Incidents Around the House

March 25, 2024
Bestseller Malerman (Bird Box) offers some predictable yet still-eerie scares in this horror novel, which is told from the perspective of eight-year-old Bela, who first introduces herself saying good night to her Daddo and Mommy, before sharing that, after they leave her bedroom, “Other Mommy” emerges from her closet. Malerman gradually reveals more about Other Mommy, a thing with eyes that migrate around her head, who repeatedly asks Bela if she can “go into her heart” and talks of what Bela understands as “carnations” and readers will quickly realize is reincarnation. Bela’s parents initially treat the existence of Other Mommy as a joke, but then her father notices a foul smell around the house. As Other Mommy increases her pressure campaign on Bela and becomes more active at different times of day, and in different places, Daddo and Mommy frantically search for answers and a way to eliminate the threat, even as fissures form in their marriage. Bela’s naive narrative voice is the book’s best feature, freshening up the familiar story beats and enhancing the creeping sense of dread. Malerman’s fans will want to check this out.

May 1, 2024
Malerman (Spin a Black Yarn, 2023) is back with a new novel that begins uneasily and relentlessly builds to full-out, feel-it-in-your-gut terrifying. Eight-year-old Bela, the sole narrator, lives in suburban Detroit with Mommy, Daddo, and "Other Mommy," a being who lives in her closet but comes out frequently to ask the young girl, "Can I go inside your heart?" Readers enter as Other Mommy is losing patience with Bela, getting bolder, even leaving the house to remind Bela that she must say yes, and soon, or else. Bela immediately grabs readers' attention and pulls them into her disquieting world, while Malerman finds effective ways to add context from the adults' points of view without sacrificing Bela's authenticity or the fast pace. Readers will be ensnared for the duration, wanting to look away or take a break from the unceasing onslaught, but they cannot, because Other Mommy will follow--even off the page--not allowing anyone to escape. For fans of Baby Teeth (2018), by Zoje Stage, and Hex (2016), by Thomas Olde Heuvelt.

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May 1, 2024

Best-selling Malerman (author of the film-adapted Bird Box and LJ Best Book Spin a Black Yarn) offers a haunting new novel where eight-year-old Bela encounters the malevolent entity known as Other Mommy, who wants inside her heart. The bonds of family have kept her safe so far, but Other Mommy is growing stronger as cracks appear between Bela's parents. Prepub Alert.

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June 1, 2024
Frightened by the "Other Mommy" in her bedroom closet who asks her, "Can I go into your heart?," lonely 8-year-old Bela enters into a horrific waking nightmare involving her whole family. Set in the fictional small town of Chaps, Michigan, near the other made-up places in dread specialist Malerman's novels, the story involves a deeply troubled family. Bela's actual mommy has been cheating on her father, Daddo, whose friendliness and good cheer clash with his wife's dark streak. Wrapped up in their squabbling and work demands, they've neglected to pay attention to Bela. Sweetly seductive in the beginning, Other Mommy offers Bela, who blames herself for the whole mess, a solution. They will trade places, with the Babadook-like presence reincarnated in the girl, and the girl...who knows where she'll go. "Whatever you do, most of all, don't allow someone else's meanness, someone else's cruelty, to get inside of you," Daddo lectures Bela. Soon enough, a screaming, shape-shifting version of Other Mommy is revealed to everyone, leading the family to run off to an assortment of supposedly safe places and bring in experts in the spirit business to get rid of Other Mommy. Leave it to Mom and Dad to get so caught up in their plight that they miss half of what Bela has to say. As a result of long monologues about secrets and lost innocence and such, the book loses some of its edge. And though Bela may well be little more than a stick figure by design, that deprives the novel of a deeper dimension. That said, Malerman keeps us in his grip, as he did in his best book, Bird Box (2014). The novel isn't the original that Neil Gaiman's Coraline is, but it still deserves a place alongside it on anyone's Halloween bookshelf. Screwy but scarrry!

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