Let’s unsettle this once and for all
Three disturbing books. What goes on in brains, man.
The important thing to remember about October is that, just because Halloween season ends, it doesn’t mean you have to let the Spirit of Halloween fade away! Nay, friend. You can keep that ember glowing within your heart and shine its dark light upon whomsoever crosses your path. So get these now and read them to little ones in the old tradition of ghost stories at Christmas (a real thing), and watch their wide eyes fill with tears in the sparkling firelight! Thank you, Spirit of Halloween!
Just kidding, of course. I love children and am not in the business of making them cry. But I do have another EELS edition of scary books for you. These won’t exactly keep you up at night, like some of the ones from our last delightful romp, but they will make you feel like, “What?” or possibly “My collar is too tight” or possibly “A spider has found a home behind my ear” or even “Time to flee!”
I love this stuff. I also love books about calm walks down a gravel lane. And books about kids saving the world. People contain multitudes. Give it a shot.
Do you have friends who like to read? Forward this email to them or share on your socials by hitting the button below! Together, we can find something for them! I know it!
🍅 Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales
Yoko Ogawa, Steven Snyder (translator), 2013
Dark tales, a woo-ooo! Is this 11 separate dark tales for real? Or is it one big tale? I’ve been trying to figure this out since I finished it yesterday. What does the title mean? I literally just wondered this as I typed it up above. The friend who gave it to me and I were all, “I feel like it gets a little too too towards the end” and then simultaneously we were like, “Wait, maybe this is intentional” and then we had a lot more thoughts, and suddenly, we were a Yoko Ogawa book club. Or a college course. Or A Swim in a Pond in the Rain (see EELS: Working title).
At one point, Revenge references itself, calling its own prose spare and unremarkable. I liked the style! It makes you want to analyze every word and tomato and tiger. There’s something about Japanese literature translated into English that I just find very… something. Clear. That might be it. Well, this is clear, beautiful, and unsettling as all get-out.
Recommended to: Those who like horror but are a little bit dainty and precious. It’s like precious, dainty horror! I don’t know how else to describe it.
Want to see what books I’ve recommended in the past? Guess what—I’ve created a handy spreadsheet with all sorts of helpful info to help you choose your next read, and if you’re an EELS subscriber, I’ll give you access to it. It’s free, it’s easy, maybe it’ll help!
🎍 Goth
Otsuichi, Andrew Cunningham (Translator), Jocelyne Allen (Translator), 2002
Another Japanese clear-beautiful-wtf book that features a duo of creepy pals that I’d completely forgotten about until I met another duo of pals in the second story in Revenge.
Content-wise, Goth is nothing like Revenge, though. It’s a lot more blood, and, warning, there’s definitely some harm done to children. It’s not for the faint of heart. Wrongs are committed. Protagonists are complicated. (It’s about a girl obsessed with murders, and the narrator friend who is obsessed with her, after all.) Antagonists are despicable. Trees are bare. Bamboo grows at odd angles. Mysteries abound, and the unlikely pair is going to solve them, but not for the reasons you think.
Recommended to: Those who have a strong stomach and a flexible sense of justice.
🐟 Cold Skin
Albert Sánchez Piñol, Cheryl Leah Morgan (Translator), 2002
Hark! I was many chapters into this book before I was convinced that it was not the book upon which the 2019 movie The Lighthouse, starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson, was based. It’s the late 1910s, and a guy goes to take over for another guy for a long stint on an isolated, wave-beaten island somewhere beyond Cape Horn. His job is to make notes about the weather or something. There’s another guy over on the other end of the island who tends to the lighthouse, and he’s got various rules the new guy can’t break, or else!
Before long, things start happening. Strange things. Fishy things. Extremely fishy things. Extremely fishy things with sharp teeth that attack at night. This is one of those books where you feel like you are absolutely 100% there on this rocky godforsaken place, growing beards, hauling nets around, wearing tattered sweaters, fearing for your life. It’s a creature book, but it’s really a psychological book, of course. Who is the real monster? We all know the answer to this one.
Recommended to: Those who want something really different to creep them out. I mean, honestly, this whole email is full of things that fit this description, but this one… hoo boy.
And now, a bonus recommendation
🤥 Never Lie — Freida McFadden, 2023
Recommended to: “Those who love a suspenseful page turner that makes you ponder how far you may go to keep a secret a secret.”
Recommended by: My sister-in-law, Autumn! She’s one of those who supports my theory that extremely sweet people are often really into dark content. The last three books she loved were Demon Copperhead, Turtles all the Way Down, and Pretty Little Wife.
That was the twenty-sixth EELS! Next week, I swear, no more scary stuff. I would be just so grateful if you’d share widely with your networks! As always, send any and all questions, feedback, and shouted book recommendations by hitting reply.
📚 Susan