First edition, 160 pages
Published July 11, 2022 by Tor Nightfire.
From T. Kingfisher, the award-winning author of The Twisted Ones, comes What Moves the Dead, a gripping and atmospheric retelling of Edgar Allan Poe's classic "The Fall of the House of Usher."
When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania.
What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.
Aided by a redoubtable British mycologist and a baffled American doctor, Alex must unravel the secret of the House of Usher before it consumes them all.
Great retelling of the classic Poe story, with some actual horrific moments. While some elements were pretty obvious, it was still gripping and Kingfisher managed to keep it not too long, while also extending the original store which was actually too short!
So, it's not very scary or anything. It also has soldiers, which often makes me dislike stories. But ah. This one is exactly right for me. It has the right kind of mushrooms and queerness and feminism and I enjoyed so many little details in it.
Oh my gosh, I was really really enjoying this book up until maybe the last three chapters. Incredible how it pivoted so hard. I couldn't help but compare this to Mexican Gothic, a book I was a fan of. But this improved on that story in so many ways. The creepiness factor was really dialed up, and I found myself to be legitimately freaked out at times. I loved the body horror and almost alien, incomprehensible horror that they were trying to uncover. However all of that went downhill when Madeline, quite predictably, arose from the dead, being controlled by the fungus. That in and of itself wasn't an issue. I thought that was creepy. But having possessed a human, it gave voice to the fungus, which was apparently semi-conscious, had motivations, and was like a child wanting to learn more. There was a comically bad scene of Madeline moaning …
Oh my gosh, I was really really enjoying this book up until maybe the last three chapters. Incredible how it pivoted so hard. I couldn't help but compare this to Mexican Gothic, a book I was a fan of. But this improved on that story in so many ways. The creepiness factor was really dialed up, and I found myself to be legitimately freaked out at times. I loved the body horror and almost alien, incomprehensible horror that they were trying to uncover. However all of that went downhill when Madeline, quite predictably, arose from the dead, being controlled by the fungus. That in and of itself wasn't an issue. I thought that was creepy. But having possessed a human, it gave voice to the fungus, which was apparently semi-conscious, had motivations, and was like a child wanting to learn more. There was a comically bad scene of Madeline moaning like a zombie, pleading with the main character to help the fungus learn and grow. It instantly dashed the scariest part of the book, which was that this was a horrific, inescapable thing that happens because fungus doesn't have motivations, and it is a horrific thought that something without motivation can do such terrible things to living beings for seemingly no other reason than to propagate. A hard truth in nature. But making the fungus sentient just ruined it for me, honestly. I want to give the book credit for how gripped it was the majority of the time, but boy was this a disappointing ending.
Merged review:
Oh my gosh, I was really really enjoying this book up until maybe the last three chapters. Incredible how it pivoted so hard. I couldn't help but compare this to Mexican Gothic, a book I was a fan of. But this improved on that story in so many ways. The creepiness factor was really dialed up, and I found myself to be legitimately freaked out at times. I loved the body horror and almost alien, incomprehensible horror that they were trying to uncover. However all of that went downhill when Madeline, quite predictably, arose from the dead, being controlled by the fungus. That in and of itself wasn't an issue. I thought that was creepy. But having possessed a human, it gave voice to the fungus, which was apparently semi-conscious, had motivations, and was like a child wanting to learn more. There was a comically bad scene of Madeline moaning like a zombie, pleading with the main character to help the fungus learn and grow. It instantly dashed the scariest part of the book, which was that this was a horrific, inescapable thing that happens because fungus doesn't have motivations, and it is a horrific thought that something without motivation can do such terrible things to living beings for seemingly no other reason than to propagate. A hard truth in nature. But making the fungus sentient just ruined it for me, honestly. I want to give the book credit for how gripped it was the majority of the time, but boy was this a disappointing ending.
I'm sure I read The Fall of the House of Usher at some point, but I didn't retain enough that I had any particular expectations for the direction of the plot, etc.
However, I did read Mexican Gothic relatively recently, so I spent a good deal of What Moves the Dead, once the overall shape of the story became apparent, nodding along and waiting for the characters to catch up - it gave me a chuckle to see the reference to Mexican Gothic in the author's note.
Great writing, an intriguing reimagination of the classic.
I enjoyed the story but it missed a little for me. I love horror but this well-written tale did not scare me. The characters are good, the backstory too, but I want more than just atmosphere.
