31 Days of Horror Day 16: Why I Love Horror by Debut Novelist and Librarian Sarah Read

Yesterday I featured fifteen horror debuts from 2019 that I think are worth your time.

One of those titles is by a horror up an comer you definitely need to keep an eye on, Sarah Read. Sarah also happens to be a librarian, but that is not why I like her writing [although it doesn't hurt].

Read writes horror stories, and now a debut novel, The Bone Weaver's Orchard, that are haunting and terrifying but also beautifully written. The novel in particular is perfect for library audiences.  Here is the cover blurb via Goodreads:

“There’s a secret in this book. It’s stunning. It’s dark. And it’s as satisfying as any unknown a horror fan could could ever hope to unearth. So well written, so well paced, Sarah Read’s The Bone Weaver’s Orchard is a thriller with class.” —Josh Malerman, author of Bird Box 

He’s run away home. That’s what they say every time one of Charley Winslow’s friends vanishes from The Old Cross School for Boys.  

It’s just a tall tale. That’s what they tell Charley when he sees the ragged grey figure stalking the abbey halls at night.

When Charley follows his pet insects to a pool of blood behind a false wall, he could run and let those stones bury their secrets. He could assimilate, focus on his studies, and wait for his father to send for him. Or he could walk the dark tunnels of the school’s heart, scour its abandoned passages, and pick at the scab of a family’s legacy of madness and murder. 

With the help of Sam Forster, the school’s gardener, and Matron Grace, the staff nurse, Charley unravels Old Cross’ history and exposes a scandal stretching back to when the school was a home with a noble family and a dark secret—a secret that still haunts its halls with scraping steps, twisting its bones into a new generation of nightmares. 

“Sarah Read is one of the best authors currently writing contemporary dark fiction, and this is a journey you’ll want to take with your eyes open wide and your coat pulled tight. A haunting, lyrical, visceral story.” —Richard Thomas, author of the Thriller-nominated novel, Breaker

Here's the thing, as good as that plot sounds and as many patrons you are already thinking will enjoy it, I can tell you it is even better than it sounds. Charley is a perfectly rendered child protagonist, the mood is dark, the story twisted and interesting, one you are sad to leave even when you are unsettled and rush to get back to, and finally, the payoff is satisfyingly horrific. 
One of the reasons I think Read is seeing so much success with her writing, stems from why she is drawn to horror in general. In fact, I think her essay below showcases exactly why I ask authors to share "Why I Love Horror " in the first place. It is because when we hear them tell us their connection to the genre, it makes their stories even more enjoyable. 

Here is Sarah Read telling us about her connection to the genre.

💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀

Why I Write Horror 

by Sarah Read 

I write horror because I love it. I’ve always loved it, though my reasons have changed over the decades. It may be that only my awareness of my reasons has changed. At times I’ve loved horror just because it was a bit of spooky fun, but I’m sure its greater machinations were always at work in the back of my mind. 

I think people tend to assume that horror creators and fans love horror because they enjoy being scared. While that is surely sometimes true, it hasn’t been for me. I can’t think of a single instance where a horror book or movie has really scared me. I’ve been unnerved, alarmed, discomforted…but fear isn’t the word for what horror invokes. It’s more that I get to tap into another’s fear—a distraction from my own. For me, it’s cathartic. It’s lancing the infection of anxiety that’s always swelling just under the surface and letting some of that pressure bleed out. It’s the relief that comes from holding a mirror up to the horrors of reality and saying, “yes, what you are feeling is normal,” and then we all work together toward the triumph over evil, all the while processing our grief for those lost along the way. 

I love horror because it’s honest. It doesn’t paint the world as easy. It acknowledges the darker side of human experience, because no life is free from horror. And neither is any honest book. 

I remember, as a child, being captivated by the mysterious, twisting corridors of Misselthwaite Manor, the halls echoing with distant crying. I remember the mad rage of Mrs. Rochester, Sethe’s baby ghost, the haunted wood near Green Gables that was so much less haunting than the foster homes that came before it. 

Not-horror books are filled with horror, and those were the moments that I, an anxious young person learning to navigate the world of real-life horror, fixated on. I took shelter in those moments that showed me the path through those big feelings. 

When I started building stories of my own, I wanted to chart my voyage through those waters. I wanted to be a cartographer of anxiety—to show the treacherous reefs and the safe inlets, alike. There’s a companionship among horror writers, as if we all hold a piece of a secret map of the heart. When we gather at conventions or book festivals, it’s like we piece the map together. When we read each other’s horror, we learn new ways to empathize.  

I write horror because no other genre has felt as real to me. No other genre made me feel as seen or understood in the way I experienced the world. Earth is an anxious place and humans are an anxious species. We need horror in our stories because horror IS our story—and we’re just coming up to the hard part, now. 

The horrors of our past experiences, we’re just now seeing, were all subplots. The real crisis, the real conflict, is creeping up over the horizon, finally showing its true size. 

I write horror because it’s my way of getting ready, of sharing my monsters and showing how they were beaten. To me, horror says, “I feel how you feel. Your fear is natural. This is how we win.”