The Wishing Pool and Other Stories

by Tananarive Due

Now in paperback, this blockbuster story collection further cements Tananarive Due’s status as a leading innovator in Black horror and Afrofuturism; featuring two new stories "[A] master class in horror fiction and sci-fi written by one of the very best in the genre." ― Joe Hill, NPR's Weekend Edition " The Wishing Pool . . . is a major treat, full of major scares. Due excels at twist endings but also brilliantly creates an atmosphere of creeping dread in which you know something terrible is coming . . . Due shows just how much territory she can cover in one short book and just how versatile terrifying tales can be."
― Washington Post
"Holy These fourteen stories from author and film historian Due might scare even the most dauntless horror fans to death . . . A patchwork of stories that somehow manages to be both graceful and alarming, putting fresh eyes to the unspeakable." ― Kirkus Reviews, starred review AMERICAN BOOK AWARD–WINNING AUTHOR TANANARIVE DUE's second collection of stories includes offerings of horror, science fiction, and suspense―all genres she wields masterfully. From the mysterious, magical town of Gracetown to the aftermath of a pandemic to the reaches of the far future, Due's stories all share a sense of dread and fear balanced with heart and hope. In some of these stories, the monster is racism itself; others address the monster within, each set against the supernatural or surreal. All are written with Due's trademark attention to detail and deeply drawn characters. The story "Incident at Bear Creek Lodge" is a World Fantasy Award finalist, and this paperback reissue includes two new stories.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Fiction, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Audiobook, Anthologies

336 pages, Paperback

First published April 18, 2023

About the author

TANANARIVE DUE (tah-nah-nah-REEVE doo) is the award-winning author of The Wishing Pool & Other Stories and the upcoming The Reformatory ("A masterpiece"--Library Journal). She and her husband, Steven Barnes, co-wrote the Black Horror graphic novel The Keeper, illustrated by Marco Finnegan. Due and Barnes co-host a podcast, "Lifewriting: Write for Your Life!"

A leading voice in Black speculative fiction for more than 20 years, Due has won an American Book Award, an NAACP Image Award, and a British Fantasy Award, and her writing has been included in best-of-the-year anthologies. Her books include Ghost Summer: Stories, My Soul to Keep, and The Good House. She and her late mother, civil rights activist Patricia Stephens Due, co-authored Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights. She and her husband live with their son, Jason.

Reviews

[Sadie Hartmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE WISHING POOL and Other Stories by Tananarive Due
(other titles I’ve enjoyed, THE BETWEEN, THE GOOD HOUSE, and GHOST SUMMER)

Release Date: April 18th, 2023
BISAC Categories: Short Stories (single author)Horror - General Science Fiction - Collections & Anthologies African American - Women

Subgenre: Afrofuturism, Southern Gothic, Science Fiction, Dystopian, Coming-of-Age, Historical Fiction, Horror, Suspense & Thriller, Mystery, Psychological, Apocalyptic, Supernatural & Paranormal, Fantasy
Themes: Magical realism, friendship, human monsters, racism, resilient women, hope, the African American experience, pandemic outbreak,
Writing Style: Character-Driven, Critically acclaimed, Stephen King(ish), Cinematic, Versatile

What You Need to Know: Horror readers need to know that Tananarive Due’s work is essential to the genre in order to experience the full breadth of what horror has to offer. It is imperative to prioritize reading her books. If you’re new to Due’s storytelling, a short story collection is the best place to start. I started with GHOST SUMMER, her first collection from 2015. Just like GHOST SUMMER, THE WISHING POOL offers a variety of stories told in different styles and subgenres categorized into parts.
Part I: Wishes
Part II: The Gracetown Stories
Part III: The Nayima Stories
Part IV: Future Shock
You can enjoy the book cover-to-cover or begin with the Part that appeals to you first. There is literally “something for everyone” as cliche as that statement can be, it has never been so true as it is when referring to either of Due’s collected stories. I am convinced that any reader could find their next, favorite story in their most beloved genre in this collection. And that favorite story will be different for everyone. I’ll tell you mine at the end of this review.

My Reading Experience:
I requested a review copy immediately. It has been almost a decade since GHOST SUMMER and I was sure Due would have some amazing stories collected over those years for THE WISHING POOL. Part 1: Wishes, are supernatural/paranormal in nature. The titular tale is also the first and it sets reader expectations perfectly. A woman is driving back to a cabin in the woods her family enjoyed when she was a child. She remembers how her and a friend used to make wishes over a secret pool. Although short, it is a sweet tease for what’s to come. You might have heard this one showcased on LeVar Burton Reads.
Bookworms prepare yourselves for your horror dreams to come true at a haunted bookstore in, HAINT IN THE WINDOW, a story about a haunted bookstore. Yes, it’s everything you want it to be.
INCIDENT AT BEAR CREEK LODGE is one of my favorites because I believe that Tananarive Due shines the most when she is narrating a story from a young person’s point of view. She’s just so damn good at it.
Part II: Gracetown, now here we go, readers! Are you ready for Gracetown, Florida? You’ve been to this fictitious town before if you’ve been keeping up with Due’s work. Gracetown is her Castle Rock, her version of Derry. Her newest book coming in the Fall, THE REFORMATORY, takes place in Gracetown too. A lot of bad things go down here.

LAST STOP ON ROUTE 9 is a “road trip gone wrong” horror story about some women who get lost and wind up on some backroads in Gracetown. No cell service, no maps, and the unsettling feeling they aren’t welcome to stop and ask for directions. As I was reading, I literally imagined the story directed by Jordan Peele in my mind; it was perfectly executed. I highly recommend indulging in those cinematic visual cues.
I also have to talk about RUMPUS ROOM. This is about a young woman who reacted to her child in anger and accidentally caused her to break her arm. Her mother takes temporary custody and the woman moves into the downstairs rumpus room of an older man’s house. At first, things seem pretty chill but as the woman begins to take in her surroundings, she realizes that she overlooked certain red flags. This is the longest story in the collection, I think, and the one that gave me goosebumps. It felt so real. One of Due’s skills is authentic dialogue and a smooth, easy, acceptable narrative. It’s easy to slip right into the story and lose all sense of time and place. I was in that rumpus room with Kat while she found strange things in the bathroom and wondered why there used to be a lock on the outside of the door. It made my skin crawl. I think this was my favorite story, but subject to change! It’s hard to choose.
Part III: The Nayima Stories & Part IV: Future Stories
Horror junkies who specifically show up for science-fiction and apocalyptic horror will love all of Tananrive Due’s stories with the protagonist, Nayima. In fact, if you do a quick Google search, there are a few shorts online for free. Check out, HERD IMMUNITY, which makes an appearance in GHOST SUMMER too. The real gems in these two parts, for me, were SHOPPING DAY about the concerns of even mundane, essential tasks like buying groceries during a pandemic, and THE BIOGRAPHER a post-pandemic-apocalyptic story about chronicling the lives of every single, person. A biographer comes to stay with a subject until the biography is complete.
During my read through this entire collection, I had an overwhelming sense of what a treasure short stories are; bite-sized works of fiction we can consume a little or a lot of depending on what our heart needs.




Final Recommendation: This is a treasure! THE WISHING POOL and GHOST SUMMER together are the perfect compendium of modern horror. Readers get a little bit of everything horror has to offer by way of beloved tropes and a full range of subgenres.
Comps: GHOST SUMMER by Tananarive Due, NIGHT SHIFT by Stephen King, MESTIZA BLOOD by V. Castro

[Nina The Wandering Reader · Rating 5 out of 5]

"As an adult, Joy told the story often with a breezy air, never confessing how she'd walked far out of her way to avoid the Wishing Pool ever since. How maybe it was the Wishing Pool, not the boredom of fishing, that had soured her visiting the cabin with her parents after she graduated high school. How the Wishing Pool had ended her childhood."

When I found out Tananarive Due was coming out with this story collection, I prayed the book gods would grant me early access to her pages. Sure enough, they heard my prayer (actually the bookstore where I work managed to snag an advanced reader's copy and it took everything in me not to squeal like a giddy child).

The Wishing Pool is in many ways similar to Due’s last short story collection Ghost Summer. Stories are divided into 4 parts titled "Wishes", "The Gracetown Stories", "The Nayima Stories", and "Future Shock". Readers should expect a range in genre from southern gothic horror to dystopian science fiction. While some stories were downright creepy--reflections of our own worst nightmares--others displayed echoes of sadness, trauma, and resilience.

From swamp monsters to human monsters, each story is laid out through the lens of the Black experience, which I loved so much as a reader of color. There are scarier things in this world for a Black person than ghosts and that fear takes on familiar imagery sprinkled all throughout these pages--Confederate flags, rabid dogs, driving while Black, corrupt law enforcement, ill-intentioned strangers. Due expressed in the book's introduction how reading Gloria Naylor's work helped her realize how powerful it was that a Black woman could write Black characters in supernatural situations. That's an epiphany that struck me as well when I first fell in love with the horror genre. And it's how I feel every time I read one of Due's books, how strange and revolutionary it is to get to see one's brown self at the center of a scary story.

Some other cool things I loved about this collection:

-One Day Only and Attachment Disorders are a continuation of the short story Removal Order which can be found in Due’s former collection Ghost Summer. So this would be an excellent excuse to read the former short story collection before starting this one if you haven't already.

- The story Last Stop on Route 9 might be hinting at Due’s upcoming southern gothic horror novel The Reformatory as it's set in the same town and references a few details found in the book summary!

I could go on and on about this collection, but instead I'll leave you with this advice: don't sleep on Tananarive Due and make sure you pick yourself up a copy of The Wishing Pool right now!!!

[Summer · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Wishing Pool and Other Stories is a short story collection by horror author Tananarive Due. The stories range from horror, science fiction, and even mystery/suspense. The stories range from a magical wishing pool, to the monsters inside of us. Some feature a dystopian future and others set in the world we know all too well.

This is my very first time reading Due’s work and I was absolutely floored by her talent! Just as I was really getting into a story and thought I knew where it was going, a twist would appear and set me spiraling! The atmosphere and attention to detail, was impeccable and drew my interest in that much more.

I listened to the audiobook format and it was narrated by William DeMeritt (he previously narrated Jackal by Erin E. Adams and The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris) and Jasmin Walker ( she previous narrated Patricia Wants To Cuddle by Samantha Allen). Both narrators did an excellent job bringing each short story to life.

The Wishing Pool and Other Stories by Tananarive Due was published on April 17 so it is available now. Many thanks to Libro FM, and Recorded Books for the gifted audiobook!

[Gyalten Lekden · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection is subdued and intentional, the kind of psychological horror story that relies on meticulous world-building and exquisite character work to get under your skin and make you thrum with a constant sense of unease. Although the supernatural sometimes played a part, it was more often a violent and unforgiving world that terrorized our characters. What terrorizes the reader is that those worlds are only a hop, skip and jump away from our own. Tananarive Due has a skill at observing the nature of the world as it is now and extrapolating from that to a world the reader will recognize without any effort but will not want to live in. Most of the stories feature a character fighting against this much larger system, the impersonal and faceless violence and oppression that is systematized and normalized, and as we root for them we see just how barely we grasp onto a sense of control and autonomy in the world as it is. None of these stories would work if Due was also incredibly skilled at developing believable, complicated, well-rounded characters. Every character felt like someone I knew, or could know, and I was immediately drawn into the emotional stakes of the story. The characters’ individual worlds, as well as the larger worlds of the story, are built out in clear and descriptive prose that is never purple. There is a great sense of interiority to these stories, you always feel like you are invited into something, which makes them intimate and tense. There are a few moments of shock and awe here and there, a little blood and a few twists of the knife, but for the most part these stories are designed to burrow under your skin and shock you with their naturalism, reminding me a lot of Ursula K. Le Guin’s work. They read almost like prophecies, if only we had the ears to hear them.

[Bethany (Beautifully Bookish Bethany) · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars rounded up

Pretty much every story in this collection is great! These tales of horror span a range of themes, but they often creep up on you in the best way. They tackle family relationships, racism, cycles of abuse, and even what a post-apocalyptic world might loom look like. There is a section of pandemic stories that were apparently written before COVID and show us how things could have been even worse.

A woman who lost custody of her daughter takes a caretaking job at a house where things keep getting creepier.

A boy staying at his grandmother's house where all is not as it seems, including her past Hollywood fame.

A toddler somehow survives for days after his parents murder-suicide.

And more that I don't want to spoil. These are smart, creepy, atmospheric, and rich in references. They all center Black characters and their experiences, tapping into fears of law enforcement, medical experimentation, government overreach, and more. The audio narration is also excellent and gives all the atmosphere you could want. Very much recommend picking these up. I received an audio review copy via NetGalley, all opinions are my own.

[capture stories · Rating 4 out of 5]

Be careful of what we wish for…. We might get the wishes but the wishes may not look the way we wanted.

[Jessica Woodbury · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you pay attention to horror, you probably already know Tananarive Due's name well. But she still doesn't have nearly as much attention and praise as she deserves so if you don't know her name, you should get to work. I really enjoyed Due's previous story collection, GHOST SUMMER, and this is an even better one. The stories are consistently strong, a few set in the same worlds grouped helpfully together.

There has been a lot of chatter in the last year or two about Black horror. (Due is an executive producer of the documentary HORROR NOIRE so she knows a lot about it.) In film and tv in particular, Black horror has had more than its share of duds in the last few years, as people try to recreate GET OUT without understanding what made it good. Racism + horror tropes is not enough. Due doesn't need anyone to explain this to her, her stories center almost entirely around Black characters, they are fully drawn, and racism certainly exists in her stories but she knows how varied horror can be, how what is scary comes from all kinds of places. She has so much more to say than many of these stories that fail because they only have one very blunt theme and no real desire to portray complex characters and a full portrait of Black life.

She's also great at ending a story just a little early, just before things really go to hell, which is an excellent tool in the horror arsenal.

I remain baffled that someone hasn't made her books and stories into more films and tv shows (the African Immortals series is crying out for a several-season series) because she is so solid, knows when to change it up, knows when to lean into a trope. One of our best.

[Theresa (mysteries.and.mayhem) · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Wishing Pool and Other Stories is the second book I've read by Tananarive Due. After my introduction to Due's writing through The Good House, I was positive I was going to love the stories in this collection. I was not wrong!

The book starts with a statement from the author saying that many stories take place in a post-pandemic world. These stories were all written pre-Covid. While I grow tired of pandemic books and stories that were written post-Covid, I'm always fascinated by the ones that were written before. Due's stories were no exception.

The book is composed of a blend of horror and speculative future sci-fi stories. The shift from horror to sci-fi was a bit jarring for my brain, but it didn't take me long to adjust and embrace the genre shift. While I'm on the topic of jarring, the endings to many of these stories are sudden and feel incomplete by design. I desperately wanted a few of these stories to continue.

My favorite story of the entire book was Suppertime. I wanted to hug the main character and her friend, Bobby. It was just a beautiful story with awful circumstances thrown in. Rumpus Room was creepy and disturbing on many levels. Those were two standouts for me, but all of the stories were excellent! I give The Wishing Pool and Other Stories four out of five stars. The loss of a star is mostly because of those abrupt endings that I had a difficult time with. I highly recommend this (or any Tananarive Due book) to any reader of the horror genre!

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tananarive Due is a win for me every time. I can trust her with any genre, any concept, and I know her writing will be fantastic and quickly immersive.

The Gracetown stories & the Nayima stories were my favorites!

Ratings for each story:

- The Wishing Pool - 3
- Haint in the Window - 5
- Incident at Bear Creek Lodge - 2
- Thursday Night Shift - 3
- Last Stop on Route 9 - 4
- Supper Time - 3.5
- Rumpus Room - 4
- Migration - 4
- Caretaker - 4
- One Day Only - 5
- Attachment Disorder - 4
- Ghost Ship - 3
- Shopping Day - 3
- The Biographer - 4

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all]]

Horror afrofuturism combined with this amazing cover? I'm sold.

[Jesse On Youtube · Rating 5 out of 5]

CAN TANANARIVE WRITE ANYTHING THAT ISN'T GOOD?! GAH DAYUM 🙌🏾 ⭐️ X 5!!!

[hawk · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this collection of short stories overall 🙂 initially, after I'd read the first couple, I felt the stories were falling abit flat for me. maybe my expectations were too high? and/or it was the reader or the prose style... or me! or maybe i would have enjoyed it more on paper 🤔 but as I got into Part 2, The Gracetown Stories, I started to feel that they were getting better/spookier/creepier 😃😁 thinking about this now, it could have been the stories' different theme/location groupings that I enjoyed more or less?

I found the introduction interesting, and it was good to read at the start... but also not good to read at the start! - when I started the first story, there was too much that was already familiar from mentions in the introduction 🙃

part way thru the penultimate story the audiobook suddenly stopped, and a pop up let me know my loan had expired! 😱 I'd hoped reading offline might circumvent that til the morning. but... the app gave me an optional extra hour, which was just enough time to finish the book (tho led to me staying up to finish, and not quite enough sleep 🙃)


❗ read on for the individual stories, but beware spoilers! 🙂❗


PART 1 Wishes

👥 The Wishing Pool
🌟 🌟 🌟
careful what you wish for 😉
age, dementia, death, family, relationships.

📚 Haint in the Window
🌟 🌟 🌟 .5+
a haunted bookshop, tho much more.
within the story there was quite alot of naming of Black and POC authors, and talking about books important to the character/narrator 📚🖤

📽 Incident at Bear Creek Lodge
🌟 🌟 🌟. 5+
a holiday with grandmother, tho lacking the actor friends that were supposed to be there he was wanting to meet. something abit creepy about the house and everyone's fear of upsetting grandmother - matriarch, abusive parent or something more sinister? the creature outside (and/or inside!).

🖤 Thursday-Night Shift
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
Shauna who can see in the dark. a special stone from Africa from aunt Priscilla, that nestles into her armpit. she starts to see more colour during the day, and people's histories abit too, and the near future. the racism of the 1960s.
an interesting way to tell some history, with a sense of the supernatural/science fiction. the symbiotic being Shauna-Stone becomes, the stone's extraterrestrial origins 🙂


PART 2 The Gracetown Stories

😯👻 Last Stop on Route 9
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
lost on a drive from a funeral to the wake/reception. ghosts from the past. blurring time and realities. atmospheric and abit scary.

🐯🪱 Suppertime
🌟 🌟 🌟
I lost track abit of what this story was about 🤔
Bobby the bobcat, and swamp leeches...!

👧🎀 Rumpus Room
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟 +
a conversation in a bar leads to a job offer. mothers and daughters. a good sense of swampy supernatural suspense.
and quite an explicit exploration of generational trauma/what gets passed along generation to generation, how to break and heal that cycle ♥ I think alot of the stories in the collection touch on/bring in aspects of this too.

💡👤🌿 Migration
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
Jazz waking up to Cal her partner smelling like... boredom. seeing themself in a shadow. waking up at the beach without knowing how she got there.
thoughts back to her early years, and her murderous attempts, her Nana's exorcism/root healing.
"possession came in many forms in Gracetown".
heading home to family and folk who know her, and will understand ♥

👶🐜🐜 Caretaker
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
Carson Emory, a toddler, survives alone for 10 days after his parents murder-suicide before he's found. who took care of the child?
Carson's language learning from what he overhears, practising on his teddy, apologising and cuddling with it after... the latter something he didn't think his parents did 💔 Greyboy the dog 🙂
before the story of how he survived, we hear the history of violence between his parents, and sometimes towards him.
his experience of the first day after, a shadow came and blocked the underneath of the door - ants! who climbed him and made a coat over him 🙂 the beginning of Carson's best day ever 😉😆 (tho did the ants take Greyboy away? awa eating the plants in the house...🤔🐜🐜).

"sometimes when the ants were wrapped around him in a blanket in the night, Carson knew things. the creature was ancient, and lived in the soil summoned by blood and death and rage to nurture the for-sa-ken. the ants had come to take care of him... "


PART 3 The Naima Stories

🦠🎭 One Day Only
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟 +
the importance of smell, including the smell of a person. the backdrop is a lethal flu pandemic. a misjudged kiss can kill if the person is not immune. Karen and Naima. the complexity of relationships. everyone fugitives - from the flu or from flu hunters.
tacking up a leaflet for a comedy show, "one day only" "free water". the transience of many things.
an audience of 12 - the most people gathered in a while - their enjoyment of Naima's jokes, their clapping muffled by their gloves.
a somewhat ambivalent/sinister closing, the helicopters on the horizon.

at times this story was so familiar that I wondered if I've read it before in an anthology, or maybe something very similar 🤔

🏡🎒🧸 Attachment Disorder
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟 +
(kinda picks up 40 years on from the previous story).
2062. "let them come".
folk living solo and/or in groups.... having to leave...
family, mothers, generations of mothers ♥

I think I would have enjoyed more stories set in this world/around this character 🙂


PART 4 Futureshock

🛳🐈‍⬛ Ghost Ship
🌟 🌟 🌟 +
ocean passage between Southern Africa and North America... with an interesting cargo/extra passenger. Burden and Big 😉 a sickness sweeps thru the ship.
the story ended abit abruptly for me, and while kinda well, also felt premature and like there was alot left undone. I'd have liked to have stayed with it for just abit longer, and to have found out what happened to two interesting characters 🤔

🛒🎹 Shopping Day
🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟
the perils involved in going shopping. great to make something so mundane so creepy 😉 really nice story of a mother and daughter again. alot of the stories in this collection seem to explore this dynamic and relationship, in different ways ♥

📖📝 The Biographer
🌟 🌟 🌟.5 +
some nice ideas about the position and role of the biographer and the creation of the biography. set in a near future, with an ongoing pandemic. ends the collection well 🙂


🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟


accessed as a library audiobook, narrated by William De Merit and Jasmine Walker.

[Mallory · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am sad to admit that despite my love of horror I had not heard of Tananarive Due. I definitely will be looking into more after reading this one though! I listened to the audiobook and I don’t think I’ve done that for a lot of books of short stories but this was perfect. I loved the two narrators and thought they really brought the characters to life. Despite the stories being decently long I was wishing for several of them to continue. I loved the organization and that a few of the stories continued in the next one or at least the same world. I really loved the later stories set in a post-apocalyptic world taking place after a disease that wipes out so much of mankind. Overall I found this collection to be excellent and it has put me in the mood for more. A couple of the stories didn’t grab me as strongly as others, but I enjoyed them all.

[Obsidian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn’t enjoy all the short stories but thought everything hung together well. Very good horror anthology. I enjoyed the Afrofuturism stories the most.

Full Review:

Part I: Wishes--I don't know about the theme for all of these stories, but definitely loved some of them and felt a bit okayish about the rest.

"The Wishing Pool" (5 stars)-A great story to set the mood. A woman returns to her family's cabin in the woods and deals with the fact that her father is growing increasingly ill and is growing senile. But there's a wishing pool nearby that seems to give as much as it takes away. Be careful what you wish for.

"Haint in the Window" (5 stars)-This was so good! A Black bookstore owner wondering if it's time to hang things up. But when his store gets visited by a haint, he wonders why it's there. I just loved loved loved this one. Brutal ending. I also read this for Horror Aficionado's Ghost/Haunting.

"Incident at Bear Creek Lodge" (3.5 stars)-This one was very confusing. A grandchild is forced to go and see his grandmother. She is not who she appears to be.

"Thursday-Night Shift" (3 stars)-I loved the idea about a young girl receiving a mystical stone from her aunt. But I think tying it into a historical event (no spoilers) did not work for me. Plus the ending left a lot to be desired.

Part II: The Gracetown Stories--I really enjoyed the linkages between all of these stories.

"Suppertime" (3 stars)-This was a weird one. Taking place in the 1900s, a girl named Mat wants more than to be married and to have children. But when her pet bobcat (just go with it) comes back she realizes that something dark may be in the swamp near her family's home. This story just went on a bit long for me.

"Rumpus Room" (3.5 stars)-I don't know where this story was going. It just seesawed back and forth a lot, but I liked the idea behind it, but wish the execution had been stronger.

"Migration" (5 stars)-A woman realizes something she thought had been drive out of her, is back to stay. And it seems like home may be the only answer.

"Caretaker" (4.5 stars)-A story you have to read between the lines to get to what happened and why. The ending was a bit abrupt though. I wanted more there.

Part III: The Nayima Stories--Loved the two stories in this part.

"One Day Only"(5 stars)-A great take on what would happen if a plague wiped out most of the world. We follow the character of Nayima here when she is younger and maybe still had a bit of hope left.

"Attachment Disorder" (5 stars)-Nayima is older and now has people she cares about, but she may be left with an ugly choice.

Part IV: Future Shock--I loved some of the Afrofuturism stories, some I was just left a bit confused about.

"Ghost Ship"-(2.5 stars) Passengers on a trip, left for dead.

"Shopping Day"'(4 stars)-Loved this story of a family that is dealing with a plague that has them forced to deal with curfew. Their mother leaves for shopping with instructions on what to do if she does not return. I wanted to read more of this story.

"The Biographer" (3.5 stars)-I was so confused by this one. Not the idea of a plague, but who the biographers were and why did they do what they were doing.

[Danielle The Book Huntress · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my second reading Tananarive Due, the first time was in the Jordan Peele edited anthology Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror (and that story was awesome), but she has been on my radar for a while. I have watched some video interviews of her and I find her so captivating and fascinating. I love the way she thinks about fiction, stories and writing. Her family background is so impactful (both her parents were civil rights activists, and her mother was injured by tear gas during a march, so she had to wear dark glasses for the rest of her life.) I appreciate how Tananarive puts a lot of herself in her stories in different ways. The stories feel authentic and true to life in that sense. There is a truth to the way she conveys the black experience in her stories as well. I feel as a whole, this is a strong collection, and a good introduction to this author. She writes a type of almost “homey”, misleadingly everyday kind of horror that insinuates itself into the conscience. In a way it’s a lot more disquieting than in your face horror. I will go through and discuss thoughts on the stories and then I will give my final rating at the end.

Apologies, as this will be a long review.

Book 1: Wishes

“The Wishing Pool”--this story hit me in the gut. I recently went through the loss of my mother and it was one of the most traumatic experiences of my life (and I thought it was bad when my father passed away some years ago). My sister and I nursed and cared for her, and I saw her deterioration, even though there is a type of denial there that I can acknowledge in retrospect. So, this tale of a woman who is dealing with her father’s progressive demise from dementia was very hard to read. This story was based on Due’s own experiences with her father’s dementia. I can’t say too much about this one, but it has a “Monkey’s Paw” kind of vibe, but in this case, perhaps more of a bittersweet victory in some ways. It’s not really horror, but there’s an underlying feeling of disquiet as one is not really sure about what powers are involved and what was was sacrificed in the process. Four stars.

“Haint in the Window”--is a story about gentrification and about being “othered” and marginalized in one’s own community. A man runs a bookstore in a black neighborhood that has become a hot property for ‘redevelopment.’ With the influx of wealthy white people, cae the overpolicing and criminalization of blackness, and the loss of self. It’s a haunting, but not like one would traditionally label as a ghost story. This was powerful and has an unsettling ending because it feels so real. Four stars.

“Incident at Bear Creek Lodge”--another one that socked me in the jaw. It reminded me of how my grandmother treated us (when she was younger. She was a genuinely kind, sweet person in her later years. God rest her soul). She was not the kind of grandparent who had time for kids, so she definitely was of the “seen and not heard” school. Let me make it clear this character is a whole lot worse. The grandmother is straight up twisted. For me, this story is about how racism makes monsters out of all of us (a society dominated by white supremacy acting as the oppressor and black people as the oppressed), and how this can cause so much damage to the family. Another ending that got under my skin. Four stars.

“Thursday-Night Shift”--definitely more of a sci-fi story. It’s something I can’t even describe too much because it gives way too much away. Suffice it to say, it’s about asking yourself the question, “If you could change something if you knew what would happen, should you or would you?” To me, this one didn’t impact me as much as the previous stories, although it touches on a historical event in the late 1960s that deeply grieves America. Three stars.

Book 2: The Gracetown Stories

“Last Stop on Route 9”– I feel like a foundational part of growing up black is going “down south” to visit relatives. In this case, it’s for a funeral. Charlotte is driving her younger cousin Kai home from a funeral in the Gracetown, Florida countryside. She is an out-of-towner and she doesn’t know the rules about that area. Her cousin Kai’s father has some very bad memories associated with their family and growing up there and has filled his son in on that. Additionally Kai has an ability to sense bad vibes. He is very unsettled driving around the area and repeatedly warns Charlotte. Charlotte rarely comes to Gracetown and is not clued in on the whole dynamic and dismisses Kai’s concerns. It turns out she should have listened better. I felt their fear like I was in that car with them. Living in Texas, I had to be very careful when I was out in the country because there are places where black people are not safe. To be fair, it’s not just in the south. A lot of sundown towns are in the midwest as well. Racism is an evil force in this story, and everyone knows it or finds out the hard way. I think this one of my favorites in the volume. Four and ½ stars.

“Suppertime”--is a coming of age story set in the 1900s from the viewpoint of a young girl named Mat growing in near the bayous of Gracetown. She balances the demands of her role as the oldest girl sibling at home, expectations on her, due to her role as a female, and trying to be free and enjoy her childhood. Her bobcat pet that she nursed back to health comes to visit and brings to her attention a very dangerous creature lurking in the nearby bayou. This was genuinely thrilling, but it also had a beautiful feeling of nostalgia, providing for young black girls the opportunity to feel part of stories that often overlook them. I grew up reading a lot of boy’s adventure. It’s nice to read a girl’s–and a black girl at that–girls’s adventure story. Five stars.

“Rumpus Room”--I had so many feelings with this one. I guess I should have been prepared, but I wasn’t. Jasmine is going through some stuff, and drifting. She ends up taking a job cooking and cleaning for an older man for a place to stay and some money. However there is something off about the rumpus room she’s staying in. This story is disturbing and eerie. The lead character is flawed in a realistic way, but perfectly suited to be the heroine of this story. Four stars.

“Migration”--Whew. I can’t say too much about this one. It’s significantly darker than most of the stories in this volume. Well-written, but not a favorite of mine. Three stars.

“Caretaker”--definitely falls into the weird fiction arena. I’ve never read a story like this. There is some difficult subject matter and it’s dealt with in a very bizarre way. Three and ½ stars.

Part III: The Nayima Stories

“One Day Only”--is the beginning of futuristic/dystopian stories that make up the rest of this collection. I felt the most detached from the futuristic stories because I am not a big reader in these genres. However, the concept was interesting with this one. I like how Nayima sets out to spread joy in the bleak landscape of a society ravaged by horrific events. Three and ½ stars.

“Attachment Disorder”--I appreciated this story very much. It was more of an adventure story featuring an older version of Nayima from the previous story. It reminded me of the strength of black women throughout generations who do incredible things under horrific circumstances, along with keeping their families together through everyday difficulties. Four stars.

Part IV: Futuristic Stories

“Ghost Ship”--pure sci-fi that is really harrowing the more you think about it. In this story, white supremacists manage to kill or kick almost all the non-white peoples out of the United States. And things aren’t much better in the Homeland of Africa. Very bleak. Three stars.

“Shopping Day”--this reminded me so much of Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. That book was incredible but it really distressed me, so I was somewhat triggered. Nothing overtly terrible happens in this story, but it’s more about the potential for what bad things could happen under these circumstances. Three and ½ stars.

“The Biographer”--was a dark ending to this collection. It was sci-fi with a horror edge. The further it goes into the story, the more traumatizing it gets. Three stars.

Final Thoughts: The Wishing Pool and Other Stories is a well-rounded collection that tends towards horror, but has some stories that are science fiction with a darker edge. I preferred the first two parts, as I am not a fan of dystopian science fiction. That said, all the stories were good. Due understands humanity and the dark and good qualities of people. Themes of family, love, injustice, society, cultural and ancestral heritage pervade all of the stories. The diversity is a strong point as there is very good representation amongst the characters, racially and also in gender and sexuality. For me, Due’s style of horror feels very distinct. It’s never in your face, but deals with subtleties and unanswered questions. It lets the fearful things in the tales sit with you and simmer in your mind. When you go back to think about it, it makes you shudder. She writes about social horror, which is absolutely relevant, and is in some ways, more disturbing than just the monster or serial killer with unknown motives. Instead, several of these stories are about how regular people can become or are monsters underneath it all based on their socialization or external forces acting on their consciousness. Or maybe they just always were a monster and are just good at hiding it. And scariest of all, about how you exist in a reality where you are othered and considered the monster for some arbitrary reason.

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been wanting to read Tananarive Due for years but I've just never gotten around to it. What better way to get a feel for her work then through a short story collection. I love short stories and I often find some of my favorite books are short story collections. As with all collections I had some favorites and some not favorites.

The Favorites:
1. The Haint in the Window= this is probably my favorite story in the whole collection

2. Shopping Day= A perfect "5 minutes in our future" story

3. Rumpus Room= a supernatural story about survival

4. Caretaker = A can't describe this one, you just need to read it

5. The Biographer = This story felt Twilight Zone-esque.

The Not Favorites

First I wanna say that all these stories are well written. These just weren't for me.

1. Incident at Bear Creek = Boring

2. One Day Only = Just didn't work for me

3. Attachment Disorder = I'm just not for me

The Wishing Pool has made me really excited to read more from Tananarive Due. I think her writing style is smart but not so smart that it made me feel dumb. If you like Horror short stories with a side of racism than I think you'll enjoy this collection.

[chasc.taylor_reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection was a mixed bag of stories — some I absolutely loved and others that were meh. The Gracetown section was my favorite. I will say, the variety of stories was great!

[Cloud · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars

So excited to go through Due’s catalog, what a great horror collection. Rtc!

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Truth be told, most of these stories left me wanting for something more, although I enjoyed the beginning of the collection more than the end. Every story has an abrupt ending and, while I don’t always mind a lack of resolve, I don’t think it worked with every tale here. Some were haunting enough to not crack the foundation with that abruptness while others felt unfinished, as if they were written in haste or created as experimental first chapters to get a feel for each reader’s experience.

Regardless, Tananarive Due writes incredibly well and I will gladly indulge in more of her work. I’m even more excited now for her upcoming full length novel, which will hopefully satisfy in a way that many of these did not.

The Wishing Pool ~ 4 stars

Paint in the Window ~ 4 stars

Incident at Bear Creek Lodge ~ 4 stars

Thursday Night Shift ~ 4 stars

Last Stop on Route 9 ~ 4 stars

Suppertime ~ 4 stars

Rumpus Room ~ 5 stars

Migration ~ 4 stars

Caretaker ~ 3 stars

One Day Only ~ 4 stars

Attachment Disorder ~ 3 stars

Ghost Ship ~ 3 stars

Shopping Day ~ 3 stars

The Biographer ~ 4 stars

3.79 average rating

I am immensely grateful to Recorded Books and NetGalley for my copy. All opinions are my own.

[Jas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Books like this are exactly why I keep picking up books of short stories despite not being a fan of many of the ones I read. Every story in this book was interesting with characters and stories that you became lost in, there were plenty of moments that had me spooked. I loved this book from start to finish. It was captivating and in my opinion more than delivered. I can't wait to jump into other works by this author.

[Tya C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you know me, then you know that Tananarive Due is my favorite author of all time, so I could not wait to read her newest short story collection and I really enjoyed it! I loved that so many of the stories connected to her previous books! We get to revisit Gracetown & a few other stories from Ghost Summer and read a story that was related to her graphic novel, The Keeper. It was exciting to revisit those stories! I also enjoyed the mention of the reformatory from Tananarive Due’s upcoming novel👀

Some of my favorite stories were The Biographer, Haint in the Window, Rumpus Room, and Migration! I will say that several of the stories felt incomplete to me. I think some of the stories should’ve been longer and could’ve had a more fleshed out ending, but overall I really enjoyed this collection! Tananarive Due never disappoints!

Story ratings:
* The Wishing Pool: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
* Haint in the Window: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
* Incident at Bear Creek Lodge: ⭐️⭐️⭐️✨
* Thursday-Night Shift: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
* Last Stop on Route 9: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
* Suppertime: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
* Rumpus Room: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
* Migration: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
* Caretaker: ⭐️⭐️✨
* One Day Only: ⭐️⭐️✨
* Attachment Disorder: ⭐️✨
* Ghost Ship: ⭐️⭐️
* Shopping Day: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
* The Biographer: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Average rating: 3.9 stars!

TW: racism, police brutality, animal death

[Melisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Listen 3 times to Levar Burton read this story.

[Shelby (catching up on 2025 reviews) · Rating 5 out of 5]

BOOK REVIEW

Thank you #partner @akashicbooks for my #gifted copy.

The Wishing Pool and Other Stories
Tananarive Due

✨ Now in paperback and featuring two new stories!

We all know The Reformatory was my top read of 2023, so when Akashic Books reached out and offered me a copy of this new paperback release, I obviously jumped at the chance to read it.

💭 A someone who only recently got into horror, I absolutely loved this immersive, suspenseful, thought-provoking collection of short stories! Due seamlessly blends horror, sci-fi, and magical realism with themes of racial violence and oppression. There are four sections, with sixteen different stories, each evoking their own range of emotions — fear and anxiety, tempered by warmth and optimism.

From a mystical wishing pool, to a haunted bookstore, to a pandemic dystopia, and so much more, Due's remarkable skill and creativity are on full display here. The atmosphere and tension are the stuff nightmares are made of. While every story is good, a few standouts for me are:
•The Wishing Pool
•Rumpus Room
•Caretaker
•Last Stop on Route 9 (with nods to The Reformatory)

I highly recommend The Wishing Pool and Other Stories to anyone who enjoys a unique blend of horror and speculative fiction.

📌 Available now!

[Booksblabbering || Cait❣️ · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you have read The Reformatory, expect similar themes, stories, and locations.

This is a collection of short stories covering a range of time and characters and dynamics.
The one that stood out the most to me was Suppertime. Due just writes incredibly well from a child’s perspective.

I expected more from the titular story, but it was one of the weakest, in my opinion.

Overall, I was let down by this collection as most were misses for me. However, I know some will stay in my head for a while.

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[Star Gater · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of short stories in one book. Each story stands alone. I liked how the ending abruptly appeared for each.

Years ago, radio personality Paul Harvey gave a snippet of a story, drew you in, had a commercial and came back with the iconic line "And now for the rest of the story." There is a difference, when Due's stories end they caught me off guard. Once I realized I had a book of short stories, I also didn't realize the previous one had ended until I heard a new story line. Each one I thought Paul Harvey prompt me. I restart each new one. I enjoyed the readings and didn't watch page counts. I feel like there was a seamless flow from story to story.

There was a lot of profanity and thus three stars.

I did like the narration. It wasn't over the top; the stories sold themselves.

Published: 04/18/23
Narrated by: William DeMeritt & Jasmin Walker

Thank you NetGalley and RB Media, Recorded Books for accepting my request to audibly read and review The Wishing Pool.

[Coral · Rating 5 out of 5]

MASTERFUL. Tananarive Due is a master storyteller. I can't wrap my head around how she crafts these short stories, creating such strong characters and settings, stories and backstories, in so few pages. She's a master.

[hope h. · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars

was first introduced to tananarive due's work via her short story the lake, featured in ellen datlow's Body Shocks: Extreme Tales of Body Horror. it was definitely one of the stories that stuck with me the most in that collection and i've been wanting to read more of her work since - and HOO BOY SHE DOES NOT DISAPPOINT. her works here range from southern gothic-style horror to mid-apocalyptic speculative fiction that calls to mind the greats like Octavia Butler. while i found that the gracetown stories were the ones that had the biggest impact for me, i thoroughly enjoyed every genre featured here and am definitely going to be thinking about this collection for a LONG time. also wanted to add that i strongly recommend the audiobook version! the narrators do an absolutely fantastic job of embodying the characters and really making the emotional punches land.

individual ratings:

the wishing pool - 5/5
haint in the window - 5/5
incident at bear creek lodge - 4/5
thursday-night shift - 3/5
last stop on route 9 - 4.5/5
suppertime - 3/5
rumpus room - 5/5 (my favorite from the collection)
migration - 5/5
caretaker - 4.5/5
one day only - 5/5
attachment disorder - 3/5
ghost ship - 4/5
shopping day - 3/5
the biographer - 3.5/5

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love short stories and I love discovering new authors, so this story collection was an absolute treat. A nice mix, of horror, science fiction and dystopia, with several stories set in and around Graceland, FL, a mysterious and magical place. I will be reading more of her work.

[Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: Really Enjoyed It - Loved It, 4-4.5 stars

This is very possibly the first short story collection I have ever finished that I read with my eyeballs. Usually, for the two or three I've finished in the past, I had to resort to audio to get through it. That alone has me leaning more towards the 4.5 stars than the 4.

I don't read a lot of anthologies, so I have a hard time deciding how to rate them. I will say though that even though there were some short stories that I liked less than others, and even though some of them confused me, I still had a really great time with these. I will definitely be seeking out more of Tananarive Due's horror works because these impressed me so much. There was not a single one that I actively disliked, and she did such a fantastic job at drawing me in and getting me invested in such a short length of time. Most of the stories are about 20 pages long, with some being longer and some being shorter, but none overstayed their welcome. Some of them left me wanting more of the story, but not in a bad way. Just in a way that I feel like indicates that she did a fantastic job of making me care about the characters and the situation.

All of these stories feature black protagonists, and many of them also feature LGBTQ characters, and the thing that really impressed me was her portrayal of children. While these are all horror stories, I'd say that it covers a wide range of horror, including: edge of your seat fear, creeping dread, everyday fears, social horror, ghosts, etc. There are also some genre blends with sci-fi and futuristic stories.

My favorites in this collection:
Rumpus Room (Gracetown) - this one was my favorite and legitimately raised my heartbeat and gave me goosebumps
Suppertime (Gracetown) - I think this would have been my favorite had I not read it already in a different collection of short stories
Haint in the Window (Wishes)
One Day Only (Nayima Stories)
Last Stop on Route 9 (Gracetown)

Stories that I enjoyed, or that I know will be sticking with me, but weren't contenders for favorite of the collection:
The Wishing Pool (Wishes)
Migration (Gracetown)
Caretaker (Gracetown)
Attachment Disorder (Nayima Stories)
Ghost Ship (Future Shock)
Shopping Day (Future Shock)

These I still enjoyed reading, but I feel like I only understood part of it:
Incident at Bear Creek Lodge
Thursday-Night Shift
The Biographer

Overall, I am very glad that r/fantasty bingo pushed me to pick this collection up, and I will definitely be reading more from this author in the future.

[Shain Verow · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my most rewarding “off the shelf” library picks I’ve had in a while! This collection of short stories is an incredibly high quality selection of stories that fall generally into three groups: Familiar Horror, Florida Magic, and Plague tales.

The stories vary greatly, but I’ll say that there was only a single story that I felt was “only good”, and the quality and variety of the tales here are not to be missed. The titular story hit so close to home, I had to stop reading and pull myself back together, while others a magical spectacles that are a feast for the mind to chew on.

More than anything else the common element that runs through this collection is strong point of view characters. They’re a diverse group, in a wide array of settings and situations, but in each story the point of view character is able to provide a perspective and voice that provides an experience that I hated to have end, even if I was dreading to turn the next page.