What I'm Reading: Booklist July 2025 STARS

I have five reviews in the July 2025 issue of Booklist so I am breaking it all up into 2 posts. Today I have the starred reviews and tomorrow the other three. All 5 are EXCELLENT and worth your time.

As usual, I have my draft reviews here on the blog with bonus info including my three words.

STAR

Black Flame

By Gretchen Felker-Martin

First published July 2025 (Booklist).

Aug. 2025. 208p. Tor Nightfire, paper, $18.99  (9781250348012); e-book (9781250348029). 

"Sometimes watching a movie is a bit like being raped,” states the very apt epigraph at the start of Felker-Martin’s (Cuckoo) latest. 1985, NYC, Ellen is a young Jewish woman from a wealthy family, working as a film preservationist. Her struggling company takes on a recently unearthed Nazi banned, German cult film, Black Flame, full of queer characters, sex, and murder. Ellen, forced to give up her homosexuality or be disowned, is extremely unsettled before she begins restoring the film, leading its subject matter to both entrance and deeply unmoor her. The film begins stalking Ellen, invading her dreams, even physically injuring her. Horror readers know none of this will end well, but they will relish every precious moment spent with this intense tale. Deliciously nasty, vicious, and erotic, this novel succeeds equally on two distinct tiers of terror– a perfect portrayal of the disorientation of being deeply closeted, and a cursed media story in which the film’s sinister agenda reaches out from the screen and grabs hold of all who encounter it. An easy sell to those who enjoy disquieting cursed movie novels like Night Film by Pessl and Horror Movie by Tremblay but also suggest to fans of the psychological horror classic, The Drowning Girl by Kiernan.

Three Words That Describe This Book: immersive, details of film preservation, disorienting

Further Appeal: Other words: vicious, nasty, erotic, discomfort, engrossing, historical, Jewish immigrants, NYC setting

That epigraph WOWZA-- it is perfect to portray what is coming. I had to remove the attribution for word count but it is Luis Buñuel, "My Last Sigh." I even noted the epigraph when I began reading in my notes to see if it would be worth it. The quote was striking, and I thought well this is a big swing, will it pay off. It did! It was totally awesome to see that happen. This is a story you fell course through your entire body.

This book is 5 stars as a cursed film horror novel but it is also 5 stars in how it depicts what it would feel like to be deeply closeted and unable to escape-- unable both because she feels trapped by her family to be straight but also psychologically as she is unable to understand her own feelings.

I am a straight cis woman, but I FELT, literally felt, all of the emotions Ellen was struggling with-- fear, anger, desire, pain.... That is the sign of a great book, if the reader can feel the intense emotions.

Short on pages-- but honestly, it is the perfect length. I never thought it needed more. You can read it in 1 or 2 sittings. Fewer sittings the better, so you can get caught up in the psychological horror.

This is a nasty, viscous, and erotic story-- all of this is high praise. Not visceral in the traditional grey horror sense-- but in the literal sense of the word. I think nasty and vicious and erotic are better than visceral here. They are more accurately descriptive.

As cursed media film go-- this is also intense. An exploitative film filled with sex and murder and just over the top, made by a Jewish auteur just before he and most of the people in the film were sent to the camps by Nazi's.

The setting -- 1985 NYC with a family of wealthy Jews, who while not super religious are in America because the family matriarch-- Ellen's grandmother-- is a Holocaust survivor. I was about 15 years younger than Ellen is in the story in 1985, but boy did Felker-Martin capture my family. Thankfully, not the homophobia, but the obsession with keeping up those the upper class NYC appearances, the obsession with being thin, and the family dynamics. 

This book will attack you-- the reader. And that is 100% NOT an exaggeration. Again- immersive-- be ready to be subsumed in the world of Black Flame-- the book and the movie.

Just read it and let Felker-Martin tell you this story. Submit to this book and I promise, you will love the journey. And the ending is PERFECT!

Readalikes: The above capture it well. Any intense well executed and disorienting cursed media books are good readalikes. I had to cut Silver Nitrate by Moreno-Garcia but that is a good one too.

STAR

We Are Always Tender with Our Dead.

By Eric LaRocca.

Sept. 2025. 304p. Titan, $27.99  (9781803368672); e-book (9781803368689). 
REVIEW. First published July 2025 (Booklist).

Move over Derry, Maine! LaRocca, master of transgressive Horror introduces readers to Burnt Sparrow, NH  in the first of a planned epic trilogy, spread out over multiple decades. Book One begins disturbingly as hundreds of townspeople lay dead, in the middle of the road, in the center of town, the victims of an attack at a Christmas parade, allegedly perpetrated by 3 faceless humanoids. The engrossing tale features two narrators, 17 year-old Rupert and Gladys, the wife of the richest man in town, who lead readers through their own personal nightmares, while Larocca works to bring them together, simultaneously building the rich and dangerous history of a town thoroughly infested with evil through news clippings, diary entries, and stand-alone short stories. Expertly balancing extreme disgust and awe-inspiring wonder, LaRocca pushes readers to their limit with his use of graphic and  illicit sex and violence, making them squirm with intense discomfort, forcing them  to confront the truth about the horrors all humans inflict, especially on those they love the most. The results, mesmerizing; the thought of waiting for Book Two, unbearable. Think Twin Peaks by way of The Twisted Ones by Kingfisher and A Game in Yellow by Hailey Piper.

Three Words The Describe This Book: transgressive, engrossing, epic

Further Appeal: This book feeds off of many of Horror traditions and yet it is wholly original.

This is meant to be a  900 page epic but it is broken into 3 parts. How to judge part 1? Well it has everything Eric LaRocca does best with his transgressive horror-- it makes you squirm, is disturbing, balances disgust and wonder, violent, sexually violent as well. It is about how we hurt the ones who we love the most. But it is also about how retribution is always impossible and seeking vengeance might feel good in the moment, but it is a bad idea.

Expect full body participation like in call LaRocca works. LaRocca's stories are UNCOMFORTABLE-- pushing as far as you think he can and then going a few steps further-- but it is all in service of the thought- provoking goal for you to discover a truth about yourself through the process. The overall feeling of experiencing a LaRocca story is that you are mesmerized. It is as if you are in trance while reading-- you are feeling uneasy while reading, but you absolutely do not want to stop.

So we get all of that which we who enjoy LaRocca's stories expect and then we get the beginnings of what looks like a promising epic tale. The world of Burnt Sparrow seems to unravel for readers with ease, but if you take just a small step back to look at it all it is clear that LaRocca is building this weird, claustrophobic, and extremely dangerous town meticulously. We have two main narrators-- 17 yo Rupert and the wife of one of the richest men in town, Gladys. By the end of the book the two are together, but in between we see the horrors they are living-- both because this town is clearly infected with evil, monsters, and tragedy-- more than any town should be able to bear and their own personal nightmarish situations, and because their home situations suck.

Knowing that this is part 1 of 3, I was judging the work to see if the town was developed enough that I would want to revisit it. Short version is-- wow, yes it was. Longer version-- LaRocca adds in ephemera-- news reports, embedded stories, diary entries-- all add depth to the town but also hint at even more mysteries and horrors than the one Rupert and Gladys are living through.

Speaking of the "current" horror of the main storyline of book 1, it's creatively creepy. Hundreds of townspeople are killed at a Christmas Day parade by a 3 person family of faceless humanoid creatures. And when I tell you this is but the top of the iceberg....trust me. 

Part one ends with a great twist (something that adds intrigue for the next book beyond the need to read more about Burnt Sparrow) but then there is also a nice coda -- in the form of a story told by one character to another-- to settle down the worst of the horror enough for readers to wait for part 2. 

It is 5 stars precisely because he has created a town where I know a lot but it is all still so weird and unexplained. Snippets of info have been given to add context to the true horror that is Burnt Sparrow.
The only negative here is the waiting for parts two and three.

Readalikes: Other topics beyond what is above-- It by Stephen King and The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt. The town here is similar to the one in Hex because can you leave? I am not sure here, which is cool because I need to read more to find out. At least some people probably can't. Also a mention of how other towns know they exist but try to ignore them. All similar to the world
building in Hex. 

The works of Kathe Koja and Clive Barker as well are excellent realizes for this book as well.