octavia_cade's review
5.0
Okay. This was pretty damn amazing. Not perfect - there are a couple of stories in here that are unconvincing, or that border on the clichéd - but when the horror hits it really hits hard. Moreover, the bulk of the stories here are creature horror, which I love, with repulsive and terrifying creatures coming up out of foundations and underground caverns and lakes. It's a little bit Lovecraftian, but without the racism and awful overwrought prose.
There are three really outstanding stories here, I think. "Feesters in the Lake", the title story, in which really disgusting wormlike creatures infest an old house and its nearby lake (and when I say "disgusting" I mean it; Leman's creatures can produce genuine revulsion). There's also "Come Where My Love Lies Dreaming", which is a chilling but deeply sad story about a man who loses his wife and is subsequently haunted by her... or something which appears to be her. It's a really interesting take on the haunted house genre, anyway. But the best in this collection, bar none, is "Window". A portal appears in the everyday world, showing on the other side a happy family, living in their beautiful home. I won't spoil it, but I was creeped out for a long, long time after reading that story. The end is just terrifying... in a wonderful way, of course, but still.
There are three really outstanding stories here, I think. "Feesters in the Lake", the title story, in which really disgusting wormlike creatures infest an old house and its nearby lake (and when I say "disgusting" I mean it; Leman's creatures can produce genuine revulsion). There's also "Come Where My Love Lies Dreaming", which is a chilling but deeply sad story about a man who loses his wife and is subsequently haunted by her... or something which appears to be her. It's a really interesting take on the haunted house genre, anyway. But the best in this collection, bar none, is "Window". A portal appears in the everyday world, showing on the other side a happy family, living in their beautiful home. I won't spoil it, but I was creeped out for a long, long time after reading that story. The end is just terrifying... in a wonderful way, of course, but still.
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