Shelly Page and Alex Brown make their editorial debut by bringing together an impressive roster of BIPOC queer authors in this gratifyingly frightening and humorous YA short story anthology centering BIPOC queer characters.
The pure enjoyability of Night of the Living Queers: 13 Tales of Terror & Delight lies in its brilliant blend of tenderly serious and lighthearted stories that feature sinister supernatural and undeniably real fears--as well as one misunderstood pizza-stealing specter. Maya Gittelman, in a stunning entry, builds a metaphor for gender diversity via a feared, outcast wizard: "This is who your town deemed monstrous? When they're the ones who trap you, as if their misconceptions of you are somehow truer than your own... understanding of yourself?" Grief is explored via an eerie father-daughter tradition in "The Visitor" by Kalynn Bayron (Cinderella Is Dead) and via an "if you stop watching this video, you will die" plotline in Trang Thanh Tran's (She Is a Haunting) "Nine Stops." A babysitter battling a ghost recognizes in it the "bone-deep loneliness that comes with being abandoned" in Page's "Anna," and characters give in to vengeance in creepy fashion. Love and its simulacra are found, too--near-death kisses, post-rescue kisses, kisses that curse or start fires.
Each story takes place on Halloween, spectacularly enhanced by a blue moon "bearing down like a watchful eye." Late-night outings and parties abound, every setting visceral: Vanessa Montalban describes an abandoned hotel as "a season away from growing teeth" in "Welcome to the Hotel Paranoia"; a mall food court is known for its spectral resident in "The Three Phases of Ghost-Hunting" by Brown; and a drive-in theater hosts a ghost car from the 1950s in "A Brief Intermission" by Sara Farizan (Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel). Ouija boards spit out spirits, ominous noises herald hauntings, and invisible forces impose their will. Comedic moments burst through the scares. "AAAHHHHH!" a character in Ryan Douglass's (The Taking of Jake Livingston) "Knickknack" screams in a dead clown's dark bedroom before deadpanning, "Oh. It's just bowling pins. Not giant dildos." A demon asks a teen his pronouns--and then begs to be taken to a house party in Tara Sim's "Hey There, Demons." Cultural lore inspires various stories: in a nod to Nezha of Chinese mythology, a girl holds within her the power of a dragon (Em X. Liu's "In You to Burn"); a teen in New Orleans fastens a dime around her neck, fearful of the Rougarou of her Maw's Cajun folktales (Page's "Anna"); and a teen beseeches help from Kali Maa, "primordial goddess of death and rebirth," during the Kali Pujo Festival (Ayida Shonibar's "Save Me from Myself").
Here there be vampires that must be invited in, one solid Ghostbusters joke, swoony queer love, and enticingly chilling Halloween fun to revel in while huddled beneath a blanket any time of the year. --Samantha Zaboski, freelance editor and reviewer.
Shelf Talker: Night of the Living Queers is a highly entertaining and suspense-filled YA anthology about queer teens braving myriad fears on Halloween night.