The first thing about What Moves the Dead that caught my eye was the cover. A wild hare, partially consumed by eye-catching red and pink fungi, stares at the reader from a black background. It’s one of those definitely hand-illustrated covers that are perfectly proportioned and beautifully detailed. It also fits the story to a T.
The second thing I noticed was the title, which grabs your attention and piques your interest. I was immediately struck with admiration and just a bit of jealousy, because naming books is hard and finding a cover artist that good is even harder.
“I’m going to be really disappointed if this is one of those books that fall short of the promise made by the cover,” I thought. Fortunately, What Moves the Dead did not disappoint.
I first heard about this book, and its author, T. Kingfisher, while researching Hugo award nominees. While a little outside of my normal reading patterns, it sounded interesting. I’m always up for a read that’s well-written and interesting.
What Moves the Dead is a reimagining of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher; but, aside from the characters bearing the same names, I wouldn’t have immediately picked up the resemblance.
I went back and reread The Fall of the House of Usher just to be sure, and found it less-than-substantial. It’s more of a sketch of a story than a well-developed tale. I’m definitely much more of a fan of Poe’s poetry than his prose. Where Poe’s Usher lacks depth and dimension, however, Kingfisher’s What Moves the Dead overflows with detail, atmosphere, and rich characterization.
We join our protagonist, a retired sworn soldier named Alex Easton, on the approach to the dilapidated old Usher estate. The weather is cold, gray, and wet, and reminds me of August weather where I grew up, in that it was mostly thoroughly miserable and you really didn’t want to be there. Easton; Easton’s mount, Hob; and Easton’s grizzled old man-at-arms, Angus, all seem to feel the same.
The wet weather gives rise to something else: the prolific growth of fungi. While initially a peculiarity of the area, these feature prominently in the story later. I came to really appreciate how Kingfisher hides these little clues in plain sight, only for them to become eerily, disturbingly relevant later.
To go into detail about all the things I enjoyed about this story would give away far too many of the exciting twists and turns Kingfisher adds to the original tale, but I will say this: where The Fall of the House of Usher was a bit of a boringly one-dimensional sketch, What Moves the Dead is a living, breathing work of art full of vibrant (and very human) characters.
Not only did the setting leap off the page in all its cold, damp, dilapidated glory, the characters were warm, alive, and relatable –yes, even the strange, doomed Usher heirs– in a way that none of the characters in the original were. I came to really like Easton and friends, to desperately want them not to come to the kind of end horror story characters generally come too.
I especially enjoyed how Kingfisher wrapped this story up, both staying more or less within the outline of the original, and solving the mystery that Poe left hauntingly unresolved. It’s my favorite kind of creepy story– the kind where seemingly supernatural events turn out to have a scientific explanation.
For a short read that straddles the line between horror and mystery, this was a phenomenally good book. I’ll definitely be checking out more of this author’s work!
