Blair's Reviews > Bad Dreams in the Night

I was interested in this book as I’ve read and enjoyed some of the author’s horror comics via Instagram. While those are typically adaptations of other people’s stories, usually from reddit posts and Twitter threads, the eleven stories here are all original. (Aside from one, a riff on the 19th-century story best known as ‘The Green Ribbon’ and recently reinterpreted by Carmen Maria Machado in ‘The Husband Stitch’.)

Highlights include the urban legend vibes of ‘Bus Stop’; the moody, Junji Ito-lite ‘Butter Corn Ramen’; and the punchy modern ghost story ‘Viola Bloom’. The longer comics work best, and I also found them more effective when framed as a personal experience of the narrator, which takes the edge off anything that seems inconclusive. Shorter pieces like ‘Forest Fruit’ and ‘Hangnail’ hinge on visual punchlines; I’d call these dark jokes more than ‘horror stories’. Others have great setups – ‘Better Kate Than Never’, ‘Murder Party’ – but don’t do anything truly unexpected with them.

My main problem with Bad Dreams in the Night – and I realise this may sound nitpicky to some – is that little knowledge or appreciation of contemporary horror seems to have gone into it. Instead, it’s inspired more by a combination of old children’s books and the sort of ‘this really happened to me!’ stories people post online in the hope of creating a viral creepypasta. This is reflected in the author’s notes accompanying each story, some of which take away from the effect. Reading the explanation for ‘Green Ribbon’, you’d think Ellis was the first person to conceive of telling this story from the woman’s perspective. One note starts with the words ‘not too much to say about this one’ – in which case, surely it’s better not to have a note at all.

So, I liked this perfectly well but it’s all quite insubstantial. I’d perhaps consider buying it as a gift for someone who doesn’t usually read horror – and to be fair, I think that’s probably who it’s aimed at anyway! If you enjoyed this and are looking for more short horror stories in graphic novel format, I’d recommend Emily Carroll’s Through the Woods.

I received an advance review copy of Bad Dreams in the Night from the publisher through Edelweiss.