There are 43 stories in Of Beasts & Bones, the latest creature horror anthology from editor Robin Knabel. The volume’s introduction promises all sorts of beasts imaginable from science, nature, myth and popular entertainment. It certainly delivers on that promise. 

Writing a review for a book like this—with 43 big whopping stories—can be quite a challenge, to say the least. There’s just no way to provide incisive commentary on every story in this puny 500-word review. Some ambitious critic should probably do it at some point, but it’s not gonna be me. 

The collection contains a string of excellent stories about how loneliness compels opportunistic monsters. Two of my favorites are by Camellia Paul and Alex Goldberg. 

A man visits his wife’s family home in a story called “Hutams Lament.” There’s only enough room in the family’s hut for the wife to sleep, so the husband is asked to stay outside at night. Soon the family and his wife forget about him completely. 

“On the third night,” writes Paul, “Chamelie did not kiss Daichi on his cheek. On the fourth night, she did not say his name. By the seventh night, she had forgotten he existed.” The only witness to the husband’s sad fate is a nearby owl calling out to the wife who never answers. 

In the story “I am Not Alone,” a lonely man named Dennis spends his nights monitoring abstract signals from deep space. Eventually he makes contact with something substantial. To his delight, the static becomes an undulating voice that slowly morphs into something softer, more recognizable. Something feminine. He found it entrancing, says Goldberg. “For the first time he felt truly seen.”

Over time, Dennis and his cosmic girlfriend develop a long-distance relationship. But, of course, it’s all a cosmic ruse. The entity had professed love, but it did not understand love. It only knew conquest, a concept it combined with affection to create a new horrific paradigm for the human race. 

Other stories worth mentioning include “Courting the Cadaver” by Jessica Gleason about a woman’s “love affair” with an ancient Egyptian mummy, “On the Hunt” by Karamia Subocz about a man chasing a sasquatch while he, in turn, is secretly being hunted by a different type of cryptid, “The Warmth” by Leonardo Lamanna about a monster created by insane grief and “Local Guide” by Clint Collins about a small Kentucky town inhabited entirely by monsters. “Food Baby” by Jen Mierisch is about two tourists who experience the wrath of an ancient Polynesian goddess.  

All the contributions in Of Beasts & Bones are pretty short, and because of this, not every story is fully formed (including, I’m sorry to say, a story by the editor herself). Some aren’t even stories at all—just vignettes of monsters doing monstrous stuff. 

But overall, this is an awesome collection of “creatures, grotesqueries, aliens, cryptids, ghosts and other anomalies.” The book closes with a story called “The Ossuary Chamber” by Marc Corondo which features a chilling Ouroboros-like ending. If I’m reading this correctly, Corondo’s story might be a tease for further volumes of beasts and bones.  

[ Of Beasts & Bones / Edited by Robin Knabel / First Printing: April 2026 / ISBN: 9798254717805 ]