Skidding Into Oblivion

by Brian Hodge

We each inhabit many worlds, often at the same time. From worlds on the inside, to the world on a cosmic scale. Worlds imposed on us, and worlds of our own making.

In time, though, all worlds will end. Bear witness:

After the death of their grandmother, two cousins return to their family’s rural homestead to find a community rotting from the soul outward, and a secret nobody dreamed their matriarch had been keeping.

The survivors of the 1929 raid on H.P. Lovecraft’s town of Innsmouth hold the key to an anomalous new event in the ocean, if only someone could communicate with them.

The ultimate snow day turns into the ultimate nightmare when it just doesn’t stop.

An extreme metal musician compels his harshest critic to live up to the hyperbole of his trolling.

With the last of a generation of grotesquely selfish city fathers on his deathbed, the residents of the town they doomed exercise their right to self-determination one last time.

As history repeats itself and the world shivers through a volcanic winter, a group gathers around the shore of a mountain lake to once again invoke the magic that created the world’s most famous monster.

With Skidding Into Oblivion, his fifth collection, award-winning author Brian Hodge brings together his most concentrated assortment yet of year’s best picks and awards finalists, with one thing in common:

It’s the end of the world as we know it . . . and we don’t feel fine at all.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Fiction, Audiobook, Adult, Weird Fiction, Lovecraftian

229 pages, Paperback

First published February 19, 2019

About the author

Brian Hodge, called “a writer of spectacularly unflinching gifts” by Peter Straub, is the award-winning author of ten novels of horror and crime/noir. He’s also written well over 100 short stories, novelettes, and novellas, and four full-length collections. His first collection, The Convulsion Factory, was ranked by critic Stanley Wiater as among the 113 best books of modern horror.

He lives in Colorado, where he also dabbles in music and photography; loves everything about organic gardening except the thieving squirrels; and trains in Krav Maga, grappling, and kickboxing, which are of no use at all against the squirrels.

Reviews

[Dr. Cat in the Brain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another collection of short fiction and another perfect score.

Have I gone mad? Yes.

But that's beside the bloody point.

This has been a good year for reading short fiction.

First there was Philip Fracassi's incredible BEHOLD THE VOID and the best book of 2021 (kiss my sweet tush Goodreads awards) BENEATH A PALE SKY. Then I tripped into Laird Barron's soul-crushing OCCULTATION collection, one of the best short fiction collections I've ever read. Finding another brilliant series of short stories after reading all that makes me feel like I've toppled into a never-ending honey pit of imagination.

Have I been missing out on some of the best work in the genre for years? Has my own personal nostalgia and myopia been denying me a trip to horror flavor country?

In a word: Yes.

DUH.

So here we go again, a chance to correct these glaring omissions in my collection and hopefully help some people discover a great book.

This time we visit Brian Hodge and enjoy his soggy series of celestial astonishments: Skidding into Oblivion.

This isn't the first book by Brian Hodge that I've read this year. THE IMMACULATE VOID was recommended to me multiple times in the past and I finally got around to reading it in 2021.

It did not disappoint.

I thought The Immaculate Void was very well done, but everything that made it interesting is magnified and multiplied into a perfect storm in Skidding into Oblivion. A series of short stories exploring themes both gigantic and personal, involving ancient gods and crumbling families, broken worlds, broken friendships and broken hearts.

This is one of the rare circumstances where making a concept shorter makes it bigger. Where the distillation of an idea leaves it room to grow in your imagination.

Hodge has this unique talent at linking the personal to the enormous in his writing. He has a way of making it feel instantly authentic. Natural. Like these giant conflicting tones belong together.

In his work a serial killer preying on children is connected to the stars. Small abuses and suicides are intrinsically linked to black holes swallowing moons. In this collection of short stories, the end of the world is waiting not in some ancient dusty tome written in blood, but in a Facebook post, in a snow day, in a ruthless music review.

The first story in the collection is called ROOTS AND ALL and it features a family being given a chance to right a terrible wrong. To save an innocent life. A piercing tale of folklore legend and a sleeping girl captured in a spell. But freeing her means paying a devastating price (9/10)

Next we have the timely and super-charged STAGNANT BREATH OF CHANGE. Where the desire to conserve the "old ways" from social and cultural advance fuels a deal with a nightmarish power. A tale of the sickness at the heart of traditionalism. Building an unnatural modern permanence for a past that no longer exists. Where a group of men try to keep their dying worldview alive only to bring down a storm of Lovecraftian terror onto the heart of their rotting nostalgia. 10/10

From one end of the world to another, the next story of apocalyptic ennui is called SCARS IN PROGRESS. Where a professional fighter has a chance meeting with a past love and becomes entangled in her emotional descent into a terrible obsession. A compulsion that draws her to creatures that are anathema to existence. Living spiritual anti-matter that decays the very fabric of reality, eating away at the core of our essence and the universe itself. 10/10

From the unblinking nihilism of the demonic to the playful horror of a child's fantasy, the next story is called JUST OUTSIDE OUR WINDOWS, DEEP INSIDE OUR WALLS. A fairy tale of dark magics as a boy with dangerous gifts is kept hidden away from the rest of the world only to find a small breath of freedom in his friendship with a girl. And when the boy realises his friend is facing a similar but different imprisonment he attempts to use his powerful talents to help her escape. To give her a place to hide. A place to feel safe. A secret place, where no one and nothing can touch her. 8/10

We go from the all-consuming warmth of a child's friendship to the bitter cold of survival in a story called ETERNAL, EVER SINCE WEDNESDAY. A frigid tale of the Snow Day that never ends. Where the playful arena of children's fantasy turns into a climate of horror. Where communities fall apart and families crumble and decay under the white barrage of endless fields of winter. 10/10

While winter can be difficult, sunshine isn't always a reprieve. In the next story we explore the psyche of an individual dedicated to making you appreciate life, no matter what. A lesson of the dangers of positivity in LET MY SMILE BE YOUR UMBRELLA. Where an internet blogger who flirts with death via anorexia gains the attention of a stalker who wields cynicism as wisdom, cruelty as education and positivity as a knife. Don't worry, be happy, OR ELSE. 8/10

Those who court death are not always as tragic as those who try to make a deal with it. As a group of mourners are about to learn in the story: WE, THE FORTUNATE BEREAVED. Where a Halloween tradition to summon the dead for one last goodbye digs up a whole town's share of dark secrets and exposes the ugly truth about why the ghosts don't wanna talk to the living. 9/10

Not all voices from beyond belong to the dead. Some belong to constructs that surpass our imagination. Horror speaks to us from the dark corners of our world in: ONE POSSIBLE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME. A tale of an otherworldly assault on children, and the sanity of their parents and families. Forcing the human race to face the reality of a dark extinction of incalculable heartbreak and loss. 10/10

Sticks and stones may break your bones, but insults can break your mind in CURES FOR A SICKENED WORLD. The online arena of music and art reviews is often less constructive advice and more like Thunderdome. And that reality becomes painfully literal for one particularly odious critic who enjoys tearing bands to pieces for the crime of daring to express themselves. Because a death metal musician with ties to the supernatural is looking to teach this nasty critic a lesson in hyperbole. 9/10

Language is important. And influential and dangerous. Make no mistake. And not just when we communicate with each other. We have always wanted to speak with the animals around us. To understand their motivations and thoughts. But what if this desire connected us to something titanic and alien? And what if that alien presence started talking back? In THE SAME DEEP WATERS AS YOU, an expert in animal behaviour is brought in to try and communicate with a group of strange beings. A group of beings who have an affiliation with a horror hidden in the depths of the sea. A monstrosity of such size, that its very nature could drive a person mad. And as the researcher tries to break the language barrier between the creatures and herself, she finds that there may be some things we were never meant to understand. 10/10

Finally Hodge saves the best for the end with ONE LAST YEAR WITHOUT A SUMMER. Where a documentary group tries to chronicle the end of the world and leave something to remember us by. A story of hope in the face of calamity. A monument toward human achievement, and the best of our nature. Our pursuit of perfection. Our acceptance of our faults. And our attempt to transcend our fate through art. 10/10

In Skidding into Oblivion, the personal apocalypse perfectly merges with the celestial apocalypse and they feed off each other like a loop. Like an Ouroboros of horror and tragedy.

All of these stories have this personal element that connects them like a thread.

This is a collection of horror that encompasses the entire genre, from slasher to fairy tale, alien invasion to giant monster, environmental disaster, ghost stories, survival horror, devil worship and demon hunting. Normally this range of topics spreads the fiction a bit too thin, it creates tonal problems. But this book has a brilliant emotional consistency.

In fact it's one of the most tonally consistent collections of short fiction I've ever read, despite the various topics. Everything feels like it belongs.

What really sticks with me with this series of stories, what makes the horror hit so hard, is the humanity of the characters. They never fall into the trap of popular cynicism or nihilism. They are never aloof in the face of terror. They are hollowed out, they are broken, they are ravaged, but they are constantly searching for normalcy, even when there is none left in their lives. They are clawing for the rational in the face of the colossal irrational and that action brings a heightened sense of realism to even the most surreal and abstract supernatural creature.

The horror is not just a threat to them physically, but a weight on them. You can feel the boards of their reality bending under their feet as they attempt to take in the size and depth of these nightmares.

The emotional reaction Hodge creates in his characters is like tumblers on a lock, everything lines up and snaps the reader into place. You connect with the character and so you can feel the size of an undersea titan in your bones as it calls out to its followers under the waves. You watch the uncanny valley wake up and move towards you like a possessed scarecrow. You breath in the abstract as storm clouds grow legs and walk across a landscape. You feel your place in the world shrink to nothing as unnatural, alien engines shift the planet's crust toward a melancholic tectonic doom.

This is the good stuff.

This is premium quality horror and bizarre fiction.

If you're interested I urge you to partake and pass it on to a friend.

10/10

Highly recommended. Loved it.

[Audra (ouija.reads) · Rating 4 out of 5]

These stories don’t just skid into oblivion. I would say they run full-tilt, brake lines cut, plummeting off the edge with no chance of turning back.

What glorious freedom in that end!

Each story that Hodge creates is a full world of its own, crafted with the care of a full length novel, something that I find quite rare in short stories. As a reader, I could see beyond the edges of the story, beyond just the characters on the page, peeking a glimpse into the rest of their world, and more importantly, how that world might be affected by the outcome of the story. That’s great writing.

All of the stories here except the last one have been previously published elsewhere, but if you’ve never had the pleasure of reading Hodge’s work before (as I hadn’t), I can recommend this collection as an excellent place to start.

This is the realm of supernatural horror, but I also found the stories very cerebral. The writing is interested in larger topics, ideas bigger than just bringing the monster to the page. They want to explore why the monster comes at all. “Roots and All” and “Scars in Progress” are very different stories, one about drugs and the other, demons. But what they are both interested in is the true source of evil—and that doesn’t always come from from the monster. Sometimes it comes from us.

There are two stories of cosmic horror, one a direct homage to Lovecraft and the other, “The Stagnant Breath of Change,” a bit more veiled and in my opinion far more interesting. It has this small town realism that slowly morphs into a creeping dread when you realize that the story isn’t what you thought at all.

I think what Hodge is great at is taking an amorphous feeling or idea—like loss and the grieving process—and tying that directly to something more concrete and often supernatural to examine how we process or react to those less concrete ideas, such as with the true intent of the straw effigies in one of my favorites, the Halloween tale, “We, The Fortunate Bereaved.”

This type of writing is so much more powerful than when writers just try to scare or go for the gross-out. It taps into our deeply human emotional centers and uses our own experiences and universal human experiences to bring us to the edge of the unknown.

My thanks to ChiZine Publications for sending me a copy of this one to read and review.

[Michelle {Book Hangovers} · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sadly, I don’t read a lot of short story collections.... and I think I need to change that, especially if there are more collections like this one.
I thought this collection was EXCEPTIONAL!!
I loved every single story.
This is my first time reading any of Brian Hodge’s work and I am very intrigued!!! I must read more.

Side note: I listened to the audiobook of Skidding into Oblivion and thought the narrator, David Bendena, did a phenomenal job.

Also, I enjoyed this collection SO MUCH, I went and purchased a physical copy. That way it can have a place on my “Favorites” shelf.

If you like cosmic horror, weird fiction, horror fiction or mind-bending stories that make you think....READ THIS BOOK!!

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

So many terrifying things about "Skidding Into Oblivion!"

First, Mr. Hodge is a skilled horror writer, who can deliver the chills as well as the best in the genre. He has a sick imagination, and uses it well. Will I ever read a bleaker short story than "One Possible Shape of Things to Come?" If I do, will I survive?

Second, he's changed my assumptions about the horror genre, the subtext of which I've always assumed was psychological (your primal fears grown tentacles and marching down the street, your repressed sexuality tapping at the window asking to drink your blood) or maybe philosophical (what is my responsibility toward this monster I've created? What fresh hell shall science summon?). But Mr. Hodge has written a few horror stories rooted in social ills -- the meth/and or opiate epidemic ("Roots and All"), white rural reaction ("The Stagnant Breath of Change"), industrial decline ("Scars In Progress"). Could horror be a more accurate reflection of the modern world than all those novels about disgruntled academics and disaffected Manhattanites that are clogging up my Kindle? Good heavens, does the New York Times Book Review have to change its focus?

But most terrifying of all . . . with the exception of "The Same Deep Waters as You," a Lovecraft paean, all the stories in "Skidding Into Oblivion" feature premises that would work as full-length novels, but Mr. Hodge manages to compress them all into short fiction, without seeming underdeveloped or rushed. So have all the horror novels I've read in my life been at least 200 pages too long? And if so, can I get a refund on them?

[Scotty · Rating 5 out of 5]

I never read short story collections like novels. I usually have three or four going at any given time, and I'm always sort of skipping back and forth between them. Even with collections by my favorite authors (H.P. Lovecraft, Gemma Files, John Langan, Shirley Jackson, etc.) and classics like King's "Skeleton Crew" and Barker's "Books of Blood," I tend to sample more than feast.

So I was surprised when I found myself three-quarters of the way through Brian Hodge's "Skidding Into Oblivion" with no sign of slowing down. When I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about reading it. And before I knew it I had plowed through cover-to-cover in a way I don't think I ever have with a short story collection.

This is hands down one of the absolute best collections I've ever read. A couple of these stories I'd read before ("The Same Deep Waters as You" has long been my favorite take on the Innsmouth theme since Lovecraft's original). More than a few should be considered instant classics of the horror genre. Even what may be the weakest entry -- "Cures for a Sickened World" -- is pretty brilliant, showing a deep understanding of both online snark culture and what made black metal so scary circa 1993.

Many of these stories are Lovecraftian -- either explicitly ("The Same Deep Waters as You" and "The Stagnant Breath of Change") or implicitly ("One Possible Shape of Things to Come," "One Last Year Without Summer"), and Hodge has proven himself to be one of the best at taking Lovecraft's basic themes and putting them within his own unique perspective. I found both "One Possible Shape of Things to Come" and "One Last Year Without Summer" more unsettling than anything Lovecraft himself ever wrote (with the possible exception of "The Temple," my personal favorite Lovecraft story), and with "The Stagnant Breath of Change" he managed to take what I've always thought of as one of Lovecraft's goofiest Outer Gods -- Shub-Niggurath -- and crafted perhaps the bleakest horror story I've read in the last ten years or so (only Nathan Ballingrud's "The Visible Filth" comes close for me).

"Roots and All" is another standout, reminding me of the old folk tales about Monkeyjack and Rawhide and Bloody Bones that my Okie grandfather used to terrify me with. I also loved "Let My Smile Be Your Umbrella" and "Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday" -- two deceptively simple stories that are devastating in impact.

My favorite, though, has to be the closer; "One Last Year Without Summer" marries three major obsessions of mine -- the Tambora explosion of 1815, Lovecraftian horror of the subterranean variety, and the end of the world -- and does so in a way I found completely unexpected. It's less overtly frightening than it is deeply, deeply mournful, and Hodge manages to end on a hint of (almost) hope that I didn't see coming.

Hodge has long been one of the best writers in the horror genre. But "Skidding Into Oblivion" raises the bar. This is a must-read.

[Josh Towzey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Favorites:

Roots and All
Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday
Cures for a Sickened World
The Same Deep Waters as You

[Panagiotis · Rating 5 out of 5]

O Brian Hodge γράφει από ένα σκοτεινό μέρος, όπους ο φωτισμός μεταβάλλεται, και κάθε φορά βγαίνει κάτι καινούριο. Αυτό μπορεί να είναι ζοφερή λογοτεχνία για τους απόκληρους της κοινωνίας, μπορεί να είναι τρόμος, άλλοτε πειραγμένη επιστημονική φαντασία. Μπορεί να είναι και μια αλλόκοτη, νιχιλιστική Λαβκραφκική αφήγηση.

Πολλά μπορεί να είναι ένα βιβλίο του Hodge, αλλά υπάρχει μια σταθερά: η εξωφρενική ποιότητα της γραφής του και η τεχνοτροπία με την οποία αναπτύσσει τις πιο πρωτότυπες, σκοτεινές ιδέες. Αυτή η συλλογή λειτουργεί σαν ένα αδερφάκι του μυθιστορήματος The Immaculate Void, όπου μοιράζονται κοινούς θεματικούς άξονες, με κυριότερο αυτόν της εξωγήινης νοημοσύνης που δεν της καίγεται καρφάκι για εμάς.

Αν σας αρέσει ο τρόμος, αλλά δεν σας αρέσει να διαβάσετε μια από τα ίδια ξεκινήστε να διαβάζετε Hodge. Κάνει καλό.

[Mike Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're looking for a short story horror novel by a writer of "literary horror" that can actually tell a good story, Skidding into Oblivion is the way to go. This is the best short story collection I've read in years. Brian Hodge continues to impress me. Outstanding and original.

[Joshua Hair · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best short story collections I’ve read in a long time. If you can find a copy (because of course they’re hard to come by) then buy it. You will not be disappointed.

[Bogdan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not so much history with this one. Not so bad ideas, but something was lacking. I think the writing really wasn`t in my comfort zone.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

“These were dark waters, full of secrets and unintended tombs [...] They were sepulchers of dread, trapped in another world where they so plainly did not belong.”

First and foremost, I want to give a HUGE thank you to ChiZine Publications for sending me an ebook copy of Skidding into Oblivion by Brian Hodge in exchange for an honest review.

Skidding into Oblivion will be released on February 26 and if you buy only one book this month, let it be this book. I read an ebook but I'm seriously considering buying a hard copy upon release.

Skidding into Oblivion is what a short story collection should strive to be; emotionally charged, rich, descriptive language, wildly imaginative. Hodge has a complete mastery of the English language. I savored every word, got lost in the language. Practically every line was quotable. I could have loved it for the words alone, however, each of the eleven stories were so well crafted, each story delicate and intricate in design and plot, the stories definitely lived up to the words.

Each story is unique and special in it's own way, although they all fit together and build off of each other. There are hints of science fiction and Lovecraftian monsters, there is love, loss, social commentary, tongue in cheek humor, communications with the dead, all blended into one cohesive, haunting, emotional horror collection. Skidding into Oblivion walks a fine, misty, gray line between dreams and reality. It begs, entreats, you to question what is real and what could be; it challenges everything you thought you knew about the world we live in. It beckons to you to explore the realms of the unknown even if you know a way home may not be possible.

Although I enjoyed every story I read, a few stand out stories include the opening, Roots and All; Just Outside our Windows, Deep Inside our Walls; We, The Fortunate Bereaved; and One Last Year Without a Summer. Each filled me with a haunting, creeping dread, a gnawing anxiety in my belly. There really could not have been a more perfect ending to the collection than One Last Year without a Summer. It was the ultimate encapsulation of all the ideas and feelings from throughout the book. It was sad yet beautiful and hopeful.

Included are endnotes where Hodge explains where his inspiration for each story came from and his thought process for writing. Even that was filled with gorgeous language. I feel like Hodge could write on any topic and I'd be thoroughly enthralled. Brian Hodge is not a new author so thankfully there are plenty of previously released books I can read to fill the void inside since finishing Skidding into Oblivion.

[Becky · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first discovered Brian Hodge in 2012 with Stephen Jones’s fantastic anthology A Book of Horrors. In an anthology full of truly excellent short stories, Hodge’s “Roots and All” was hands down a favorite and put him immediately on my list of authors I needed to read more of. The only problem was that much of his work was out of print at the time. So I sought out more anthologies!

“Root and All” just happens to be the opening tale in his latest collection, Skidding Into Oblivion, which released earlier this year. And trust me when I say that opening with that tale is a great indication of what’s to come. The entire collection is amazing! And mostly new to me (two Lovecraftian tales were the only others I was previously familiar with, though one was in a collection I was never able to get my hands on).

Hodge’s work runs the gamut from folklorish nightmares and creepy kids to cosmic horror and demons. Each story is a perfect short, a fully encompassed tale with a fully realized world and fully developed characters. He is, in my opinion, one of the best horror writers of the moment and one of the best short story authors I’ve ever read.

Yes, I know I’m fangirling a bit, but one of my favorite things about diving into any anthology is the promise of discovering a new-to-me author. And for seven years now I’ve never once read a story from Hodge that I didn’t love. They’re creepy but also, sometimes, pack an unexpected emotional punch as well. “We the Fortunate Bereaved” and “One Possible Shape of Things to Come” hit me hard as a new parent.

“Eternal, Every Since Wednesday” (a definite favorite of this collection) also had a bit of an emotional punch for me, but stands out simply because I abhor the cold and the snow! And yet I live in Colorado, which also happens to be where Hodge lives (and says he loves the snow). So the story hit close to home for that reason as well!

Any fan of the genre will be doing themselves a real treat in reading Skidding Into Oblivion. I highly, highly recommend it!

Here's a list of all of the stories included in the collection. Note, only "One Last Year Without a Summer" is new to the collection. All of the other stories have previously appeared elsewhere and are collected together for the first time here.

Roots and All
This Stagnant Breath of Change
Scars in Progress
Just Outside Our Windows, Deep Inside Our Walls
Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday
Let My Smile Be Your Umbrella
We, The Fortunate Bereaved
One Possible Shape of Things to Come
Cures For a Sickened World
The Same Deep Waters as You
One Last Year Without a Summer

[Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightfully bleak collection of stories featuring broken people struggling to find direction in rather hopeless situations. The kind of stories where there isn't much hope (or any), but you still need to make ethically challenged decisions to live with yourself or maybe even just to get by another day.

The book embraces a rural Americana perspective, and confronts a variety of characters that bought into roles of societal expectations. There are a lot of toxic dudes in this, but even when they are the main characters from time to time, their motivations aren't really glorified. They just shape the decisions that they make.

Mostly these are small human stories confronted with much larger mystical, cosmic or apocalyptical threats.

My favorites were:

SCARS IN PROGRESS - the story of a boxer looking for purpose that reconnects with his ex after seeing she's a wreck to find out that she's been obsessed with photographing otherworldly creatures that have taken over our abandoned spaces.

STAGNANT BREATH OF CHANGE - a town and its citizens are cursed to be trapped in the 50s because their leaders made a deal with a otherworldly entity to keep their town pure. Now the last of the original leaders is dying and the townsfolk have to pay the price.

ONE POSSIBLE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME - Something strange is happened with the MC's nephew. He keeps being compelled to stand in the corner. Things get wild fast in this, and grow to a grand scale. I really loved this cosmic icepick.

ETERNAL, EVER SINCE WEDNESDAY - a messed up story of the Joneses in a true Snowpocalypse.

Honestly, there was only one story that I didn't enjoy, LET MY SMILE BE YOUR UMBRELLA. It really leaned into the privileged psycho stalker thing, and there's already too much of that in reality for me to enjoy it in fiction.

But on whole this is a solid collection of stark horror. I recommend it for anyone not suffering from depression or completely overwhelmed by existential dread already.

[Jess · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this short story collection. Really unique ideas. The kind of concepts that make you mad because you didn't think of them. Many could have been made into novellas, but they still fit this format perfectly. Definitely want to read more from this author.

[Janice · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm reading this book on Scribd. It doesn't appear to be the Kindle edition, but I don't see another ebook version to use. And I'm not confident enough to add a new edition.

Anyway:
I like short stories. And a good horror short story can be very good indeed. I think this is the first time I've read Brian Hodge (except for one story in this collection that I must have read elsewhere.)

I wanted to see if I could do a quick summary of each story without spoiling it. These summaries may sound a little snarky, but I don't mean them too. They're all deeply unsettling.



Roots and All: Folk horror + modern drug concerns and the loss of a sister. Or is she lost?

The Stagnant Breath of Change: A deal made in the past comes due. Be careful what you wish for.

Scars in Progress: Demons aren't what you think they are.

Just Outside Our Windows, Deep Inside Our Walls: Boy meets girl in next building. They get together, sort of.

Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday: Ultimate snow day(s)

Let My Smile Be Your Umbrella: Hunger artist inspires feelings.

We, The Fortunate Bereaved: A Halloween tradition has unexpected results.

One Possible Shape of Things To Come: Someone's watching. That's not good news.

Cures For A Sickened World: Death metal critic plays unexpected role.

The Same Deep Waters As You: Innsmouth meets the Animal Whisperer.

One Last Year Without A Summer: Monument at world's end

[David Thirteen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This has to be one of the best single-author short story collections I have ever read. Brian Hodge’s writing really lands in the sweet spot for me and every tale in this volume hit the mark. These stories are beautifully written with a deep sense of character and emotion. Each time I finished one of them, I felt extreme satisfaction from the experience and needed to pause to both think about and savor what I just read. I already know this is going to be one of my favorite reads of the year (and I’m not even halfway in). This gets my highest recommendation.

[Alison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fabulous horror stories! I’ve tried Lovecraft and can’t get it, and Peter Straubs Ghost Story which is so so but Hodge is rocking it!

[Lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truely well-written and engrossing collection of short stories. Some definitely shone brighter than others - the town under a demonic pact to halt progress, the woodwalker, and the one taking place in Innsmouth (this was so respectful to the subject matter…it felt right, it fit the universe) were all fantastic. And the one about the encroaching other dimension was really excellent too. Probably my favourite if I think about it.

The demon-hunter one had a really nice, graphic ending, very satisfying IMO. The snow day, not so much. Great story but I must have missed something to explain the end? One thing that these stories don’t do is hold your hand and explain the endings. That’s a very good thing, because most modern horror fails at getting you to use your own imagination and in that, lies the real subtly and terror that exposition cannot achieve. Not so great if you have a short attention span and sometimes miss things.

I didn’t much like the rockstar/critic one, I just found it a little dull, although now I think of it - it almost paid homage to the Reddening (published around the same time I am not suggesting it’s connected but wouldn’t it be nice if it was!?) with its whacked out rocker devil worship in a barn vibes. I really didn’t like the open letter to the anorexic YouTuber because I wasn’t sure what the commentary was exactly - something about toxic positivity and a prison of your own making but what was it saying about depression (?) I lost track and couldn’t be bothered going back because I just didn’t enjoy it all that much as a matter of personal taste.

I guess, personally, I go for either folk horror and cosmic horror and there was a bit of both in here so I was a happy camper. How’d this make me find corners unnerving now? And talk about triggering to those of us with kiddos. Nothing creepier than a child except a child at night acting weird. And, of course, the innsmouth look was handled so beautifully, I was again caught up in a world I’ve loved since I was a child - very nostalgic.

Overall, it was a brilliant collection though and well worth five stars. I’m embarrassed to say I hadn’t read anything by the author until now but I’ll rectify that by searching out some of his other works.

[Mike Mclatchey · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a shame that the demise of Chizine has left one of the most fantastic weird/horror collections in out of print status (not to mention it was only the beginning of a rough road for the author). Brian Hodge is quite simply one of the best authors working in this field today, I would put maybe Caitlin R. Kiernan, John Langan, Cody Goodfellow and early Laird Barron on the same level. It includes two of his best mythos stories, the classic post-Innsmouth "The Same Deep Waters As You" and the fabulous small-town twist on Shub Niggurath "This Stagnant Breath of Change" as well as another half dozen weird fiction stories that are almost as great. The apocalyptic (one fast, one slow) "One Possible Shape of Things to Come" and the haunting "One Last Year of Summer" could almost be described as Lovecraftian as well (although they do not contain any overt references) due to Hodge's great skill at combining character arcs with that vast sense of the cosmic and unknowable, a broad reach spanning smaller, more intimate moments with the sense of something major happening outside of human control or comprehension, only the latter of which was very central to what made Lovecraft's best stories so strong. Hodge's prose is readable, really smooth and imbued with such a careful sense of subtlety, a gift that perhaps only Kiernan equals or surpasses his talent on. I find it hard to give any collection five stars because it's rare for everything to be on such a rarified level, but this is among the closest I've read in the last five or ten years and might be more like a 4 1/2. I would hope that Hodge gets a chance to show the best of these off in a future collection as they don't deserve to languish due to the troubles of a less-than above board publisher.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I use the word 'masterpiece' to describe Skidding Into Oblivion, I'm not using it in the light, amorphous way that musicians and directors claim all their works to be; though they are in their own way. I think any piece of art can, and should, be considered a masterpiece if the creator poured themselves into a work.

However, when I use the word here, what I mean is that this book is truly something special. Every single story between these pages whisks you away to a truly unique, and uneasy, world with its own rules and machinations. Each idea this collection touches on could be made into a movie; each paragraph a television episode.

It actually breaks my heart to see that only 291 people have reviewed this specific piece of work.

The final story is a beautiful bow that wraps this gift up perfectly and it's something I truly believe every single person should read.

In a society now dominated by nuance and complexity - where everyone is asking what 'art' truly means - I think the final story perfectly encapsulates the answer to that question.

Art is human. Art is our response to finding ourselves in such a horrifying predicament. Art is both the answer to and the question of 'the meaning of life'.

Art is us; and yes, we may be utterly imperfect beings on an imperfect planet in an imperfect universe within an EXTREMELY imperfect timeline - and it simply doesn't matter. We continue to create, we continue to *make* even as we are being *unmade* by the universe's unalterable occurrences.

We create and we build and we change, regardless of the fact that we're all skidding into oblivion.

[aden · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had very high expectations for this collection, as it's a companion piece (though it didn't feel like it) to one of my favorite novels, The Immaculate Void. 
I was a bit disappointed, but I think that is because this collection wasn't what I was expecting. A lot of the stories have cool cosmic horror angles (in One Possible Shape of Things to Come, literally, lol), but they are more so the backdrop for character-driven tales. I feel like all were good, but none left a big impact on me.

Roots and All - 4/5
The Stagnant Breath of Change - 4/5

Scars in Progress - 4.5/5 - Loved this one. Combines cosmological and religious ideas into... spiritual anti-matter! Some really vivid, bleak imagery.

Just Outside of Windows, Deep Inside our Walls - 4.5/5 - Really wholesome and creepy. I love stories like this that combine love and horror. Reminded me a little of Pop Art from Hill's 20th Century Ghosts.

Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday - 4/5
Let My Smile Be Your Umbrella - 4/5
We, The Fortunate Bereaved - 4/5
One Possible Shape of Things to Come - 4/5
Cures For A Sickened World - 3.5/5
The Same Deep Waters As You - 2/5
One Last Year Without A Summer -

[Linzi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Skidding Into Oblivion is a short story collection and a sister to the novel The Immaculate Void. I read The Immaculate Void first and while I loved it I would say this book is this the better of the two. Which is rare because I usually struggle with collections.

I'd say roughly half of the stories deal with apocalyptic situations - some from world changing weather, eldritch horrors or something cosmic - and they were all my favourites. Of the non-apocalyptic "We, the Fortunate Bereaved" was the stand out and I would say "Cures for a Sickened World" was the weakest of the collection (which doesn't mean it wasn't good).

My favourites were "Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday", "The Same Deep Waters As You" and "One Last Year Without A Summer". They pulled a lot of emotions out of me and they'll sit with me for a long time. I hope Brian Hodge considers expanding on them one day

[Jake M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brian Hodge's eclectic collection of stories deserves more than a single read. There's not a single weak entry in a lineup that features supernatural, climate, urban, stalker, revenge, sci-fi and body horror. Monsters, spectres, a vengeful earth and Lovecraft are all present in these economical yet unnerving works. Hodge creates a frenetic energy and invests the reader into characters with within a limited writing space. A personal favourite is Eternal, Ever Since Wednesday where a snowstorm does not stop - simple yet terrifying. This is worth looking at for readers new to horror and genre fans alike.

[Travis Crafton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m not going to take the time to write individual thoughts on each of these stories…many others have done that already, in more eloquent ways than I could. What I will say is that there is not a single one of these stories that I didn’t wish was longer, that I didn’t want to spend more time exploring or that I didn’t wish could have been expanded into a more fully realized world of characters. It’s absolutely one of the best collection of short stories I have ever read and I can’t wait to read more by this author

[K · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phenomenal. Criminally it seems to only be easily available in audio format at the moment, but the narration is excellent. Bleak brilliance on display in every story in here. Consistent in theme and execution in a way I haven’t encountered in any other single author anthology despite covering a range of settings and ideas. For fans of the cosmic, the doomed and the fierce gritted teeth of human hearts facing oblivion.

[Spencer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Skidding into Oblivion is a collection of literary horror, thoughtfully written to illicit subtle unease. The stories are easy to get into and yet still have depth and meaning, each vary from one another but share themes and ideologies that link them together. These stories would undoubtedly entertain those into cosmic horror and weird fiction, I highly recommend this collection.

[B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing book. Enjoyed all, but the final, titular story which almost seemed cobbled together last minute...why it would be the moniker for the book is unknown as I found it to almost be incomprehensible. Oh well, the rest of the book was interesting, well written and gave horror a new breath of fresh air. Excited to read more of his works.

[Sherrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the better anthologies I’ve had the pleasure of reading. Writing short stories is a true art, and Mr Hodge gets it. Good plots, good characters, truly eerie settings. My sole criticism is that I often found his endings abrupt or simply fading into nothing, but I find this a lot in horror writing, so perhaps the flaw is mine.
Excellent read for fans of the genre.

[Melissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a bit skeptical about listening to a short story collection, but this book is currently not available in print. I shouldn't have worried though because this is one of the best collections I've ever read. Honestly, not a dud story among them. I still think about ones that weren't favorites. I can't wait to read more by Hodge.

[NeonBloodMoon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this book by emailing the author and sending money for an epub, and until he works out whatever’s going on with his publisher, I recommend doing the same. What an amazing ride. If you like horror shorts from John Langan, Laird Barron, Thomas Ligotti, etc., Brian Hodge fits right in with all of them.