Review: King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 27, 2025May 18, 2025ReviewsDavid Simms, King of Ashes, Reviews, S.A. CosbyLeave a comment

cover of King of Ashes King of Ashes by S.A Cosby
Flatiron Books|Pine & Cedar (June 10, 2025)
Reviewed by Dave Simms

Today’s modern master of crime fiction is back in a scathing work that does what S.A. Cosby does best — entertain, but also leave a scar on the reader’s psyche. If one is familiar with the growing catalog, the expectations are high. In King of Ashes, those expectations are met again, and exceeded. His writing is akin to a beauty and the beast dichotomy — gorgeous prose wrapped around vicious scenes and broken characters — a mix that is addicting but also a gut punch, sucker punch, and whisper of poetry.

Bev Vincent explores Never Flinch by Stephen King

Bev VincentMay 26, 2025May 24, 2025Reviews, Stephen King News from the Dead ZoneBev Vincent, Cujo, Finders Keepers, Holly, If it Bleeds, Mr. Mercedes, Never Flinch, News from the Dead Zone, Reviews, Stephen King, Stephen King News, The Outsider1 Comment

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Although Stephen King has written books that could be classified as thrillers in the past, it’s hard to pick one with more intricate interweaving of fast-paced events featuring numerous characters in different locations than you’ll find in the climactic section of Never Flinch. With plenty of foreshadowing to prime the pump, King begins the drive toward an impressive series of confrontations at the book’s midpoint. It’s a whodunit, replete with red herrings and misdirection, and even after the true identity of the killer is revealed, King keeps the tension level high as he juggles several independent but interlinked plotlines and roars to a gripping finale.

Review: Pushing Daisy by Christopher O’Halloran

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 19, 2025May 18, 2025ReviewsChristopher O'Halloran, Elizabeth Broadbent, Pushing Daisy, ReviewsLeave a comment

cover of Pushing Daisy

Pushing Daisy by Christopher O’Halloran
Lethe Press (May 23, 2025)
Reviewed by Elizabeth Broadbent

Christopher O’Halloran’s Pushing Daisy has a simple premise: a grieving widower begins to suspect that his recently departed wife has returned from the great beyond. Roger Darling is the type of man women tell their girlfriends to dump immediately. He’s bitter and manipulative, self-centered and cruel. Daisy martyred herself to assure his happiness. Continue Reading

Review: Down The Hill: My Descent into the Double Murder in Delphi by Susan Hendricks

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 16, 2025May 12, 2025ReviewsDown the Hill, Haley Newlin, Reviews, Susan HendricksLeave a comment

cover of Down the Hill: My Descent into the Double Murder in Delphi Down The Hill: My Descent into the Double Murder in Delphi by Susan Hendricks
Hachette Books (September 2023)
288 pages; $19.58 hardcover; $15.99 e-book
Reviewed by Haley Newlin

As a child, I spent summers in Delphi, Indiana. I remember sycamores and cottonwood trees climbing the blue sky and the churn of gravel as we sipped on McDonald’s sweet teas, approaching “the farm.”

Reading Down The Hill: My Descent into the Double Murder in Delphi was nostalgic, hopeful, and tragic. I naively believed McDonald’s sweet tea and car rides through the small town were unique to my childhood. But I was wrong. Many kids in Delphi did the same — like 13-year-old Abby Williams and 14-year-old Libby German on the day they disappeared. Continue Reading

Review: Hospital of Haunts edited by Heather Daughrity

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 14, 2025May 12, 2025ReviewsHeather Daughrity, Hospital of Haunts, Reviews, Rowan B. MinorLeave a comment

cover of Hospital of Haunts — Version 1.0.0

Hospital of Haunts edited by Heather Daughrity
Watertower Hill Publishing (October 2024)
Reviewed by Rowan B. Minor

Hospital of Haunts, edited by Heather Daughrity, is the second installment in a unique horror anthology series. The first book in this series focuses on a haunted house; the current book is set in a hospital; and the forthcoming installment will be in a hotel. Although part of a series, these books also stand alone as individual anthologies. Hospital of Haunts includes twenty-three stories by twenty-three authors. All stories in this book were written for and are set in Lychhurst, a fictional hospital set in the mountains of West Virginia, and are sectioned off into different “triage levels.” Not only does Hospital of Haunts include interactive passages that break the fourth wall, but readers get floor plans and a history of the hospital as well. Continue Reading

Review: The Harrowing Game by Antoine Revoy

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 13, 2025May 12, 2025The Comic VaultAntoine Revoy, Columns, Joshua Gage, Reviews, The Comic Vault, The Harrowing GameLeave a comment

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The Harrowing Game by Antoine Revoy
23rd St. (May 27, 2025)
Reviewed by Joshua Gage

Antoine Revoy is an award-winning French writer, artist and designer, raised in Tokyo, Japan and Mexico City, Mexico. Revoy has created illustrations for clients such as The New York Times, Der Spiegel and Harvard University. He teaches visual storytelling and comics-making courses at the Rhode Island School of Design and is a thesis mentor at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Revoy lives in Providence, Rhode Island, with his wife, author-illustrator Kelly Murphy, and their many animal companions. His newest graphic novel is The Harrowing Game.Continue Reading

Review: Haint Country: Dark Folktales from the Hills and Hollers edited by Matthew R. Sparks and Olivia Sizemore

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 7, 2025April 26, 2025ReviewsHaint Country, Matthew Sparks, Olivia Sizemore, Reviews, Rowan B. MinorLeave a comment

Haint Country: Dark Folktales from the Hills and Hollers edited by Matthew R. Sparks and Olivia Sizemore
University Press of Kentucky (October 2024)
Reviewed by Rowan B. Minor

Haint Country: Dark Folktales from the Hills and Hollers is a new book of over 50 chilling short stories adapted, collected, and edited by Matthew R. Sparks and Olivia Sizemore. These local legends center around haints, boogers, UFOs, and supernatural happenings within the Appalachian region. Separated into five sections, the otherworldly retellings in Haint Country are accompanied by unsettling watercolor illustrations by co-author Olivia Sizemore. These beautifully eerie designs are reminiscent of those by Stephen Gammell in Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, and the legends and lore will remind you of an adult version of the Short and Shivery series. Haint Country also corrects misinformation and harmful stereotypes about rural folklore and Appalachia as a whole. Authors Sparks and Sizemore have expanded the traditions within Appalachian storytelling and invite their audience to participate in its culture. Continue Reading

Review: Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil by Ananda Lima

Cemetery Dance OnlineMay 5, 2025April 26, 2025ReviewsAnanda Lima, Chandra Claypool, Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil, ReviewsLeave a comment

cover of Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil by Ananda Lima
Tor Books (June 2024)
Reviewed by Chandra Claypool (Instagram) (TikTok)

Imaging meeting the Devil at a bar and they convince you that you’re kindred spirits because you both crave stories and you’re just drunk and heartbroken enough to let them in. This book has a unique format in that there’s stories within the main story. We follow the main character and her several encounters with the Devil as we get a peek into the stories she is writing for them. I absolutely love the cover for this as it shows this concept so well.Continue Reading

Review: The Haunting of Room 904 by Erika T. Wurth

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 30, 2025April 26, 2025ReviewsErika T. Wurth, Flatiron Books, Reviews, Rowan B. Minor, The Haunting of Room 904Leave a comment

The Haunting of Room 904 by Erika T. Wurth
Flatiron Books (March 2025)
Reviewed by Rowan B. Minor

Erika T. Wurth, a Kenyon and Sewanee fellow, lives in Denver, Colorado and is an urban Native of Apache, Chickasaw, and Cherokee descent. She has published in The Kenyon Review, Buzzfeed, and The Writer’s Chronicle. She is a narrative artist for the Meow Wolf Denver installation and has been a guest writer at the Institute of American Indian Arts. Wurth’s horror novel White Horse is a New York Times editor’s pick and a Good Morning America buzz pick. Her most recent novel is The Haunting of Room 904. Continue Reading

Review: The Night Birds by Christopher Golden

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 29, 2025April 28, 2025ReviewsBlu Gilliand, Christopher Golden, Reviews, The Night BirdsLeave a comment

cover of The Night Birds The Night Birds by Christopher Golden
St. Martin’s Press (May 6, 2025)
Reviewed by Blu Gilliand

It is, as they say, a tale as old as time.

Someone seeking power and purpose joins a group centered around an ancient evil — in this case, something called an Ur-Witch, with followers known as weavers who practice its mysterious rituals. When the hideous truth of their involvement comes to light, a couple of women break away and seek shelter with an old acquaintance, unwittingly bringing danger and death to his door.Continue Reading

Review: Symphony for Walpurgis: A Collection by Rami Ungar

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 23, 2025April 17, 2025ReviewsJoshua Gage, Rami Ungar, Reviews, Symphony for WalpurgisLeave a comment

Symphony for Walpurgis by Rami Ungar
May 1, 2025
Reviewed by Joshua Gage

Rami Ungar is the author of Rose, a novel about a woman who turns into a plant, and the collection Hannah & Other Stories, which includes the tale of a carnivorous horse. He is the Ohio chapter coordinator for the Horror Writers Association. His newest collection of novelletes is Symphony forrWalpurgis.

Novellettes are a strange beast. Many publishers and readers find them difficult because they’re such an in-between style of writing. They’re too short to build real suspense, some readers will tell you. Others will insist that they’re too long, and that they’re just short stories that need more editing. However, as the novelette is Ungar’s chosen form, he’s done his best to prove naysayers wrong, and what a job he has done!Continue Reading

Review: Blood On Her Tongue by Johanna Van Veen

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 21, 2025April 17, 2025ReviewsBlood on Her Tongue, Haley Newlin, Johanna Van Veen, ReviewsLeave a comment

Blood On Her Tongue by Johanna Van Veen

Poison Pen Press (March 2025)

Reviewed by Haley Newlin

Blood On Her Tongue is a vividly violent and sapphic, good-for-her horror story with a strong appetite and ferocious bite. Johanna Van Veen has repeated her success; Blood On Her Tongue is every bit as unputdownable and shocking as her 2024 novel, My Darling Dreadful Thing.

Review: Saint Catherine by Anna Meyer

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 16, 2025April 13, 2025Reviews, The Comic VaultAnna Meyer, Columns, Joshua Gage, Reviews, Saint Catherine, The Comic VaultLeave a comment

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Saint Catherine by Anna Meyer
23rd St. (April 29, 2025)
Reviewed by Joshua Gage

Anna Meyer is an author, designer and comic artist living in Brooklyn, New York. Originally from the Midwest, Anna went to a two-year design school in Lakewood, Ohio, where she received her associate degree in graphic design. She has over eleven years of professional design experience as both a senior designer and a design manager. She has been drawing and making comics ever since she could hold a pencil. Anna’s debut graphic novel is Saint Catherine. Continue Reading

Review: This Cursed House by Del Sandeen

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 14, 2025April 13, 2025ReviewsDel Sandeen, Haley Newlin, Reviews, This Cursed HouseLeave a comment

This Cursed House by Del Sandeen
Berkley (October 2024)
Reviewed by Haley Newlin

Jemma Barker needs a fresh start, and it appears in a strange letter offering her a position with the Duchon family in New Orleans. It promises the highest pay she’s ever earned.

The author, Del Sandeen, wastes no time settling readers into the gritty anticipation of horror and mystery. When Jemma arrives in New Orleans, a woman in a café urges Jemma to return home. The driver ices her out, not wanting to speak of the Duchon place, much less see it.

This Cursed House was unputdownable from the get-go. Continue Reading

Review: Old Monsters Never Die by Tim Waggoner

Cemetery Dance OnlineApril 11, 2025April 10, 2025ReviewsChandra Calypool, Old Monsters Never Die, Reviews, Tim Waggoner1 Comment

cover of Old Monsters Never Die Old Monsters Never Die by Tim Waggoner
Winding Road Stories (May 2024)
Reviewed by Chandra Claypool (Instagram) (TikTok)

“18 provocative tales of terror that explore the darkest corners of the human mind.. concluding with an unforgettable metafictional story on what it takes to be a horror writer.” Yes, please!Continue Reading

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