‘What Moves the Dead’ Book Review: An Eerie, Scientific Retelling of Poe’s Gothic Tale

Author T. Kingfisher is known for her award-winning entries into the horror folklore realm with The Twisted Ones and The Hollow Places and dabbling in the fantasy genre with A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking and Minor Mage. Her newest release, What Moves the Dead, retells Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher but with more of a scientific take on the classic gothic tale.

The newly horrific take on Poe’s story releases on July 12th, 2022, from Nightfire Publishing.

What Moves the Dead follows Alex Easton, a retired soldier in the Galician army, as they travel to the Ushers’ manor after receiving word that their old friend, Madeline Usher, has become extremely sick. Upon arrival, they meet a British mycologist studying fungi local to the area, an American doctor tasked with treating Madeline, and her old friend and brother to Madeline, Roderick Usher.

While exploring the Ushers’ land, Alex notices local wildlife acting eerily strange and possibly infected with fungi and thinks this may be the cause behind Madeline’s sudden illness. Alex is tasked with getting the Ushers away from their home before it’s too late, and their friends succumb to mushroom-induced madness.

What a great idea this retelling was. I’m a sucker for most historical fiction. Although Poe’s original story was fictional, it’s such a staple in the zeitgeist of classic literature that the story feels like true history. With Edgar Allan Poe’s known interests in fungi and hinted-at moments in the original story pointing at certain black molds being the cause behind the Ushers’ madness, T. Kingfisher put two-and-two together to craft an outside view of the classic tale by adding in a few likable characters. This includes giving the reader a desperately needed personality and position to the original story’s unnamed narrator.

With many modern period-piece horror novels, pacing often comes up as an issue, mostly because the story’s setting just can’t keep up with a modernized world experienced by a modernized reader. A helpful fix for this is to create relatable and interesting characters that could be written in a modern setting and focus on their development.

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A more recent book to do this perfectly was Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, a book whose themes remind me a lot of Poe’s work and one that Kingfisher references in this book’s afterword. What Moves the Dead does a good job of this as well, but unfortunately, only to an extent, as the book’s short length doesn’t allow readers to delve into the characters as much as one might like.

What I’ve absolutely loved about Kingfisher’s writing is her superb imagination and attention to detail when it comes to the macabre. When I read The Hollow Places, I had very vivid visions of her horrific creations. The same can be said for What Moves the Dead. Although I feel like the idea of a creeping fungal brain-takeover has been a little overdone in the last few years, with massive book releases like David Koepp’s Cold Storage, M.R. Carey’s The Girl with All the Gifts, Joe Hill’s The Fireman, and Chuck Wendig’s Wanderers all going that route, few other writers are able to capture the terrifying and gruesome effects a fungus can have on one’s body with their words like Kingfisher can.

My biggest issue for What Moves the Dead is a good one to have. I just wanted more. While I think the ending buttoned things up decently, there were questions that even the characters had that would never be answered. However, I do understand the hesitancy to make the story longer, as it already clocks in at twice the length of Poe’s original story.

Overall, What Moves the Dead was a great read; smooth and quick; it felt like a much-needed update to a tale that’s almost 200 years old by this point. I certainly suggest picking it up, along with any other T. Kingfisher horror books you can get your hands on.