User Profile

caracabe

caracabe@books.theunseen.city

Joined 2 years, 2 months ago

Writer and software engineer in the US Midwest. I enjoy poetry, horror, some f/sf, some mystery, some literary fiction (but not the kind where the main character is a professor and nothing happens).

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caracabe's books

Currently Reading

Ada Limón: You Are Here (2024, Milkweed Editions) No rating

Published association with the Library of Congress and edited by the twenty-fourth Poet Laureate of …

Review of You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World

No rating

Not every poem here is a “nature poem,” but all acknowledge that we are in and of nature, not separate from it. The most basic test of an anthology is whether I want to read more work by the writers in it. For this anthology, the answer is loudly yes. (Including the authors I’ve already read.) I have a favorite poem in this book, but I’m not telling you what it is. The next time I read the book—and there will be a next time—I’ll probably find a different favorite poem. Kudos to Limón for, among other things, curating an anthology and not including her own work.

David Ly, Daniel Zomparelli: Queer Little Nightmares (2022, Arsenal Pulp Press) No rating

This is what small presses are for!

No rating

Queer Little Nightmares is a collection of stories and poems for the monsters in all of us (especially the queer ones). Diverse in style and content, these works are deliciously weird and grounded in emotional truth. Standouts for me include the stories "The Vetala's Song" by Anuja Varghese and "Strange Case" by Eddy Boudel Tan, and the poems "Godzilla, Silhouette Against City" by Ryan Dzelzkalns and "Cryptid Cruising" by Avra Margariti. But they're all worth reading.

X. Reyes: Horror a Literary History (2020, British Library Publishing) No rating

Interesting overview of the last few centuries of horror literature

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A collection of essays surveying the horror genre in English and American literature from the 18th century to today. Sometimes the style is over-academic, but the content is interesting throughout. Every chapter ends with a list of references and a “What to Read Next” section, making it a useful book to keep on hand.

X. Reyes: Horror a Literary History (2020, British Library Publishing) No rating

I’m about 1/3 of the way through this collection of essays. So far, the quality varies. Some of the authors are too academic for my taste, wandering into irrelevant minutiae and believing that a sentence with two independent and five subordinate clauses makes a banger ending for a subsection. Others write with unpretentious verve. But even the professorial pieces have fascinating passages.