"Stargazers" Book Review

Written by Tony Jones

Published by Cemetery Gates Media

stargazers lp hernandez poster large

Written by LP Hernandez 
2022, 120 pages, Fiction
Released on 5th July 2022

Review:

Stargazers is the first release in the My Dark Library series published by Cemetery Gates Media and curated by Sadie Hartmann, who also provides a foreword. This series of six novellas features some terrific pieces of speculative and horror fiction, including Tim McGregor’s Taboo in Four Colors, which was recently awarded the rare 5/5 stars on Horror DNA. It is no surprise Hartmann and the publisher chose Stargazers to kick off their new series, as it is an incredibly clever piece of writing which blends horror, science fiction and apocalyptic fiction. It also squeezes a huge amount into its 120 pages and there is considerable scope for the story to be expanded into a longer piece, or even a novel should the author ever fancy revisiting it.

Much as I love huge 1,000-page post-apocalyptic doorstoppers in the style of Robert McCammon’s Swan Song or Larry Niven’s Footfall, LP Hernandez shows that you do not necessarily need that many pages to bring our world to the point of extinction. Many of the most famous post-apocalyptic novels are epic in scope and feature multiple characters and points of view, but with Stargazers, Hernandez does the exact opposite and cleverly focusses on a tight (but struggling) family unit and the reader can easily imagine the trials which face this husband, wife and little girl being repeated across the world.

When speculative fiction is of the highest quality, the reader never feels cheated by the fact that all the big questions are not answered. This is most certainly the case with this brilliant novella, which is loaded with clever observations, clues, and an overwhelming feeling of sadness, as it seems like the twilight of humankind has truly arrived. Even though it is short, Stargazers is top-loaded with striking scenes. Imagine settling down to your breakfast and the television news is showing scores of people patiently queuing on the top deck of an army battlecruiser to jump off the side, one by one, committing mass suicide.

Even though the focus is primarily on the family of Henry Sylva, the story cleverly uses a Reddit-style notice board to feed information into the plot, allowing the reader a glimpse at the bigger worldwide picture, which begins with a forum post titled “My Neighbor Has Been Staring at the Moon for Hours.” Dismissed as a poor attempt at fiction, other similar accounts are added, describing family members and neighbours gazing open-mouthed at the stars throughout the night.

This is certainly one of the weirdest and low-key ways for an apocalypse to begin. But soon more and more people are staring at the sky in a deep trance and initially, relatives wrap them in blankets and cover them up until the numbers grow and grow. For Henry’s wife Judith, things start very normally. She is leading a presentation at the hospital where she works, it is rescheduled, and overnight people stop going to work and all sense of normality disappears incredibly quickly. Then, the ‘Stargazers’, as they are now called, start to walk (this reminded me of Chuck Wendig’s Wanderers), some for many miles and with no shoes, and start congregating in certain areas. Clearly waiting. But for what?

Whilst the fascinating Reddit feeds buzz in the background, the novella concerns what happens to Henry, Judith and their small daughter Penny when society begins to disintegrate. Initially, the family faces the challenges familiar to this type of fiction; lawlessness, looting and mass panic, but Stargazers refuses to fall into the usual stereotypes as the trio battle to survive and the numbers of Stargazers swell and begin to show distinctive characteristics.

The sheer uncertainty of survival carries a real whack, in reality anybody could wake up in the morning and find their companion or loved one lost, unmoving, and staring at the sky. Of course, Henry has to try and explain the dynamics of this scary new world to his young daughter and there are threats and monsters everywhere, many of which are still human.

Stargazers is an intense read loaded with tension in a tale which documents the final days of humanity through the struggles of a normal family fighting to survive. Hernandez skilfully weaves together elements of post-apocalyptic fiction, thriller, and horror into a fast-paced novella that delivers an emotional punch which will have you reading between the lines for clues to what the hell is going on.

Grades:

Overall: 5 Star Rating Cover
Buy from Amazon US.
Cover
Buy from Amazon UK.

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Tony Jones
Staff Reviewer
Such is Tony’s love of books, he has spent well over twenty years working as a school librarian where he is paid to talk to kids about horror. He is a Scotsman in exile who has lived in London for over two decades and credits discovering SE Hinton and Robert Cormier as a 13-year-old for his huge appetite for books. Tony previously spent five years writing The Greatest Scrum That Ever Was, a history book very few people bought. In the past he has written for Horror Novel Reviews and is a regular contributor to The Ginger Nuts of Horror website, often specialising in YA horror.
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