A review by badspringbye
The Dangers of Smoking in Bed by Mariana Enríquez

dark mysterious

2.0

 I stumbled upon this collection that I thought was going to be a dark literary fiction novel but that was totally wrong. not even sure how can I describe this genre... magical realism? search up the trigger warnings and you’ll see. it’s not simply horror.

maybe the best way to explain this thing is to leave my ratings per section. here are the stories described in few words:

  1. angelita unearthed - the rotting baby’s bone ⭐️⭐️⭐️
  2. our lady of the quarry - teenage insecurities & lust ⭐️
  3. the cart - suspected curse from the poor old man ⭐️
  4. the well - nightmares & the woman & the witch & evils & sacrifice & betrayal ⭐️
  5. rambla triste - rotting smell of the ‘police city’; there was a shift. political matters mixed with horror stories based on true events? sick & twisted & I enjoyed this the most ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
  6. the lookout - ? ⭐️
  7. where are you, dear heart? - lust again; jane eyre; heartbeat obsession ⭐️⭐️
  8. meat - musician and his album; cannibalism case ⭐️⭐️⭐️
  9. no birthdays or baptisms - furrowed brows while I was reading the whole thing. thought it was just a disgusting porn but the open(?) ending left me confused and wanting to know more who was the ‘he’ ⭐️⭐️
  10. kids who come back - missing kids ⭐️
  11. the dangers of smoking in bed - ? ⭐️
  12. back when we talked to the dead - scanned/mostly skipped because ouija plot wasn’t interesting at all ⭐️

at first I found no values with the stories. boring. then after fifth one, the content started to get better, but narration is still meh at times or maybe it was the translation. idk. this will give you everything you’ll least expect from the title and cover art. the last stories were weak though. overall, I think it’s better than my most recent horror-ish read (the houseguest and other stories). that one had a theme whereas this one’s more diverse, just not as gripping as I would like it to be. 
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