Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia 
Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Del Rey (August 2021)
288 pages; hardcover $14; paperback $20.48; e-book $13.99
Reviewed by Haley Newlin
They were both angry at the world, that was why this was happening. It was a kiss of scorpions, both heavy with poison.
Once again, Silvia Moreno-Garcia exhibits the versatility of her eloquent storytelling in her noir/pulp fiction novel Velvet Was the Night.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews, The Comic VaultLeave a comment on Review: The Book of Maggor Thoom by James Turner 
The Book of Maggor Thoom by James Turner
SLG Publishing (September 2021)
164 pages; $14.95 paperback
Reviewed by Joshua Gage
Beware, Mortal! You hold the forbidden book of Maggor Thoom, a text from beyond sanity! Read further and your puny ape-brain will boil inside your skull and your eyeballs melt into a steaming ooze. For I am a being of impossible thoughts, who dwells on the surface of Azathoth, the living black hole, the cosmic chaos!
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: Cunning Folk by Adam L.G. Nevill I immediately knew Adam Nevill’s writing style, and storytelling was for me within the first few chapters of Cunning Folk.
Nevill opens with a horrific scene of a man which readers can only guess spells misfortune for the protagonist, Tom, and his family (wife Fiona and daughter Gracey).
Nevill then takes us to present day, where Tom‘s family arrives at their new home in rural Southwest England. The property is a massive but ruinous-looking house, one in which the tragic history and condition made affordable.
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: The Queen of the Cicadas by V. Castro 
The Queen of the Cicadas by V. Castro
Flame Tree Press (June 22nd, 2021)
224 pages; $14.95 paperback; $6.99 e-book
Reviewed by Sadie “Mother Horror” Hartmann
There are so many important themes to unpack in V. Castro’s The Queen of the Cicadas, that I almost don’t know where to start. First, I’ll entice you with some plot details. There is a dual narrative which involves a present-day wedding ceremony at a farmhouse and a story from the past that takes place at the same location.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: Seth’s Christmas Ghost Stories (2021 Set) 
Seth’s Christmas Ghost Stories (2021 Set)
Biblioasis (October 2021)
$9.50 each paperback; $25 set of three
Reviewed by Blu Gilliand
Reading a ghost story on Christmas Eve was once as much a part of traditional Christmas celebrations as turkey, eggnog, and Santa Claus.
I wish that had been the case with my family growing up. Don’t get me wrong, I love our traditions, but mixing in a ghost story would have been perfection. But I have to be honest — even as a young card-carrying, Fangoria-buying, Stephen King-reading horror fan, the idea of reading a ghost story at Christmas never occurred to me. If it had, I have no doubt I would have gravitated to these “Seth’s Christmas Ghost Stories” sets from Biblioasis.
Biblioasis, a literary press based in Windsor, Ontario, has been releasing these editions for a few years now. They’re a smaller (4×6) size, so they’re perfect for stockings, and each year they focus on a different set of Christmas ghost stories. Past entries include such tales as “The Signalman” by Charles Dickens, “The Apple Tree” by Daphne du Maurier, and “The Story of a Disappearance and An Appearance” by M.R. James.
The 2021 set includes the following stories, each presented as its own paperback book:
As good as the story selection is, the design of each book is the star. Seth’s evocative covers and black-and-white interior illustrations provide the perfect accompaniment to the stories. His clean style elicits a ton of atmosphere without being hyper-detailed. In his work I see the brilliant use of shadow a la’ Mike Mignola, combined with the dark whimsey of Tim Burton.
Come Christmas Eve, you might find me dimming the lights and gathering the family to listen (and look at) one of these tiny terrors. Come the day after Christmas, I’ll be hitting the Biblioasis website to start building out my collection. Highly recommended for the horror lovers looking for something special in this post-Halloween season.
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: The Secret Skin by Wendy Wagner 
The Secret Skin by Wendy Wagner
Neon Hemlock (October 2021)
102 pages; $11.57 paperback
Reviewed by Sadie “Mother Horror” Hartmann
“Last night I dreamed of Storm Break, dear Lillian, for the first time since we escaped that salt place.”
June Vogel returns to her family’s estate on the Oregon Coast after being away for six years. In the tradition of all atmospheric, Gothic storytelling, Wendy Wagner sets the stage perfectly in the prologue, hinting at family tragedy and secrets that will be revealed in time. But with only one hundred pages used to tell the tale, readers don’t have to wait long.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: Body Shocks edited by Ellen Datlow 
Body Shocks edited by Ellen Datlow
Tachyon Publications (October 2021)
384 pages; paperback $15.95; e-book $6.49
Reviewed by Janelle Janson
Body horror is a relatively new horror sub-genre to me, but it has quickly become one of my favorites. That being said, it needs to be done right, so when I heard about a short story collection called Body Shocks: Extreme Tales of Body Horror edited by the great Ellen Datlow, the queen herself, I knew I had to read it.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories Reviews, The Comic VaultLeave a comment on Review: WereWoofs by Joelle Sellner and Val Wise
WereWoofs by Joelle Sellner and Val Wise
New Paradigm Studios (December 21, 2021)
160 pages; $7.99 paperback
Reviewed by Joshua Gage
Joelle began her writing career as an advertising copywriter, creating award-winning campaigns for brands like In-N-Out Burger, Kleenex and Lexus. Since making the jump to screenwriting, she’s written several romantic comedy and family telefilms including Hallmark Channel’s Paris, Wine and Romance. Joelle has also written comics for Blizzard, DC, Marvel, and Dynamite Entertainment. Graphic novels for IDW/Lion Forge Comics include reboots of the NBC classic shows Saved By the Bell and Punky Brewster. Her newest graphic novel is the YA horror book, WereWoofs.
The small, Midwest town of Howlett was established, long ago, by werewolves. When ordinary humans came in, they drove the werewolves underground, but all that’s going to change when the pack alpha disappears and his nephew takes over. Working at the Paw Paw dog food mill gives him certain advantages, including corrupting the donated food at local animal shelters with the virus that creates werewolves.
In the meantime, the baby of the pack, Mara, is struggling in high school. She’s been branded the freak of the class and has no friends. When a pack of dogs from the shelter break free and attack her classmates, however, she instantly gains some friends, especially when they begin shifting into dogs themselves. Her knowledge of werewolves and werewolf training helps them bond, but that still doesn’t solve the mystery of the missing alpha nor what caused the dogs in the shelter to go crazy.
WereWoofs is a great YA graphic novel. There are horror elements, to be sure, but nothing too scary that a middle-grade or YA reader will be completely put off. Furthermore, the scenes of bullying and teasing in high school, as well as the problems with teachers, grades, crushes, etc. will connect well with a YA audience, as well as many adult readers. Val Wise’s cartoon style fits the narrative and the audience well, too. The characters are detailed enough to be realistic and not too cartoony, but they’re soft enough to not be overly realistic or scary; there’s an excellent balance that Wise has achieved with her art which only serves to propel the narrative further.
Overall, WereWoofs is a fun story about lycanthropy and high school. It’s not too graphic or over-the-top, but it’s also not too cheesy as to upset or put off any of its target readers. It’s a solid mystery, open-ended mystery tale combined with high school drama that makes for a fun read.
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: TKO Presents: Tales of Terror edited by Sebastian Girner
TKO Presents: Tales of Terror edited by Sebastian Girner
TKO Studios (November 2021)
180 pages; $19.99
Reviewed by Danica Davidson
TKO Presents: Tales of Terror is a comic book anthology with nine different short stories. It’s in the vein of Tales from the Crypt in that each story is self-contained, each story has a twist, and they’re all snippets of horror in bite-sized pieces.Continue Reading
Landis: The Story of a Real Man on 42nd Street by Preston Fassel
Encyclopocalypse Publications (December 7, 2021)
146 pages; $9.99 paperback, $3.99 Kindle
Reviewed by Damon Smith
The modern internet has made being a fan of genre film so much easier. Information is abundant on even the most obscure z-movie and new “boutique” Blu-ray labels seem to pop up overnight with lavish releases and restorations of dozens of obscure horror, action, and exploitation films. The scene has come a long way from trading bootleg tapes at cons or mailing out orders cut from fanzine pages, and a major figure at the very genesis of this movement was the late Bill Landis. His fanzine, Sleazoid Express, set the standard for what exploitation film journalism could be and acted as an ethnography to a culture that much of America was more than happy to sweep under the rug.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: The Feverish Stars by John Shirley 
The Feverish Stars by John Shirley
Independent Legions Publishing (March 2021)
306 pages; $22.35 paperback; $5.90 e-book
Reviewed by Rick Hipson
A kaleidoscope of stunning visuals, The Feverish Stars delivers a bullet of an experience which ricochets off every nerve and fiber of the imagination. Firing its trajectory on a one-way collision course with any expectations you might have, Shirley grabs your senses by the roots and coaxes with a lust for more. Against the maelstrom of a sci-fi punk master’s deliberate muse, every word strikes down like a hammer of poetic reckoning, smashing down gates to portals of fantastical realms. There can be no return without alteration, but isn’t that what we’re all here for?Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: The Boy with the Spider Face by AJ Franks 
The Boy with the Spider Face by AJ Franks
Crystal Lake Publishing (November 26, 2021)
126 pages; TBA paperback; TBA e-book
Reviewed by Sadie “Mother Horror” Hartmann
In this young adult, coming-of-age horror novella, AJ Franks imagines what life would look like for a teenage boy with an actual spider-face. The story unfolds rather quickly with the protagonist, Jeff Pritchet, struggling to lead a normal life but realizing that nothing will be easy for a boy with his unique condition. At school, Jeff befriends “the new kid” which introduces a combination of subtle queer themes and very heavy-handed racism.Continue Reading
The Strange Things We Become and Other Dark Tales by Eric LaRocca
Off Limits Press (September 2021)
128 pages; $13 paperback; $6.99 e-book
Reviewed by Sadie “Mother Horror” Hartmann
Nobody could comfortably follow an act in indie horror fiction like Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke, except Eric LaRocca with another release.
Things Have Gotten Worse… broke every record for sales and reviews I have ever seen for an indie release. That book was released in June and just three months later, here we are with The Strange Things We Become.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: Yours Cruelly, Elvira by Cassandra Peterson 
Yours Cruelly, Elvira by Cassandra Peterson
Hachette Books (September 2021)
305 pages; $22.99 hardcover, $14.99 ebook, $29.65 audiobook (or 1 audible credit)
Reviewed by Haley Newlin
Q: If your new memoir Yours Cruelly, Elvira is adapted into a movie, who would you want to play you?
A: Dolly Parton! We have the same…uhm.. assets.Quote from Barnes & Noble Virtually Presents: Cassandra Peterson Celebrates Yours Cruelly, Elvira (Sept. 21, 2021).
I had the immense pleasure of reading Cassandra Peterson’s new memoir, Yours Cruelly, Elvira, and attending a live event celebrating the release.
Two opportunities I know I’ll never forget. I mean, it’s damn near impossible to forget the cheeky, tassel-twirling queen of Halloween.Continue Reading
Author Cemetery Dance OnlinePosted on Categories ReviewsLeave a comment on Review: Cats of the Pacific Northwest by J.W. Donley 
Cats of the Pacific Northwest by J.W. Donley
Dark Forest Press (July 2021)
74 pages; $6.99 paperback; $2.99 e-book
Reviewed by R.B. Payne
Most horror fans learned about horror through seemingly innocent fairy tales read to us by loving parents before bedtime. Illustrated in fanciful colors on glossy paper, and lit by golden lamplight, we were tucked in with visions of cannibal witches, evil sisters, dark spells and curses, goblins, and trolls beneath bridges.Continue Reading
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