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Hidden Folk: Strange Stories
Hidden Folk collects twelve previously published "strange and darksome" tales by C.M. Muller, editor of the award-winning Nightscript anthology series. These stories first appeared in venues such as Shadows & Tall Trees, Supernatural Tales, and Weirdbook.“Remarkable…The best stories do a lot in a very short space.”—Brian Evenson, author of A Collapse of Horses“The writing here is so assured it’s hard to believe it’s a debut.”—David Longhorn, editor of Supernatural Tales“An author of strange fiction to keep a close eye on.”—Simon Strantzas, author of Everything is Nothing“Muller’s stories are sorrowful and stay in my head like folk tales…They haunt me long after finishing them.”—Christopher Slatsky, author of Alectryomancer“An excellent, enigmatic, and precise examination of the topography of the weird. Recommended!”—Michael Kelly, editor of Year’s Best Weird Fiction“Darkly didactic...Those who follow Muller through these thresholds will remain haunted.”—Clint Smith, author of Ghouljaw and The Skeleton Melodies“A landmark collection.”—Des Lewis, Real-Time Reviews
- GenresShort StoriesHorror
169 pages, Kindle Edition
First published December 1, 2018
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121 people want to read
About the author
C.M. Muller
59 books46 followersI live in St. Paul, Minnesota with my wife and two sons—and, of course, all those quaint and curious volumes of forgotten lore. I am related to the Norwegian writer Jonas Lie and draw much inspiration from that scrivener of old. My tales have appeared in Shadows & Tall Trees, Supernatural Tales, Vastarien, and a host of other venues. In addition to writing, I also edit and publish the annual journal Nightscript. My debut story collection, Hidden Folk, was released in 2018.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
June 10, 2020
This is an "alright" collection of appropriately titled "strange stories." I felt that many of these were a bit too predictable, perhaps because I've read a lot of fiction of this sort. Muller does create some interesting situations and characters with genuine emotion, but the way the plots play out is often rather pat. The problem is, I feel like I've read these stories before, and often in better versions. That said, there's a few really good ones like "Slattergren," "Resurfacing" and "Omzetten."
A common theme of these stories is grief and loss of identity, and also becoming trapped in a sort psychic prison or purgatory. Muller often excels at describing settings too, such as in "Resurfacing" and the emotional "The Church in the Field." I would have liked a bit more "fleshing out" in these stories, I think "strange stories" often benefit from longer length, although not always.
Vrangr - This story has some predictable elements (an unknown inheritance and creepy dreams) but it also throws in some surprises and the end has a nice weirdness. A man travels to look over an old farmhouse in the country he inherits from an aunt he's never met.
The Dust Child - This story was so-so. It has some emotional moments, but didn't do anything for me. A boy whose mother is dying from cancer starts seeing a "dust child" hovering over her bed.
A Trace of Darkness - This story was an improvement, it's an eerie doppelganger tale with a jaw-dropping ending. It has some predictable elements, but overall an effective sense of personal identity slipping out of ones' grasp. A young man who has recently moved to a new city with his wife deals with a double of himself while coping with several painful recent events.
Absconsa Laterna - A very short, simple story. It has some nice, creepy details and makes good use of its 1,000~ word length, but I felt it could use a little something more. It reminded me strongly of Michael Wehunt's unforgettable tale "A Thousand Hundred Years." A father loses his son in a peculiar sculpture park.
Slattergren - This is one of the best stories, it's a very emotional story of aging, the pain of old memories and the changing of our collective landscapes. I especially liked the setting and feeling of mounting dread. An elderly woman moved into an assisted living home starts exploring a patch of woods nearby that holds a painful childhood memory for her.
Lost in Arcadia - This story takes some odd turns. Like the previous one it's a "creepy forest" tale. The central character makes some strange choices which make sense in a sort of "supernatural context," but still felt somewhat incongruous and the end didn't quite satisfy. A struggle single mother loses her emotionally disturbed young son in woods beside her childhood home.
Diary of an Illness - This is one of the less-subtle stories in the book, it's downright apocalyptic, but it's one of the better tales. There seems to be a bit of Ligotti in this one. A man notices a strange new church opening in the city, at the same time as everyone seems to be falling ill.
Resurfacing - This is one of the best, it's told in the second person, and creates a really eerie setting. A man whose life has fallen apart has retreated to a seedy apartment where he becomes fascinated by an odd construction site in the street outside.
The Church in the Field - This is a more traditional ghost tale, focused on issues of grief and aging. I liked it but the end came hard and fast like most others here. An elderly man whose wife has recently died starts repairing an old church.
Omzetten - This may be my favorite. It has the mood of a great Aickman tale, with many weird elements and an effective ending, all packed into a mere 3,000~ words. A young woman writes a letter to her mother from a European village she seems to be trapped within.
Krogh’s Remains - This story is very similar in overall outline to the first story "Vrangr," but this one is more developed and the ending is much better. Better than the average in this collection. A young woman goes to visit a mysterious book-collecting uncle after the death of her mother.
Dissolution - A very brief story, not bad but not especially memorable. An author receives a strange book which proceeds to destroy his life.
A common theme of these stories is grief and loss of identity, and also becoming trapped in a sort psychic prison or purgatory. Muller often excels at describing settings too, such as in "Resurfacing" and the emotional "The Church in the Field." I would have liked a bit more "fleshing out" in these stories, I think "strange stories" often benefit from longer length, although not always.
Vrangr - This story has some predictable elements (an unknown inheritance and creepy dreams) but it also throws in some surprises and the end has a nice weirdness. A man travels to look over an old farmhouse in the country he inherits from an aunt he's never met.
The Dust Child - This story was so-so. It has some emotional moments, but didn't do anything for me. A boy whose mother is dying from cancer starts seeing a "dust child" hovering over her bed.
A Trace of Darkness - This story was an improvement, it's an eerie doppelganger tale with a jaw-dropping ending. It has some predictable elements, but overall an effective sense of personal identity slipping out of ones' grasp. A young man who has recently moved to a new city with his wife deals with a double of himself while coping with several painful recent events.
Absconsa Laterna - A very short, simple story. It has some nice, creepy details and makes good use of its 1,000~ word length, but I felt it could use a little something more. It reminded me strongly of Michael Wehunt's unforgettable tale "A Thousand Hundred Years." A father loses his son in a peculiar sculpture park.
Slattergren - This is one of the best stories, it's a very emotional story of aging, the pain of old memories and the changing of our collective landscapes. I especially liked the setting and feeling of mounting dread. An elderly woman moved into an assisted living home starts exploring a patch of woods nearby that holds a painful childhood memory for her.
Lost in Arcadia - This story takes some odd turns. Like the previous one it's a "creepy forest" tale. The central character makes some strange choices which make sense in a sort of "supernatural context," but still felt somewhat incongruous and the end didn't quite satisfy. A struggle single mother loses her emotionally disturbed young son in woods beside her childhood home.
Diary of an Illness - This is one of the less-subtle stories in the book, it's downright apocalyptic, but it's one of the better tales. There seems to be a bit of Ligotti in this one. A man notices a strange new church opening in the city, at the same time as everyone seems to be falling ill.
Resurfacing - This is one of the best, it's told in the second person, and creates a really eerie setting. A man whose life has fallen apart has retreated to a seedy apartment where he becomes fascinated by an odd construction site in the street outside.
The Church in the Field - This is a more traditional ghost tale, focused on issues of grief and aging. I liked it but the end came hard and fast like most others here. An elderly man whose wife has recently died starts repairing an old church.
Omzetten - This may be my favorite. It has the mood of a great Aickman tale, with many weird elements and an effective ending, all packed into a mere 3,000~ words. A young woman writes a letter to her mother from a European village she seems to be trapped within.
Krogh’s Remains - This story is very similar in overall outline to the first story "Vrangr," but this one is more developed and the ending is much better. Better than the average in this collection. A young woman goes to visit a mysterious book-collecting uncle after the death of her mother.
Dissolution - A very brief story, not bad but not especially memorable. An author receives a strange book which proceeds to destroy his life.
December 21, 2018
Darkly Didactic: Lingering Lessons from C.M. Muller’s HIDDEN FOLK
The ostensible simplicity of a line like, “Look, Dad, a door!” belies a complicated subtext in the story “Absconsa Laterna,” and acts as an unassuming invocation of irretrievable consequence.
Far from his first publication project, but his first fiction collection, many of the “strange stories” in C.M. Muller’s Hidden Folk possess such unpretentious portents, and those who follow Muller through these thresholds will certainly remain haunted and, likely in some way, fundamentally altered.
Muller’s aesthetic is one of calm, sharply-defined surfaces; and though the illustration of a quiet, dawn-dim pond—the scene of an early-morning fishing episode, say—may be a mundane metaphor, it’s serviceable for this assessment. We read Muller, in part, because of his subdued execution: beneath the superficiality of that peaceful, reflective epidermis is a dark district inhabited by shadowy entities. Focusing on the surface yet coaxed by curiosity, we narrow our focus, shift the lenses of our eyeline toward a furtive movement below: the languid sway of infected kelp...the peek-a-boo retreat of something sinuous...the serpentine flash of scales.
A sense of Muller’s aesthetic is gained after reading the collection’s opener, “Vranger,” but it’s with the conclusion of “The Dust Child” that readers begin to better understand not only Muller’s tonal wheelhouse but his artistic intentions.
Muller comes from a line of writers (I count myself among their motley ranks) influenced and affected by a particular era of the late-1980s and early-90s horror and science fiction; and though not directly affected by it, the 80s produced a variety of fiction which reflected predecessors directly “shaped” by the time-bound structures of, sure, radio shows, but more specifically televised serials—especially Serling’s instructive segments on the Twilight Zone and, later, his morose portraits on The Night Gallery.
Some fantastic commercial short fiction was borne out of that 80s-90s span. It’s a subjective submission, but I’d point to the work of my personal North Star writers of Charles Grant, Norman Partridge, Ed Gorman; and to tighten my scope and intent here, I’d direct one to, notably, Robert McCammon’s wonderful Blue World and Dan Simmons’s indelible Prayers to Broken Stones. It’s evident there’s quite a bit of DNA from imparted from these periods (I can’t help but think Muller is sharing a sly wink to Simmons’s “Metastasis”—which was, suitably, converted into a teleplay titled “The Offering” for the early-90s anthology series Monsters—in his presentation of the aforementioned “The Dust Child”). The result, in Hidden Folk, is a collection showcasing a pleasing circularity.
In “Absconsa Laterna,” Muller constructs a scenario which is a suitable creative-process metaphor for, perhaps, the often aimless and meandering routes we take in order to gain genuine momentum, and as Muller submits, “[W]e were able to witness the slow and often painstaking process by which many artists constructed their fantasies.” Here, Muller relies on a central topic that I, as a writer, often have trouble navigating: the “loss” of a child. And I mean it when I say that I’m still haunted by the nonchalant words of a child, “Look, Dad, a door!”
“Resurfacing” and “Diary of an Illness” are essentially fraternal twins with dissimilar voices; but something realized in the scenarios is a glimpse at the author behind the barrier of glass; although “Resurfacing” is more potent and reflects some of that signature circularity. Something else that occurs to me with this story is the reprisal of the doppelgänger device. Muller is adept at portraying the dimensions of “the shadowed self” (“Krogh’s Remains”)—a motif which certainly telegraphs his forthcoming anthology, Twice-Told: A Collection of Doubles (set to be released, quite appropriately, on February 2, 2019— 02/02, in case I was too subtle).
“The Church in the Field” captures many of the writer’s eruditic strengths and fiction-rhythmic tendencies, and is perhaps his most artistically didactic. The story contains a line which might very well sum up this unsettling collection, as Muller’s effectively created “brooding sketches of darkness and hunger.”
My central, critical observations come in the form of my need for more interactive dialogue. There are too few instances of Folks engaging in spoken interplay; and I find that the exhalation of conversation might dispel the murky mist of ambiguity. But there is a knowing liberality in Muller’s vagueness, as if gifting his audience with a participatory reciprocity. You have to want to see what he see; and I think he wants some questions to linger. “There was nothing more pleasurable,” says one of his narrators, “than patience.”
As a writer, yes, but more so as an editor and scrivner, C.M. Muller is a commendable custodian of the horror medium and its continually forking branches. Of course, writers are aware (in some cases to a debilitating degree) the nuances of dramaturgical interactions in which we all engage; but it’s a writer’s obligation to infuse their products with abundant gravity so as to, ideally, sufficiently drag the readers beneath the exhibited surface. In Hidden Folk, Muller has succeeded at both.
And so, my encouragement to curious parities is this: while I’m loath to surrender my own copy, I’d like you to imagine the rectangle of a dark bookcase, its shelves packed shoulder-to-shoulder with varying, somber volumes of traded tales...I would then gesture toward the spine of Hidden Folk. “Look,” I’d say to you, removing the object wrapped in overcast, “a door…”
The ostensible simplicity of a line like, “Look, Dad, a door!” belies a complicated subtext in the story “Absconsa Laterna,” and acts as an unassuming invocation of irretrievable consequence.
Far from his first publication project, but his first fiction collection, many of the “strange stories” in C.M. Muller’s Hidden Folk possess such unpretentious portents, and those who follow Muller through these thresholds will certainly remain haunted and, likely in some way, fundamentally altered.
Muller’s aesthetic is one of calm, sharply-defined surfaces; and though the illustration of a quiet, dawn-dim pond—the scene of an early-morning fishing episode, say—may be a mundane metaphor, it’s serviceable for this assessment. We read Muller, in part, because of his subdued execution: beneath the superficiality of that peaceful, reflective epidermis is a dark district inhabited by shadowy entities. Focusing on the surface yet coaxed by curiosity, we narrow our focus, shift the lenses of our eyeline toward a furtive movement below: the languid sway of infected kelp...the peek-a-boo retreat of something sinuous...the serpentine flash of scales.
A sense of Muller’s aesthetic is gained after reading the collection’s opener, “Vranger,” but it’s with the conclusion of “The Dust Child” that readers begin to better understand not only Muller’s tonal wheelhouse but his artistic intentions.
Muller comes from a line of writers (I count myself among their motley ranks) influenced and affected by a particular era of the late-1980s and early-90s horror and science fiction; and though not directly affected by it, the 80s produced a variety of fiction which reflected predecessors directly “shaped” by the time-bound structures of, sure, radio shows, but more specifically televised serials—especially Serling’s instructive segments on the Twilight Zone and, later, his morose portraits on The Night Gallery.
Some fantastic commercial short fiction was borne out of that 80s-90s span. It’s a subjective submission, but I’d point to the work of my personal North Star writers of Charles Grant, Norman Partridge, Ed Gorman; and to tighten my scope and intent here, I’d direct one to, notably, Robert McCammon’s wonderful Blue World and Dan Simmons’s indelible Prayers to Broken Stones. It’s evident there’s quite a bit of DNA from imparted from these periods (I can’t help but think Muller is sharing a sly wink to Simmons’s “Metastasis”—which was, suitably, converted into a teleplay titled “The Offering” for the early-90s anthology series Monsters—in his presentation of the aforementioned “The Dust Child”). The result, in Hidden Folk, is a collection showcasing a pleasing circularity.
In “Absconsa Laterna,” Muller constructs a scenario which is a suitable creative-process metaphor for, perhaps, the often aimless and meandering routes we take in order to gain genuine momentum, and as Muller submits, “[W]e were able to witness the slow and often painstaking process by which many artists constructed their fantasies.” Here, Muller relies on a central topic that I, as a writer, often have trouble navigating: the “loss” of a child. And I mean it when I say that I’m still haunted by the nonchalant words of a child, “Look, Dad, a door!”
“Resurfacing” and “Diary of an Illness” are essentially fraternal twins with dissimilar voices; but something realized in the scenarios is a glimpse at the author behind the barrier of glass; although “Resurfacing” is more potent and reflects some of that signature circularity. Something else that occurs to me with this story is the reprisal of the doppelgänger device. Muller is adept at portraying the dimensions of “the shadowed self” (“Krogh’s Remains”)—a motif which certainly telegraphs his forthcoming anthology, Twice-Told: A Collection of Doubles (set to be released, quite appropriately, on February 2, 2019— 02/02, in case I was too subtle).
“The Church in the Field” captures many of the writer’s eruditic strengths and fiction-rhythmic tendencies, and is perhaps his most artistically didactic. The story contains a line which might very well sum up this unsettling collection, as Muller’s effectively created “brooding sketches of darkness and hunger.”
My central, critical observations come in the form of my need for more interactive dialogue. There are too few instances of Folks engaging in spoken interplay; and I find that the exhalation of conversation might dispel the murky mist of ambiguity. But there is a knowing liberality in Muller’s vagueness, as if gifting his audience with a participatory reciprocity. You have to want to see what he see; and I think he wants some questions to linger. “There was nothing more pleasurable,” says one of his narrators, “than patience.”
As a writer, yes, but more so as an editor and scrivner, C.M. Muller is a commendable custodian of the horror medium and its continually forking branches. Of course, writers are aware (in some cases to a debilitating degree) the nuances of dramaturgical interactions in which we all engage; but it’s a writer’s obligation to infuse their products with abundant gravity so as to, ideally, sufficiently drag the readers beneath the exhibited surface. In Hidden Folk, Muller has succeeded at both.
And so, my encouragement to curious parities is this: while I’m loath to surrender my own copy, I’d like you to imagine the rectangle of a dark bookcase, its shelves packed shoulder-to-shoulder with varying, somber volumes of traded tales...I would then gesture toward the spine of Hidden Folk. “Look,” I’d say to you, removing the object wrapped in overcast, “a door…”
January 22, 2019
Hard to believe this is a first collection. Originally published between 2014 and 2018, these 12 stories start strong with "Vrangr" and continue to get stronger. Repeated themes of dislocation and loss of identity give the collection an especially cohesive feel. I know Muller primarily as the editor of the superb Nightscript anthologies and was delighted to find his own prose lives up to the quality of those books. Highly recommended for fans of strange literary fiction.
March 24, 2019
Muller’s words lurk in a darkness somewhere in his mind then creeps along the page like some kind of supernatural shadow being. These 12 stories share the supernatural elements but all do there own scare or mind trick. An entertaining collection and I’m sure there is still a large handful of Hidden Folk living out on the range, dying to haunt the next volume of collected shorts from C.M. Muller.
My 4 top favorites
The Dust Child
A Trace of Darkness
Resurfacing
Krogh’s Remains
My 4 top favorites
The Dust Child
A Trace of Darkness
Resurfacing
Krogh’s Remains
August 22, 2020
(2.4 stars)
Like Michael Kelly, C.M. Muller is a good anthologist but a mediocre writer. The strange tale, tending to be one of the more ambiguous and subtle subgenres on the environs of horror fiction, demands a certain sophistication of prose-styling as well as indelibly harrowing imagery; even more so than the average peddler of dark imaginings, because all who choose to write in the shadow of Aickman do not often have the luxury of resorting to shock-and-gore effects. Elegantly haunting atmospheres do emerge here and there in 'Hidden Folk,' especially in the melancholy introspectiveness of "Resurfacing" and in "Diary of an Illness" which seems to owe at least a partial debt to Mark Samuels' story, "Glyphotech." The suggestively epistolary approach of "Omzetten" displays a deft manipulation of narrative lacking from many of the others.
The most amusing flaw of this book, however, is that its most interesting aspects often are the titles: "Vrangr," "Slattergren," etc., but very few of the stories intensely depict the otherworldly mystique suggested by such strange names. Overall, I'd say read his anthologies before bothering with this collection.
Like Michael Kelly, C.M. Muller is a good anthologist but a mediocre writer. The strange tale, tending to be one of the more ambiguous and subtle subgenres on the environs of horror fiction, demands a certain sophistication of prose-styling as well as indelibly harrowing imagery; even more so than the average peddler of dark imaginings, because all who choose to write in the shadow of Aickman do not often have the luxury of resorting to shock-and-gore effects. Elegantly haunting atmospheres do emerge here and there in 'Hidden Folk,' especially in the melancholy introspectiveness of "Resurfacing" and in "Diary of an Illness" which seems to owe at least a partial debt to Mark Samuels' story, "Glyphotech." The suggestively epistolary approach of "Omzetten" displays a deft manipulation of narrative lacking from many of the others.
The most amusing flaw of this book, however, is that its most interesting aspects often are the titles: "Vrangr," "Slattergren," etc., but very few of the stories intensely depict the otherworldly mystique suggested by such strange names. Overall, I'd say read his anthologies before bothering with this collection.
October 26, 2024
"Hidden Folk" contains a dozen strange, intelligent, and unsettling tales. The triumph of this book, however, is the achievement of a unified aesthetic---that of the downright eerie and hauntingly melancholic. The notion of 'doubles', or second-selves, is explored in each tale, often in unique and startling narratives. It seems to me these psychological manifestations (be it a dust-child, or one's lingering shadow, or a dark embrace from some internal-specter) are indeed the 'hidden folk'. Being that these tales are psychological and existential in nature, it strikes one that there is most certainly a hidden folk within all of us . . . and that their emergence into the light of day is sufficient cause for nightmares.
April 20, 2024
A startling collection of the strange, underpinned by a deep emotional urgency that gives the stories real pith and weight. The notion of doubles is explored uniquely in each tale; one never knows quite how or when it will appear, but when it does (usually around the denouement), the effect is powerful and equal to the very greatest examples of fiction in the genre. These tales are best enjoyed as little nightly episodes. They are digestible in a brief sitting, and linger long after the reading. I found some of the plots following me into sleep, where they continued to work their sinister and lovely magic. True hauntings of the highest caliber.
January 27, 2021
And this landmark collection finally comes together in this vignette of dust and books. Making me believe that all books are the same book. The Gestalt. Dust as haunting fragments of a whole. Dust is often sand coloured like the book. Writerly hopes of a Work imported. The self in others, others in the self. A word’s worth. And the Child is the Book of all us hidden folk as one.
The detailed review of this book posted elsewhere under my name is too long or impractical to post here.
Above is one of my observations at the time of the review.
The detailed review of this book posted elsewhere under my name is too long or impractical to post here.
Above is one of my observations at the time of the review.
October 26, 2021
Al igual que otros lectores aquí, opino que esta colección de relatos no está nada mal pero sus temas, historias, ambientes, etc., constantemente me recordaban demasiado a los de otros escritores del género. Se nota que el autor está fascinado con la idea del döppelganger, cosa que está muy bien, pero la verdad es que llega a cansar el encontrar dicha figura en dos, tres, cuatro o hasta más cuentos.
Mis relatos favoritos fueron The Dust Child y Dissolution.
Mis relatos favoritos fueron The Dust Child y Dissolution.
January 19, 2023
Repetitive themes, hackneyed phrases, cliche after cliche. Stories read like a defiant stool. Had high expectations.
January 5, 2019
This is a collection of strange and creepy stories, some better than others. Interesting and entertaining.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews