“[S]imultaneously beautiful and grotesque . . . Even now, nearly 40 years after its initial publication, it feels a bit taboo to read it. Here at last, is a boundary that few dare cross, an element of the macabre that has not been played out in a thousand similar iterations already, and it’s been kept secret from me by the barrier of language.”

Rue Morgue is a magazine devoted to the horror genre.