Another mind-bending mystery from the author of Strange Pictures... This time, old house plans reveal something very odd linking two separate houses and a mysterious death. Uketsu does 'unsettling' right: the sinister implications that the two main characters uncover does all the work without any linguistic fanfare. Along with diagrams of the floor plans in question, this makes Strange Houses really quite accessible – which seems deliberate [1]
It's set up for a shocking, unusual reveal, though I still found it hard to suspend disbelief. Still, worth reading for the creeping atmosphere.
For me, it brings back memories of a misspent youth seeking out the creepiest horror comics/manga/novels, and occasionally finding something that sticks with you for a long time.
A woman on a night out gets stuck in Charing Cross station with someone/something murderous. Apropos for a station with abandoned platforms and tracks used for training. We have a classic Karen screaming main character, yet again, generally recognised even by critics to be unlikeable.
I do enjoy the environment though – the Underground has plenty of mysteries and perils all on its own even without a serial killer on the loose.
Found footage/mockumentary – a film maker and cameraman crew get locekd in with the inhabitants of a doomed apartment building. We have here a rather panicky, shouty protagonist with a sidekick who truly deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. The horror itself: classic base under siege material. People turn on each other as they try to make it out, so on and so forth.
A horror fanatic gets caught up in a realistic horror film experience – basically becoming the protagonist of about six different horror films, having to use all his knowledge to survive. This is a deeply unlikeable protagonist, for whom it is difficult to summon symptoathy for his trials and tribulations... and eventual outcome.
I guess if you really liked Ready Player One, and a certain flavour of American horror films (Final Destination, Friday the 13th, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre), then you'd like this. Unfortunately, I didn't.
The first in a whole franchise. Summer camp slasher flick, where the unremarkable main character gets bullied by The Popular Girls. Plenty of setups which show you the payback almost immediately. This is not a good movie, mind you. Worse so given the dramatic reveal, right at the end, of the transfem protagonist?! With absolutely zero buildup!
Cornish folklore turns surreal. A lone volunteer tasked with making wildlife observations of a rare flower starts losing her grip onf realitiy. Remember that 15th Doctor episode 73 Yards? Yeah. Like that, but Cornish instead of Welsh. Bit of claustrophobia/agoraphobia. Body horror features amongst a carousel of disjointed images.
If this was aligned with a Magnus Archives fear entity, it'd be The Lonely.
Call the Midwife (TV series) (sorry cheesy I know but very conscientiously focused around women)
Kamome Diner (2006 film) – does this count? slow-moving film about a Japanese woman who starts a cafe in a Finnish town
Derry Girls (TV series) – I don't think there are any particular boyfriend plots; much more about these girls (and one guy) growing up
The Makanai (TV series) – about a group of girls training to be geisha
Enola Holmes?
Horror
T Blockers (2023 film) – queer trans zombie horror
Camp Damascus, Chuck Tingle – more along the Fox Mulder Nice Boyfriend
Fantasy
Discworld esp Witches arc – Equal Rites, Wyrd Sisters, Witches Abroad, Sourcery... or Tiffany Aching arc – A Hat Full of Sky, Wintersmith, I Shall Wear Midnight
Elatsoe, Darcie Little Badger – the male main character isn't a fucko boyfriend
Legends and Lattes, Travis Baldree – no particular romance/boyfriend storyline
A Natural History of Dragons, Marie Brennan – again Fox Mulder Nice Boyfriend-type husband character
Cadence Eastman – privileged and somewhat sheltered – spends every summer at an island villa with friends of a similar background. She finds love in the form of Gat: idealistic, and very much the only Brown kid in all of this, certainly the only one who gets any lines at all. It's all great until she turns 15. All she knows is that something happened, but she doesn't remember any of it and everyone is determined to hide it from her. Whatever it was, it leaves her with debilitating migraines and residual neurology, which changes the course of the rest of her life.
It makes a weak attempt to say something about intersectionality – in that Cadence's disability and chronic pain doesn't make her automatically an expert in every hardship – as Gat points out repeatedly. But ultimately it takes a while to get to the point, and although it isn't the point but Cady isn't brilliantly likeable. This is a sort of coming of age story in reverse, I guess.
It suffers from a writing style that favours sentence fragments and what starts as pithy short sentences. This strikes this reader as being more dramatic and coy for the sake of it rather than any genuine atmosphere.
There was not much of a journey to Discover The Truth either, which I expected to be the focus – there was little effort required on Cady's behalf. Not very satisfying, given I am usually a fan of this kind of narrative.
it's guilty because its premise is awful. a British detective inspector joins a Caribbean island police team for a few seasons at a time, with hijinks.
at first, most of the inspectors (by and large, up until the latest season, white British men) struck me as neurodivergent coded; Humphrey Goodman for example could well personify unmedicated ADHD; Neville Parker, autism, perhaps. but I realised that – really – all the inspectors are just written as “weird outsiders”.
many of them have poor social skills and/or strike the rest of the (painfully neurotypical) team as weird, erratic, rude, or awkward. many of them have beloved routines they carry over from the UK which they insist on bringing to Saint Marie, and their story arc always involves some level of compromise – some adaptation to a place they have to consciously accept as a new home.
and equally their weirdness comes with a preternatural gift for observation, attention to small details, their ability to make connections and spot patterns – all traits commonly described with autistic and ADHD worldviews.
in each of these arcs, their outsider status pushes them to an overseas outpost – but is also what makes them exceptional. and excepting the colonialism and the whole... cop show schtick, is a rather hopeful message, all things considered.
These follow the format COMPOSER'S SURNAME – PIECE TITLE – SUBSECTION (if applicable) for ease of Internet searching. Basically I'm hoping plugging in each line with “easy piano” will get you a video and sheet music.
This list is arranged in roughly time order of when they were composed.
JS Bach – Well Tempered Clavier Book 1 – Prelude 1
JS Bach – Minuet in G major (BWV Anh.114) (super short, you might have heard this one before)
Mozart – Piano Sonata No.16 in C major, K.545
Beethoven – Moonlight Sonata (the 1st movement is the most well known but 3rd, while more difficult, is a banger imo)
Beethoven – Sonata Op 49 no. 1
Mussorgsky – Pictures at an Exhibition (it's a series of short pieces; Promenade would be a good one to start)
Grieg – Peer Gynt Suite – Morning Mood (again all the pieces are v tuneful)