When Things Get Dark: Stories Inspired By Shirley Jackson

TipToe by Laird Barron ★★★★★ 

That sent shivers all the way up my spine and down again for more.  I listened to the end three times.  

Take Me, I Am Free by Joyce Carol Oates ★★★★½  
That story was so short yet so painful.  A little girl is put out with the trash by a mother with severe postpartum depression.  Not everyone was meant to be a mother but that’s a bell you can’t unring.

Hag by Benjamin Percy ★★★★☆ 
Oooh, that took its time but had payoff!  Every family needs a little mother-daughter vs monster bonding time.

A Trip to Paris by Richard Kadrey ★★★★☆ 
Whether it was the ghosts of her murdered family, toxic mold, or guilt, a family annihilator eats her own pie.

In the Deep Woods; The Light is Different There by Seanan McGuire ★★★★☆ 

Gorgeous little story about a recently divorced woman who moves into her deceased father’s lake house and befriends her fey neighborhoods.   Woodfolk take care of their own and fey repay their favors with violent interest.

Something Like Living Creatures by John Langan   ★★★½☆

You can’t stop there!  I want to know everything about these spooky pagan girls living in Maine.  What did the organs say?!?!?

Refinery Road by Stephen Graham Jones ★★★½☆
Jones has this sturdy way of writing ghost stories - they are meaty and meaningful.  It’s unique.  

Skinder’s Veil by Kelly Link ★★★½☆  

A doctoral student housesit’s for Death.  There were several stories-within-the-story.  The extra half star is for Turtle story, which was not the worst story she had ever heard about marriage.  Man that made me laugh!

Funeral Birds by M. Rickert  ★★★½☆
A home health care worker with a murderous secret is haunted by her last client.

For Sale By Owner by Elizabeth Hand ★★★☆☆ 
Older snoopy ladies decide to slumber squat in a fancy house abandoned in the woods.  Things get a little spooky.

The Door in the Fence by Jeffrey Ford ★★★☆☆ 
A boy’s memory of the odd widow next door who became “her own kind of woman.”  This was quite odd but entertaining.

Pear of Anguish by Gemma Files ★★★☆☆ 
Ouch those preteen years are tough, for me they were harder than all of high school.  Not everyone makes it, I remember the funeral.  It’s best not to pick at those scars.

Special Meal by Josh Malerman ★★★☆☆ 
More of a tribute to Kurt Vonnegut’s Harrison Bergeron than anything I have read or heard of from Shirley Jackson.

The Party by Paul Tremblay ★★½☆☆  
With shades of The Masque of the Red Death we enter a party with dislikable characters.  But by the end you are just at some awkward office party - lame.

Quiet Dead Things by Cassandra Khaw ★★½☆☆ 
This is about a town with ugly secrets I know not where or when.  It was entertaining but it did not go anywhere.

Money of the Dead by Karen Heuler ★★½☆☆ 
No, bringing back the dead is never a good idea.  This was sad and boring.

Sooner of Later, Your Wife Will Drive Home by Genevieve Valentine ★★☆☆☆ 
Not sure what this was meant to be other than depressing.

A Hundred Miles and a Mile by Carmen Maria Machado ★☆☆☆☆ 
As usual with this author, I wonder why I wasted my time.

I finished all 18 stories for a total of 3.2 stars.