Wednesday, April 14, 2021

What We've Been Reading #92

We have three recent reads to share with you today! We hope you find your new favorite book and don’t forget to click either tag above to find more recommendations.


Antioch by Jessica Leonard

Antioch used to be a quiet small town where nothing bad ever happened. Now six women have been savagely murdered. The media dubs the killer ‘Vlad the Impaler’ due to the gruesome crime scenes of his victims. Clues are drying up fast and the hunt for the monster responsible is hitting a dead end.

After picking up a late-night transmission on her short-wave radio, a local bookseller named Bess becomes convinced a seventh victim has already been abducted. Bess is used to spending her nights alone reading about Amelia Earhart conspiracy theories, and now a new mystery has fallen in her lap: one she might actually be able to solve.

Assuming she doesn’t also wind up abducted.

Antioch, a cross between Session 9 and Disappearance at Devil’s Rock, is an eerie mind-bending debut horror novel guaranteed to leave you drowning in paranoia. 

Goodreads | Amazon | Bookshop

Audra’s Teaser Review

A small town, a vicious string of murders, and a bookish girl who enjoys shortwave radio and conspiracy theories—Leonard’s unique debut horror novel had me hooked from the first page.

Read Audra’s entire review at Goodreads.


A Collection of Dreamscapes

A Collection of Dreamscapes poetry by Christina Sng

A Collection of Dreamscapes by Christina Sng is an exploration of the darkness inside us, the shadow-self that screams and begs, forever fighting to claw itself out. It’s a siren song of transformation, an uncovered diary that bleeds fairy tales and dystopias, and it reads like a grimoire full of spells and curses that bring monsters and madmen to life.

Between these pages, readers will meet women who hide behind the taste of poisoned apples, who set themselves on fire, who weep at riverbanks, the taste of freedom too much to swallow, too heavy to bear. They will be whisked away to faraway lands and unimaginable worlds, the drip of fog-soaked dreams a steady flow down their throats while they choke on betrayal and bathe in the waters of tears twice cried.

Sng’s poems are a blend of dark fantasy and science fiction, a changeling’s whisper and an ogre’s cry. They are both subtle and violent, and they weave themes of empowerment and strength through stars and earthquakes, forcing us to push away the rubble and look at what we’ve had to do to survive. They are the sacrifice in the forest and the haunting in the house, every gasp and ancient fear a reflection of the violence we’ve had to bury deep inside ourselves, all those battle cries and reimagined dreams we desperately try to forget. Here, Sng marries blood and magic, forever walking hand-in-hand with scar and ash, their imprints both a nightmare and a blessing, a dream and the truth.

Swallow them carefully. Once they’re inside you, there’s no getting them out.

Goodreads | Amazon | Bookshop

Laurie’s Teaser Review

This little book of dark poetry will entrance you with its dark magic and simmering rage. Within its pages, you will find fairytale worlds filled with magic, wonder, and furious brutality. If you like dark fiction, I recommend giving it a try. The poems are broken up into themed chapters that often progress from one to the next continuing in a story-like fashion.

Read Laurie’s entire review at her blog Bark at the Ghouls.


Ghastly Tales of Gaiety & Greed by E.F. Schraeder

Coasters, carousels, an old cemetery, and sprawling hotel on a stormy lakeside. Visit this haunted tour of scrapbook memories where legendary summers intersect with history and rumor. Told in vignettes that weave stories, newspaper clippings, postcards, and images, Ghastly Tales follows four families through the decades at a lakeside resort and amusement park where everyone eventually returns.

Goodreads | Amazon | Bookshop

Alex’s Teaser Review

The stories inside are more subtle and creepy than in your face, jump out at you and possess you, full blown terror… so I think readers who like slow-burn and build up will love this one!

Read Alex’s entire review at Goodreads.


Thank you for joining us today! We hope you found something to add to your tbr list. Please share your recent reads with us in the comments below.

If you are a LOHF writer and have a book you’d like us to consider for a review please visit our review submission page here.


Laurie is one of our LOHF Admins. Laurie creates our review posts, coordinates review requests, oversees the Ladies of Horror Fiction directory, and manages our LOHF Goodreads group.

You can find Laurie on her blog Bark’s Book Nonsense, on Twitter as @barksbooks, on Instagram as @barksbooks, and on Goodreads.

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