Husks

Horror doesn't always have to terrify you; sometimes it just has to make you feel something you weren't ready for. Husks by Glen Krisch is a 2025 limited release from Cemetery Dance Publications, and it's that kind of book.

It follows Hank Moreland, a man drifting through Depression-era farmland, starving and exhausted, carrying the weight of a promise he made to his late wife. When he collapses in front of an isolated farmhouse, two strangers take him in: Margo and Ollie. They're kind. Maybe too kind. Something about them is off, and the story takes its time letting you figure out what.

Delivered Without Warning

This one came without any buildup: it's a Cemetery Dance Club exclusive, so there were no reviews to read beforehand, no word of mouth to go off of. I knew it was set during the Dust Bowl, and the synopsis made clear that something wasn't quite right with the people Hank encounters, which was enough to make me curious. What I didn't expect was how much it would stay with me after I finished.

Empty Country, Full Pages

The writing is descriptive without being heavy. Krisch builds the Depression-era setting in a way that feels real: the scarcity, the isolation, the way desperation shapes how people move through the world.

The book is short enough to read in one sitting, an hour to an hour and a half, and the pacing earns that. It never lulls. Even the slower opening, where Hank is walking us through his past and his grief, doesn't drag. It's doing the work of making you understand who he is before the real story kicks in. Once Ollie and Margo appear, things move.

The language throughout is great, literary without feeling pretentious. It's the kind of prose that pulls you along without you noticing, which is exactly what a short book like this needs.

The Strangers at the Door

For a novella, the character work here is genuinely impressive. Hank feels like a real person dealing with real loss. Margo is well-developed and distinct. But Ollie is the one who stuck with me. He's an older gentleman, warm in a way that feels earned rather than convenient. The story gives you a reason for why he is the way he is, and that reason lands.

All of this in a book you can finish in an afternoon. If you can't get me to care about your characters, none of the rest of it works. Krisch gets that, and he delivers.

Something in the Humming

This is not a scary book. There's no gore, no jump-scare dread, nothing conventional about the way it operates as horror. What it does have is Margo, which I won't explain further, because discovering it is part of the experience!

There are supernatural elements here that are woven into the story in a way that feels organic to the setting and the grief at its center. But they don't take over the book, they just serve it. What they lead to is a moral question that Hank has to face, and the book makes sure you feel the full weight of his situation before it asks you to judge him.

That's where the real horror lives. Not in what's described, but in what you're asking yourself while you read.

Walk Up or Walk Past

If you want gore, big scares, or a fast-moving threat, this isn't the book for you. There's none of that here, and it's not trying to be that kind of story.

But if you want something introspective, something that puts you in a character's shoes and makes you sit with a hard question, Husks is worth your time. It's for readers who appreciate character-driven horror, who don't mind a slower burn, and who want to finish a book feeling something rather than just being frightened. It's a short read, but it doesn't feel slight.

I can see returning to this one down the road. Not anytime soon, but a few years from now when enough has changed to make the question at its center land differently. It's heartbreaking in the best way, and that's exactly what it set out to be.