Rating:
5/5 Gulps of Milk
Give me the short version:
Think you know horror? Will you know it when it fumbles along your face in the dead of night, presses flabby flesh across your gaping lips?
Some Will Not Sleep’s Halloween release is rushing at us on pattering little feet but by a stroke of fortune I got my grubby paws on an advance e-copy in exchange for an honest review.
Cut a long story short I’m now gagging to buy the limited edition hardcover with its eerie artwork as soon as the new store comes online {update: Hardcover copy acquired!!}. Quite the labour of love, Some Will Not Sleep is Mr Nevill’s first collection of shorts. An author who writes fluently and often about his work, he includes fascinating backstory on how these were compiled. The most enchanting thing about Some Will Not Sleep as a collection is its scope, you really get a sense of what Mr Nevill is capable of when the gloves come off. Honestly, it is impossible to adore every single piece an author puts out. Especially an author looking to extend themselves, because nobody’s brain is wired exactly like yours and other people often want to explore different side trails. That’s where the awesomeness of short stories comes in. You get variety, there’s something to push everyone’s sticky buttons. Over time you’re also furbished a smeared window on the development of the author’s obsessions. Tackling horror and humanity Mr Nevill writes with his trademark flourishes of miserable, naked honesty; a direct challenge for you to look away, to try and deny this is happening. All the stories gave me the shudders but neck and neck my favourites were Mother’s Milk and What God Hath Wrought? for their unusualness and deep unsettling sense of transgression. If, like me, you’d read the novels and thought you knew Nevill you have quite the treat coming. And if you have never heard of Mr Nevill you have quite the treat coming.
My favourite bit:
“… as soon as I’m in the garden the grass catches my eye and holds my stare. It grows in my dreams. Sometimes in the middle of the night I imagine I’ve woken up face-down, and that I’m pushing my nose and mouth into the lawn’s soft pelt, sucking the sugary blades.”