Mapping the Interior

FINALLY, book #3 for 2023, Mapping the Interior by Stephen Graham Jones… the goal of reading 50 books this year seems as far away as ever. Anyway, one of the things currently happening in BookTube circles is a thing called “Horror May-hem”, which is a month devoted primarily to shorter horror (books 250pp and under approximately), so this fit the bill brilliantly (weighs in at 112pp in print form, according to Amazon, though obviously I got it for Kindle). I discovered it via Dave at Book Blather, who has it as one of his titles for the event; it sounded intriguing in his description so I picked it up, and yeah, I think I was duly rewarded.

Basically it’s about a young boy of Native American ancestry who sees his father come home late one night, which is obviously not unusual apart from the fact that Dad has been dead for some years by this point. This will prove to be a somewhat less happy reunion than Junior initially thinks. Mapping is well-proportioned as a novella, doesn’t waste time or words unduly, and I managed to read it in only about an hour and a half. The real horror of the story, though, is perhaps less the ghost (or whatever the manifestation is) than it is the way the past doesn’t just linger on without ever really leaving us, it carries on and repeats (as the slightly obscure conclusion perhaps indicates).

And one thing I found very striking is how the Native narrator refers to himself and his people as “Indians”, which… well, Jones himself is Native, so the term is obviously less questionable than a white author doing it, but it was just kind of striking to see a Native character use the word. Cos I was under the impression that “Indians” was kind of verba non grata now in the way that “Eskimo” is, although having done a quick squiz at Wikipedia that appears to be a more vexed issue than I realised before now… Anyway, splendid little book, and I’ve now acquired a couple more of Jones’ books as recommended by Alessandro Manzetti, whose 150 Exquisite Horror Books I’ve been using as a bit of a guide to the more recent stuff…