Good websites for reviews and criticism of literary horror fiction?

July 14, 2020 1:05 PM

I've long been interested in the horror genre, but there are tons of novels and short stories out there and most of them, in my experience, are terribly written. I'm looking for websites, podcasts, newspaper reviewers, etc that will provide me with recommendations and discussions about horror fiction with an eye towards well-written, interesting stuff that's on the literary side of the spectrum.

Stuff that I have enjoyed reading recently has been written by authors like Samanta Schweblin, Carmen Maria Machado, Laird Barron, Shirley Jackson and John Langan. I find Nathan Ballingrud a bit dull but I like his general project of using techniques from literary fiction to tell genre stories. In the past I've wound up trawling through Shirley Jackson Award nominee lists to try to find more work I might like, but surely I can't be the only reader who prefers their gruesome tales to have an MFA sheen?

Things I am generally not interested in are 10-novel cycles about the zombie apocalypse, sparkly vampire novels and their descendants, true crime, and YA fiction. I don't think those things are bad! I'm just personally not interested in them. (Also the zombie novels are probably bad.) But in general I'm more interested in quality writing than in the specific subgenre something fits into.

Anyways, I'm hoping someone can recommend a good site or podcast or online community that produces interesting criticism and commentary about this type of work. Bonus points if there's some kind of discussion apparatus. I suppose I'd even check out a subreddit if I have to, but would prefer to avoid twitter if possible.

posted by whir to Media & Arts (12 answers total)

Have you read Dracula?

An English professor of mine once said, "There are two great horror stories, Frankenstein and Dracula. Frankenstein is a great movie but a lousy book, and Dracula is a lousy movie but a great book."

He was correct.
posted by Dolley at 1:44 PM on July 14, 2020

I have several potential book or author recommendations, but the most popular horror novel podcast I know is Books in the Freezer. I don't know if you're going to find a podcast that focuses specifically on literary horror, but a good general horror novel podcast will help you find the stuff that's worth your time.
posted by gideonfrog at 1:54 PM on July 14, 2020 [1 favorite]

Thoughts and Fancies of a Fake Geek Boy posts a lot of what I consider good reviews of horror content - look through the author list on the right; they have a 10+ year archive.

There's also Doris V. Sutherland, who's done quite a bit of writing on horror both on her own blog and on other sites.
posted by sagc at 2:03 PM on July 14, 2020 [1 favorite]

This doesn't quite answer your question as asked (so feel free to flag and delete) but if you don't know about Ellen Datlow, you should. She's one of the preeminent editors of horror and has been working in the field of literary horror for decades - picking up one of her anthologies will almost definitely give you some new authors whose work you'll enjoy. She co-edited The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror anthology for years, as well as solo editing Best Horror of the Year. When I see her name on an anthology I know there's good stuff inside.
posted by athenasbanquet at 2:38 PM on July 14, 2020 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: I'm definitely happy to get book and author recommendations, too, but I'm mostly looking for sources of new leads to stuff I'd like, so I don't need to come back and post another question once I've read them all. Thanks for the suggestions so far, they look promising!
posted by whir at 2:40 PM on July 14, 2020

In a way, you're there--MeFi is where I first read Carmen Maria Machado in 2013 (further coverage), Samanta Schweblin's stories and novel have been posted, and I've surveyed good chunks of older weird lit over the past year and posted some other good candidates in the past.

But other sites I can suggest are r/WeirdLit (it's not all Lovecraft, etc.), r/horrorlit (it's not all King, Barker, etc.), r/booklists (two lists about genre-bending horror and diverse weird fiction yesterday), Revenant Journal, Studies in Gothic Fiction, and usual suspects for literary fiction like LitHub Daily (there's an email subscription).
posted by Wobbuffet at 2:41 PM on July 14, 2020 [3 favorites]

Eric Brown's reviews in the Guardian have been useful to me in finding new SF to read. Some months there'll be a horror novel or two among his reviews. There's generally enough in the reviews to work out if I'll like something (and I too lean to the more literary side of things).
posted by pipeski at 3:23 PM on July 14, 2020 [2 favorites]

Tor Nightfire is the arm of Tor that does horror. Their blog often has literary criticism and recommendations as well. I’ve found some great stuff through them. Emily Hughes, who writes for Nightfire, also has an excellent newsletter about horror called Nightmare Fuel. (I’m on mobile; sorry for the lack of links!)
posted by incountrysleep at 4:04 PM on July 14, 2020 [3 favorites]

By nature of the series they are "Classics," but I've read some great literary horror just scrolling through the NYRB catalogue. Including plenty of stuff not necessarily written about as such.

This* is also an area I enjoy immensely and there seems to be quite a bit of it right now (whether the more straightforward like Victor LaValle or the straight up, dark comedy bonkers body horror of Mona Awad or, lord, Evie Wyld (she has a new one coming, if I recall correctly. I recommendations off of LitHub and The Millions. Every now and then I'll find a thing on Electric Lit, but sometimes that gets too predictable.

Anyway, following this thread closely.

*Literary horror, also the dark side of magical realism--Obscene Bird of Night is one of my favorites. I'm similarly off on vampires, zombies and true crime stuff. Also, if I never read another post-apocalyptic survivor book for the rest of my life, it will be too soon.
posted by thivaia at 12:41 PM on July 15, 2020 [1 favorite]

I've literally just found a wordpress blog with some great reviews of new and older literary horror and weird fiction, and I thought of you! The author also links out to others from time to time so you may be able to start building a circle of similar blogs. MarzAat
posted by Acheman at 1:01 AM on July 20, 2020

And, whoops, I've just read some more of this blogger's reviews and it's started to become apparent that they're a racist. Why is the internet like this. I hate everything. Sorry for jumping in with a recommendation before I read more, I got overexcited.
posted by Acheman at 1:31 AM on July 20, 2020

Response by poster: As a quick update, the blog Acheman posted led me to librarything.com, which I knew about before but hadn't used much; adding a few of my favorites to my library there has got it kicking up much better suggestions than I was getting on GoodReads, Amazon or Audible, and it's got a few groups that seem interesting. Also the Tor Nightfire blog has a few more listicles than I'd like but there seems to be some good stuff in there, and I there are some interesting essays in Revenant Journal (despite the site seeming to be running on someone's 8-year-old laptop). Thanks!
posted by whir at 1:22 PM on July 29, 2020