The Passengers You Cannot See

For many people in my age bracket we were drawn to <i>Fight Club</i> and <i>American Pyscho</i> for all the wrong reasons. We were promised ultraviolence and probably weren't ready for the themes of depression and being outsiders contained within.

I signed up for an review copy of this book having never heard of the author. There are a lot of books coming out by authors I read a lot or books with a lot of hype; so I kinda wanted go just take a shot with this one. Boy, was this a pleasant surprise. Being that it's made up of short stories I was going to do it in chunks while I read some novels I'd be anticipating, but this book was lingering in my brain so much I had to stop a novel 100 pages in and go back.

I made the comparison to Palahniuk and Ellis earlier because a lot of this book is <b>dark</b>. The author here isn't using violence as padding, but there are some difficult subjects here. In one story a couple loses a baby, in another a man grapples with suicide. However, the author does this as graceful as one can without always giving us a happy ending.

Like most short story collections sometimes the author stretch out a little and sometimes the stories falter a little; but even at the worst I still enjoyed most of these stories. This is more to say there may be some stories in here you don't like, but there are some amazing ones in here.

Again I must say this isn't going to be for everyone based on the content, but then again if you've head Stephen King you've tested your limits some too, so I highly reccomend this one.

I don't know anything about The Behrg but I want to read everything.

Emotional, powerful and terrifying stories. I had nightmares for two nights. So....excellent writing.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I got a free advance readers' copy in exchange for my honest review. Thanks NetGalley and Pricks Like Thorn Media!

The Passengers You Cannot See is a collection of short horror stories by the author known as The Behrg. This was the first book I read by him. The stories in this book were supposed to be unforgettable, carried with you until the end of time. 

The one which that description fit was Still Born. As a parent, that affected me the most. Having to live in that nightmarish world after experiencing something like that is one of my worst fears and so it hit me hard. 

Every House is Haunted was chilling. After reading it, even though I knew it was impossible, I found myself wondering what if something like could really happen. I also felt that way about Kill Your Darlings.

The story that would be the creepiest for me, however, would definitely be Reborn. Even after reading the entire book, I was still thinking about the creature within this story. 

What I liked too was that just like in Every House is Haunted, An Ugly Resurrection made you look at things you would do normally with a new perspective. Like the author himself said in his note at the end of the book, what might be magical to some could be hell to another. 

He even touched on mental illness in stories such as The Lines and These Concrete Walls. Those stories made you look at the inner workings of patients dealing with depression and Alzheimer's. 

I enjoyed this book and am actually looking forward to checking out more books by The Behrg. I would definitely suggest that readers interested in horror check out these stories. 

Suitable audience: This is a book with quite a bit of blood and gore. I would suggest this book be read by older teens and adults. 

Recurrent themes: Death. Mental illness. Terror

Violence: Some quite violent scenes of death, both suicide and murder
Sexual Content: None
Profanity: A few instances of mild profanities
Religious Themes: One of the stories took place in a Catholic Church with priests and nuns.
Alcohol/Drugs/Smoking: Instances of each scattered throughout the book

I am not really a fan of collections of short stories ... but ..... these are really different. They are dark, and filled with emotion. Really well written and extremely clever. I have to give more praise, as this sits outside my normal area of interest. I tend not to read darker stories. Definitely worth checking out. It reminds me of Black Mirror.