A review by bucher_freund
The Roots Grow Into the Earth: A Collection of Short Horror Stories by Bert S. Lechner, Bert S. Lechner

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

4.0

This unnerving short story collection leans heavily into the cosmic and the weird. Lechner's writing is poetic and emotional. His storytelling style can be ambiguous and meandering, which works in places, although I found some of the narratives confusing. However, this approach makes sense with the author's intent of creating melancholy and macabre moments of unreality and the unknown.

Favorite stories for me were Interstate, about a woman battling a cosmic evil on the side of a highway, His Castle Crumbles, about a man trying to hold together his reality through the worship of an otherworldly Patron, and the absolute stand out, The Orchestra, a beautifully violent tale of a transcendent piece of music that has a maddening effect on its listeners.