Tommy

I'm a big Adam Cesare fan, but this novella was unfortunately a swing and a miss. It takes too long to get to the action and when the good stuff does happen it doesn't happen for nearly long enough. The beginning feels padded and the ending feels strangely rushed. The characters also seem rushed; I liked them initially but nobody was given time to grow or develop. The ending could've been good if it had been built up properly, but as is it just... kinda happens?

It hurts to rate this so low because it has a great premise and I love Cesare's work. That said, I'd be lying to myself if I went even one star higher.

An excellent comic book companion to Joe Hill's NOS4A2. It's a prequel, fully fleshing out Charlie Manx's backstory and introducing us to a few of his victims. The writing is great and the artwork is excellent, with both conspiring to make you feel like you yourself have travelled the long and icy road to Christmasland. This was so good that I kind of wish I would've started here and then read the novel, because the whole thing feels like an excellent cold open.

When I started this book I figured there was zero chance that I'd finish it by Christmas, but the story was so captivating that I'm done with time to spare! For such a chonker of a novel the pages just flew by. Joe Hill is an amazing author and I look forward to devouring even more of his works.

It's not a bad book, but I probably would've liked it better as a short story because parts of it feel a little tedious and padded out. Still, I liked the characters and the overall story. A solid read.

Pretty good! Lays a solid foundation for a series I hope to continue reading. The plot was a little predictable and the villain quite undercooked, but I really liked the protagonists and all the worldbuilding. I have a feeling this series will only improve as it goes on.

The journey was pretty good, but I wasn't particularly thrilled with the destination.

A gripping, scary, and surprisingly timely read. Adam Cesare killed it.

Bradbury's mastery of the English language is on display here as always, but the story itself just wasn't what I hoped it would be and that really hampered my experience. Still, it got me out of a lengthy reading slump, so it deserves kudos for that!

While this book is longer than it needs to be and some of the content has aged pretty poorly, it has a great story, likable characters, and plenty of truly chilling horror. It isn't perfect, but there sure is a lot to love here.

This was such a good series! I can't believe Marvel ended it after a measly two volumes. Tom Taylor has such a great grasp of what makes Spider-Man tick; I'm super bummed that we won't get to see more of his take on the character. But regardless, this was a fun read that was just as excellent as the first volume. The final issue even made this Spidey fan tear up a little!

This one starts and ends strong but kind of lags in the middle. While I liked it well enough, it's definitely one of the lesser King things I've read.

It has some good ideas, but ultimately feels more like the outline of a story than an actual story. I definitely prefer the movie.

Grim, gross, and utterly gratuitous. It made my skin crawl!

A mostly unsatisfactory conclusion to a middling series. I think this story would've been better served as one book and not three - there was way too much padding and way too many superfluous characters.

An impressive debut, teeming with vivid prose and plenty of genuinely unnerving horror. I'll definitely be on the lookout for whatever this author does next!

A slight improvement over the first book, though it still shares the same problems. The story is interesting but never actually scary, and there are just too many characters to ever really feel like you've gotten to know anyone. Still, I'm intrigued to find out where things go - and I think the final book might finally get down to the horror I was hoping for when I started this series.

A quick and mostly compelling read, but it's a little too short for its own good and the ending isn't very satisfying. That said, I would definitely give this author another go because the finer moments of this showed great potential.

It's not a bad book, but at the same time I'm a little let down. There were too many characters, too much exposition, and not nearly enough horror! I wanted something that would make my skin crawl and there was surprisingly little of that here. That said, the action picked up towards the end and left plenty of room for a more satisfying sequel. I think I'll probably end up reading on, even if I have some gripes about this first entry.

If you look at this as the work of fiction it so clearly is, it's not bad. It's actually pretty gripping in places, even if it starts to feel a little repetitive and padded out as the days of the Lutz family's stay at Amityville pile on. Overall, I'm torn - it was a solid read and I don't regret it, but I also feel like it's a cash grab that shouldn't exist in the first place. I'll go 3/5 because, as a story, the good mostly outweighs the bad. It's decent schlock.

This is the first Grady Hendrix book I didn't love. The characters just aren't as vibrant as they are in his other works, and the story feels like it takes forever to actually start. It's not a BAD book - it picks up in the second half - but it's the first of his titles that I could never see myself rereading.

Another winner from Jonathan Janz! A very gripping read.

This was a silly idea from the get-go, but it could've been far worse than it actually is.

144 pages of schlocky, self-aware, gratuitous gore for gore's sake. The whole book plays like a wild, wicked '80s horror film. I liked it, of course - this sort of thing is right up my horror loving alley. That said, the lack of a strong central character to root for brought things down a notch, making what could've easily been a great book only a good one.

Nevertheless, this was a solid read that I'd recommend to those who think they can handle it, but only ever to those who think they can handle it because it's pretty intense.

I'm not crying. You're crying.

This one hit me right in the feels. Good stuff.