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Blood Moon Rising by Amelia Faulkner (Tooth & Claw #2)

A pack in turmoil. A ray of sunlight. A moon that demands blood... Randall Carter is in love. If only he could say it to Ellis’ face, but he’s been too busy - or too much of a coward - and now he may never get that chance. With the threat of a blood moon looming in the night sky his Alpha is on the warpath against both a new pack invading his territory and the vampire lover he ordered Randall to destroy. Ellis O’Neill’s problems are mounting fast. Randall’s Alpha wants to kill him, a vampire neighbour invites him to join some sort of coup, and his secrets are stacking up like firewood waiting for a single spark to set them ablaze. The last person he expects to betray his trust is the man he’s fallen in love with. Torn between love and obligation, Randall soon realises that he can’t satisfy both. He’ll have to choose, but the cost may well be more terrible than he can imagine. COVER ARTIST: Cover Design by Amelia Faulkner and Jen Fowler PUBLISHER: Ravensword Press YEAR: 2015 LENGTH: 268...
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Lucky Girl by Mary Rickert

Ro, a struggling writer, knows all too well the pain and solitude that holiday festivities can awaken. When she meets four people at the bar at the local diner—all of them strangers and as lonely as Ro is—she invites them to an impromptu Christmas dinner. And when that party seems in danger of an early end, she suggests they each tell a ghost story. Something seasonally appropriate.

But Ro will come to learn that the horrors hidden in a Christmas tale—or one’s past—can never be tamed once unleashed.

TITLE: Lucky Girl, How I Became A Horror Writer: A Krampus Story
AUTHOR: Mary Rickert
PUBLISHER: Tordotcom
YEAR: 2022
LENGTH: 112 pages 
AGE: Adult
GENRE: Horror
RECOMMENDED: Yes

Queer Rep Summary: No canon queer rep.

*I received a free review copy in exchange for an honest review of this book. 

LUCKY GIRL is a horror novel set at a succession of Christmases, following a young woman who has a Christmas dinner with strangers one year and their lives become entangled.

Usually I can tell pretty quickly whether I'll like a book or not, and I wasn't won over by the opening. But this one turned positive for me when they started telling the ghost stories, and I came away liking it a great deal. Some of the quirks in the main character's narrative style made it hard to tell how seriously the narrative was taking certain things, as she has a very flat way of conveying distressing information. This has a fascinating payoff and ended up being a new favorite character-driven ending for me. 

It touches on a wide variety of traumatic situations while avoiding graphic details on most of them. This means that while it's difficult to emotionally brace for what's about to be discussed in the narrative, there also isn't as much to brace for as there easily could have been.

This a well crafted bit of horror with a truly excellent payoff, don't miss it!

CW for cursing, grief, alcohol, fatphobia (brief), eating disorder, colonization (brief mention), kidnapping, confinement, fire/fire injury (not depicted), pregnancy (brief), blood (brief mention), gore (brief mention), pedophilia (brief mention), car accident (not depicted), suicide (not depicted), parental death, murder, death.

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The top of an ornate iron gate, with a dark forest behind it


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