Amazon has gathered a few talented horror writers together for their “creature feature” collection with six authors penning six stories for the spooky season.  I’ll be reading and reviewing all six this month – up first, Joe Hill’s THE PRAM.

Hill’s story follows Willy and Marianne as they relocate to rural Maine as the COVID-19 pandemic allowed them to leave the hustle and bustle of Brooklyn behind to work remotely in their dream home.  While a tragedy has left a stain on their idyllic marriage, the pair resolve to work through it and hopefully, come out of it stronger than ever.

This all changes when Willy borrows an old Pram from the general store to help carry his groceries home.  Willy swears he can hear a baby crying in the night, but is he losing his mind?  Did he make too much of an effort to care for his guilt-ridden wife, that he never focused on his own unraveling mind?

Coming in under 60 pages, this is a really strong effort from Hill.  That isn’t exactly shocking given that he clearly takes after his father with respect to his gripping short fiction.  There is a great line near the story’s climax that left me with chills and had me saying out loud, “oh damn, that’s good.”

It seems like it’s been far too long since we’ve had a proper novel from Joe (2016’s THE FIREMAN).  I think we’re well overdue and stories like The Pram prove that he’s still at the top of his game.