Nothing But Blackened Teeth
by Cassandra Khaw
Tor Nightfire, 2022
128 pages
ADULT
The striking cover alone sells this book, setting the tone and mood before you even reach the first word. You hope you will live to see the last. This novelette can be read in a single sitting, so it’s perfect for a stormy night with creepy music in the background. It tells the story of five young people who are flown to Japan to attend the small private wedding of one of the couples in a thoroughly haunted house. (*The promotional blurbs for the book all talk about a Heian Era mansion. I called up images of Byodo-In Temple and Jingu Shrine.)
The first time I watched Monster House, I recognized the premise of the haunting was incredible. I know, it’s a well-known meme, the skeleton in the chimney or bricked up in the wall, buried in the root cellar (Poe’s The Black Cat and Cask of Amontillado, De Balzac’s La Grande Bretche), even the noir trope of the bumped-off detective hidden in the mortar of the basement. But here is the viciously supernatural story I was coveting, in fully adult, blood-soaked majesty.
The problem is the prose. It’s so purple that the writer’s emphasis on emotive word choice confuses the otherwise simple story.
The protagonist, Cat, arrives with Phillip, a newly ordained priest initially characterized as a jock in the purple and gold of a letterman’s jacket, but also wealthy enough to have all his friends flown to Japan as a wedding gift. Then the betrothed couple, Faiz and his horror-loving bride Talia, join them, and Lin shows up late but still in time for the festivities.
This crew used to be ghost tourists, though very little is given in the way of an establishing back-story. In fact, these “friends” share so much history between them they all seem to hate each other. The house has extremely little back story itself, which seems at odds with the exuberant prose, but what we do know of its history tells of a woman buried alive at her own request after being left at the altar, then another woman condemned to join her each year thereafter to keep her spirit company.
As the wine begins to flow, the story becomes mixed with the surreal. Talia runs off on her own and disappears, kidnapped by the house and its resident horde of yokai. Swarms of kitsune begin to follow the house guests. Enter the Ohaguro-Bettari, an evil spirit with a false face and a smile carved from ear to ear. Her purpose is to bring about the end of young men.
Distraught at his wife Talia being stolen by the malign influences within the house, Faiz becomes convinced there is a book in the moldy library that will explain how to get her back, some ritual, and he finds a choice example. The book has been eaten away by silverfish and bears only scrawled sigils. Faiz, and only Faiz, can read it. Four directions, four offerings of blood and organs …all sacrifices that will come easily once the entity called “Nothing But Blackened Teeth” begins to exert her deadly influence over her guests.
References to being aware that they are in a horror movie, guessing who will be the first to die, comes close to breaking the fourth wall but serves to show that the story doesn’t take itself too seriously.
Despite the shortcoming of the storyline being convoluted by poetic description that lacks explanation, the book effectively leaves the reader with the taste of a horrific pipe-dream that will linger for days. Reading this put me in the mood for a J-horror binge, Sadako vs. Kayako and Hosu queued up for late night!