Atlanta’s Reviews > The Fisherman > Status Update

Taking a pause here. Chapter 13 hit hard—not for the cosmic grief, but for the raw helplessness and childhood trauma threaded through it. It’s brutal, brilliantly written, and just a little too close to home right now. Switching to something else for a while before I wade back in.

The tone finally turns unmistakably horror. Chapters 11–12 slide from grief and legend into outright possession—hallucinations, doubles, and domestic spaces turning hostile. Langan balances the supernatural with emotion so raw it feels physical. The dread isn’t just creeping anymore; it’s moving furniture.

Chapter 10 splinters into small-town folklore and pure brutality—Helen’s return, the desperate chaos around the Vitellos, and the undertaker’s apprentice losing his mind. It’s less “fishing tale” now and more a mosaic of grief turned feral: parents, lovers, workers, all breaking under whatever came back from the water. The tone is biblical and local at once—violence told like gossip.

The story inside the story just crested into full-on myth. George’s account of Reiner and Maria shifts from grief to nightmare—folklore swallowing realism. Langan’s prose feels like standing on a dam while the water underneath remembers every name it ever drowned. The dread is slow, tidal, and impossible to look away from.

I love this book! It’s been a while since I read a horror novel. First book from this author for me.