Clairviolence: Tales of Tarot and Torment

by Mo Moshaty

The Tarot holds mystery, prediction, and unsettling omens for those who practice, divine, or are sensitive to it.

A turn of the cards weaves CLAIRVIOLENCE through space and time to delve into the stories of those shaken by life-shattering choices that threaten to tear their souls apart:

A warring couple is forced to reconcile during the end of the world.

A young man is drawn into the surreal prison-scape of an elderly woman.

A dead woman’s curse travels miles and decades to bring her killer to justice.

CLAIRVIOLENCE: TALES OF TAROT AND TORMENT unearths one novelette and ten short stories—each one exclusive to this volume—beneath the exterior of an otherwise charmed and quiet existence.

Genres: Short Stories, Horror

154 pages, Paperback

Published October 20, 2025

About the author

Mo Moshaty is a horror writer, lecturer, and producer. Flexing her horror acumen, coupled with her additional vocation as a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist, Mo has lectured with Prairie View A&M in Texas as a keynote speaker for Nightmares from Monkeypaw: A Jordan Peele Symposium, with Horror Studies BAFSS Sig for No Return: A Yellowjackets Symposium, with Centre for the History of the Gothic at the University of Sheffield and the University of California for The Whole Damn Swarm: Celebrating 30 Years of Candyman, Final Girls Berlin Film Festival's Brain Binge on Women's Trauma Within Horror Cinema and Cine-Excess: Raising Hell on The Creepy Kid Horror Subgenre.

As a core member and producer with Nyx Horror Collective, creators of the 13 Minutes of Horror Film Fest for Woman-Identifying and Non-Binary creatives, she has partnered with horror streaming giant, The Shudder Channel for 2021 and 2022, as well as Stowe Story Labs where the collective has created a fellowship to help support woman-identifying creatives over 40+ working in the horror genre. Mo has also been awarded a slot in the prestigious Black Women in Horror Class of 2023, and can be found in the collection, "160 Black Women in Horror" by Sumiko Saulson, Kenya Moss-Dyme, and Kai Leakes

Still engaging with her first love, short horror literature, her work can be found in "A Quaint and Curious Volume of Gothic Tales", by Brigid's Gate Press, and "206 Word Stories" by Bag O' Bones Press. Her debut novella, "Love the Sinner" will be released on July 5th through Brigids Gate Press, and her following titles, "Clairviolence: Tales of Tarot and Torment Volumes 1 & 2 will be released in 2024 through Spooky House Press.

Not bad for a little Brown girl from NY who fell in love with space, Frye and Laurie, and slasher films.

Reviews

[Sadie Hartmann · Rating 4 out of 5]

One sitting read! I read these Dec. 26th, sat in my comfy chair with my tea and just enjoyed every word. Fantastic short story collection. Moshaty's storytelling voice is easy and accessible--really drawing the reader in with good hooks, great characters, and a wide variety of sub-genres and styles
the first story is so good
The Devil- "Fever Man"
CW: Miscarriage
dreams, visions, ghost, haunting, memories
-mental health
Great twist
.
Sad!
The Hermit-Magic Hour
A man is the victim of a violent home invasion which leaves him with a consuming case of PTSD-this was sad
.
The Fool-Surface
-Myth/legend
-Sea/Ocean
-Sailors
-Mermaid? Sea Creature-mysterious woman (sea lion)
-Procreation
.
The Severity of Things (novellette)
-Elderly people
-Workplace horror/nursing home/meals on wheels
-povetry/money/marriage
-nested story within a story
-Relationships/romance
-deep dive/research
.
Death-I Wish I Could Grow Plants
The narrator has a dark gift--a Black Thumb that seems to not just extend to plants--but pets and people too
.
The Lovers-Dandelion Wine
a couple settle in for some plum cake and their favorite radio programming that ends tragically
(Orson Wells-War of the Worlds)
.
The Tower-Stained Glass
Creakers
Zombies
Father/Daughter
Pandemic/Airborne disease
apocalyptic
.
The Hanged man- The Human Seed
-The business of death
-ECO-PODS bio-friendly packages for human remains
CW: suicide
.
The Empress- Mourning Cloak
Body horror
motherhood
grubs
.
The Wheel- RUMPUS
A phantom is haunted by the living

[unstable.books · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clairviolence: Tales of Tarot and Torment is a collection of one novelette and ten short stories, each based on a card from the Tarot deck. With each turn of the page, and each turn of the cards, we don't know what's coming next. We meet people who must make impossible choices: an estranged couple who is forced together during apocalypse, a young man who is trapped in a horror-scape of an elderly woman, a curse that travels far and wide to bring a killer to justice, and many more messed up situations that meld the real-life and the supernatural. Mo Mashaty gives us an unsettling set of stories and fresh horror take on the Tarot. Thank you Tenebrous Press for sending me an ARC. You can pick this up directly from their site. You can pre-order now and it releases October 21st, 2025!

[Leo Otherland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Special thanks to Tenebrous Press for the ARC copy they provided.

Clairviolence instantly grabbed me and dragged me into a twisting corridor where behind every door was another grotesquerie. Another unexpected something that wrapped me in its filaments and refused to let me go unchanged. Mo Moshaty has created a panorama of horror and scintillating fascination, each story its own dark fragment, and I am more than grateful to have been able to read an ARC of this book.

It has been some time since I read my last anthology, and I’d forgotten how entrancing they can be. Mo Moshaty has given me one hell of a reminder.

Clairviolence starts with “The Fever Man,” a tale of two people in love losing the life they’ve built for themselves, bit by bit. First their baby, then themselves. Until the ultimate twist at the end that has still left me wondering what is true and what is the fever dream.

Next up is “Magic Hour,” and I still haven’t recovered from the narrator losing pieces of themself, until they finally succumb to the magic hour of dusk. Though I have to say, there are times we all thank the gods for the busy bodies. That line, like many others in this book, resonated with me and has refused to leave my mind.

Comparatively, “Surface” felt like a blood-tinted dream where pain hinges the edges, but underneath is a vast calm and serenity. Of all the stories in Clairviolence, this was one of the few that didn’t leave me feeling shuddery.

Where this collection really captured me, though, was with “The Severity of Things.”

Up until this story, the collected works had been relatively short and I passed through them, barely noticing they were there, just as they barely seemed to notice I was there in turn. But once I delved into “The Severity of Things,” I at once had the feeling that here, here was the beginning of the book and I was in it at last.

In some ways, “The Severity of Things” sets the tone for Clairviolence and it still hasn’t taken its claws out of me.

Following this tone setter comes “I Wish I Could Grow Plants,” a short little looping nightmare that honestly has not much to do with plants. I’ll let you read it for yourself.

When “Dandelion Wine” comes up it smacks you upside the head and invites you to drink the herbicide and listen to the radio. This is another tone setting piece that I just can’t shake. Especially with the bit of history thrown in. It is a slice of cake and I love it.

“Stained Glass” creeps in next with unsettling fingers and taps on the glass. Sorrow is the best way I can describe the particular kind of disturbing this story serves. Sorrow and squeamishness.

And then comes “Shallow.” If you like ghost stories wrapped up with revenge, “Shallow” will sink into you and pull you under.

Then “The Human Seed” will leave you wondering about the state of the world and our future, while “Mourning Cloak” considers what we will do for what we want most and just how much we’re willing to give to get it.

And at the end comes “Rumpus,” where two monsters meet. If “The Severity of Things” and “Dandelion Wine” set the tone for Clairviolence, “Rumpus” leaves the collection at just the right ledge of twisted horror. I’ll let you read it, but believe me, you won’t regret it.

Welcome to Clairviolence: Tales of Tarot and Torment. You may never leave.

[Books For Decaying Millennials · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received a digital ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review. All views and opinions are my own. My thoughts and opinions were not swayed by any Deck of Tarot, Oracle, fortune or void peering cards, of any kind.
-
If you, or anyone you know is *witchy*, strange or admits to having some form of "the sight", then when I say that I treat divination cards (Tarot, Oracle or otherwise) with a certain level of respect and caution, you'll understand what I mean. Oracle cards are by no means something new for horror. Ominious Fortune Tellers, who Deal out Cards, foretelling doom. Decks of Cards brought out at a party, with comical inaccurate understandings of what any given card may represent. The list goes on.
But hold up, this isn't your run of the mill, lets get spooky with divination cards book. This is Tenebrous Press Country. This, my fellow readers is Clairvoilence: Tales of Tarot and Torment . The Cards in this book are not the plot device, they are the book itself. Mo Moshaty has placed each card before, it is up to each of us to take the cards we have been dealt, wherever it takes us.

Clairviolence was a sincerely refreshing and surprising read, with each story represented by supberb drawing depicting specific cards in the Tarot Arcana. If you have any grasp of what each card may represent, you will most likely try to guess what each story may be about. I can't stop you from trying, just know that you will fail. I love it when a writer presents a story that truly surprises me. When I can feel the hooks for fear sink into me. Each story, each card, reads as if it truly was written by a different person. That's the magic of an excellent anthology of stories. Moshaty deals the cards, leaves you to read them, and no two are alike, Just as no two cards in a divination deck are the same. Each story will force you to pause for a moment, to process and linger on what you just read. Come October, Clairviolence will be released. Will you pluck of the courage, to see what the cards of have to tell you?

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disclaimer: I received an e-ARC from the publisher.

A collection of horror short stories (and one novelette), based on tarot cards. With each story being introduced with a tarot card, this anthology leads you nicely from story to story (and I could imagine reading them based on which cards you pull from the deck instead of in the order they are presented could be a really fun experience). What I really liked is that each story is accompanied by a gorgeous illustration of a card and I found that added to my enjoyment a lot as I would often find myself wondering how the illustration connected with the story and enjoying the moment I found out. The stories in here are weird, mostly horror, but sometimes more, sometimes less, often dark, but not always, sometimes fantastical and also one monster erotica. I was never able to predict where the next story would go with all of them being quite different and so this anthology never got boring. The characters are definitely one of the strong points, their reactions to the strangeness around them and the often weird personalities represented here were one of the main points of interest (alongside the strange scenarios of course).
My favorite short stories were Magic Hour (exploring the psychological horror of home invasions), The Severity of Things (telling the story of a woman haunted by her past), Dandelion Wine (where a horrifying radio broadcast interrupts a couple’s bickering), Stained Glass (about a father and a daughter surviving the zombie apocalypse), The Human Seed (exploring new burial practices after ecological disaster), Mourning Cloak (telling the story of a strange woman’s deep yearning for motherhood) and Rumpus (where a ghost encounters a monster).
All in all, this was a really, really interesting anthology and one I can recommend to any enjoyer of weird and strange horror fiction that does interesting things with the genre.
As always below you can now find my thoughts on each short story including trigger warnings.

The Fever Man: After the loss of their child and the wife’s admission that ever since a fever early during pregnancy she has been dreaming about a strange man, a couple tries to manage their grief. They seem to be slowly healing, until the wife falls ill and develops a fever and now their struggle for survival has truly begun. A haunting story with a twist at the end. I honestly liked the previous horror part better than the more grounded in reality reveal at the end, but that’s a personal preference of mine and other readers might fare differently.
TW: grief, hallucinations, illness, institutionalization, miscarriage, mentions of animal death and cancer

*FAV* Magic Hour: A woman struggles with an increasing sense of paranoia and fear after a home invasion landed her in the hospital. She will make her home a safe place by any means necessary. Gruesome and rather short, I especially would have liked the ending scenes to be a bit more detailed, but I still enjoyed reading it.
TW: attempted murder, eye trauma, isolation, paranoia, self-mutilation, stabbing

Surface: A sailors’ tale about a monster hunting the seas becomes reality for one man, who falls into the water and encounters the creature that has been eating other men who sunk into the depths. The creature has a different plan for him though. I really enjoyed the initial part of the story and while the resolution was fine as well, this story didn’t really scare me. I just expected a bit more horror here (or more emotion about what happened) and this might have been a genre mismatch for me. I think monster erotica certainly has a place in stories, but I think it was all just handled a bit too quickly for me to work well.
TW: death, drowning, gore, injury, pregnancy, sexual assault/rape

*FAV* The Severity of Things: A man takes on a new responsibility at work to provide better for his wife but finds himself entranced and terrified by one of the houses he delivers food to, and he begins to investigate the life of the lonely woman living there. Haunting and with a very gruesome ending, I really enjoyed this one.
TW: car accident, death, domestic abuse, haunting, violence

I Wish I Could Grow Plants: A young person knows their parents will die when they walk down to the breakfast table. Very short, but intriguing story and I loved the insidious way self-hatred and self-blame seeped through these pages.
TW: animal death, gore, murder

*FAV* Dandelion Wine: A couple’s long simmering fight finally breaks out, while the radio narrates an unusual and perhaps dangerous meteorological event. While I was able to get the reference being made here and thus had the ending spoiled, it was still a very gripping narrative and I enjoyed reading about how the couple dealt with their stress.
TW: fatphobia, murder, suicide

*FAV* Stained Glass: A fun little take on the zombie-virus genre centered around one terrified father and his too-young-to-understand daughter as they try to survive. I liked the newspapers hinting at the fact that people immediately reacted with racism (because of course they would) and I really enjoyed the ending. Very fun.
TW: death, decapitation, decay, disease, racism (minor element), vomiting

Shallow: A short story about revenge and murder. Unfortunately, a bit confusing for me, due to many scene and pov shifts and I couldn’t really follow the plot in the beginning, which was a bit unfortunate. Once I got into it though, it was enjoyable.
TW: bullying, cheating, drowning, murder

*FAV* The Human Seed: A new business has opened up humanity’s path towards a better future, burials in ecopods with genetically enhanced plant material, which help regain precious farmland after a fungus has destroyed previously existing food sources. But a small addition to the contract makes things soon take a darker turn. Haunting and with really interesting worldbuilding, I liked this one a lot. I also enjoyed the journalist tell-all interview style, it really made for a great framing device for this story.
TW: death, murder, suicide

*FAV* Mourning Cloak: A woman struggling with human connection and filled with the intense wish to become a mother encounters a strange and beautiful butterfly while on a walk. When she notices that it has left an eggsack behind, she takes her chance for motherhood. With really fun body horror at the end and a main character that is deeply weird, this is one of the short stories that will stick with me. I loved it a lot.
TW: bullying, death, gore, insect infestation, murder

*FAV* Rumpus: A short story about a ghost finding out one of the new inhabitants of their house is a monster as well. Interesting and with a fun vengeful ending, I really liked that a variety of monsters were presented here.
TW: child death, grief, murder

[Katrina Carruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short story collection based on tarot cards? Yes please! Mo Moshaty does an incredible job pulling the reader into the world of each character and gets you to feel simultaneously devastated and terrified. It’s a really great collection and I’ll absolutely be buying from this author again.

[S.A Reidman · Rating 4 out of 5]

RTC pity I started reading this during a reading slump, a slump that came on like a sneaky little cold, all sniffles at first and then I looked up and it's been 3 weeks.

And just like that it's over.

[Sorrell · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some gems in this compilation of shorts that would’ve benefited from being expanded into a novel and felt shortcut by the format. Mostly trashy and very predictable stories.

[Alishia Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this one. It’s such a clever mix of horror and imagination, each short story feels fresh and unsettling in its own way. Some gave me chills, others made me think twice about what’s hiding in the shadows. It’s the kind of book that keeps you up a little later than you meant to, just to read one more story. I think my favorite was the sea monster or the radio show 😮‍💨

[The Blog Without a Face · Rating 4 out of 5]

BWAF Score: 7/10

Mo Moshaty’s collection is a deck cut wide open. Each story keys off a Major Arcana card, then bleeds, burns, or writhes its way toward some hard emotional truth. It’s horror that cares about the body and what grief does to it. It’s also messy, horny, and mean in the best way.

Let’s start with the woman behind the nightmare. Mo Moshaty is an Afro-Latina horror writer, screenwriter, and producer who’s been carving out a bloody niche in the indie horror scene. Her background as a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist gives her a scalpel-sharp edge when dissecting trauma, which she wields like a pro in her work. She’s got street cred from lecturing at places like Prairie View A&M and the University of Sheffield, diving into horror’s psychological underbelly with symposiums on Jordan Peele, Yellowjackets, and women’s trauma in cinema. Her short stories have haunted anthologies like A Quaint and Curious Volume of Gothic Tales (Brigid’s Gate Press) and 206 Word Stories (Bag O’ Bones Press). Her debut novella, Love the Sinner (Brigid’s Gate Press, 2024), was a twisted little number, and now she’s running NightTide Magazine, championing marginalized voices in horror. Oh, and she’s a core member of Nyx Horror Collective, producing the 13 Minutes of Horror Film Fest with Shudder. This isn’t some newbie scribbling jump scares; Moshaty’s a force, and Clairviolence is her latest middle finger to bland, cookie-cutter horror.

Clairviolence is exactly what the title promises: clairvoyance with teeth. Each tale maps to a tarot trump:
- The Devil: “The Fever Man.” A couple’s stillbirth fractures reality as a shape made of heat, sickness, and hunger moves in. The twist doesn’t cheapen the grief; it refracts it like ice.
- The Hermit: “Magic Hour.” A home-invasion survivor barricades her life plank by plank until the world itself is a weapon. It’s a claustrophobic descent that ends in a terrible kind of peace.
- The Fool: “Surface.” A dock worker meets an oceanic entity with too many eyelids and an agenda. It’s grotesque, erotic, and oddly tender, like Cronenberg doing “The Little Mermaid” after three shots of NyQuil.
- High Priestess: “The Severity of Things.” A gerontology worker smells death, watches jaws unhinge, navigates a corporate “Compassionate Care” machine, and gets pulled into a darker economy of need.

Others swap in intimacy, collapse, and moral reckoning for jump scares. The table of contents reads like a spread on a velvet cloth; the stories feel like hands flipping those cards and saying: ok, now live with this.

This deck runs heavy on bodies and thresholds. Mouths gape. Teeth bloom like stalactites. Fever becomes a person that can stand in your doorway and bargain. The tarot isn’t just a gimmick. The Devil and Tower entries, in particular, trace classic meanings — bondage, revelation — while avoiding cosplay. The cards give the collection an organizing current without choking the stories into one aesthetic.

Moshaty’s prose toggles between lean and lush. She writes clean declaratives that jitter into mania when needed, then pulls back for surgical lines that land like a bruise. She is especially good at sensory nastiness that never feels cheap. Metallic breath. Static at the edge of vision. The click of a jaw going too far. She also lets humor in, not as a release valve but as salt in the wound. The result reads like bedside confessionals that occasionally get up, pace the room, and spit on the floor.

The book keeps returning to the same sick question: what will you give up to live with the thing you can’t fix. In “The Fever Man,” grief is a parasite but also a deal you keep making with yourself. “Magic Hour” deconstructs safety until it’s indistinguishable from self-harm. “Surface” flips reproductive terror on its head and asks whether consent is possible when a species is going extinct and the ocean itself smells like desire. The High Priestess piece pushes on caretaker ethics — who gets fed, who gets seen, who gets paid to pretend it’s “compassion.”

Threaded through is the tarot’s promise that patterns exist. A card is a story is a fate is a loop. People here are constantly reading signs — a smudge in the corner of the eye, a day’s particular color of dusk — and then deciding to honor or betray them. That’s where the violence comes from. Clair-violence.

Standouts. “The Fever Man” sings because it risks both readings at once: the supernatural is real and the mind is breaking. The end lands like a double exposure. “Magic Hour” nails the texture of post-trauma domestic life, right down to the wrong weight of blankets and the TV that feels like it’s looking back. “Surface” is the audacious banger — vivid, foul, strangely gentle — that many collections promise and few deliver. It’s the story that gets you to text a friend, “you are not ready for the tentacle scene.”

Soft spots. A couple mid-deck entries feel more like solid tarot riffs than fully lived-in lives. The conceit occasionally decorates rather than animates. There are moments of on-the-nose exposition where the ambiguity had already done the job. And while the collection’s emotional register is admirably raw, that very bluntness can sand down character specificity. You feel the archetype first, the person second.

Originality. High. The tarot frame has been done, but the way Moshaty binds bodily horror to domestic spaces and care labor feels distinctly her own. The ocean romance from hell is a genuine new flavor.

Pacing. Uneven by design. Some stories spool slowly and then plunge you through the floorboards. Others sprint into a set piece and dare you to catch up. The ratio mostly works, but two pieces could lose a page or three without losing power.

Characters. Not just meat puppets for set pieces. Even when they’re archetypal, they get interiority and bad decisions that make sense. The caretakers and the bereaved feel observed rather than harvested for misery.

Is it scary? It’s scary like a fever dream you half remember at noon. Less boo, more oh no. There are genuine gross-out images (mouths, knives, sacks from places sacks do not belong) but the lasting fright is existential. The book makes you feel watched by your own coping mechanisms.

This is strong work. A cohesive, gutsy collection with a pulse and a nasty streak, executed with enough control that the big swings don’t wobble off the table. A couple stories underwhelm relative to the killers, but the average is high and the aftertaste is potent. Well-crafted, with distinctiveness and impact. Something I’d recommend often, especially to readers who like their weird with a side of human ruin.

TL;DR: A tarot-themed horror collection that marries body horror to grief, care work, and the lies we tell ourselves to keep breathing. Big swings, sticky images, and a couple absolute rippers. A little uneven, a lot memorable. Strong recommendation for readers who enjoy weird, intimate brutality.

Recommended for: Tarot nerds who want their cards dipped in blood, indie horror freaks who crave prose that bites, and anyone who’s ever cried in therapy and wants to see that pain weaponized into art.

Not recommended for: You want blood, body horror, or tidy structure. Or if the word “trauma” makes your eyes roll into the back of your head.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

really great collection of horror stories. what really drew me to this collection was that the stories were broken down into tarot cards. The stories were very well written and kept my interest.

[RoseDevoursBooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mo Moshaty is a new-to-me author, and her collection featuring one novelette (The Severity of Things) and ten short stories, showcases an impressive range within the horror genre. You’ll find everything from cosmic horror and human monsters to ghosts, strange creatures, and more. While a few stories felt a bit unclear, the majority absolutely blew me away with their creative points of view and haunting twist endings. What makes the collection even more unique is that each story is tied to a tarot card that appears at the beginning of each tale, with the image offering a subtle clue of the horrors to come. The majority of these stories will leave you pausing for a moment to process what you just read, and letting it linger.

One standout for me was ‘The Fever Man.’ What a brilliant twist! It’s the kind of story that makes you want to immediately reread it, just to see it all unfold from a new perspective. I also loved ‘The Severity of Things’, a creepy tale about a ghost that keeps someone captive. I only wish the ending had lasted a bit longer instead of wrapping up so abruptly. Another favorite was ‘Dandelion Wine’, inspired by the real-life 1938 War of the Worlds radio broadcast and the panic it caused, it’s such a clever and eerie concept.

There’s many more I loved but I’d recommend going into this collection blind. There’s a story here for every kind of horror fan. Moshaty’s writing is sharp, imaginative, and haunting - a little bloody, not gruesome, but deeply unsettling in a way that lingers.

Here are my ratings for each story:
- 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐌𝐚𝐧: 5⭐️
- 𝐌𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐜 𝐇𝐨𝐮𝐫: 2.5⭐️
- 𝐒𝐮𝐫𝐟𝐚𝐜𝐞: 3⭐️
- 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐨𝐟 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 (novelette): 4⭐️
- 𝐈 𝐖𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐈 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐰 𝐏𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐬 3.5⭐️
- 𝐃𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐖𝐢𝐧𝐞: 5⭐️
- 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐝 𝐆𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐬: 5⭐️
- 𝐒𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰: 3⭐️
- 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐒𝐞𝐞𝐝: 4⭐️
- 𝐌𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐂𝐥𝐨𝐚𝐤: 4.5⭐️
- 𝐑𝐮𝐦𝐩𝐮𝐬: 4⭐️

Many thanks to Tenebrous Press for an ARC of this title. Out 10/21/25!

[tara_l · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good collection of short stories with a variety of vibes. Some stories I really loved, some were okay, some I didn't understand, I think there was only one I didn't really like. This is pretty normal though for a short story collection and means that there is probably something for everyone.

I found the writing really excellent, and some of the stories really made me think.

Key points:

- The stories are all different, so it doesn't feel repetitive. Some are monster stories, some aren't, some are creepy, some aren't, some have a little bit of gore, some don't, some are body horror, some aren't, some are psychological, some aren't. It's a good mix.

- I didn't find it an overly gory book (which is good). There were a couple of stories that had some gore, but it was easy to skip or skim over those parts, as it wasn't the main part of most of the stories. Many of them had minimal (tolerable) gore levels.

- Definitely some content warnings though because it's a horror short story collection so there's weird stuff happening and some of it's not very nice.

- About the Tarot... I didn't really see heavy tarot references, but then the Tarot is not my area of expertise. Each story starts with an image of a tarot card and is somewhat thematic to that card, but I thought that the tarot would have been a heavier influence in the stories.

Overall: I found this satisfying for a short story collection, and had enough stories that I really enjoyed to make it worth reading.

[Horror Reads · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really really love a full blown horror collection and this one has terrors aplenty waiting to ruin your sleep.

Evil twisted things come to life with what I like to call no frills horror. These stories are just scary, filled with monstrosities of various shapes from cosmic horror nightmares to people being cruel to one another as hell unleashes around them to a ghost story (the final story) which is just outstanding.

There are also some stories within which are set in the past, including a fantastic one about a couple on the brink of a breakup as they listen to the infamous War of the Worlds radio broadcast which caused mass hysteria when it aired.

Most of these tales also have twists you don't see coming and doing that with a short story and executing it well is a mark of a talented author such as Mo.

If you want an excellent horrific collection of stories, you definitely want to put this one on your list. I highly recommend it.

I received an ARC of this book through the publisher. This review is voluntary and is my own personal opinion.

[Phoenix Wetzel · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars! Rounded up
I honestly loved this! It reminded me a lot like Twilight Zone, and it brought me back. I love those kinds of stories.

If you’re looking for happy endings, you won’t find one here. But you’ll definitely find yourself at the edge with just about every story in the book. I nearly finished them all in one night.

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

These stories blew me away. Each one was so unique, so original. They each perfectly blend real life with the supernatural which made it feel all too real. I don't want to give anything away. Going in blind is best.
Thank you Tenebrous Press for another mind blowing ARC!

[Loïc · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not all stories were good but the first one literally blew my mind.