A healthy diet. Exercise. Sleep. Things to arm yourself with to promote good health and longevity.
But no one goes through life unscathed when accidents, sickness and disease can happen. Still, you have the chance to fight back with treatment, medicine and rest. And with these things on your side, the odds of winning are good. You may even make a full recovery.
Unless you go where the roaches are . . .
Dark bleatings, my lovely tribe! I had the pleasure of reading this so long ago and I’m so excited that it’s finally out so I can talk about it. CC has just excelled himself with this collection of twisted, interconnected stories. Before I dive into all its separate parts (I could not think of a less disturbing way to put that, I’m not as good a writer as CC), let me summarise my thoughts on this work as a whole.
It’s bloody brilliant. What I love is that the way the overall story of the location is told is just so much fun. Slices of information in each story that lets you put together the whole, sordid thing together as you progress through these increasingly unsettling tales. The fact that the overall story isn’t told in a linear fashion makes it feel disjointed, much like I imagine many of the characters feel throughout their own scary snippets.
And, of course, as always with this author, the writing is extremely pleasing. In terms of personal taste, I think this might be his most unsettling and spooky work yet, and it’s my favourite of everything I’ve read by him so far. Time to dive in!
I’LL HANG IN THERE
Jocelyn is a nurse that is constantly bearing the brunt of racism directed at her in a hospital in 1988. She experiences a trauma when she comes upon the body of a visitor, a woman visiting her husband, whose neck is somehow snapped. She’s the only one who has the kind of reaction you’d expect, and is scolded for being upset.
Jocelyn is such a sympathetic character and though I was initially a little confused (as I said, the stories are connected so treat this like chapters rather than stand alone tales), I was invested right away.
THE VISITOR’S BANQUET
1988 – same hospital (this applies to all following stories)
Shin Chan is admitted following a car accident, with lots of injuries and broken bones. Shin might be on the mend, but the accident was disastrous for others, and a terrifying visitor that comes at night makes sure he won’t forget it. This one utilises one of my very favourite horror…things…and it was scary!
UNINVITED GUESTS
1944
Darren’s horrible father is hospitalised. Everyone believes it was just an accident., but was it? Was it, indeed? The cockroaches turn up…
Jump to 1988. and we get a little more information about something from the first story, plus Jocelyn appears, along with a friend, a porter called Cordell.
Cordell (I’m trying to avoid spoilers here), comes across something horrifying, and another worker called Gavin digs up some history of the place and starts speculating on what’s been happening.
The plot unwinds and also thickens at the same time. The details the author is feeding in here are scary and highly interesting.
LITTLE BAG OF SECRETS
1988
Tristan (a doctor) is sleep deprived and seems to be hallucinating. Is he? I’m not telling you. Alicia, a bully who’s always horrible to Jocelyn, is asked an uncomfortable and revealing question by a patient.
I can’t say any more about this story without revealing too much of the plot, but there’s an extremely clever use of the time disorientation here, plus loads more of those delicious little interconnecting details.
BEFORE THE NIGHT IS OUT
Aaaaaand I really can’t go into this one at all because now we’re too deep into the overall plot. But I will say this – Alicia is a truly detestable bitch and I wished only the worst for her, and this story is scary as f***. Probably my favourite part so far.
EPILOGUE
I obviously can’t go into this either but needless to say, the ending slaps.
It’s REALLY good. Nuanced, detailed, really well put together. I would say this isn’t the kind of collection where the stories work as stand alones and even though they’re not linear, I must insist you read them in order, as intended. It’s really unnerving right from the first story and had my attention from the cover to the final page.
One of the best collections of this year for sure, possibly the best of all so far, in my humble opinion.
If you’d like to check out the book or the author – and honestly, why wouldn’t you?! – I’ve popped some links below for you:
Bleeeeat!
Happy Goat Horror 
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