Book Review: The Bone Spear by Alexander Layne

I’ve always found horror to be a particularly difficult genre to write in, as your ability to imagine the horror limits its capacity to scare you. This is why some of the best horror writing I’ve encountered is instead carried by aesthetic and clever subversions on established expectations. I think The Bone Spear embodies these aspects, but it also goes a bit further still, capturing the intense violence of a story like Berserk and then mashing it against the otherworldly terror of Hellraiser and Lovecraft.

Understandably, this is a bleak book, and that alone makes it something that not everyone will find enjoyment in reading. But if you’ve been seeking an experience to genuinely unsettle you then The Bone Spear is the story that’s most likely to accomplish that, while still yet having the substance required to be engaging as a complete narrative. I think one of Alexander Layne’s strengths is their ability to horrify you with descriptions of flayed bodies and ghastly parasites, then fill you with need to immediately flip on to the next page to learn more about the world, which requires a balance that could have easily been exceeded to feel gratuitous.

Lacking subtlety in its content does not mean that The Bone Spear lacks depth. Beneath all the character interactions is a conscious interplay between trauma and emotional bonding that demonstrates a keen understanding of the two. You can appreciate how the characters connect without ever feeling like the narrative is endorsing the unhealthy aspects that stem from their troubled relationships. It’s not necessarily at the forefront of the narrative experience, but the fact that it still manages to shine through is a sign that Layne has more to offer readers than expertly detailed gore.

Given this is a new author’s first foray into both self-publishing and a challenging subgenre of fantasy-horror, I have few complaints that pass the reasonably low threshold of being worth mentioning. The ending is rather abrupt, leaving a lot left to tell, and for the first entry in a series that is certainly not unreasonable. But as a reader, I just have to hope that the desire to explore the world further sustains itself into the next few books.