Everything the Darkness Eats

by Eric LaRocca

An insidious darkness threatens to devastate a rural New England village when occult forces are conjured and when bigotry is left unrestrained.

After a recent string of disappearances in a small Connecticut town, a grieving widower with a grim secret is drawn into a dangerous ritual of dark magic by a powerful and mysterious older gentleman named Heart Crowley. Meanwhile, a member of local law enforcement tasked with uncovering the culprit responsible for the bizarre disappearances soon begins to learn of a current of unbridled hatred simmering beneath the guise of the town’s idyllic community—a hatred that will eventually burst and forever change the lives of those who once found peace in the quiet town of Henley’s Edge.

From the Bram Stoker Award®-nominated author of the viral sensation, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke, Everything the Darkness Eats is a haunting supernatural thriller from a new and exciting voice in genre fiction.

Genres: Horror, Fiction, Audiobook, Queer, LGBT, Adult, Fantasy

202 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 6, 2023

About the author

Eric LaRocca (he/they) is a 3x Bram Stoker Award® finalist, a Shirley Jackson Award nominee, and a 2x Splatterpunk Award winner. He was named by Esquire as one of the “Writers Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age” and praised by Locus as “one of the strongest and most unique voices in contemporary horror fiction.” LaRocca’s notable works include Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke, Everything the Darkness Eats, and At Dark, I Become Loathsome. He currently resides in Boston, Massachusetts, with his partner.

Reviews

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all] · Rating 1 out of 5]

Okay, this was not it for me. At all. Which is a shame because the premise sounded like something I’d really enjoy with a religious cult overrunning a small town that emboldens all the horrific bigotry that wasn’t even trying to hide under the surface that well, but even the fancy and fun brick designs on every page couldn’t bring this story to life. I should have trusted myself and how much I felt wildly underwhelmed by their viral short story, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke, but LaRocca keeps putting out books and I figured they’ve gotta be getting better, right? Ehhh. It doesn’t help that the writing is clunky and sort of reeks of trying, and while with horror suspending disbelief is something I’m totally fine with, theres a difference between glossing over plot holes for the sake of fun and feeling inauthentic even in the novel’s own inner logic. This falls hard into the second category. Good writing can make even unlikely scenes or actions feel at least contextually justified, but here it feels so in service to the plot you wonder if the words are getting paid to SCAB.

Sorry, maybe this was for you and I usually give horror a lot of grace with the way issues are handled because, well, it’s horror and it is intended to unsettle and disturb, but there’s a way to use disturbing elements to create a larger theme and overall purpose and then there’s just vomiting out the most fucked up thing you can think of to make people squirm. Without a “why,” the latter begins to feel hollow and you shiver it off pretty quickly and much of this book feels like it is searching for a “why” instead of leading us to it and over-seasoning the narrative with shocks instead of delivering something worth devouring underneath. Feeling very overstuffed while ultimately shallow and with some problematic executions, Everything the Darkness Eats is a total misfire that aims to shock but ends up being merely annoying,

It is a shame this was a let down, but there is a really strong rise in literary horror that functions as a brilliant investigation into queer identities or cultural insights from authors usually left out of the conversation long dominated by straight white men and seeing how effectively those have been handled really made this pale by comparison. This just didn’t offer much beyond edgelord shocks and bad plott and, sure, there is the message that bigotry like homophobia and ableism is bad, and religious trauma is really harmful, but none of that feels fresh here and the insights into that feel either very shallow or underexplored when the only tool for excavation are shocks that don’t add up to much. Tell Me I’m Worthless is a good example of a book that manages to have extremely disturbing scenes that all culminate for a deep, dark investigation into fascism and transphobia. A lot of what I wrote about their short story (read all that here) still stands in Everything the Darkness Eats as well, and it feels like such a wasted opportunity. Also, in a story where erasing events that happened is a large element, it feels like LaRocca is playing with traumas like sexual assault rather blithely in a way that isn’t effective and just seems uncool. Plus the whole “well at least the person who led the group of people all sexually assaulting me is sexy” was…yikes. This book is going to upset people, but not in a fun spooky way more just in a hey maybe people with disabilities and sexual assault survivors being seemingly exploited isn’t enjoyable.

Furthermore a lot of the story just doesn’t work. It comes together at the very end in a rather forced way and there’s very little take-away. Gonna have to say I was not a fan of this one as a story but also as a product—having an image of a brick wall as the background of every single page felt early 2000s but not in a good way and would have been cooler if it wasn’t every single page. I can see others enjoying the novel if cheap shocks are your thing, but it just felt pretty empty and hollow to me. Which is a shame as I’ve enjoyed seeing a lot of queer representation in horror, but this whole thing felt like a bad gimmick covered in glow paint rather than a shining star.

[destiny ♡ howling libraries · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let me preface this entire review by saying that I have been a fan of Eric's since reading Starving Ghosts in Every Thread back in 2020, and I have given every release of theirs 4-5 stars. I generally think of myself as someone who "gets" (and thoroughly enjoys!) Eric's particular flair for traumatic, bizarre horror and purple prose.

Unfortunately, we all know the saying "there's an exception to every rule", and it seems that Everything the Darkness Eats is my exception for Eric's books, because this book did not work for me on multiple levels.

First, the biggest issue I had was the writing. The narrative voice was so heavy on metaphors and similes that it became distracting. I found myself re-reading paragraphs because my attention was continuously being snagged by lengthy similes, sometimes back-to-back with multiple in the span of just a few sentences.

Second, the split plot lines became frustrating for me. Everything the Darkness Eats follows two unrelated main characters, Ghost and Malik, and their stories have nothing in common until the last few pages. Even when the story all came together, it felt unnatural to me and I still found myself wishing that these had been two entirely separate novellas instead of one combined book.

Third, while I have no issue at all with queer trauma in horror, I do have a problem with sexual assault being handled poorly: specifically, a rape victim - in the middle of a graphic rape scene - thinking of his attacker as "his god", and then later empathizing with his rapist and viewing the man as attractive. I won't harp on about this one too much because I know everyone reacts to assault differently, but as a survivor, I was immensely uncomfortable with this depiction.

Fourth, the ableism regarding a blind child made me mad every single time she was mentioned. Whether she was on the page or being mentioned by another character, it was a constant barrage of comments about how pitiful and helpless she was, or what a burden it was for her mother to raise her, and so on.

And finally, there were many moments where the suspension of disbelief was too much of a stretch for me to accomplish. A little blind girl wandering off on her own all the time, a mother instantly falling for the man who (very creepily) plays with her disabled daughter at the hospital, a man stopping in the middle of a ritual sacrifice to answer the doorbell... the list goes on.

Truly, I'm heartbroken writing this review. It pains me to leave a scathing review for a hyped new release from an author I love with my whole heart, but I can't help feeling like this book needed much more editing work and to be split into two smaller pieces. If that had been the case, the base storylines had potential and could have been just as great as everything else I've read from Eric, but the end result here didn't work for me in any way.

I still love Eric's books and will excitedly read their next release because this is only one miss for me after a long line of hits, but I won't be recommending Everything the Darkness Eats and would instead strongly encourage you to pick up any other title from this author.

Thank you to the publisher for the review copy! All thoughts are honest and my own.

✨ Representation: Malik is gay and Muslim, Brett is gay, Ghost is bisexual and disabled (walks with a cane), Heart is gay, Piper is blind

✨ Content warnings for: homophobia (including slur usage), graphic rape, graphic abuse, violence, gore, murder, ritual sacrifice, religious bigotry, ableism, home invasion, AIDS, terminal illness, Islamophobia, grief, loss of an infant

———
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[Mimi · Rating 1 out of 5]

Oof.
My first inclination is always to give books I hated 2 stars, simply because I can usually think of something I liked about them. But with this one, nothing comes to mind.

The prose felt artificial, the story disconnected and directionless.

The worst part was the horrible, completely pointless violence. A character gets gang-r*ped and when his attackers are done with him, he thinks about how attractive their leader is.
He proceeds to get stabbed multiple times.

And then, by some literal deus ex machina, he survives and Jesus heals him and ctrl-alt-deletes everything he went through. It's as if it had never happened. So why did it have to happen in this story in the first place?
I think narratives about overcoming trauma are so important, but here you get smacked in the head with some of the worst imaginable things a human can experience and it gets no resolve whatsoever.

I don't know why this book had to exist. Wish Jesus could make me forget I ever read it.

[Sadie Hartmann]

EVERYTHING THE DARKNESS EATS by Eric LaRocca
Other Books I Enjoyed by This Author: The Trees Grew Because I Bled There, You’ve Lost A Lot of Blood, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke and Other Misfortunes
Affiliate Link: https://bookshop.org/a/7576/978195590...
Release Date: June 13th, 2023
General Genre: Horror, Occult & Supernatural

Sub-Genre/Themes: small-town horror, homophobia, kidnapping, insta-romance, trauma, SA, occult, human monsters, bigotry, strange disappearances

Writing Style: Dual Narratives, Plot-driven

What You Need to Know: I will need to go into specific plot details in the “my reading experience” section of this review so skip that if you’re hoping to avoid that before reading this book for yourself. I think you need to know there are scenes of extreme sexual and physical violence. The gratuitous, graphic nature of the SA is out of balance with the rest of the book. Certain details are off-putting and inconsistent so it caused me to emotionally disassociate from the victim’s experience which I hope was not the point but an unfortunate result of the writer miscommunicating the message or me misinterpreting it.
I also think it’s important to note that there are two storylines running in tandem to make one cohesive, full-length novel. It felt like reading two very different stories side by side. The two narratives had little to do with each other.

My Reading Experience: *some spoilers*
It needs to be said that my love for previous Eric LaRocca books sets the bar high. Everything the Darkness Eats has been on my most anticipated list since I first heard the early buzz about it. I went into it with my heart wide open and full of hope. It’s my opinion that LaRocca has consistently demonstrated capability with short fiction and I have been eager to read something longer; to see what they could do with a story that has time to marinate and the characters have more page time to develop.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have the best experience with this book. Instead of just “info-dumping” my reading notes in this review (too spoilery) I can share some of the technical issues I have and I will share how I was let down by some of the expectations set in the synopsis.

Synopsis: After a recent string of disappearances in a small Connecticut town, a grieving widower with a grim secret is drawn into a dangerous ritual of dark magic by a powerful and mysterious older gentleman named Heart Crowley. Meanwhile, a member of local law enforcement tasked with uncovering the culprit responsible for the bizarre disappearances soon begins to learn of a current of unbridled hatred simmering beneath the guise of the town’s idyllic community—a hatred that will eventually burst and forever change the lives of those who once found peace in the quiet town of Henley’s Edge.

“...a recent string of disappearances”
-Surprisingly, there is very little mention of these disappearances upsetting the town apart from Chapter Two. There’s no setup, no suspense, no real investigation, it’s just something that we know because we’ve been told and it plays into one of the two main storylines.

“...in a small Connecticut town/idyllic community”
-Again, we’re told this. I have no real sense of the community or the setting apart from the bigotry that is highlighted in the main character, Malik’s storyline. I think it’s important to establish the idyllic nature of a small town, the way it’s nestled in between rolling hills, or the maple trees in the Fall, or the downtown with its cute, white houses and brick building or cobblestone streets, the townspeople gathering for potluck at church, or a farmer’s market, you know something to paint a picture instead of the reader just assuming it’s idyllic. I couldn’t see Henley’s Edge at all, therefore the contrast between "idyllic" and evil/hatred didn't make an impact.

“...a grieving widower with a grim secret…”
The very first pages of the book introduce readers to the main character, Ghost and reveal the secret and the grief. Which is fine. Some books tell and some show. An author could show me a character waking up and smelling the pillow on the left side of the bed every morning and then hanging their head in shame. You could show me an anniversary card they bought and wrote a love letter in because it would have been ten years today. Anything but just telling me.
There are some unique qualities about Ghost that are in that ‘Eric LaRocca style’ I love to enjoy and show up for and you’ll know right away what I’m referring to–it’s memorable.
However, Ghost's insta-romance with Gemma and first encounter with Gemma's daughter, Piper is unintentionally awkward/hurried.

“...drawn into a dangerous ritual of dark magic by a powerful and mysterious older gentleman named Heart Crowley.”
How do I say this without just saying it? Listen, there’s no mystery to solve here. The prologue takes care of it for readers and…

“Meanwhile, a member of local law enforcement tasked with uncovering the culprit responsible for the bizarre disappearances…”
This is the other storyline, Nadeem Malik. We see him interview one person about a recent “bizarre” disappearance and then Malik and his husband Bret are targeted by a hate crime that becomes the central event. The way Malik and the police department he works for DO NOT investigate this hate crime or ever see an odd stranger trolling the streets in a very recognizable car is just hard to believe. What is bizarre is a blind child being kidnapped in a taxi and then returned to the scene of the crime in the same taxi and nobody cares.

Despite all the issues I have with the plot and storytelling, it was the technical difficulties pulling me out of the narrative that made investment impossible. The writing is saturated with the overuse of similes and metaphors. So, so, so many similies and metaphors. A lot of repeated words as well. It needed some editing; some more time in the oven.
My two biggest problems with this book boil down to,
The way SA was handled. It felt forced like the main objective of this whole book was to include it. And the way the victim telegraphs physical attraction to his attacker was off-putting.
The assumptions made about Gemma’s feelings toward her blind child, Piper. Ghost leaps to some pretty egregious conclusions, “Playing the role of the dutiful mother while secretively resenting her child, perhaps even hating her”
Why would Ghost assume this? It’s infuriating.

Final Recommendation: Goddamn the bare bones of both stories, Ghost’s and Malik’s could ultimately be something if they were both given time individually. But in this underdeveloped, fused-together form of Everything the Darkness Eats, it didn’t work for me. A lot of folks seem to like it, so these are my issues and I hope that it doesn’t color anyone’s opinion so much that they won’t even try it for themselves. Please try it. My hope in sharing my reading experience is to normalize it for myself instead of hiding my feelings. I don’t want to just praise good books, I want to be open and honest to encourage that behavior in others. I'm also using this opportunity to recommend the short story collection, THE TREES GREW BECAUSE I BLED THERE, especially if you're a newcomer to Eric LaRocca's work.

Comps:

[Lisa Lynch · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'll say it. Eric LaRocca is the king of pretentious, try-hard horror. He sucks you in with beautiful covers and cool, literary titles, but once you get past that, his writing is so overstuffed with similes and metaphors that it just RADIATES look-at-me energy.

To me, LaRocca's stories feel like products of collegiate creative writing prompts, like they were manufactured specifically for critique and praise. And in his stories he always includes some SHOCKING grotesquerie to gasp at to make them memorable and cool and edgy.

But honestly, the only thing I will remember from Everything the Darkness Eats and the only thing that had me gasping was this book's offensive discussion about disability.

Let me makes this clear: it is NEVER ok to state, imply, or insinuate that a person with a disability would have a "better" life without their disability. It is also not ok to feel sorry for people with disabilities and to use condescending, pitying language when referring to them.

In all honesty, when I encountered exactly these things in this novella multiple times, it made me incredibly sad. Because the one thing I'll give LaRocca is that he writes about LGBTQ+ characters and issues and I'm always frothing at the mouth for horror books by and about diverse people.

So on one hand, I want to give LaRocca credit for being an own-voices author writing about queer issues. However, my other hand wants to slap the guy for being so insensitive to another marginalized group.

Because negative sentiments like the ones in this book are harmful and damaging to the disability community. When you talk about people with disabilities like this, you paint them as sad, abnormal creatures, which further perpetuates the negative stereotype that they are, because of their differences, less than human.

And while I can excuse LaRocca's pretentious, try-hard writing style, I simply cannot excuse this.

And yeah, this kind of toxic rhetoric could be a product of ignorance, but in this year of our lord 2023, that is no longer an excuse. I implore not just authors writing characters with disabilities, but everyone on the planet to JUST LISTEN to the disability community and do a little research about ableism.

Because ALL marginalized groups deserve to have a voice and to be heard. And if you are really out here not actively listening to diverse people, then we just cannot be friends.

I tried to be friends with LaRocca, but as of right now, I don't think I can stomach another one of his stories... and that has nothing to do with the kind of horror he writes! Because I've never wanted to like an author's work more than I want to like LaRocca's.

But sadly, I just can't. I might give the author one more chance, because I really do want to hear what he has to say about LGBTQ+ issues, but I don't have high hopes for a redemption.

I was interested in Everything the Darkness Eats because it's longer than LaRocca's other works, and I wanted to see if having a little more room to breathe would be a good thing. I'm sad to say it wasn't. Somehow this still relatively short narrative managed to be the only two things that are worse than being bad: it was boring and repetitive.

I know I should discuss this more, and I know I should discuss the poorly handled inclusion of graphic rape, but I don't want to waste my breath. There are other reviews out there that go into those topics better than my patience at this time allows.

So my primary goal with this review is to to be a voice of the disability community loudly saying, THIS IS NOT THE REPRESENTATION WE WANT OR DESERVE. And shame on you Eric LaRocca.

For it's crimes against the disability community, I'm rating Eric LaRocca's Everything the Darkness Eats one 1 out of 5 stars.

And that's all I have to say about it.

[Krysta ꕤ · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eric .. bestie, I’m confused cause wtf was this 😭

[viktor · Rating 1 out of 5]

my constant thought process while reading this book: this is the author everyone has been talking about for the past year?? is this your indie horror darling? your fresh new voice in genre fiction? good god.... we deserve so much better than this.
its insane to me how widely published and generally well-regarded eric larocca is, since this book struck me as incredibly amateur-ish. it's like he's desperately trying to be clive barker, without any understanding of why clive barker's books work. but as bad as the plot was, the writing was by far the worst part of this book. each sentence is bloated like a waterlogged corpse, engorged by similes and unneeded adjectives. ive been told by multiple people that i use too many similes in my writing, but this book makes me look like fucking HEMINGWAY. jesus christ.
this book includes: a gay couple that exists only to suffer, a blind child that exists only to be pitied (seriously the way disability is treated in this book is actually fucking terrible, clearly no thought was put into the ways in which piper and ghost actually navigate the world, replaced with depressing ableist platitudes about being "broken" and stuff), a motivation-less and cartoonish villain, and a ridiculous deus ex machina clearly only written because eric larocca was tired of writing this stupid book. listen, i would be too.

[Ghoul Von Horror · Rating 1 out of 5]

TW: Murder, animal death, homophobia, death of spouse, hate crimes, kidnapping, HIV

*****SPOILERS*****
About the book:After a recent string of disappearances in a small Connecticut town, a grieving widower with a grim secret is drawn into a dangerous ritual of dark magic by a powerful and mysterious older gentleman named Heart Crowley. Meanwhile, a member of local law enforcement tasked with uncovering the culprit responsible for the bizarre disappearances soon begins to learn of a current of unbridled hatred simmering beneath the guise of the town’s idyllic community—a hatred that will eventually burst and forever change the lives of those who once found peace in the quiet town of Henley’s Edge.
Release Date: June 6th, 2023
Genre: Thriller/horror
Pages: 157
Rating: ⭐

What I Liked:
1. The story reminded me of Needful Things meets Something Wicked This Way Comes

What I Didn't Like:
1. Characters always do repetitive things
2. This writing is trying TOO hard to be something
3. So boring

Overall Thoughts:
How do you know a man wrote this that doesn't have kids? The nurse calls Pipers name and the little girl goes off with the nurse to the back. I've never known anyone to let their little kid go alone to the back. Also it's weird they are even there just to get Pipers height and weight. Why? Also we learn that Piper is blind so how does she just run off by herself and not run into something? Also Gemma smiling at her daughter to go along with Ghost talking to her is confusing. How would she see her mother's smile?

I just always get this feeling when I read the authors books that he is trying too hard to write overly intelligent.

What is with these people putting their finger between their teeth?

I was bored with this book. Nothing happens. Paragraphs are just peppered with these fillers - senseless words. A lot of things the author writes makes zero sense in context.
Whether his companion was male or female, he was and always would be invisible—invisible to the women he adored because he sometimes preferred men, and indistinguishable to the men he cherished because he was known to adore women.
What??? There are so many sentences that are like this. It's boring and overdone to the point where I had to skim on some pages. Comparisons felt like they had no point to them. You feel like you're watching some kind of artsy movie that has no meaning. You could just read only the dialogue, ignore the mindless ramblings, and still know what's going on.

One of the things that drives me most upset about this author is how every paragraph describes something with "He/she/it/I/we/they were like...." Every page the author uses the word "like" in at least almost every paragraph. It becomes annoying. Some examples from the same page;
"Dripping wet like the bodies of drowned woodland sprites."
2 paragraphs down
"Brett curled on the floor like a child's doll discarded in a rainstorm, blood leeching across the carpet like a shadow."


Not sure how this thing town doesn't notice this old dude driving around in his big black car and picking up people - people that end up missing.


Ghost kidnapping Piper is insane to me! So the uncle left his blind neice standing in an aisle by herself. Ghost then kidnaps her and takes her back to the house. Afterwards he returns back to the grocery that's surrounded by police and NO ONE questions anything? They didn't watch cameras to see where she went? The police didn't notice a blind little girl matching the missing girl get out of a taxi. The taxi driver didn't think any of this was weird???

Honestly this book wasn't good. It was so so boring. The ending is predictable. Actually this whole book is predictable. I read 157 pages and it feels as though nothing happens.

Final Thoughts:
I feel like the authors books are getting worse and worse. Somehow he managed to make a novella feel so long. There are plot holes in this book that make no sense. I didn't understand the whole point of telling Malik's perspective when it is just barely tied into the main story. It was so boring reading about them.

I would not say this is a horror novel. Maybe more of a magical realism thing but if there was horror then I missed it.

Recommend For:
• Novella's
• Queer love
• Magical moments

IG | Blog

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for this advanced copy of the book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

[Dr. Cat in the Brain · Rating 4 out of 5]

An older man with a hidden power, a widower with a hidden secret and a loving husband facing a hidden rage out to destroy his life. A trio of characters caught in a web of cosmic nihilism. A parasitical trap of attraction and cruelty, abuse and destruction, faith and an empty, burning, melancholy.

Everything the Darkness Eats is the book that finally answers that age-old question: What if Jack Ketchum wrote The Ceremonies?

Oh dear.

Oh fudge.

Oh my tender meats.

What terrible calamity hath mankind's arrogance unleashed?

The last time I read Eric LaRocca he was under considerable fire for writing a story about a parasocial relationship gone toxic. That book was called Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke. I'm certain you've at least seen the cover of that novel. Because it is an all-time banger.

People got very upset indeed. Babies were thrown in the air. Fingers were pointed.

After that controversy Eric LaRocca obviously learned his lesson with Everything the Darkness Eats. He has finally been tamed. It's all going to be cuddles and snuggles and kittens and puppies and fluffy white clouds from this point on. He has toned down his significant mean-streak and is now bringing you a PG-13 rated Pixar style story safe for all children and most woodland animals.

Coming soon to Disney plus.

I'm just kidding, he came out in 2023 throwing more middle fingers than an AI program.

Last time people complained that Eric LaRocca went too hard. So this time he brought the strap-on and the scary Bojack Horseman mask.

Everything the Darkness Eats has an extended brutal assault scene that makes Last House on the Left look like My Little Pony. If you thought The Girl Next Door wasn't quite hideous enough? This book is for you!

This novel is so nasty it could curdle milk from 50 yards away. And I mean that as a compliment.

I'm quite the fan of horror and I've read a lot of diabolical shit. And I was scandalised. My hair was well and truly ruffled. My feathered pillows were awash with sweat and tears. It was not quite at the level of John Farris and Son of the Endless Night. But absolutely in the neighbourhood of David J. Schow.

So yeah. This book has got teeth. Too many teeth. And it's coming for your teeth. With a claw-hammer. IT WANTS YOUR TEETH.

When I was reading one scene, all I could imagine was thousands of sheltered, fragile, little YA book critics, plummeting to their fainting couches. The sky raining TikTok book reviewers like something out of a Magritte painting. A veritable storm of perfumed handkerchiefs!

And that made me smile.

I was intrigued by this novel's cosmic horror, but I was shook to my jammies by the unrelenting viciousness. It's not that the book lacks empathy, it drowns you in empathy while it's twisting the knife in your guts and asking if you want it to spit in your mouth.

If you paid for evil? You're getting it in bulk. No need to get that Costco membership. You're all stocked up till Christmas.

The prose style is significantly different from Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke and I wasn't a huge fan, but I liked that LaRocca was going outside of his usual comfort zone. He's experimenting here with narrative, blending styles of horror and I appreciated it. Even though the book is pretty short, the ambition of the themes are remarkably huge. The concepts are fantastic, the storytelling was vivid and the characters are compelling. And when shit starts spinning towards the abyss you feel it in your toes.

That's the good stuff.

I was so excited and happy with this book that I'm gonna recommend it to everybody with a few gigantic caveats: If you can't take the heat? If your idea of nasty stuff is Percy Jackson? Everything the Darkness Eats might be a bit too spicy for you. But if you're adventurous and wanna try it? If you checked out The Troop and thought "this isn't quite cruel enough"? Eric LaRocca has got something for your Daddy. Just grab both of your cheeks and expand those horizons. But remember to bring a lot of milk and ice-cream.

Cuz. This bad boy has got some kick.

Just a bit.

Okay it's a fully loaded donkey.

I think I got a kidney infection.

8/10

[Jan Agaton · Rating 4 out of 5]

i was so skeptical because of all the mixed reviews but i loved the writing, the ending, and the weirdness! there were even parts that really hit the feels. absolutely look up trigger warnings though because the homophobia is BRUTAL, to say the least.

[Eadbh · Rating 1 out of 5]

If LaRocca has a million haters, then I am one of them. If LaRocca has ten haters, then I am one of them. If LaRocca has only one hater then that is me. If LaRocca has no haters, then that means I am no longer on earth. If the world is against LaRocca, then I am with the world.

[Janelle Janson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Everything the Darkness Eats is an exquisitely written story of magic, darkness, and the human condition. You will be sucked into an abyss of both horror and beauty, never to come out the same again.

Janelle Janson - writer at Dark Matter Magazine and Scream Magazine

[Leo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know if it's a 3 stars or 4 star read for me. There were things that had me very intruiged and things that didn't work for me. I did not like the whole situation with the main characters getting to know the child and mother. That whole plot was too weird. It was a weird kind of horror that I'm not sure what I think of. But I'm interested to read more from this author.

[Dez the Bookworm · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oh. Ma. Lawd….

I picked up this book because the cover and pages are super unique and I love a dark read. I took a chance and now I’m just left scratching my head. I have a cool looking book though?

Ok, so there is no meat in this story, all mushy potatoes. The writing feels like a high school paper where the amount of analogy’s are incredibly intrusive and distract from the story. I wasn’t able to lose myself ONCE to the descriptions- meaning I could never picture anything due to the lack of cohesion and heavy overuse of analogies. They were EXHAUSTING.

Also - believability here. Ok, I love funky horror. I read Winterset Hollow and Slewfoot and those are two of my all time favs. This book reeked of the author trying too hard and pushing a very clear agenda. This was a multi-pov, which I liked, but the authors agenda
seemed to swallow the actual story, thereby ruining what could have been an interesting plot.

Save yourself and read something else. One and a half stars rounded up.

[Judith Sonnet · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's no rumor that I think Eric LaRocca is more than just a good writer. He's an important one. And so, when EVERYTHING THE DARKNESS EATS came out I snagged a copy and expected to have it read and written about in a few hours.
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Well... a few days later....
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This book is a lot. It's very fast and short, sure. But it requires something few books expect from their audiences anymore. Nuance, and patience, and a period of gestation in which it's allowed to marinate on the mind. Yeah, it's one of THOSE books. The sort of thing that starts arguments and debates. The kind of book that leaves all readers feeling stranded in some way... as either feeling like the only person who loves the work, or the only person who hates it. It's less like commercial arthouse horror--A24--and more like an insane risk--like Alejandro Jodorowsky. And whether or not that risk pays off is dependent on the reader. If Goodreads is any indication, folks are split right down the middle.
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This book is not easy to define or discuss. And that, folks, is the point.
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EVERYTHING THE DARKNESS EATS barely has a narrative. We follow two haunted men, who's stories are as separated as they are entwined. One seeks futile vengeance against a wave of bigotry, and the other falls into a dangerous ritual while suffering from loss. Both men never truly interact, even when their paths collide at the books conclusion. Their stories are their own, but they just happen to coexist in the same universe.
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There's supernatural elements, and even some human horror that touches the extreme, but this project is not going to be accessible to those looking for a cut and clear plot, or readers who are used to authors holding their hands and offering guidance.
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This feels less like a review and more like a stream of consciousness, don't it? Well, that's the sort of thing this book inspires in those who read it attentively. And if I haven't made it clear, YES... I did love it. I think it's a bold and beautiful read. But no, I'm not sure yet how I interpret it. That will just have to be a work in progress...

[s · Rating 1 out of 5]

im a lifelong hater but honestly this broke me. like eric larocca's editor i think it would be cruel to critique a book as plainly awful as everything the darkness eats — maybe this is why the new wave of queer horror is so buddy-buddy. Nobody can bring themselves to state the obvious. i think it would be good for many writers to focus on the work in a sort of humble craftsperson way instead of doing carny PR about how transgressive and extreme and boundary-breaking their work is. because look at the material babe. really look at it. look in the mirror. i'm worried about u! this is childish. its pathetic. be serious!!!

[Sura Shealey · Rating 1 out of 5]

Before this review, I want to share the good things about this book!:
- good general premise
- the two characters’ separate povs were well done
- the idea of the wraith was GREAT
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I read Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke almost a year ago, and I didn’t care for it at all, even though everyone loved it. After recognizing the name on Netgalley, I decided to read this book to try one of LaRocca’s books again. I didn’t enjoy this one either.

This book feels like a rough draft. Every other sentence is a metaphor or a simile. This is not an exaggeration, i counted about five similes on one page. On top of this, there were several points in the story where I was just like… This doesn’t make any sense.

There is a moment where Ghost sees a sad child with her mother at a hospital, and he goes up to the child and asks her for her name, pretending he already knows her and was “looking everywhere” for her. The girl acts scared and doesn’t give him her name. He sounds like a kidnapper! This situation screams kidnapper! But the mother encourages the little girl to give her name, and then gives Ghost her phone number!

A very frustrating part of this book is just how much the police cannot do their job. There’s several disappearances happening under the same circumstances, and they’re like “hmmm… it might be connected”. But there’s no evidence they’re trying that hard to find the killer, who is driving around in a big black car, openly inviting people into the car, and then taking them to the big scary mansion in town. There’s also apparently a group of people you can just hire to kill hanging out at a bar and telling anyone who asks exactly who they are. When Ghost kidnaps Piper using a TAXI, the taxi driver says nothing, the police don’t catch the taxi pulling up to the store after the kidnapping, how is Ghost not caught???

Some more personal qualms:
- the way disability is written about in this book. Piper is blind, there are multiple descriptions of her relating to this that just absolutely rubbed me the wrong way.
- That rape scene was unnecessary. And so was then trying to make one of the rapists seem like a sympathetic character for a split second. There was no reason to give that character any backstory, it just seemed thrown in.
- Back to the repetition, there’s a lot of “as if”, “like”, and “seemed”. Ghost would not shut up about being “invisible”. But there were also way too many mentions of urine and feces, especially mentions of someone urinating. I swear it was mentioned something like five times in the last half of the book for seemingly no reason.
- The homophobia seemed out of place and poorly written. I don’t know how else to describe it, but it felt like it was really trying to make a point, and failing.

Final thoughts:
The writing style needs editing, and the story needs editing. This story and the writing style are trying really hard to be something amazing, but it’s falling flat, and the characters fell flat too.


Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher

[Oliver Clarke · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a weird, weird book, uncomfortably weird at times. It has the feel of a low budget 70s horror movie - creepy, bizarre and sometimes hard to process.
Unusually for me I wasn't sure of my thoughts on it immediately on finishing it, so have let it sit overnight before reviewing. And I've decided I liked it. There is a lot going on here, and not all of it works, but overall it has a mood I found irresistibly appealing and fascinating. It's definitely not perfect, but so much of it is good that overall I liked it a lot.

[Ellen Gail · Rating 4 out of 5]

Darker than the lighting on an HBO show Everything the Darkness Eats is a fantastic book full of grief derived horror. It's very well written, unafraid to get bloody, and makes some smart character choices.

However. 'Twas excellent, but also traumatic as fuck. So be prepared for that. Content warnings in the spoiler tag if you're interested: homophobia, hate crimes, graphic violence, rape

Definitely meets all the criteria for a four star read, but I don't know if I'll ever reread it. It's one my brain needs time to recover from.

Thanks to Edelweiss and CLASH Books for the digital review copy.

[Yvonne (the putrid Shelf) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything the Darkness Eats fizzles with tension, the pages just turn of their own volition. A fierce exploration of grief and power. LaRocca hits you with yet another viscerally compulsive story.

You can trust Eric LaRocca to hit that fucked up o’metre and turn your quiet reading day into a bubbling cauldron of angst and apprehension.

Everything the Darkness Eats is like LaRocca’s other books, in that, the titles are designed to make you think. His presence is everywhere and with a unique writing style all his own I am his ultimate fan. He’s an auto buy author because well, where else can you indulge in your intrusive thoughts because that is what Mr LaRocca indulges their readers in – intrusive ecstasy.

I couldn’t resist this story with deeply sympathetic characters like Ghost and Piper I was a goner. Nothing makes me fall into a story faster and harder than one that is character driven. I imagined Piper’s inability to see not as a disability but a strength. Her senses are heightened by touch and emotions. Her capacity to trust without seeing facial expressions made me love her all the more.

This is LaRocca’s first full length novel and boy did it pack a punch. I’ve enjoyed experiencing his affinity for writing about humanity, whether that’s how it breaks down in trauma or how hope shines through even in the darkest of times. Within a few pages, I felt like I was back at home – if home was a gothic cathedral of shadows and lingering threats. I held this story dear, my hands protecting a fragile creature, I felt its heart and braced myself for the onslaught of obscurity.

The story is told in dual POV, that of Ghost and Malik, a small-town cop investigating the numerous disappearances of elderly residents. Ghost is a widower, and I felt such sympathy for his mental state after losing both his wife and unborn child in a car accident. He’s in a stranglehold of grief and is plagued with a monster that resides around his throat (I took this to be the living embodiment of his grief, his guilty conscience.)

Malik a cop who lives in a small town with his husband, Brett. They very quickly are at the centre of a homophobic attack. It drives me insane how small minded some communities can be and was shocked that the very department Malik works for can take the attack as a signifier of how they behave. These two storylines interweave together and rush headlong in the conclusion.

The way the author examined the flaws of humanity was well, flawless. What would we do in order to get back that to which we have lost? The answer is simple and unconvoluted. Absolutely anything. LaRocca has shown that with dazzling brightness that we are searching for the lost parts of us and will stop at nothing to get it back.

[Netanella · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Everything the Darkness Eats" is black, black, black, like the cover of the book, like the contents of the book. For a long minute there I completely considered that there didn't seem to be a single speck of lightness in this book, that it was populated with people swimming in dark currents, victims of circumstance or chance, or worse, the evil, malicious characters who also peopled this book.

But then, a single, solitary wisp of a character made its single, solitary play, and I felt that all was right in the world.

This book was amazingly good. Bleak, but amazingly good.

My thanks to Netgalley for allowing me a sneak peek read for the amazingly talented Eric LaRocca. My opinions expressed here are solely my own.

[Sheena · Rating 2 out of 5]

I want to love LaRocca so bad but I think he just isn't for me. I'm all for dark horror but this was not it. A lot of this didn't make sense and I felt pretty bored for most of it. I didn't care for the characters either as well as found the 3 different story lines unnecessary. I personally don't want to be bored if I'm reading a horror book. There is also a lot of violence and trauma (rape scene) so just a warning there.

Also i'm sorry but if you tell a poor child who's blind you have a magic stick.....and then the mother proceeds to ask for your number?!!?!?!? File under things that would never happen.

Thank you to Netgalley for an advanced copy of this book

[Trashique · Rating 4 out of 5]

“It was as if someone had crept into her coils of memory and dragged the thoughts of him screaming by the roots from the bed of her mind.”

No cara mia, you are reading it wrong. This is LaRocca. You gotta sit back, clear your mind and grant it immunity. Let the story seduce you. Allow it to whisk you away and see where it takes you. When you get there, keep going.

*ahem* I love your work paisan but I was choking on metaphors in this one.

[Ross Jeffery · Rating 5 out of 5]

Is there a dark place LaRocca is unwilling to travel to terrify his readers? With ‘Everything The Darkness Eats’ the answer is a resounding no!

LaRocca’s words (in this debut novel) hold us captive like crudely driven nails at a crucifixion, where we are the unwilling offering and of which there is no escape from the horrors he is going to reveal to us.

We are forced to face the depravity of man and deity, made to endure suffering and fear and dread of the unknown - all the while hanging from the tree he’s nailed us to.

But he doesn’t leave us without comfort, he’s not that cruel. LaRocca - as always - is in full command of his craft, and with his sumptuous prose - at times of unforgiving torment - are a much-needed balm to the horrors and terrors which wash against us as his antagonists scourge us with their hate and devilry - there is beauty here, but there is also eternal punishment, pain, suffering fear and unrelenting dread.

[Paul Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Absolutely loved the short story collection The trees grew because I bled there, so was looking forward to Everything the darkness eats.

After finishing I was struck by the differences in the content, almost to the point where it could have been a different author. It was only the style of hypnotic prose that peeked out occasionally reminding me of the writer.
I would categorise this as a young adult urban fantasy novella, the expected horror element was barely existent bar a rape scene that felt like it didn't belong, inconsistent with the characters and story.

There's bits of magic and tiny spirits attached to people. I thought Ghost was an intriguing character, his sadness and his current predicament were interesting. There was emphasis on small-town homophobic attitudes and the animosity that descended into violence but I guessed where it was going and it felt too convenient.

In conclusion this is not something I would normally read and usually avoid like the plague. It was too much young adult with barely any darkness or horror elements.

My thanks to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for the opportunity to review this.

[Henrietta · Rating 1 out of 5]

It’s 0.5 ⭐️ for at least a tidy end albeit weird end to all the mess that this was
And I’m actually forced to leave a star rating so that there’s no confusion because I’ve left some really good books I’ve read here without star ratings

What did I just read ?!
I listened whiles walking to the market so at least I don’t feel bad about wasting time
The premise of this was so strange

That gang rape scene was just off
The reason for that whole seemingly random evil character being abused as a child was totally weird to explain his intense homophobia
And cmon why should his victim admire his hair ??

And the whole “God” and ritual situation was so weird that I couldn’t even tell that this was actually supposed to make some sense
I get that it’s captured “fantasy “ but hey we’ve all read books that made sense and this was the very opposite of that at most times ; most of the characters don’t even make sense; like it felt they were being forced into the world of the story from elsewhere
The romance too was not great ; for all the shame the couple felt being together it left a bitter taste in my mouth
The mention of disability; not cool and felt exploited
I did not like it
( I might not have been clear from the beginning , so I’m adding that for clarity )

Trigger warnings:
- homophobia & hate crimes
- sexual abuse
- death of a spouse
- suicidal ideation
- blasphemy
- disability

[Joanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's something about small town horror that packs a punch, and Eric LaRocca's newest story will knock your lights out. Everything the Darkness Eats leans more towards mainstream horror than LaRocca's previous works, but with the same beautiful prose fans know and love. I felt like the plot and the characters were more thought out than his previous, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke. The characters are compelling, and it is easy to get attached to them and care what happens to them. I loved that Eric put a magical spin on his usual examination of the darkness within humanity. I cannot wait for more full-length novels from LaRocca. This book is dark, just like the title suggests, so search up trigger warnings.

Thank you Netgalley, CLASH Books, and Eric LaRocca for the eARC.

Everything the Darkness Eats is out now.

[johnny ♡ · Rating 1 out of 5]

what the fuck.

[Willow Heath]

Eric LaRocca made a huge name for himself in the world of modern horror fiction with a slew of fantastic and varied short horror stories.

These included the now-iconic short story Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke and the novellas You’ve Lost a Lot of Blood and We Can Never Leave This Place.

Everything the Darkness Eats is a modern horror novel like no other, and one which stretches LaRocca’s themes, tone, and style to their limits.

My full thoughts: https://booksandbao.com/best-horror-n...

[Davis Morgan · Rating 2 out of 5]

1.5. It keeps getting worse the more I think about it. The most shocking aspect of this book was finishing it, reading the blurb, and finding out that I am somehow reading a “revised, second edition” version of this story. I honestly shudder to think of what this looked like before the revision. This very much felt like two completely disconnected novellas that were stapled together to create something that could be classified as a novel. The story creates a legitimately interesting hook with this mysterious old man who is luring people to his mansion, only to abandon that narrative every other chapter to focus on a gay couple’s struggle with the intolerance of the new town they’ve moved into. That town is the same town as the setting of the first narrative, but there is no development done to make that town feel like it has any sort of character at all. Speaking of characters, I would have really appreciated if any of the characters in this story were given meaningful arcs. It feels like we are expected to understand where these characters start their journeys but we are never actually given enough time with them to understand their motivations. One of the plot lines is so laughably undercooked that I think the author decided to put some extreme violence and torture in their to hopefully make it seem more impactful, but it really didn’t work for me. This saves itself from being a one star for having a really brisk pace and being mostly competently written in terms of the moment to moment prose (although some words were reused too frequently for my liking and I also found a handful of typos). Maybe I can find a LaRocca novel that impresses me more than this one because this left me scratching my head as to why any editor and publisher would approve this story in its current state. Maybe we’ll get a third edition that solves some of my issues with this.