Reviews with content warning for Gore - What Moves the Dead

This book just didn’t work for me. I found the plot obvious, the prose grating and the attempts at humor irritating. It’s short and I nearly finished it (I read half before switching to the audiobook for the rest), but now I’m super busy and I don’t think I’ll make an effort to see it through. I do appreciate that the main character is non-binary and uses pronouns specific to the world of the story, and the Gothic vibe was successfully vivid and creepy sometimes. But it’s not enough to get me on board.

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biwi's review against another edition

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dark funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

unexpectedly funny but still Edgar Allen Poe adjacent. Anything fungi related is an instant read for me

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veeples's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

This was a very enjoyable short read! Delightfully spooky and horrifying with enough detailing of the gorey aspects to horrify instead of being purely disgusting. It’s a great quick read for Halloween.

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ruthiedr89's review

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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anni_swanilda's review against another edition

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dark funny informative mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

Content Warnings

erebus53's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

I am developing a soft-spot for this author. I am tickled in both my sciencey and my witchy wants and that's all good by me. This is a book that I was recommended though book club, and I was glad to find a copy to listen to.

30 minutes into the audio (12%) I realised that I had assumed the gender of the protagonist because of what the Audiobook narrator sounded like. This story has an interesting take on gender and I like the diversity of it. I do wish that the narrator of the book could manage to use unfamiliar pronouns as though they were.. pronouns? rather than emphasising them due to lack of familiarity and treating them like they are nouns. It got annoying that the flow was interrupted in a way that it wouldn't have been if I was just reading it myself.

I have not read the original Poe, Rise and Fall of the House of Usher, but it is source material for this re-imagining. The author's note on the end of the book gives a little more insight and it's really cool. I vibe deeply with the author's love of passionate people with fringe interests, and this same tendency is mirrored in the protagonist of the story.

There is a satisfying cast of supporting characters in this story. Each has their own flavour and inner motivations. There is an English mycologist who is confounded by her peers' reluctance to acknowledge her work (due to her lack of a Y chromosome). Although she is fictitious, the character is portrayed as Beatrix Potter's aunt, which ties really nicely in with the narrative device of strangely behaving animals.

Dunno if I am the target audience, or just too overly interested in natural science, because the plot was fairly transparent, to me. I don't know how easy it would be for non-nerdy people to understand and predict like I did. I like that the story is relatively short because it didn't have a lot to it more than vibe (which is apparently the case with the original). Short stories are nice when they don't overstay their welcome.

A little creepy, a lot interesting, and with some cute ideas developed. I will read more books by this author.

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