Review: 'Acquired Taste: Chilling Stories' by Clay McLeod Chapman

I love horror short stories, there's just something delightful about the brief bumps of terror each story provides. I got many such little bumps in Acquired Taste, but the collection was a little too inconsistent for my taste. Thanks to Titan Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Pub. Date: 9/9/2025
Publisher: Titan Books

They're feeding on you too.

A father returns from serving in Vietnam with a strange and terrifying addiction; a man removes something horrifying from his fireplace, and becomes desperate to return it; and a right-wing news channel has its hooks in people in more ways than one. 

From department store Santas to ghost boyfriends and salamander-worshipping nuns; from the claustrophobia of the Covid-19 pandemic to small-town Chesapeake USA, Clay McLeod Chapman takes universal fears of parenthood, addiction and political divisions and makes them uniquely his own. 

Packed full of humanity, humour and above all, relentless creeping dread, Acquired Taste is a timely descent into the mind of one of modern horror's finest authors.

Acquired Taste is a collection of previously-published horror short stories, although it's more a mix of some stories and various one-shots. By the latter I mean that many of the "stories" are more like very brief glimpses at something that has happened. For example, the first few stories have very intruiging concepts, such as a man getting obsessed with his fireplace and what he might burn there or a reverend going overboard with his purity-focus, but it's more like glancing through a window than stepping into a room. There is limited build-up and the story usually stops before the concept is fully developed or given proper weight. Because of this they are interesting but left me somewhat unfulfilled. Some of the stories that get a fuller treatment are absolutely excellent. 'Battlefield Séances', for example, is stunning and brutal, bringing together ghosts, hauntings, grief, body horror-elements, and sisterhood in a way that speaks to more than just the plot. I really liked getting to know the characters and their relationships, the historical setting, and the horror implicit in a seance and getting too close to the dead. 'Sisterhood of the Salamander' was also very atmospheric (and inspired the gorgeous cover). While it isn't very horror-heavy it has a nice mix of dread and the fantastical which builds up to something quite beautiful. 'Stay On the Line' was also gorgeous, working in some delightful fantastical horror while commenting on the power of grief. I wish more of the stories had been like this rather than ending just as things got juicy. There were also a number of political stories but these were almost too obvious for me. On the one hand this had a nice *wink wink nudge nudge* vibe, but, on the other hand, it also undersells the ability of horror to investigate socio-cultural concerns a little. 

This is my first time reading anything by Clay McLeod Chapman and I can only applaud the man's imagination. Some of these stories are truly bonkers in their concept and I did love that Chapman didn't shy away from the craziness of it. However, I don't really find the absurd scary, if that makes sense. In one story, a toy from a video game infests a house and the father has to combat both it and the lure of online content. That set-up has a lot to offer, but how it was presented the silliness outweighed any terror. The initial fear of bedbugs expressed by the mother was the scariest thing to me, if I'm honest. Horror is a quite broad genre, admittedly, and the collection does span much of that breadth. There is body-horror, divine terror, violence in the home, childhood trauma, war trauma, the paranormal, etc., so in a way, Acquired Taste has everything to offer. Yet in that very breadth, the collection overall loses some of its potency. Perhaps a shorter collection, more strongly focused in theme, would have been a stronger read overall. As it is now, I picked my way through the stories and hoped for one's that actually fit my taste. 

I give this collection...

3 Universes!

I did enjoy reading Acquired Taste, but it veered wildly in quality and consistency for me. However, I'd definitely be intrigued to pick up something novel-length by Chapman to see how his writing works on me when it is focused and in-depth.