bright. –RW
5Tart: Misadventures of an Anonymous Chefby Slutty CheffAuthor’s Home Base: London, England
Author’s take: “I got into food late, and I didn’t want to read about food. I wanted to make food. It feels like having a wank instead of having sex, you know what I mean?”
Favourite lines: “I have been in the kitchen for two seconds and I have already heard a swear word. This is fine: I come from a family that is fluent in fuck.”
Review: A cynic might suggest that the libidinous author behind Tart – the latest in the seemingly boundless kitchen confidential genre, jump-started by Anthony Bourdain – opted to remain anonymous as a marketing ploy to make the book seem steamier than it is. After all, Ms. Cheff does not reveal lover surnames or workplace restaurant names. Plus, readers of almost any other title in the category, from Laurie Woolever’s excruciatingly candid Care and Feeding, to Stephanie Danler’s Sweetbitter, have previously encountered kitchens teeming with sex, drugs and sundry improprieties. So, perhaps it’s that Cheff doesn’t want to invite rancour and ridicule as she moves up in the swish London dining scene she joined after her dreaded nine-to-five office job made her want to flay herself instead of fish. Indeed, the book’s best passages aren’t the ones detailing late-night, coke-fueled romps with fellow hospitality workers – though there are plenty of those, she’s not nicknamed Slutty for nothing – but rather, Cheff’s vivid descriptions of acing mercilessly busy dinner services and fighting exhaustion on double shifts to create something superb for her guests. Play-by-plays don’t come pithier. — Kim Hughes
Author’s Home Base: London, England
Author’s take: “I got into food late, and I didn’t want to read about food. I wanted to make food. It feels like having a wank instead of having sex, you know what I mean?”
Favourite lines: “I have been in the kitchen for two seconds and I have already heard a swear word. This is fine: I come from a family that is fluent in fuck.”
Review: A cynic might suggest that the libidinous author behind Tart – the latest in the seemingly boundless kitchen confidential genre, jump-started by Anthony Bourdain – opted to remain anonymous as a marketing ploy to make the book seem steamier than it is. After all, Ms. Cheff does not reveal lover surnames or workplace restaurant names. Plus, readers of almost any other title in the category, from Laurie Woolever’s excruciatingly candid Care and Feeding, to Stephanie Danler’s Sweetbitter, have previously encountered kitchens teeming with sex, drugs and sundry improprieties. So, perhaps it’s that Cheff doesn’t want to invite rancour and ridicule as she moves up in the swish London dining scene she joined after her dreaded nine-to-five office job made her want to flay herself instead of fish. Indeed, the book’s best passages aren’t the ones detailing late-night, coke-fueled romps with fellow hospitality workers – though there are plenty of those, she’s not nicknamed Slutty for nothing – but rather, Cheff’s vivid descriptions of acing mercilessly busy dinner services and fighting exhaustion on double shifts to create something superb for her guests. Play-by-plays don’t come pithier. — Kim Hughes
