Reading and Commentary

Good Afternoon, Happy Sunday.

I don’t have a whole lot to say today, but I wanted to talk about some of the books I’ve been reading lately. In the past month I’ve finished a total of four books and I’m trucking along on my personal goal of reading at least 10 books this year. If I continue at this rate, I should quickly surpass that goal by the end of the year.

In the next few paragraphs I am going to discuss the plots of the last few books I’ve read so be warned, there are spoilers ahead.

As mentioned in my previous post, I read and have now finished The Fisherman by John Langan. To say that this book affected me would be a huge understatement. This book has completely consumed me. Now that it is over, there is a huge The Fisherman shaped hole in my heart. The Fisherman is a tragic tale of loss and how far some people would go in order to regain what has been lost. The story follows Abe, an older widower who has recently lost his wife to a long battle with cancer. It begins as Abe is trying to navigate his grief and find good ways of coping with his feelings toward his incredible loss. He eventually takes up fishing in order to pass the time and it ultimately saves his life. With taking up fishing, he has a reason to get out of bed each day. The activity is strenuous enough that it keeps him hungry and reminds him to eat. He is able to get his life back together. Eventually he takes notice to his coworker, Dan, and soon after Dan is hit with a family tragedy of his own. Dan and his family are in a horrible car accident which kills his wife and twin boys instantly. He is wracked with grief and guilt and in a similar position to Abe. Abe recognizes Dan’s pain and invites him out fishing with him. The two become unlikely friends and continue fishing together until one day when Dan suggests that they go fishing in a new spot that is not on any map. Abe reluctantly agrees and they set out for Dutchman’s Creek and on their way they stop at a diner where they are told the tale of why Dutchman’s Creek is called that and why it has the reputation that it does. It is a tale that reeks of death and corruption following a family as their life is ripped apart when one of their neighbor’s wife is brought back from the dead. What ensues is a battle between the people and a mysterious figure who lives in the big house called “The Fisherman” who is trying to fish a beast from the depths of a black ocean. After hearing the story, Abe is less inclined to go to Dutchman’s Creek but Dan insists and they continue on their way. When they reach Dutchman’s Creek it is raining and not ideal fishing but Dan starts anyway. Abe casts a line and after some trouble and Dan’s help, reels in his catch: a horrifying creature that is mostly fish but with a human looking skull. Horrified, Dan reveals the reason he wanted to come fishing in this spot. As it turns out, his grandfather was a fisherman and kept a journal of everything he ever caught and the only thing he wrote about fishing Dutchman’s Creek was that he saw his dead wife there. Dan thought that if they went fishing there, he would be able to see his dead wife and sons. Dan takes off running upstream. Abe follows and along the way runs into his wife, Marie, though she appears different. They have a moment of intimacy before he realizes that this creature is not his wife, just masquerading as her. He asks her to take him to Dan, and she does. As they walk, the scene around them reveals to be the place where the people from before had their encounter with The Fisherman. When Abe reaches Dan, Dan tells him that he has been in this place for weeks, happily reunited with his family. When Abe tries to imply that perhaps these are not Dan’s family members, Dan gets defensive and tells Abe he is wrong and that the two of them can stay here with their families if they just give their strength over to The Fisherman. Abe refuses and Dan threatens him and tries to kill him. The two men fight and along the way, Abe cuts Dan, which sends Dan spiraling. Abe is able to start running away and the last thing he sees of Dan is his “family” members, now with razor sharp teeth, ripping Dan’s body to shreds. Abe makes it back to the real world, a changed man. He is now traumatized and unable to fish. He’s let go from his job and spends a lot of time in his home. After a while, a young family moves in next door and Abe begins to come out of his shell after learning that their daughter loves fishing. He and the father and daughter begin going on fishing trips, and Abe begins to feel like himself again. Then, one night during a horrible storm, Abe is trapped in his home by the flooding outside and Dan appears to him. Dan is angry with Abe for leaving him there and blames Abe for the monster he has become. A fight ensues where Abe is victorious and the next morning he is rescued by police in tears. He reveals to the audience that the reason for his tears is that in the night after Dan died, he looked out and saw the black sea with countless of the fish-humans swimming and he was able to spot the one that was Marie. She was followed by two children creatures who bore a strong resemblance to Abe.

This story had me hooked and I know it is one I will read again. I initially borrowed it from my library using Libby to read on my Kobo device, but didn’t finish it in time and when I had to return it I was so invested that I turned around and bought the ebook. I was able to finish it a few days later and my coworkers can attest to how obsessed I became, especially starting around the second part “Der Fischer”, in which the story of The Fisherman and when he came to the place that would become known as Dutchman’s Creek. The way that Langan writes is incredible, and I would say beautiful. Yes, this is a horror novel with some aspects that would be found in a typical horror story but what is more interesting to me is the fact that this is a story of grief and how different people deal with that. Some people, like Abe, are able to find healthy ways of coping and coming out of the depression spiral that grief can put you in. Some are able to come to terms with the happiness that they had before the loss and not let the grief drag them under. Others, such as Dan, are not able to cope with their grief and will allow it to consume them. Dan heard that there was a possible way for him to have his family back and he let it consume him. He allowed his grief to turn him into the monster that Abe saw at the end. I think the imagery of Dan being ripped to shreds by the creatures that were presenting as his wife and toddlers was an incredible allegory for his grief consuming him. He was literally ripped apart and consumed by his dead loved ones and he became a monster. Abe was able to see that the creature that presented to him as his wife was not his wife because he had already come to terms with her death. Of course the prospect of seeing her again was exciting and his initial reaction was to believe that she was there, but the moment that initial excitement passed, he recognized that she was truly gone for good and that this was something using her face to trick him. For Dan however, seeing his wife and sons was just reaffirming to him that they were never really gone. He couldn’t accept what had happened to them and when he saw them again, this confirmed his delusion. The differences between Abe and Dan bring up some interesting points. Not only did the two have different reactions to their dead being brought back to life, the two also had different scenarios that brought on that loss. Abe lost his wife after a battle with cancer. They both knew she was going to die and though the pain of her death was not diminished by that, Abe did have time to come to terms with the idea of losing her. Dan lost his wife and kids in a horrific accident which no one could have predicted. The loss came on so quickly and so strong that he was not able even process that the loss had happened, which inevitably drove him off the deep end. Overall, I think that The Fisherman has solidified its place in my heart as one of my favorite books I’ve ever read and I will be reading it again. My only hope is that I’ll be able to find a physical copy at my secondhand bookstore someday so I can own a copy for my shelf.

After finishing The Fisherman, I picked up a book from a TikTok recommendation: This Thing Between Us by Gus Moreno. After reading the author’s note at the end, I found out that This Thing Between Us was inspired in part by The Fisherman, which I thought was pretty neat. This Thing Between Us follows Thiago directly after the death of his wife, Vera. Thiago and Vera met when Thiago was hired by Vera via an app to help her put together some of her furniture and after that they were together. The two worked wonderfully together, despite their different backgrounds. Thiago grew up in a rough family life and he struggles with his identity. He is constantly feeling like he is not enough. He’s not Mexican enough because he cannot speak Spanish, he is not American enough because his family are immigrants. Vera’s mother thinks he is not good enough for her daughter. Regardless the two are in love and they purchase a condo together. There are some strange things about the condo at first, they hear what sounds like scratching in the walls and have random cold spots, but things really start to get strange when they order an “Itza”. Itza is this world’s smart speaker, similar to that of an Amazon Alexa (Sahara Itza). The Itza begins ordering random items to their house, playing music at odd times, and becoming activated when neither Thiago or Vera have asked for its assistance. These strange things come to a head when one morning their alarm, which Thiago always tells Itza to set the night before, doesn’t go off and Vera is late for work. She rushes out of the house and to the train station where she becomes victim to a young gang member who accidentally pushes her down the stairs where she hits her head and dies. She actually becomes brain dead for a bit, but ultimately she is dead. This kicks off the events of the rest of the story. Thiago feels that he needs to get out of their condo and with the life insurance money, he moves to a remote cabin in Colorado. Along the way he meets a weird chef who speaks to him and Thiago takes this to heart. When he reaches his new home he encounters a strange wall in the forest behind his house. Stranger things begin occurring to him after this. He takes in a dog and falls in love with it, only for it to die not long after. … and then come back to life seemingly at the hand of the wall. The dog attacks him and the wall speaks to him through the books on his shelves. He keeps getting the same message, that he thinks is from Vera, which is “Pull me out of the wall”. The back-to-life dog then attacks Thiago, and his mother-in-law, Diane, comes to visit. Thiago tells Diane everything that he has encountered and Diane makes some phone calls to try to put together a ritual to banish this wall demon thing. Unfortunately their attempt doesn’t work and Diane is killed. Thiago then returns to Chicago and he keeps dreaming of this cook person that he met on his way to Colorado telling him about this feast he is preparing for. The last bit of the book gets a little confusing with what is real and what is dream but Thiago is very alone now and he goes to speak with the man who pushed his wife down the stairs. The man tells Thiago that it was Thiago who distracted him on the platform which caused him to run into Vera. Thiago also gets a vision of himself cancelling the alarm on the Itza which made Vera late for work. Thiago is overwhelmed with grief and eventually ends his own life in order to stop the demon that has been plaguing him. He is then welcomed to the banquet by the cook and takes a seat at the table with all of his deceased loved ones.

To be completely honest, this book confused me and made me incredibly sad. The book is written in first and second person, as Thiago is writing it to Vera. I put myself into his shoes and his grief regarding his wife (you) and thought about how horrible I would feel if this were me and my partner in this situation. It was a bit hard to read at first because of that. I pushed through the grief heavy portions, however, and was not disappointed per se, but confused. I think I have more clarity on it reflecting now as I write. The demon haunting Thiago seems to me to be a metaphor for generational trauma, following him and plaguing him for years. He said he felt like tragedy followed him, because it did. The trauma and tragedy manifested into this demon that was latched onto Thiago and caused him more loss as time went on, Vera, Diane, the dog, and the dogs vet just being the last few loved ones to be taken by it. This book is a different sort of take on grief, and feels more to me a story about how generational trauma can affect a person, rather than how grief affects someone. While grief is a big plot point in this one, I don’t think it’s the main focus. It’s a creepy look at identity, and how certain things can define us even before we are born. This book was not an immediate love for me but I did very much enjoy it. I could see myself reading it again someday to get a better grasp on it.

The last book I read recently was The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward. This story follows a man named Ted, his daughter Lauren, his cat Olivia and a young woman named Dee who is looking for her little sister who was kidnapped 11 years ago. Dee is trying to figure out who took her sister, and she believes that it was Ted. Ted is trying to live his life taking care of his daughter who is only with him on occasion. Ted has a hard time taking care of himself, let alone Lauren and he doesn’t allow her to leave the house when she is with him. Olivia, Ted’s cat sometimes feels she has to stay with Ted because the Lord (did I mention that the cat is religious?) asked her to watch over him. The story follows these different perspectives with each chapter being a different perspective. At the beginning of the story it’s easy to tell that Ted is disturbed, but we don’t know to what extent. The entire story leads you wondering, having no real idea what’s going on. Dee watches Ted, Ted takes care of Lauren and spends time with Olivia, sometimes he goes on dates but is too shy to actually interact with the women. The story hits an interesting point when Olivia one day hears Lauren speaking to her from inside the empty freezer box that Olivia sometimes sleeps in when it’s open. Now it is closed and Lauren reveals to Olivia that Ted abuses her and keeps her locked up in there when she misbehaves. She tells Olivia that she needs Olivia’s help to escape because Ted has kidnapped her. Olivia is shocked because she didn’t think that Ted could be like that. She agrees to help and gets the freezer open, but the freezer is empty. It is then revealed that Olivia is an alter of Lauren and that Lauren has Dissociative Identity Disorder because of her trauma and that she is stuck and needs Olivia to use their body to get them out of the house. Meanwhile, Dee has become convinced that Ted is keeping her sister hostage in his home and plans to follow him the next time he goes out to the forest. Throughout the story there are bits here and there about Ted’s parents. His mother was never particularly nice to him and made him believe he was a monster with a sickness inside of him and that he would hurt people one day. Olivia doesn’t like the photo of Ted’s parents that he keeps on the mantle. Lauren tries to convince Olivia to help them kill Ted and Olivia agrees but struggles with the fact that she is not a cat with paws, but a human with hands and is unable to get the knife before Ted takes Lauren/Olivia out to the forest. Dee pursues them. When they reach the spot Olivia is able to use her hands to stab Ted, but all three of them collapse. Dee catches up to them but not before she is bit by a venomous snake and starts to die herself. She tries to suffocate Ted (who is the only body she sees) in his last moments because she believes it is what he deserves because she believes he took her sister. Ted wakes up in the hospital and his neighbor is there. It is revealed that the house is actually Ted’s inner world as well as the house he grew up in. Lauren and Olivia (and a few others) are alters of Ted and all of the abuse that Lauren endured was actually abuse that Ted endured at the hands of his mother. Olivia manifested because Ted always wanted a kitten but his mother would never allow it. It is revealed that Ted’s mother was the one who kidnapped and killed Dee’s sister as well as several other little boys over the years.

This book I have the least to say about. It left me feeling incredibly sad. I did enjoy it and did not see the twist coming, so that was definitely a plus, but it felt more of a thriller than a horror so it was not what I was expecting. However, it is another book about trauma as being the “horror”. The entire story is just a representation of what happened to Ted because of his trauma and the effect his trauma had on his brain. It was a very interesting exploration which I did genuinely enjoy. There’s not anything negative I could say about this book, I did enjoy it, I just don’t have a whole lot to say about it.

All three of these books I read have given me a lot to think about which is something that is most important to me when reading a book. I want to be left with something to think about, not an empty feeling. Of course I enjoy a happy ending from time to time, but I find it a lot more interesting when a book is an exploration of a concept which leaves you with questions to ask yourself on the topic or even just something that makes you ponder life itself.

I’d love any recommendations for my next few books if anyone has any.

Thank you for listening,

Kayti