The 17 tales herein feature an array of horrors. Some are blatantly sinister, like a serial killer who\u2019s more than she appears to be; others seem innocuous but have the potential to become outright menaces, like an apparatus for keeping pests out of a garden. In still other instances, the true horror doesn\u2019t reveal itself until the last few pages\u2014as in the haunting \u201cEver Shall They Feed,\u201d in which a boy named Beno plans to enact some relatively harmless revenge for his father embarrassing him at school. While hiding somewhere in the family\u2019s funeral home, Beno inadvertently witnesses an event that rattles him; the situation grows increasingly unsettling for Beno (and readers) as it rolls along. In \u201cPujkamaunka Splash,\u201d Trevor distinctly remembers the eponymous video game, which was immensely popular decades ago. Why does it seem everyone else has forgotten it? He recalls going to buy the game with his grandfather on a day rife with violent and bizarre incidents almost certain to traumatize any kid. Interspersed throughout the collection are several flash-fiction pieces, which the author proves can be just as powerful as longer selections. In one memorable example, the diner-patron narrator of \u201cBoxed Breakfast\u201d has seen all sorts of sidewalk passersby\u2014just not anyone like the man who shows him something he\u2019s not ready to see.<\/p>\n
As in all great horror fiction, Grass bolsters the stories with extraordinary characters. Such characterization allows the twists and turns to hit especially hard, as when one man\u2019s chair triggers memories of his sickly mother, or when the aforementioned Trevor is taken aback when something actually frightens his stoic grandfather. The author also weaves in satire, lampooning such subjects as medical industries and penal systems. \u201cThe EP\u2122 Implant\u201d tackles both excessive wealth and plastic surgery addiction; in the story, Lupita\u2019s latest cosmetic surgery comes with an app that allows her to adjust her new implant\u2019s \u201ccontour and buoyancy,\u201d but she\u2019s ill-prepared for what to do when a horrifying post-surgery problem arises. The author\u2019s prose rarely strays from the somber, even when humorous, and it often reads like poetry: \u201cMoving between rooms brought on dizzy spells. Total fatigue drained his bodily battery dead. By nighttime, he was moribund, his muscles aching and bloodless, anatomically teetering toward a mortal deficit.\u201d Grass\u2019 metaphors are darkly evocative: \u201cViolative in the way of a trussed-up sexual masochist loitering near a seesaw\u201d; a \u201cmiasma that brings to mind a river overflowing with spoiled pigs\u2019 blood.\u201d One standout tale, \u201cOdd Egg,\u201d perfectly encapsulates the collection. It opens with an uneasy sight as Maryellen comes home to a stranger on her porch. The man, with an egg-shaped head and long, bumpy fingers, just wants to give her a free carton of eggs, courtesy of a growers\u2019 association. But does Maryellen really want to eat those eggs, or even know what\u2019s inside them? This relatable protagonist, one among many such memorable characters, endures a progressively more disturbing experience that readers won\u2019t likely soon forget.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 17 tales herein feature an array of horrors. Some are blatantly sinister, like a serial killer who\u2019s more than she appears to be; others seem innocuous but have the potential to become outright menaces, like an apparatus for keeping pests out of a garden. In still other instances, the true horror doesn\u2019t reveal itself […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":6837,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6836","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\/6836"}],"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=6836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}