The Twisted Ones

By T. Kingfisher

Award-winning author Ursula Vernon, writing as T. Kingfisher, presents a terrifying tale of hidden worlds and monstrous creations…

When Mouse’s dad asks her to clean out her dead grandmother's house, she says yes. After all, how bad could it be?

Answer: pretty bad. Grandma was a hoarder, and her house is stuffed with useless rubbish. That would be horrific enough, but there’s more—Mouse stumbles across her step-grandfather’s journal, which at first seems to be filled with nonsensical rants…until Mouse encounters some of the terrifying things he described for herself.

Alone in the woods with her dog, Mouse finds herself face to face with a series of impossible terrors—because sometimes the things that go bump in the night are real, and they’re looking for you. And if she doesn’t face them head on, she might not survive to tell the tale.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Titan Books
• Release date: Mar 17, 2020
• ISBN: 9781789093292

T. Kingfisher

T. Kingfisher, also known as Ursula Vernon, is the author and illustrator of many projects, including the webcomic “Digger,” which won the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story and the Mythopoeic Award. Her novelette “The Tomato Thief” won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette, and her short story “Jackalope Wives” won the Nebula Award for Best Story. She is also the author of the bestselling Dragonbreath, and the Hamster Princess series of books for children. Find her online at RedWombatStudio.com.

Reviews for The Twisted Ones

[tuusannuuska-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Suitably creepy. I liked the characters a lot, and this had just the right level of mundane everyday things in the mix to make it more believable. The Weird was interesting and other enough to have me creeped out, but not too much to make me anxious.

[bookczuk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Pandemic read. Not my usual genre, but a most excellent book, recommended by a sister. Read it on as dark and stormy day, with the ocean’s roar in the background. Will read more by this author.

[maryellencg-894309 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Well, that was creepy as hell.

[kordasix · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was a delightful blend of weird, creepy, and humorous.

[slmr4242 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Truly creepy. Loved it!

[rivkat_2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Mouse comes down to North Carolina to clean out her grandmother’s hoarder house, but discovers that her step-grandfather left a mystery, possibly having to do with the creepy stone behind the house. Uncanniness ensues. OK, but a little extended for “horror happened but mostly I didn’t understand what was going on.”

[charrlygirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

3.5/5* (Rounded up to 4 for Goodreads.)

THE TWISTED ONES was a nice take on folklore and an homage, (or is it a sequel?) to Arthur Machen's THE WHITE PEOPLE.

I loved the narrators of the story, (both the protagonist and the narrator of the audiobook), which went a long way towards my enjoyment. I think if I had read this, instead of listening, the repetition of certain phrases and certain behaviors regarding the protagonist and her dog would have gotten on my nerves a lot more.

I enjoyed THE TWISTED ONES mostly for the characters, I think, especially Foxy. She cracked me the hell up-maybe because I know people just like her? Full of surprises, sometimes vulgar, but always down to earth and willing to help.

Overall, I'm glad I joined the group read with the LADIES OF HORROR FICTION group here on Goodreads. I enjoyed chatting with them while we were reading.

Recommended!

*I bought this audiobook with my hard earned cash and this is my honest review.*

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The setup for this horror story is that Mouse returns to the home of her detestable but now dead grandmother in rural North Carolina to clean out her house--her grandmother was a hoarder. She finds her step-grandfather's diary and a manuscript he wrote about a missing book and mysterious white people in the woods. The story starts out very strong: Mouse's voice is engaging, she has a cute dog (maybe a little too cute?), and a couple of very creepy things happen. But things get progressively weirder and less scary as Mouse gets closer to the mystery of the White People. This story is of course inspired by Arthur Machen's "The White People," and I am not a fan of Machen anyway. I think Kingfisher did a good job reinterpreting him and Lovecraft's response to him, but she can only do so much when the material she is working with is already batshit crazy. Good setting, good monsters, good creep factor, but a bit too much in the end.

[quondame · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Reworking the stolen by the fair ones with a vengeance, this tale of a young woman attempting to empty the house of her hoarder grandmother in North Carolina, has inverse resonances with the outsider in a small southern town fables, but mostly gets where it's going. It isn't ultimately disturbing, but I held onto my dachshund for the last chapters.

[jjmcgaffey · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Wow. It's horror, but it's horror I can read, which is rare. Partly my usual shield - the narrator never quite gives up. She never feels utterly helpless, mostly because whenever she starts to, she remembers she has to protect her dog. It's not nearly as amusing as it sounds. Nice sequence of rising tension - it's written from afterward (starts with her explaining why, perhaps, she's writing this down), but that's not front of the mind as things ratchet upward. A few nasty people, mostly not actually present, and some very nice ones on multiple levels (from a cup of coffee to marching into danger along with the narrator). The horrors are actually almost pitiable...but only almost. In an afterword, Ursula tells us that this story is in response to a letter about a story about a book...but I don't read horror, so I never encountered these sources. It doesn't reduce the power of the story at all. A very rich story. But I hope there's never a sequel.

[liscarey · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Melissa, known as Mouse to family and friends, travels from Pittsburgh to North Carolina to clean out her deceased grandmother's house. Her grandmother had been prickly, unloving, and unfriendly, and moreover had been in a nursing home for a couple of years. Mouse hadn't visited in years, and her father, now hospitalized with his own health issues, didn't adequately warn her.Mouse's grandmother was a hoarder.While working through the trash on the first floor, she finds her step-grandfather's journal. Much of it seems not just odd, but potentially crazy, until she starts to encounter the frightening things he wrote about for herself. These include creatures constructed of bones, animal hides, and other random items.Some of them seem to be stalking her.And, out walking in the woods with her dog, Bongo, she finds herself on top a a hill that can't be there, and strangely carved, and strangely wrong, large stones. She can hardly get away from them fast enough.At the same time, she's going into town regularly, where she meets sane, normal, friendly people, who are a touchstone for normality even as stranger and stranger things happen at the house and in its immediate area. She makes friends, including with her neighbors, at the small commune that were her grandmother's closest neighbors.She's very grateful to have those friends when the bone creatures start actively hunting her.Mouse, as well as Foxy, Tomas, Enid, and others in town are varied, interesting, complex, and likable characters. It matters to me that Mouse is a devoted, responsible dog owner, and yes, the dog survives! This is a frightening but absorbing, and satisfying, story.Recommended.I bought this audiobook.