Literary Scene

Enjoy three scary tales for Halloween!

By Ryan G. Van Cleave

October, 2020

Night of the Mannequins
By Stephen Graham Jones

Let me start by sharing three things.

• I know Stephen. We went to graduate school together at FSU (in the late 90s).
• I’m trying hard to bring him to Ringling College as a speaker in spring 2021.
• He’s an incredibly talented writer, period.

While I’ve never reviewed any of his many books before here or elsewhere, this one prompted me to do so. Night of the Mannequins is a contemporary horror novella (136 pages) about…yep, a plastic human figure. Told by a terrifically unreliable narrator, Sawyer Grimes, it all starts innocently enough—a group of friends find a mannequin in a swamp, name him “Manny,” and use him to screw with other kids in the neighborhood. What’s wrong with a bit of weird fun, right?

Eventually, they get busy with their teen lives, and Manny gets forgotten.

But now those kids are nearly ready for college, and they want one last childhood romp before they all pass into the humdrum world of adulthood. Re-enter Manny and one final prank to top all previous pranks. How does it go? The opening line clues us in about the well-wrought horror to come.

So Shanna got a new job at the movie theater, we thought we’d play a fun prank on her, and now most of us are dead, and I’m really starting to feel guilty about it all.

This book is chock full of dark humor, trope-bending twists, and absurdity that just works. Sawyer’s a first-rate narrator with a great voice and the right amount of teen angst and half-truths. It’s a fine, fine read.

Ryan’s Rating: 4.5 Out of 5
www.DemonTheory.net

Last Case at a Baggage Auction
By Eric Guignard

I’m sucker for good book covers, and the spooky antique gramophone player here promises the kind of supernatural/horror/thriller tale that I’m always game to read. And this book delivers on that promise.

It’s Detroit in the early 1960s, and Charlie Stewart—a hoarder of sorts—loves to bid on items at the weekly baggage auctions. He lands a mysterious suitcase containing an old gramophone and some records. When played, there’s clearly something unnatural about the music that soon turned to eerie chanting that proves so captivating that Charlie’s friend, Joey, becomes enthralled. Spookily so.

And then a voice spoke.

Or, rather, chanted. Joey and I looked at each other. I immediately felt nauseous, the way castor oil curdles in your guts, and I saw Joey felt the same. The voice was a man’s and he spoke in slow solemn words, the intonations seeming to reverberate throughout my room in low bass rumbles. The words were unfamiliar, but emotions dripping with wet fog somehow filled each syllable, and my head swooned.

The chanting’s like an addiction. Charlie’s not quite as hooked as Joey is, and so he seeks to find out who the suitcase belonged to, and what’s the story with its mysterious—perhaps deadly?—contents. 

I’ll hold off saying more, but this is a fine novella clocking in at just over 100 pages, complete with lovely black-and-white noir-style illustrations throughout. The historical details feel spot-on, and the prose is smooth. Charlie might be a fool at times, but he’s entirely believable, and it’s easy to root for him as he tries to vanquish the unholy, unignorable music that could well be the cause for people in the Detroit community to go missing.

Ryan’s Rating: 4.25 Out of 5
www.EricJGuignard.com

Winter of the Wolf
by Martha Hunt Handler

Sam’s sister, Bean, is devastated when her brother is found dead in his bedroom during a frigid winter in small-town Minnesota. Everyone thinks it’s a suicide. Yes, it’s sad and horrible, but he simply hung himself, they decide. Bean doesn’t buy it. She might just be fifteen, but she knows him better than anyone—better than her other two older brothers, she thinks—and she’s determined to find out what actually happened.

Bean enlists her friend Julie to uncover the truth. Sam’s interest in Inuit beliefs cause them to immerse themselves in that world to try to figure out what might’ve happened, and the exploration of spirituality quickly becomes a key part of this book.

Readers who aren’t already fluent in Inuit beliefs and customs might feel they’ll be at a disadvantage, but that’s not the case. You’ll learn plenty as you read, and you’ll likely be caught up in both the family’s attempt at coping with loss and Bean’s ongoing pursuit for answers.

Somehow, this YA book manages to deal with tough topics like suicide, grief, loss, and animal death without being a total downer. It might even provide a sense of hope for readers who’ve known losses of their own, since the book affirms that those who leave this world are never truly gone.

From her bio as well as her writing, it’s clear that the author has deep passion for animals in general and wolves in specific. She’s the president of the Wolf Conservation Center, Protect Our Wolves, and all proceeds from the book go to that organization. 

Ryan’s Rating: 4 out of 5
www.MarthaHuntHandler.com