Horror anthologies can be so hit or miss for me. I tend to avoid collections published by one author unless I know their work because I have specific tastes for horror and I dislike the ambiguous short stories the genre often results in. I made an exception for The Shapes of Midnight and I am so glad I did!
This is a VERY short collection (~100 pages) of horror stories which are mostly basic in concept but are executed really well. The first two were my least favourite and the most straightforward of the bunch but it was all uphill from there. If you could plot my ratings of these on a graph, it would almost be a perfect bell curve because I felt the middle stories were definitely the strongest. My Kindle ARC was sadly missing two stories (Canavan’s Back Yard and Slime) which might also be why it felt so short to me.
No of stories: 10 (12 in actual collection)
Diary of a Werewolf-What it says on the tin. This was definitely one the weaker ones. It wasn't bad but it was very straightforward and there were no surprises or depth to it.
The Corpse of Charlie Rull-A man dies in a radioactive river and comes back to life. Slightly better than the one above because I couldn't tell where it was going and it was less of a standard plot. I also loved the way this opened, it had a fantastic style to it.
The Pavilion-A very creepy story about a man who murders his friend and returns to check if the body has been dislodged by the sea. This grabbed my attention and kept me excited to see what was going to happen next.
House of Memory-A different type of horror story to most and a refreshing addition to the collection. A woman is forced out of her childhood home and refuses to accept it has been demolished, much to the confusion of her family. Another very decent and enjoyable one.
The Willow Platform-A man in a small town finds an evil demon book. The writing style of this was very entertaining but I wasn't a fan of the story topic itself, which is probably just personal preference.
Who Was He?-A man in hospital keeps getting visits from a hospital barber. This was hands down my favourite of the whole bunch. I read it late at night and was genuinely very scared by it.
Disappearance-Another very strong story about a man whose brother has gone missing and the narrator suspects he killed him. The 'twist' of this was very easy to guess but it was still entertaining and possibly my second favourite.
The Horror at Chilton Castle-A man lives near a castle which has a secret sealed room, the contents of which are only shown to the heirs of Earls. This started off strong but the actual contents of the room turned it into not my type of horror story. It was still one of the best and definitely had some good horror moments.
The Impulse to Kill-A man who has the urge to kill devises a way to do so without being arrested for it. This is a neat enough idea for a story and it was well-written but it suffers from being very linear and not having a lot beyond the basic concept.
The House on Hazel Street-Upon entering a house, a man realises he has no memory of why he is there. The occupant of the house has a specific request of him. This story has one of the more unique concepts in the anthology and it was good but not one of my absolute favourites.
I debated between 3.5 and 4 stars for a while but I felt 4 stars was right since I enjoyed almost every story in here and the writing style was consistently strong throughout. At points Brennan has almost a Lemony Snicket-esque narration style and this was very enjoyable when it cropped up. This collection is very short in the form I received but that was minus two stories so I decided to not lower the rating due to that. Overall, this was a wonderful horror anthology and I would definitely want to read more by this author.
Overall Rating:
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