Men in Black showed us that aliens live among us disguised as humans.
Ghouls Amongst Us tells us that ghouls live amongst us. Sometimes they help us. Other times they terrify us. The book opens with a short story that illustrates this perfectly, and it will probably discourage you from taking a job delivering pizza.
The story βPizza Boyβ is introduced as an hors dβoeuvre to whet your appetite for the rest of the stories. Did it work? Yep.
Written in second person, this story makes you feel as though you are the one in the story. You can feel the tension build as this pizza boy does things like go into dark rooms and down dark stairways, things that you scream for the characters in horror movies not to do because you know that no good will come from those actions.
What is the story about? A pizza boy has to deliver a vegetarian pizza to this building that appears to be a church. No one answers the door, but the door is open, and he walks into this place that appears to be deserted . . .
But how did these beings come to live amongst us? First, there were goblins. Shunned by mankind, they lived apart from man. They started out mating with each other but soon began kidnapping humans to mate with, giving birth to ogres and eventually ghouls. Over time, they learned the ways of man.
Reading how all this came about was interesting, even fascinating. When Quasimodo came into the story, I was a bit surprised. But where Quasimodo came from gives new insight into why he looked the way he did, why his appearance horrified and scared others. Their fascinating history also gives new explanations to the disappearance of the famous Roanoke Colony.
From their beginnings to the Roanoke Colony of the new world to the sewers of Paris to the modern day, I was entertained, grossed out, and fascinated by how they progressed from being shunned by all of mankind to finding a way to live amongst us to where they couldnβt be recognized until they wanted to be.
This book really makes you wonder: is there a torment of ogres living in your town?
I was sent a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. If you would like your own copy of Ghouls Amongst Us, Iβve provided an Amazon link for your below.
Amazon Link: Ghouls Amongst Us
Favorite Sentences:
Itβs a silent scream captured in celluloid for all eternity.
Among goblins, it is not the strongest and boldest who survive, but the sneakiest and the cleverest.
From the torches, the flames leapt and grew, growing claws and tails and fanged snouts in the fashion of giant, flaming lizards.
A lean, gray arm pushed up from the earth beneath him and its clawed hand clamped down on his mouth and pulled him down.
New Words Learned:
anathema – a person or thing detested or loathed
charnel – deathlike
compact – a formal agreement between two or more parties, states, etc.; a contract:
defile – any narrow passage, especially between mountains
erudition – knowledge acquired by study, research, etc.; learning
fungoid β resembling a fungus
geas β an obligation or prohibition magically imposed on a person.
insensate – inanimate
keffiyeh – an Arab headdress for men; made from a diagonally folded square of cloth held in place by an agal wound around the head.
loup-garou β a werewolf
rout – any overwhelming defeat
Van Dyke β a short, pointed beard
windlass – winch
About the Author:
Perry Lake lives in Northern California. He is a lifelong devotee of world history, geography, and true tales of horror. Inspired by the works of Stoker, LeFanu, Mary Shelly, HP Lovecraft, and countless other masters of supernatural horror, Mr. Lake brings considerable experience and authenticity to his tales of the outrΓ© and weird stuff.
