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From Dean Koontz, the international bestselling master of suspense, comes an epic thriller about a terrifying killer and the singular compassion it will take to defeat him. Woody hasn’t spoken a word in his eleven years. Kipp is a dog who is devoted to people. When he hears the boy who communicates like he does, without speaking, Kipp knows he needs to find him before it’s too late. Woody’s fears are taking shape. A man driven by evil has set a depraved plan into motion. And only a force greater than evil can stop what’s coming next. Read Devoted today.
The Mummy (1999) is, as S.A. Bradley calls it, my “first kiss” with horror. Though it’s absolutely a summer blockbuster action film, Stephen Sommers’ love story between Imhotep and Anck-su-Namun will forever be my #relationshipgoals. After all, death is only the beginning.
The movie about the preserved corpses didn’t scare me so much in Imhotep’s reign of evil, but rather his punishment of being mummified alive. I know now as an adult that the “hom dai” is not a practice supported in concept by archaeological research, but rather the Hollywood-ified Planet Egyptland version of Ancient Egypt that popular culture has come to know and love. (Make no mistake: I know it’s bullshit, and problematic, and yet I also love it.)
In fact, you’ll notice as we navigate through this realm of hell, preserved corpses, that while many of the corpses are of people of color, very few of the authors are of color. I attribute that disproportion to Orientalism, or the long-enduring Victorian obsession with Egypt and its remains, but that’s just my opinion. The fact is that we don’t have many books about preserved corpses by authors of color, though the corpses themselves are often non-white. Take, for example, this Diorama surprise, which featured a human skull. Or the amazing Mary Roach’s how-to guide on the historical practice of shrinking human heads. Even the inimitable David Sedaris has his story “The Gift of Owls,” in which he says, “It would have been disturbing to see the skeleton of a slain Pygmy in a museum, but finding him in a shop, for sale, raised certain questions, uncomfortable ones, like: How much is he?”
Nonetheless, you’re in The Fright Stuff, Book Riot’s weekly newsletter about the latest and greatest in horror. I’m Mary Kay McBrayer, and I’ll be your Virgil through this realm. Call it Duat, the bog, the funeral parlor… wherever preserves your body after your death.
Earworm: “Back to Life” by Soul II Soul–However do you want me? However do you need me?
New Releases:
Death by Shakespeare by Kathryn Harkup
This new release talks about the deaths that Shakespeare wrote about in his plays, and whether they can be validated by science. For example: can you really kill someone by pouring poison in their ear? Shock? Sadness? Fear? Shame? And, most relevantly, how did Juliet look dead for 72 hours and then rise to perfect health?
“Bog Girl: A Romance” from Orange World and Other Stories by Karen Russell
I’ve loved Karen Russell’s writing for a long-ass time, but these stories rival my long-time favorites in the weirdly horrific. I know I told y’all about one of them in last week’s newsletter, but this one, about the boy who works the peat bog and then finds a bog girl and then falls in love with her… deeply unsettling in the most romantic way.
The Mummy of Canaan by Maxwell Bauman
Though this novel utilizes the trope of the mummy’s curse, American teens are the ones who wake it from its rest in Israel and allow its rage to begin. The noir-like narration lends itself well to this interesting retelling.
Cryptkeepers:
Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor
You know I had to include this most classic southern gothic tale if we were talking about mummies! Flannery O’Connor at her epoch-Flannery-O’Connor, here. Featuring an anti-religious prophet, a sex worker, and a stolen museum artifact… you won’t regret reading this one in one sitting.
Mostly Dead Things by Karen Arnett
If you have a macabre sense of humor–and you must, because here you find yourself–this novel is for you. After her father’s suicide, Jessa takes over the family’s taxidermy shop in Florida. From there, things get out of hand.
El Negro and Me by Frank Westerman
In this book of nonfiction, Frank Westerman writes about his interactions with a centuries-old mummified man, displayed in a Spanish museum, from present-day Botswana. In this book, he not only details his personal emotional reaction to the obvious disrespect, but also the man’s return to his homeland. (This title has yet to be translated into English, though it is currently available in ten other languages.)
Nine Years Under: Coming of Age in an Inner-City Funeral Home by Sheri Booker
More macabre humor! This memoir tells the rites of passage of Sheri Booker, who grew up in her family’s West Baltimore funeral home. Their funeral home was “never short on business,” and she witnesses every form of grieving from brawling to bawling.
Rest in Pieces: The Curious Fates of Famous Corpses by Bess Lovejoy
This book of nonfiction is almost an ethnography: it’s a series of detailed accounts of famous corpses. Want to know what happened to Elvis Presley’s body? Osama Bin Laden’s? Grigori Rasputin’s? Eva Peron’s? All of them are in this book. It’s. so. fascinating!
Hadriana in All My Dreams by René Depestre, translated by Kaiama L. Glover
Though this novel is less about a preserved corpse and more about the traditional folklore of the Haitian zombie, I think it still deserves to be on this list. For one: zombies in the traditional sense are NOT walking corpses, but rather souls imprisoned in their own bodies and controlled by another person. The narrative of this book follows one such victim who, on her wedding day, drinks the zombie-making potion. It’s a must-read for any zombie lover who needs to be disillusioned about their origins, but who also loves a rapt plot.
Harbingers (FKA news):
Stop the press: a posthumous story by Katherine Dunn, beloved author of beloved horror novel, Geek Love, has just been released. Click here to read “The Resident Poet.” I cannot wait.
Click here to read about the Doomed Mouse Utopia That Inspired the ‘Rats of NIMH.’
Want to see how the economy fared in other pandemics? Click here to read about the 1381 Black Plague peasant revolt. And if you want to read about Bloody Saturday, the 1918 strike after the Influenza pandemic, click here.
I guess we can call it horror? Stephenie Meyer is releasing her spin-off to Twilight, entitled Midnight Sun.
One of my favorite horror authors, Samanta Schweblin, talks about tackling writer’s block (or not), inspirations, and book she wishes she had read in this interview! (Her book Little Eyes just released, too)
In case you missed it, James Baldwin wrote about the Atlanta Child Murders. That’s some real life horror, right there.
Atlas Obscura is launching the Obscura Academy. This challenge is to create your own map, including history, or monsters, or krakens of the deep. You know, chart your own course.
Rest in peace John Lafia, Child’s Play co-screenwriter.
Joe Keery (Steve Harrington) hints at a “scarier” season 4 of Stranger Things.
Don’t forget to enter to win $50 to your favorite Indie Bookstore!
And, click here for a chance to win a 1-year subscription to Kindle Unlimited!
Until next week, follow me @mkmcbrayer for minute-to-minute horrors or if you want to ask for a particular theme to a newsletter. I’m also on IG @marykaymcbrayer. Talk to you soon!
Your Virgil,
Mary Kay McBrayer
Co-host of Book Riot’s literary fiction podcast, Novel Gazing