What Moves The Dead by T. Kingfisher

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I enjoyed the story and the fact that it was a really quick read. I thought it was done well—gripping, the gothic atmosphere, the sense of impending doom. I didn’t quite fall in love to the point of giving five stars, but still a great read. Would recommend for fans of Poe, and of gothic horror.

A retired soldier visits the home of her childhood friends when she learns one of them may be dying. When she arrives, it seems both siblings are very unwell, along with the house, and particularly the hares around the grounds. Things seem dire at the Usher residence but it’s clear that there’s more going on than meets the eye.

Here's the blurb:

What Moves the Dead is Kingfisher's retelling of Edgar Allan Poe's classic "The Fall of the House of Usher.”

When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania.

What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.

Aided by a redoubtable British mycologist and a baffled American doctor, Alex must unravel the secret of the House of Usher before it consumes them all.