Kindle Edition, 159 pages
Published July 12th 2022 by Tor Nightfire
5/5 Stars
What Moves the Dead is a retelling of The Fall of the House of Usher and follows a retired soldier on a visit to his old friends' decaying mansion. What they find at the remote dwelling of the sickly siblings is beyond their wildest nightmares. With the help of a mycologist and an American doctor, they have to find out quickly what is plaguing the siblings before it's too late.
I love historical fiction set in old creepy mansions, and this book was no different. It had a Gothic feel to it (no doubt due to it being a Poe retelling), and an air of mystery shrouded each page of this short novel. What was truly special about this book are the pronouns integrated by the author, and the world building surrounding them. It was something that took a minute to click, but once it did I really appreciated how it was done by T. Kingfisher.
The body horror and overall gore is pretty high up there, but not overwhelmingly so. The author might have given me a new fear of fungi, but I still enjoyed every last minute of it. I do wish the book would've been a bit longer, but all good things must come to an end.