This is the most recent “horror” that I’ve read, a couple months back at this point, and while I enjoyed it a lot, it was not really scary. It’s (in translation) a noir-ish Korean detective story with vampires. The main plot energy is devoted to the mystery–why people at a senior citizen’s facility keep jumping off the roof. Which would seem almost a non-mystery, but a detective notices certain details that do not add up and starts investigating.
It runs three different character narratives, which I usually don’t like but mostly works here, and it moves into believable vampire territory pretty quickly. But there’s nothing graphic, the violence is mostly off-screen, and the vampires are treated as people more or less–some good, some bad.
I was absorbed by the mystery and the slowly-revealing intertwined backstories, and kept expecting it to lean into horror, but it really never did. Tragedy maybe, but not horror in the way that I think of it. It’s a good read, and I have no hesitation recommending it, but keep your expectations checked regarding the “horror.”
I agree about King and Straub, and I can’t remember the last time I read something billed as horror that really scratched that itch well. Although, for me, I wonder if it’s less about the level of fiction happening in the genre and more about the intensity of the film-making happening in the genre. Have our expectations for horror in books been pushed to a level that isn’t really attainable as a result of the extreme cinematic treatments of the genre? And, if anyone would care to share, I’m very genuinely curious about what you think is missing from short stories and novels in this regard? The suspense/dread? The gore? Some overwhelming sense of doom? I ask because I’m working on a horror story (or maybe it’s a novel, Idk).
. I’m going to have to give Buffalo Hunter Hunters a read.