Nightmare “The Summer Castle” by Ray Nayler
“Fenworth City Municiple Watersheds Field Survey” by A.L. Goldfuss
“In the Walls and Beneath the Fridge” by Jonathan L. Howard
Reviewed by Tara Grímravn
Though one might expect the editor at Nightmare to follow the crowd, they’ve shied away from stories based upon the usual love theme that tends to proliferate everything every February. Instead, the tales woven in this month’s issue center in various ways around memory and nostalgia, more specifically those memories that tend to follow our darker thoughts and experiences.
“The Summer Castle” by Ray Nayler
Set during what one may assume is one of the World Wars, an unnamed narrator recalls a summer spent with his siblings and grandfather in the family’s summer castle. His wounded father, an officer sent home from the frontlines to recover, visits occasionally but is traumatized by what he’s seen in battle. All the while, the narrator wonders how much of these memories are real.
This is a very intriguing tale. It’s not horror in the strictest sense of the word—there are no monsters, no supernatural or physical enemies to fight or run from. But this piece of psychological horror is still unsettling. The slow, dream-like pacing of the tale combined with a child’s imagination and the terrors of war create an eerie feeling that permeates every scene. And all this serves to make us question how much of what we believe to be our past is real and genuine, and how much is just us trying to justify our hopes and fears. It is really quite a wonderful read.
“Fenworth City Municiple Watersheds Field Survey” by A.L. Goldfuss
A lone conservationist huddles in their office nestled in the Conservation League’s basement. They spend their time observing six cameras and making notes on a wildlife field survey. But there’s something rather odd about some of the local wildlife at the Fenworth City Municipal Watershed.
This piece of flash fiction is an okay read, though it fails to deliver. While one might consider the narrator’s circumstances to be inconvenient, nothing of any real consequence happens to make the story truly interesting—neither in terms of action nor the few reveals the narrator relates to the reader that are meant to be surprising. The conservationist themselves isn’t likable or even relatable, although they are a bit hypocritical. Overall, this story was a miss for me.
“In the Walls and Beneath the Fridge” by Jonathan L. Howard
A recently-divorced man and his daughter, Jess, recently moved into a new flat. After Jess claims to have seen something run under the fridge one night, he starts to worry their new home may be infested with vermin, though he can find no sign of them anywhere. The next day, Jess tells him that there’s a man living in the walls, but before he can process this news, his violent, abusive ex-wife shows up, threatening their new life.
I am quite fond of Howard’s story. The twist on the “monster in the walls” and “imaginary friend” tropes is very refreshing. That’s not to say there’s no menace there—there is, but not in the way these tropes are usually employed. The same goes for the abusive ex. It’s almost invariably presented the other way round, and this story provides an enjoyable deviation. The overall plot and the ending are par for the course in these types of stories, but that doesn’t make it any less engaging or entertaining. All in all, it’s an excellent read.