The stories in this collection are strange and engrossing, but leave a lot unsaid. Were Moses and Gaspar… cats? Was the titular Houseguest a human, or a dog? These questions and many more swirl in my mind as I set out to put interpretations to the contents of this collection. Ceaselessly unsettling, I was surprised that these stories mostly felt short of actually making me feel spooked. I think I personally require a greater deal of specificity for a story to give me chills, but if undefined lurking horrors are your thing this collection will be totally up your alley. Populated with significant he’s and she’s, much is left up to the reader’s imagination to follow into the characters’ terror, and to the reader’s interpretation of whether the looming dangers are in the characters’ minds or actually occurring. This collection was very interior and cerebral, and while I feel a little less haunted than I expected going in, these stories have left me a mountain of swirling thoughts to sort through. ⁣⁣
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I always wonder after reading something billed as “terrifying” whether I just don’t scare easily enough from books, or if I haven’t yet found the right read.