Monstrumologist by Rick Yancey

William Henry just passed away in a retirement home. No one knew his age, he had no friends or relatives, and they couldn’t even tell if Will Henry was his real name. The only thing he left behind was his diary. However the diary seems more like a work of fiction. It claims that Will was born in 1876, over 120 years before his death. Also the stories themselves do not seem real. They depict a young Will Henry who is an orphan in service to an eccentric doctor. The doctor took in Will after his parents died and is now exposing Will to the world that very few wish to see, the world full of monsters. Like his father before him Will learned the study of monstrumology becoming “indispensable” to the doctor. After a year of servitude, a knock on the back door pushes Will away from endless nights of dissecting deformed carcasses and sends him on the hunt for real living beasts. The hunt leads them to multiple people with a horror story to tell, and they make a few horror stories of their own. It’s a book full of interesting characters and side stories that leave you guessing until the very end.

Reviewed by David Downes