In \u201cThe Contagion,\u201d the Dreiyer family\u2019s annual road trip includes a stop at a bed-and-breakfast\u2014that\u2019s where 7-year-old Sylvia peeks into a trunk of dolls, one of which, she swears, moves on its own. Decades later, when looking for inspiration for a TV show she\u2019s working on, she returns to the inn and makes a startling discovery. Von Hessen\u2019s 14 stories herein tackle such diverse subgenres as the undead, body horror, and something more Lovecraftian (\u201cSpectral Golem\u201d), but there\u2019s a discernible theme of identity that runs throughout the book. Characters interrogate their pasts; the narrator of \u201cThe Patent-Master\u201d travels to an island coastal town, where the discovery of their late mother\u2019s former profession is the first of many surprises. In one of the collection\u2019s highlights, \u201cThe Obscurantist,\u201d Brooklyn-based Andrei\u2019s lifelong obsession with a girl who once appeared on an obscure variety show ultimately leads him down a dark path. These tales are bleak, forgoing humor and zeroing in on individuals who find themselves in miserable, appalling, or lethal circumstances. A few of the entries dive deep into visceral and grotesque imagery; one that\u2019s sure to turn stomachs is \u201cRoscoe\u2019s Malefic Delights,\u201d which is about a newly opened eatery with only one item on its menu: These \u201cdelights\u201d (\u201creminiscent of blood-drained white worms or skinned, flattened rats\u2019 tails or stringy strips of tripe\u201d) definitely don\u2019t look appetizing, but their appearance may not be their worst attribute. In every chilling moment and unexpected turn, the author\u2019s prose is nothing short of intoxicating\u2014unforgettable passages equate one man with \u201cthe human embodiment of a prolonged sigh\u201d; a \u201csloshing\u201d akin to a \u201chalf-empty jar of preserves\u201d describes something that ideally shouldn\u2019t be making that sound.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In \u201cThe Contagion,\u201d the Dreiyer family\u2019s annual road trip includes a stop at a bed-and-breakfast\u2014that\u2019s where 7-year-old Sylvia peeks into a trunk of dolls, one of which, she swears, moves on its own. Decades later, when looking for inspiration for a TV show she\u2019s working on, she returns to the inn and makes a startling […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1092,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1091"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}