The Gathering Dark

Starred review from October 17, 2022
This frightening anthology edited by Bovalino (Not Good for Maidens), who also contributes, features 10 folk-horror stories by authors including Chloe Gong, Courtney Gould, and Aden Polydoros. Bovalino’s haunting “Loved by All, Save One” follows a group of bored, snowed-in teens as they learn the truth about a grisly town legend. In Allison Saft’s eerie “Ghost on the Shore,” bereft Maud teams up with an unlikely ally to work through her grief when a girl who looks like her dead best friend mysteriously walks out of a local lake. Olivia Chadha takes the concept of a calcified forest to new and terrifying heights in “Petrified,” in which teenage Dhara, of Indian descent, alongside fellow members of tight-knit community Children of the Aspen, teaches a tourist that women and the land do not belong to him. And Shakira Toussaint’s immersive tale “The Burning One” centers an unnamed narrator with brown skin who lives on a cliffside observing the Below, where newcomers have begun settling. Tapping into timeless fears such as ghosts and monsters, and interweaving overarching themes of friendship and love, this unique and delightfully creepy anthology delivers scares while inviting contemplation. Characters are intersectionally diverse. Ages 14–up. Agent: Uwe Stender, Triada US.