Liz

Nothing But Horror Tropes & Misplaced Expectations

One of my deepest and longest standing loves has been for the horror genre, ever since I was young enough to read a classic Goosebumps novel or feel the sensation of my skin crawling when reading “Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark.” As an adult, horror has still been my longest love, with the classic haunted house storyline being one of my personal favorites told repeatedly over time. It can be told in a thousand different ways and still give you that sense of dread that leaves you glancing around at the pale walls of your own home with weary concern.

From “Haunting of Hill House” to “Hell House” and even “Naomi's Room,” the haunted house plot can never grow trite and cliche, so long as it's done right and the reader is immersed into the atmosphere along with the characters. But that's the catch – with a storyline done so many times before, it absolutely must be done right to be scary.

Sadly, “Nothing But Blackened Teeth” missed the mark on this.

Cassandra Khaw created a story that seemed to be every checkbox of haunted house tropes packaged neatly in this grotesquely covered novella. Four lifelong friends, coupled with some romantic rivalries mixed in, rent out an eerie Heian-era mansion for a night of ghost hunting and wedding ceremony. It's a creative take, and one of the things that appeals to a horror audience is the creepy myths and tales that come from the Eastern end of the world.

I mean, twenty years later, and the Grudge still gives me the creeps and unsettles me. And some of the best horror movies and novels I've discovered came from the other end of the world, from a culture I know nothing about but continue to keep me hooked.

That's the problem with this novella, though. It seems to give the impression that we as an audience are expected to know immediately what we're experiencing and seeing in the context of this story. We're supposed to automatically know what yokai and kappa are, the vocabulary used to describe the interior of the mansion, and the cultural influences that hang over the ambience of it all. And that's not the case with many of the readers, I spent a good portion of the time reading this book highlighting words to search up and help myself create a mental image of what was happening. That, sadly, broke the experience of being immersed in the story, and as an author, that's something you don't want to happen when writing a horror novel.

Though this isn't the only issue I had with the story.

The characters are all extremely unlikeable, and even when we're supposed to root for them, or be sad, we're not given the chance to really get to know them. Even the one casualty that occurs at the end seems to come from nowhere but we're not given the chance to be shocked or experience any kind of emotional investment, despite the author's insistence to describing this characters as everyone's best friend and the perfect person.

And then there is the constant fourth-wall breaks or references to horror movies done throughout that felt more comedic than part of a legitimate story, let alone how true characters should talk. “This is the part where we die” and “I'm rich, you're bisexual, we are always the first to die....” this was not as humorous or entertaining as it felt it was intended to be. If anything, that suspension of disbelief was broadened even more, and made it even more difficult to relate to these characters.

I could go on about the cliche horror tools, such as a library in the next room or suddenly there being a book with the instructions on how to stop the ghosts altogether and get their friend back. It felt like an incredibly lazy wrap-up to the story that had a lot of potential in the beginning, but fell flat a third of the way in.

To summarize my review, the idea, the hook, the story altogether had me in a good hold at the beginning, but the momentum died down quickly before the end of the first half, and from there, it just felt like a need to finish since it was such a short book rather than out of enjoyment. There are plenty of high quality haunted house stories out there, some as short as this, if not more, but this would not be one I could recommend.

“This is a story of a man named George,
George, George, George,
He thought he had the perfect life
A great son, teenage daughter, and the perfect wife
But George grew bored, you see
And restless like a bitch in heat
So he hopped on an app to find a new toy
And discovered a cute teenage boy
Chasten was his name, and he loved to play
So the two decided to meet one day....”

This was not my first time experiencing the realm of extreme horror, known for testing the boundaries of shock and gore, trigger warnings galore, and nauseating, chilling pieces of fiction that stick with the psyche for extended periods of time. It's not unheard of for authors of this genre to cater to the gratuitous need for shock, or leaving permanent stains upon the souls of their readers, an imprint that haunts them, never to be forgotten. From Jack Ketchum's “Girl Next Door” to Sam West's “Home Intruder” and Edward Lee's “Bighead,” there is a variety of a palette to choose from, each catering to the taste of those curious readers looking for the next big scare or gross out moment.

Mique Watson's “Call Me Son” offers a disturbing look at human desires, the risks of exploring one's inner demons and fantasies, and the consequences that come with them. It delves into the life of George, a seemingly successful family man, living the picturesque life with his devoted and loving wife, Evelyn, and teenage children, Ron and Jennie. However, when Ron, driven by restless need for novelty, embarks on a dangerous online liaison, he finds himself entwined in a series of horrific and violent events that, in the depths of all this bloodshed, could have been prevented.

Had he never downloaded the hookup app to his phone to begin with.

Beneath the facade of success and domesticity, George harbors dark and horrendous cravings, a growing dissatisfaction with his mundane existence, and seeks solace and excitement in an online relationship with sixteen-year-old Chasten, a choice that sets him and his family on a wild rollercoaster of violence, bloodshed, torture, all that irrevocably alter their lives together.

My first impression with Mique Watson's work, the novella is short, twenty chapters, completed in a combined three hours spread out over the course of three days. It presents a compelling premise, creatively twisting a theme and plot line that has been done a thousand times over. Yet it also falls short in its execution.

The writing style itself poses inconsistencies throughout the story, oscillating between moments of brilliant literary prose, beautiful wording to describe a sunrise or the appearance of the seemingly innocent and cute character, Chasten, then shifts to passages that border on juvenile fanfiction, (an experience I know well of, and not my proudest of years in my life). This can be jarring, detracting from the overall reading experience.

The character development in itself is uneven. I can understand and forgive the shortcomings of this being on the short length of the novella, but I've seen other authors utilize their skills and tools to depict compelling and likable characters in the same novella length. An example of this is in George's internal struggles portrayed with some depth, while it is as a storm, which is trite and overused, but it was still used poetically and beautifully, while other characters remain underdeveloped, forgettable, and I mean this on the literal bases (I forgot the name of the daughter, for instance, as she is mentioned infrequently throughout the story, but there is no real interaction between her and the main cast of characters). A multitude of individuals are introduced, new ones seemingly brought every chapter or so, that serve little purpose in advancing the plot, or contributing to the theme. There is a lack of focus, weakening the narrative and the impact it has on the reader.

The plot suffers from the same, a lack of cohesion, where plot points are introduced but never fully fleshed out or resolved, loose ends left that both confused and frustrated me. The transitions between scenes are abrupt, disjointed, disrupting the flow, with some characters standing in a bathrobe one moment then in their car the next with no mention of what is happening in between. Or a character still being depicted on their knees, then in the first sentence of the next paragraph they are stabbing another character, who was standing, in the neck, with no mention of them standing up, approaching, nothing.

Yet despite all this, “Call Me Son” offers moments of genuine suspense and horror. The exploration of both George's and Chasten's inner turmoil, their history, their demons, neither without fault or sin in their pasts, and the destructive paths they are drawn to, intertwining their fates together. Taboo subjects are explored, (some more horrifying than others) and are unflinching in their portrayal, not just the acts themselves, but in the consequences of those actions.

Intermingled in all of this were references or sections that felt like call-outs to either true crime or popular media. A scene that I took particular note of was when Evelyn is out with her friends. A conversation takes place that reads as though taken word for word from an episode of Sex and the City. The conclusion of the novella felt way too similar to the ending of A Serbian Film. And when a character is first introduced, I had to pause to wonder if Mique inserted a copy of Liezyl Margallo, (if you know, you know, and yes, you may need therapy).

In conclusion, “Call Me Son” is a flawed but intriguing entry into the extreme horror genre, with this being an interesting first impression of Mique Watson's ability to explore the darkness in human desires and its destructive power. The only drawbacks being the inconsistent writing style, underdeveloped characters, and disjointed plot held this novella back from reaching its full potential, though it will not prevent me from seeing what else Mique may have up his sleeve. I look forward to seeing more from him and how his talent and skills will develop.

High Expectations, Over Promise... Under Deliver, Underwhelming


The moment I opened this Pandora's Box of depravity, there was nothing short of a relentless onslaught of “what the f**?!” that bombarded me, but not in the way expected of an experienced reader of extreme horror.Matt Shaw is known for being an author of countless books classified in the extreme horror genre. I'm not unfamiliar with his works, having purchased a digital copy of “Sick Bstards,” “Hunger,” “Obsession,” and wanting to dive into “Happy Ever After” following my discovery of it from one of those overdone YouTube iceberg videos.

You really can't dabble into the category without stumbling across his name, among the likes of Judith Sonnet, Aron Beauregard, Kristopher Trianna, et all.

This is the kind of genre you either love or hate, and Matt Shaw is everything that embodies it.
When writing this book, he might as well have had a checklist of taboos, disturbing topics, scenarios that were known to upset, possibly even start a mob with pitchforks and torches, and ticked them off with glee and a face reminiscent of the cartoon Joker.

I've read a number of reviews and watched a selection of videos covering this book, and different opinions were thrown. Some considered it the most disturbing book they've ever read, some classified it as a poor excuse of shock value.

And then there was a comment I read under a video review that perfectly summed up everything I was thinking when reading the book: “There's nothing transgressive about this. It's CP-torture fantasy that uses shock value as a mask in order to label itself as a work of horror.... It's less about substance and more about ‘oh what will get people disgusted' which is a cheap distillation of what it means for something to be considered a work of horror.”

I am not one with a weak stomach for the disturbing, the macabre, the gruesome and violent, the gory and the depraved. In fact, some would consider my tolerance as fairly high, since the only story I have read to make me visibly nauseous was Terry Musalata's “Baby in a Blender” and the novel that made me take several pauses to finish because of how uncomfortable I felt was Alyssa Nutting's “Tampa.” I enjoy horror movies as much as the next person, with some of my personal favorites being the ones that set me on edge and leave me questioning reality, what is within control, and what isn't (for reference: “Hereditary”) and beautiful symbolism represented through horrifying creatures and entities that stay with you for years (“The Babadook”).

Yet I have an absolute love/hate relationship with slasher films and whatever genre you would throw the Saw and Hostel movies into. I hate shock and gore for the sole purpose of making people uncomfortable without a deeper intention behind it. There needs to be reason, a method, something to add context and substance to it, not just trying to disturb me.

This is where HUB falls remarkably short.

From the first to the last page, there were moments of violence and gore, instances of children being forced and trained to “please” their potential new families, not an inch of ink spread on the pages didn't contain some sort of content that made you question the legalities of such a book, and more so, wondering when the FBI were going to come crashing down your door.

The characters, what few there were, were a special breed of dysfunction, a marinated concoction steeped in toxic sludge of questionable life choices, and even more questionable, illicit morals. It was a difficult challenge just trying to feel empathy for the children in the story, the true victims of not just the heinous crimes inflicted on them but also victims of Shaw's twisted mind.

And the events of the storyline, the plot, all played out like a car crash captured on a TikTok video, one that you have saved and watched a hundred times, looking for anything different than what you've already seen. In this situation, though, the car is driven by one man, a crazed, demented psychopath high off his own inflated ego and self-centered view of the world, and this is in reference to the male lead of the story, (not directed at Shaw, whom I am not familiar with his personality or personal life).

By the time the predictable ending came, I was wondering if there was a way to stage some sort of intervention for Shaw, or at the very least whatever little inspiring Demons planted these ideas in his head. Poor things are overworked, understaffed and underpaid, and it shows in this book. There were so many opportunities to dive head first into genuinely upsetting and very real aspects of human nature, the way society is so easily manipulated by those in wealth and power, and how those of the meek and innocent are simply tools used by the hierarchy to fulfill their ultimate goals and needs.

Except these ideals and messages were reduced to a cheap thrill ride with predictable “scares” if you could call them that, with the ambient horror music missing the beat to drop when the monster peaks around the corner to jump out at you. I prefer my darkness with a side of depth, nuance, true horror, not some list written out by a middle school student of what their definition of “scary” is, aiming to disturb the schoolyard crush.

There is potential to meet the markers of transgressive fiction. If time and effort was put into it, skills that I know Matt Shaw possesses but did not put into this piece of literary fiction. What is considered by many to be the most disturbing Matt Shaw book, if not quite possibly the most disturbing book in extreme horror, they've ever read, did nothing more than fall flat to me.

“Baby in a Blender” still holds firm as the only book I've ever placed in the zero stars category, but this book could easily give it a run for its money. I will reward it though at 1 star, for the potential, alone.

I'm going to start this review off by saying I came across this book in the same way most of its readers did.

... Through the power of social media.

It was everywhere you looked, advertised more frequently than a BetterHelp sponsorship on YouTube. And to be honest, I think I would have gotten much Better Help from them than I would if Theo Faber were my psychotherapist. And that's saying something, considering I'm still debating which platform was more aggressive with their notifications, BetterHelp or Duolingo.

“The Silent Patient” by Alex Michaelides was, in retrospect, a pretty good premise. A woman, Alicia Berenson, is convicted of murdering her husband has gone mute for a few years, hasn't spoken a word since the event, not to or in her own defense. Theo Faber, the main character and narrator with exception to the diary entries of Alicia, is a psychotherapist who is hired for The Grove, a mental institution that houses some of dangerous and mentally unstable patients.

His goal? To get Alicia to speak again through the use of talk therapy. And learn exactly what happened that fateful night of August 25th, the night her husband, Gabriel, was shot five times.

I thought this was a spectacular premise with a lot of promise, the chances to go in multiple directions. Psychological thrillers entice me, and I enjoy the ones that are meant to make you think, put the puzzle pieces together, and keep you involved and invested in the characters along with the story. After all, you can't have a compelling story without fully fleshed out and relatable characters. Right?

Well... that seemed to have been the mark missed in this story.

I'll be frank and brief: the only characters I came to care about somewhat were Alicia and Theo. And I think the only reason was due to the narration being from their point of views. The story is mostly told from Theo's perspective, but there is too much separation between the reader and him, his analytical mind. He tells us about his traumatic past and upbringing, his tumultuous relationship with his parents, but I didn't feel anything in relation to that. I'm not sure if it was the way these elements of the story were written, or Theo was an overall a character I could not like.

Alicia I could relate to on some level due to her narration and point of view being closer to mine than Theo's. I'm not a psychotherapist, I'm not big into psychology, and the only exposure I have to true crime is through the documentaries and YouTube videos I watch. So Alicia, who was not of a psychological and analytical mind, who was emotional, moody, and impulsive, much like myself. Along with her own problematic upbringing and traumatic past, she felt more real, more fleshed out, compared to Theo. There were more layers to her, more to learn about her and know, from the first diary entry to her last in the novel.

But these are the only two characters I could bring myself to remotely care about. And there is a whole cast of characters that play important supporting parts. Alicia's husband, Gabriel, the victim in the horrific murder, who is portrayed as a doting husband from Alicia's perspective but from the testimony of others, was annoyed by her and distant. There is Kathy, Theo's wife, who is depicted as a loving and affectionate woman, the focus of Theo's entire world and happiness, who is playing the stereotypical trope of the unfaithful actress wife.

There are a slew of doctors, attendants, and staff members in the institute that you learn and interact with, but they come across as two-dimensional. Even the brother-in-law to Alicia came across as flat and two-sided as a piece of cardboard. It didn't feel like a character-driven story, and without the fleshed-out dynamic characters, the actual story seemed fall flat on its face.

Then the ending... I don't want to give spoilers, but I truly felt that the ending was a watered down version of “You” by Caroline Kepnes. The twist was unexpected, I was not thinking the elements of that ending would happen, but the events leading up to it were fairly predictable. And the final chapter of the story was unsatisfactory, to be honest. A build up to a final end that didn't come, a form of karmic justice served that felt, to be fair, anticlimactic.

So you may be wondering by now why I give this book 3 stars if these are all the faults I felt about reading it. And I'd be happy to answer it: the premise, and the integration of the different timelines were, in my opinion, brilliantly done. And there was a line in the story that really struck out to me that I felt summed up the entirety of the storyline in one beautiful statement: “... We were crashing through every last boundary between therapist and patient. Soon it would be impossible to tell who was who.”

If it was just the characters, the writing, and the sequence of events that brought the story to its pivotal end, I would give this a hard 2.5 stars. Not the worst story I've ever read, not the best, and the furthest thing I would consider a masterpiece. The hype was not worth the story, to be frank. But the premise, the idea, the framework, and the timelines, pushed it to a good 3 stars.

Okay, I was not aware this was a Reese's Book Club pick, but I stumbled across this book the same way I always come across new books: casually walking through the book aisles of Target, looking for something to distract me adequately while my 7-year-old looks and plays with the dinosaur toys to his heart's content. Of course, all in the hopes of killing time.

What drew me to this book was not the colorful and creative cover image, or the blurb on the back cover, detailing a story of a woman trying to investigate what really happened to her best friend all those years ago, but it was the opening preface. The descriptive nature of a cabin materializing from nothing, detail for detail, where it was easy to visualize the walls, the rooms, the doors. I find I have a very vivid imagination, and when I'm given a description of something, I don't just visualize it, but my mind conjures up elements to engage all of my senses.

I could practically hear the water of the creek running over smooth stones, the gentle breeze rustling in the grass. I smelt the soft, delicious aroma of stew cooking on the stovetop, feel the warmth of the cabin from the fireplace, and taste the food being described in those first couple pages.

All while standing in a Target toy aisle, surrounded by noises and bright lights and screeching kids.

I was sucked in immediately. And it was an instant purchase.

If only I had enough time to finish the book there in the store before bringing it home. And there's a number of different reasons why.

Needless to say I'm a sucker for psychological thrillers, books that could pull me in and get me thinking, start looking for clues and pieces that would unravel before my eyes, create complex characters, and generate a compelling conflict that would leave a lasting impression on my mind for years to come. I do not like detective mysteries, they don't interest me (because most of the time, the killer is almost always related to the detective or the spouse of the victim, a little too predictable for my taste). So it was a nice breath of fresh air to see the protagonist trying to solve this mysterious murder was your normal, everyday, flawed human being.

And boy, is Maya flawed. Suffering from psychological instability, drug withdrawals, hazy memories, Demons haunting her own mind and a sense of survivor's guilt that was consuming her life not just on a surface level, but subconscious level. For many years.

She's convinced her friend, Aubrey, didn't die of natural causes, but it is hard to convince other people when a relatively normal, healthy young girl just suddenly drops dead with no explanation, and your family just happens to have a history of mental illness.

Maya has resolved herself to her own personal suffering, her own trauma, and she's left to finding answers to unspoken questions at the bottom of a gin shot glass or prescription pill bottle. These addictive, self-destructive habits are dismantling her life, putting her career, personal life, and sanity on a razor sharp edge.

Then, after seven years, she watches a viral YouTube video of a young painter, Cristina, dropping dead in a restaurant, in the presence of none other than Frank, a man Maya dated in her small town around the time Aubrey died. This ignites Maya's obsession to figure out what happened, to Aubrey, to Cristina, and hopefully save it from happening to another girl. She returns to her hometown, confronting her past, her secrets, her memories, and that cabin in the woods where everything started.

The plot, the protagonist, the descriptive language, and the pacing of it all was well worth the read. The utilization of the past and present together felt like I was watching things happen within a movie. The last time I watched someone utilize these two different timelines in such a fluid, seamless way was the horror movie Occulus (and despite what some would save of the movie, it is one of my favorites for this very reason). It gave the opportunity to get to know the girls, bond with them, and relate to them on so many levels. Maya and Aubrey could very easily have been my own friends in high school, the type of well-rounded characters that spoke to a deep need in my core.

Then there was the pleasant surprise of incorporating Guatemalan heritage, a mysterious book of her father that served as a catalyst for bringing our antagonist Frank into the picture, and eventually as the conflict progressed, a pivotal part to resolving it. The folklore serves a purpose in dropping hints, and perhaps one of my favorite scenes in the entire book was what I would call the “connecting of the dots.” I could feel through the pages that “aha!” moment, that eureka feeling of when a realization hits you like a wrecking ball and it all makes sense.

And that, perhaps, was the final moment in the book that I felt connected. As the last third of it began to come together, it felt like all of the key points were lost and became vague. The revelation came, how it all happened, the answer to this seven-year-long mystery of how these girls died and what part Maya has in it all and what Frank did... fell short of anticlimactic. If anything, it felt unbelievable, and not in a good way.

I went from being invested to being detached and disassociated. From some deep crevice in the back of my mind, Johnny Depp's voice echoed to the surface, a quote from that disaster of a movie, “Secret Window”: “the only thing that matters is the ending; it's the most important part of the story, the ending.”

That's what happened here. A thrilling story, a compelling idea, believable protagonist, relatable characters, the fast pace, the descriptive language. Only for it all to fizzle out in a less than satisfactory conclusion that left me with a puzzled look on my face, wondering if I was really reading the same book.

For this reason, I rate the book at 3.5 Stars. The fresh, powerful new idea, the writing, all of it was wonderful and outmatched what many in the genres do. But that ending... it would have been 4 Stars if the ending were different.