Epeolatry Book Review: Black Out the Stars by Christopher Bond
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Title: Black Out the Stars
Author: Christopher Bond
Genre: Crime horror
Publisher: Aquino Loayza
Publication date: 25th March, 2025
Synopsis: Marcus, a man estranged from his family, returns to his roots amid a backdrop of generational trauma in rural, poverty-stricken Ohio, only to find that not all family secrets die given time. As Marcus helps his uncle drain a pond on their ancestral property, he uncovers the dark secrets of his family and the land they’ve called home.
Ghosts have always scared the heck out of me. Whatever you may call them, phantoms, shadows, or an entity which is no longer living, I’m not interested in seeing or interacting with one in real life. I’d rather be oblivious to the whole interaction. Kind of how Kevin Bacon is none the wiser in Stir of Echoes before he’s hypnotized. He had no idea he was living in a haunted house. After a medium spellbound him to be more open, he “woke up,” and all he saw were ghosts. This is my nightmare.
Yet, a part of me wants to experience them indirectly. And I can do it through reading or watching TV. It’s curiosity mixed with foreboding, with hands haphazardly covering my eyes enough to peek through and watch the horror unfold. Those were the emotions I felt reading much of Bond’s novel. Bond’s work has a Mayfair Witches meets Poltergeist feel. In the first chapter, the setting is understood, my curiosity is peaked, and I have questions I hope to have answered.
Bond’s work is revealed through stories. Lots of storytelling about a particular family. All of them are eerie and disturbing. Family trauma is a constant theme running like the river along the property in Bond’s book. Other themes include family dysfunction, exploiting religion for personal gain, forsaking family members, and plain old inaction.
Reading through multiple generations of stagnation is truly horrific. Still, I wanted to turn the page and genuinely enjoyed the storytelling and Bond’s prose. At times, the slow burn is slightly stifling for me because I wanted more forward movements and action during the story telling and with the protagonist, Marcus.
From the start, the reader is clear on Marcus’ current situation, yet what he wanted is vague. Did he wish to learn about his childhood? Did he wish to outrun his grief? This question remained with me the entire story and it was never answered. The events seemed to happen, and the main character never took action.
Even if this piece didn’t entirely hit for me, anyone who likes a good ghost story while sitting around a campfire or while hiding under the bed covers (like me), can dig into these pages.
/5
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Amie DeStefano enjoys writing short stories, poetry, the unusual and weird, but especially fantasy or anything else she dreams up and puts on paper. Her short story is published in That Darkened Doorstep anthology. While living in Pennsylvania with her husband and two children, she writes as often as possible. Amie enjoys sushi, coffee, and a good book, but nothing compares to the Zen-in the moment feeling she gets from writing.
