Tessa
https://www.goodreads.com/tessalacoil
to-read
(1052)
currently-reading (2)
read (595)
horror (73)
ya-middlegrade (26)
favorites (17)
graphicnovels (14)
currently-reading (2)
read (595)
horror (73)
ya-middlegrade (26)
favorites (17)
graphicnovels (14)
writingbooks
(9)
brainz (7)
thriller (7)
couldn-t-finish (6)
valancourtbooks (4)
bizzaro (3)
magicalrealism (3)
brainz (7)
thriller (7)
couldn-t-finish (6)
valancourtbooks (4)
bizzaro (3)
magicalrealism (3)
“Bad horror stories concern themselves with six ways to kill a vampire, and graphic accounts of how the rats ate Billy's genitalia. Good horror stories are about larger things. About hope and despair. About love and hatred, lust and jealousy. About friendship and adolescence and sexuality and rage, loneliness and alienation and psychosis, courage and cowardice, the human mind and body and spirit under stress and in agony, the human heart in unending conflict with itself. Good horror stories make us look at our reflections in dark distorting mirrors, where we glimpse things that disturb us, things that we did not really want to look at. Horror looks into the shadows of the human soul, at the fears and rages that live within us all.
But darkness is meaningless without light, and horror is pointless without beauty. The best horror stories are stories first and horror second, and however much they scare us, they do more than that as well. They have room in them for laughter as well as screams, for triumph and tenderness as well as tragedy. They concern themselves not simply with fear, but with life in all its infinite variety, with love and death and birth and hope and lust and transcendence, with the whole range of experiences and emotions that make up the human condition. Their characters are people, people who linger in our imagination, people like those around us, people who do not exist solely to be the objects of violent slaughter in chapter four. The best horror stories tell us truths.”
― Dreamsongs, Volume I
But darkness is meaningless without light, and horror is pointless without beauty. The best horror stories are stories first and horror second, and however much they scare us, they do more than that as well. They have room in them for laughter as well as screams, for triumph and tenderness as well as tragedy. They concern themselves not simply with fear, but with life in all its infinite variety, with love and death and birth and hope and lust and transcendence, with the whole range of experiences and emotions that make up the human condition. Their characters are people, people who linger in our imagination, people like those around us, people who do not exist solely to be the objects of violent slaughter in chapter four. The best horror stories tell us truths.”
― Dreamsongs, Volume I
“I was ashamed of myself when I realised life was a costume party and I attended with my real face”
―
―
“Everyone who keeps a secret, itches to tell it.”
― Dark Places
― Dark Places
“The only advice … that one person can give another about reading is to take no advice, to follow your own instincts, to use your own reason, to come to your own conclusions.”
―
―
Valancourt Books
— 514 members
— last activity Dec 23, 2025 01:37PM
Valancourt Books is an independent small press specializing in the rediscovery of rare, neglected, and out-of-print fiction. Horror & Supernatural, W ...more
Fantastic Strangelings Book Club
— 440 members
— last activity Apr 17, 2025 06:33PM
For everyone in Jenny Lawson's Fantastic Strangelings Book Club! If you're wondering what that is, please see: https://thebloggess.com/2020/01/27/hel ...more
Tessa’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Tessa’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
More friends…
Favorite Genres
Polls voted on by Tessa
Lists liked by Tessa

























































