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Lunar Gothic Trilogy #2
Cathedral of the Drowned
Not yet published
Expected 21 Oct 25The sequel to Crypt of the Moon Spider, Cathedral of the Drowned is a dripping, squirming, scuttling tale of altered bodies and minds.
There are two halves of Charlie Duchamp. One is a brain in a jar, stranded on Jupiter’s jungle moon, Io, who just wants to go home. The other is hanging on the wall of Barrowfield Home on Earth’s own moon, host to the eggs of the Moon Spider and filled with a murderous rage.
On Io, deep in the flooded remains of a crashed cathedral ship, lives a giant centipede called The Bishop, who has taken control of the drowned astronauts inside. Both Charlies converge here, stalking each other in the haunted ruins, while a new Moon Spider prepares to hatch.
There are two halves of Charlie Duchamp. One is a brain in a jar, stranded on Jupiter’s jungle moon, Io, who just wants to go home. The other is hanging on the wall of Barrowfield Home on Earth’s own moon, host to the eggs of the Moon Spider and filled with a murderous rage.
On Io, deep in the flooded remains of a crashed cathedral ship, lives a giant centipede called The Bishop, who has taken control of the drowned astronauts inside. Both Charlies converge here, stalking each other in the haunted ruins, while a new Moon Spider prepares to hatch.
144 pages, Paperback
First published August 26, 2025
2 people are currently reading
3953 people want to read
About the author
Nathan Ballingrud
69 books1,291 followersI'm the author of North American Lake Monsters: stories, coming from Small Beer Press in July 2013. I'm currently at work on my first novel and several more short stories. I live with my daughter in Asheville, NC.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
June 12, 2025
This horror scientific gothic novella is definitely a compelling, bizarre and a very strange one! This book is a sequel to the “Crypt of the Moon Spider”. It is a story that centers around Charlie Duchamp’s brain. It explores two parts of Charlie’s brain. As both sides of his brain are drawn to a flooded wreckage of a cathedral ship on lo, the two parts also differ in many ways. One side of his brain is a host to moon spider eggs and is driven by a murderous rage and is also hanging on the wall of Barrowfield’s house on Earth’s own moon. The other side of his brain seeks to return home on Jupiter’s jungle moon and is in a jar. Some of the themes expressed in this book are isolation and loneliness, duality and identity, body horror and the unknown. As this story unfolds, a lot of chilling and intense things begin to happen. Overall, I give this a 3 out of 5 stars.
This book is uniquely written, dark and has psychological tension. I found that it has ethical implications of advanced technology and it contained gothic and noir elements. It is like a nightmare that you want to wake up from. It’s gruesome, hard to stomach, not comfortable to read and surreal. I found this to have mysterious and adventurous vibes. I was not fully immersed while reading this book. This book is very sad and reflective. This is a very fast paced, short read that contained vivid imagery.
Thank you to NetGalley, author Nathan Ballingrud and Tor Publishing Group | Tor Nightfire for this electronic arc of this book in exchange for my honest review. All thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.
I think fans of science fiction, mixed in with fantasy and psychological elements, would really enjoy reading this. There is a huge audience that would really love this book, it just didn’t connect with me. Content warnings include body horror, violence, gore and blood.
This book is expected to be published on October 21, 2025! Just around Halloween time!!
This book is uniquely written, dark and has psychological tension. I found that it has ethical implications of advanced technology and it contained gothic and noir elements. It is like a nightmare that you want to wake up from. It’s gruesome, hard to stomach, not comfortable to read and surreal. I found this to have mysterious and adventurous vibes. I was not fully immersed while reading this book. This book is very sad and reflective. This is a very fast paced, short read that contained vivid imagery.
Thank you to NetGalley, author Nathan Ballingrud and Tor Publishing Group | Tor Nightfire for this electronic arc of this book in exchange for my honest review. All thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.
I think fans of science fiction, mixed in with fantasy and psychological elements, would really enjoy reading this. There is a huge audience that would really love this book, it just didn’t connect with me. Content warnings include body horror, violence, gore and blood.
This book is expected to be published on October 21, 2025! Just around Halloween time!!
August 7, 2025
Crypt of the Moon Spider split the difference between horror and weird. Cathedral of the Damned will still make your stomach turn, but leans more heavily into the strangeness than the pure terror of its predecessor, and the story arc is elevated as a result.
Most of book one was spent at the psych ward on the Moon. In this packed sequel, more time is allotted to Earth (specifically a racial turf war in late 1920’s Brooklyn) as well as new setting — a partially submerged gothic Cathedral ship that landed just offshore on one of Jupiter’s moons, rich with volcanoes, jungles, and terrifying creatures of the deep.
The author paints a menacing picture of the many types of monsters in the story, be it environmental, alien, or human. The pages reek of dread as they fly by, an impressive mix of violent gang warfare, twisted science experiments, and arachnid-fueled horror — all presented with tight, evocative prose and excellent pacing.
It’s going to be a long wait for the next entry.
Most of book one was spent at the psych ward on the Moon. In this packed sequel, more time is allotted to Earth (specifically a racial turf war in late 1920’s Brooklyn) as well as new setting — a partially submerged gothic Cathedral ship that landed just offshore on one of Jupiter’s moons, rich with volcanoes, jungles, and terrifying creatures of the deep.
The author paints a menacing picture of the many types of monsters in the story, be it environmental, alien, or human. The pages reek of dread as they fly by, an impressive mix of violent gang warfare, twisted science experiments, and arachnid-fueled horror — all presented with tight, evocative prose and excellent pacing.
It’s going to be a long wait for the next entry.
September 5, 2025
Arc from NetGalley
Another weird delving into Ballingrud’s strange and horrifying world. This entry trends to more immediate violence as opposed to the build in the first. The series is unique and beautiful and I’m eagerly anticipating the next entry.
Another weird delving into Ballingrud’s strange and horrifying world. This entry trends to more immediate violence as opposed to the build in the first. The series is unique and beautiful and I’m eagerly anticipating the next entry.
June 3, 2025
This review was originally published at FanFiAddict.
Picking up immediately where Crypt of the Moon Spider left off, Cathedral of the Drowned follows Dr. Cull’s return to Red Hook where he joins up with local mobster Goodnight Maggie, seeking protection from the Moon Spider and her murderous cultists, the Alabaster Scholars. Maggie has problems of her own, as she begins to feel the squeeze of the Sicilian’s growing power, which has left two of her men dead. At night, she’s haunted by the ghost of Charlie, an enforcer she had sent to the moon to work for Cull, and who instead became a lab rat in the bad doctor’s various experiments revolving around the human brain and moonsilk. A section of Charlie’s brain has been removed and sent to Io, one of Jupiter’s many moons, where frightening discoveries await.
Oh yeah, all this is set in the 1920s, too.
If it sounds like there’s a lot going on, well… there is. Somehow Ballingrud makes it all digestible and easy to follow, keeping all of the very high weirdness remarkably grounded. Cathedral of the Drowned, however, is not a proper starting point for the uninitiated, with Crypt of the Moon Spider, the first entry in Ballingrud’s Lunar Gothic Trilogy, being a must-read prior to starting this one. Woe to the poor reader who picks up this book expecting a complete and self-contained story! The looks of confusion upon their faces are sure to be hilarious, though, as they try to figure out what they surely must have been drugged with prior to descending into this dream-occluded nightmare.
For those who might need some selling on The Lunar Gothic Trilogy, which upon Cathedral‘s release in October will be two-thirds completed, Ballingrud forgoes any modern scientific realism in favor of crafting a pulpy retrofuturistic horror story that owes far more to Edgar Rice Burroughs than Neil deGrasse Tyson. Where Burroughs had John Carter of Mars, Ballingrud has his Spider Woman of the Moon. The first book in his trilogy dove into the spider-webbed forests and Dr. Cull’s sanitarium on Earth’s moon. Here, Charlie’s dissected brain pilots a satellite to Io, the Jungle Moon of Jupiter, where a massive Cathedral ship from Earth has crashed and its crew of dead priests roam under the control of a titanic centipede god known as The Bishop.
All-in-all, it’s a throwback to classic pulp adventures from the early 1900s up through the black-and-white sci-fi flicks of the 50s. Ballingrud plays it all straight, too. He doesn’t try to explain anything away, like the hows and whys of regular, routine space travel for the common man and woman of the 1920s. It all just is. Readers are trusted to accept it without any fussy hand-holding. And unlike the retrofuturistic 1950s-inspired Fallout series of video games and TV show, there’s no tongue-in-cheek whimsy or self-referential silliness. Both this and the previous Crypt of the Moon Spider are hard-edged, cut-your-throat serious works of alt-history that pays terrific, and terrifying, homage to the stories and creators of yesteryear. While it shares some superficial similarities to Ballingrud’s other fantastical, alt-history sci-fier, The Strange, he also brings in plenty of horror, both body and cosmic, not to mention the plain old savage kinds, too. In some ways, these two Lunar Gothic stories feels like a marvelous blend of both The Strange and Wounds: Six Stories from the Border of Hell. Certain passages here can’t help but remind one of “The Atlas of Hell” or his diabolical surgeons from “The Maw.” Ballingrud’s revisionism of the 1920s feels both real and ethereal, as degrees of the familiar coexist alongside nightmarish otherness. The more one buys into this world, the more they’ll be greatly rewarded.
Cathedral of the Drowned is also very much the middle child of this trilogy. It’s the essential middle part in Ballingrud’s narrative and readers are expected to already be familiar with this crazy world and what’s come before. They’re also expected to understand that this entry is, by its very nature, an incomplete story. Cathedral is a fine entry on its own, and a great follow-up to Crypt, but it also exists within the context of an as-yet-unfinished three-book cycle and how good or worthwhile it is depends on how well the third book lands. While Cathedral ends with a bang, it’s not THE ending to this story. There’s another book coming in 2026, and Cathedral does the necessary work to position these characters and align the stars for whatever weirdness comes next. If the first two books are any indication, we can expect the grand finale to be absolutely bonkers.
Picking up immediately where Crypt of the Moon Spider left off, Cathedral of the Drowned follows Dr. Cull’s return to Red Hook where he joins up with local mobster Goodnight Maggie, seeking protection from the Moon Spider and her murderous cultists, the Alabaster Scholars. Maggie has problems of her own, as she begins to feel the squeeze of the Sicilian’s growing power, which has left two of her men dead. At night, she’s haunted by the ghost of Charlie, an enforcer she had sent to the moon to work for Cull, and who instead became a lab rat in the bad doctor’s various experiments revolving around the human brain and moonsilk. A section of Charlie’s brain has been removed and sent to Io, one of Jupiter’s many moons, where frightening discoveries await.
Oh yeah, all this is set in the 1920s, too.
If it sounds like there’s a lot going on, well… there is. Somehow Ballingrud makes it all digestible and easy to follow, keeping all of the very high weirdness remarkably grounded. Cathedral of the Drowned, however, is not a proper starting point for the uninitiated, with Crypt of the Moon Spider, the first entry in Ballingrud’s Lunar Gothic Trilogy, being a must-read prior to starting this one. Woe to the poor reader who picks up this book expecting a complete and self-contained story! The looks of confusion upon their faces are sure to be hilarious, though, as they try to figure out what they surely must have been drugged with prior to descending into this dream-occluded nightmare.
For those who might need some selling on The Lunar Gothic Trilogy, which upon Cathedral‘s release in October will be two-thirds completed, Ballingrud forgoes any modern scientific realism in favor of crafting a pulpy retrofuturistic horror story that owes far more to Edgar Rice Burroughs than Neil deGrasse Tyson. Where Burroughs had John Carter of Mars, Ballingrud has his Spider Woman of the Moon. The first book in his trilogy dove into the spider-webbed forests and Dr. Cull’s sanitarium on Earth’s moon. Here, Charlie’s dissected brain pilots a satellite to Io, the Jungle Moon of Jupiter, where a massive Cathedral ship from Earth has crashed and its crew of dead priests roam under the control of a titanic centipede god known as The Bishop.
All-in-all, it’s a throwback to classic pulp adventures from the early 1900s up through the black-and-white sci-fi flicks of the 50s. Ballingrud plays it all straight, too. He doesn’t try to explain anything away, like the hows and whys of regular, routine space travel for the common man and woman of the 1920s. It all just is. Readers are trusted to accept it without any fussy hand-holding. And unlike the retrofuturistic 1950s-inspired Fallout series of video games and TV show, there’s no tongue-in-cheek whimsy or self-referential silliness. Both this and the previous Crypt of the Moon Spider are hard-edged, cut-your-throat serious works of alt-history that pays terrific, and terrifying, homage to the stories and creators of yesteryear. While it shares some superficial similarities to Ballingrud’s other fantastical, alt-history sci-fier, The Strange, he also brings in plenty of horror, both body and cosmic, not to mention the plain old savage kinds, too. In some ways, these two Lunar Gothic stories feels like a marvelous blend of both The Strange and Wounds: Six Stories from the Border of Hell. Certain passages here can’t help but remind one of “The Atlas of Hell” or his diabolical surgeons from “The Maw.” Ballingrud’s revisionism of the 1920s feels both real and ethereal, as degrees of the familiar coexist alongside nightmarish otherness. The more one buys into this world, the more they’ll be greatly rewarded.
Cathedral of the Drowned is also very much the middle child of this trilogy. It’s the essential middle part in Ballingrud’s narrative and readers are expected to already be familiar with this crazy world and what’s come before. They’re also expected to understand that this entry is, by its very nature, an incomplete story. Cathedral is a fine entry on its own, and a great follow-up to Crypt, but it also exists within the context of an as-yet-unfinished three-book cycle and how good or worthwhile it is depends on how well the third book lands. While Cathedral ends with a bang, it’s not THE ending to this story. There’s another book coming in 2026, and Cathedral does the necessary work to position these characters and align the stars for whatever weirdness comes next. If the first two books are any indication, we can expect the grand finale to be absolutely bonkers.
September 11, 2025
"Cathedral of the Drowned," the middle part of Nathan Ballingrud's Lunar Gothic Trilogy, continues the story of one of the lesser characters in the first book, Charlie or Grub. Charlie was an enforcer on Earth, working for a female mobster, Goodnight Maggie; on the Moon he became the violent head nurse of the now destroyed Home for Treatment of the Melancholy, working for the mad neuroscientist Dr. Cull; and he's now two people, his body and the violent part of his brain stuck in the lair of the new Moon Spider, and the sweet and gentle part travelling on a satellite, on the way to Jupiter.
And that's just one premise of the book! If it sounds complex, it's because it is: certainly not a standalone, the second entry in the trilogy complicates things even more, by bringing Goodnight Maggie front and center to the story; throwing Dr. Cull himself at her mercy; and allowing the space-travelling part of Charlie to appear to her and communicate his own anxieties once he lands on Io, one of Jupiter’s moons, a place with its own sinister backstory.
It's a wonder how Ballingrud manages to include so many plot-twists in a mere novella: from marvelous planetary vistas of a drowned cathedral-shaped spaceship on Io, and several nightmarish scenes in the Moon Spider's nest under the surface of the moon, to the pulpy atmosphere of Red Hook gangs preparing to fight each other, this is a well-crafted tale of dark scientific fantasy with strong Gothic overtones - though not for everyone.
The second book underplays the alternate, steampunk-like 1920s setting of the trilogy, almost taking the weird context for granted, no explanation or apology given and none needed. It delves into territory better fitting a cosmic horror adventure tale, bringing in dead old gods and their memories, accessible through dream-inducing substances produced by moon spiders; and last but not least, it includes a type of savage mentality which feels very modern, occasionally conflicting with the sense of revisionist, classic pulp adventure which the author intends to convey in general.
In sum, this is a complex book, deceptively short, fast-paced but not entirely reader-friendly on its own. Having read the first book is a must, and tolerating the irresolute standing of several mysteries integral to the plot has to be allowed for. If anything, however, this means that the finale will be impossible to predict: Ballingrud keeps his cards close, and isn't that exciting?
#NetGalley #titanbooks
June 29, 2025
In this sequel to Crypt of the Moon Spider, we focus on the two halves of Charlie Duchamp. One part of him is a brain in a jar, stranded on Jupiter’s jungle moon Io, who just wants to go home. The other, more murderous half of him, is left behind at Barrowfield Home on Earth’s moon and is a repeat host to the eggs of the Moon Spider.
There was a lot to unpack in this novella. This story was unique and amazingly written while also being incredibly atmospheric - all makings of a fantastic sci-fi horror story. I fell in love with Crypt of the Moon Spider for the ease in which Ballingrud shaped such a unique sci-fi world set in the 1920s. Everything felt so natural and common, that I never once questioned anything crazy that was happening, which is good, since this book continued those themes and upped the crazy.
I loved the gangster themes and enjoyed learning more about Maggie in this novella. Although I wish Veronica made a bigger appearance. But it is clear to me that this story is aligning all the stars in place for the final book and I can feel that the final installment is going to be a show stopping finale.
Overall, this made for a quick and entertaining read. I did enjoy the identity themes laced throughout this one, but as a whole, I personally enjoyed the first book more. The final book is set to release in 2026, and I can’t wait to see how Ballingrud finishes this series!
Thank you so much to NetGalley, Tor Publishing Group/Tor Nightfire, and Nathan Ballingrud for the eARC of the second book of The Lunar Gothic Trilogy in exchange for my honest review!
There was a lot to unpack in this novella. This story was unique and amazingly written while also being incredibly atmospheric - all makings of a fantastic sci-fi horror story. I fell in love with Crypt of the Moon Spider for the ease in which Ballingrud shaped such a unique sci-fi world set in the 1920s. Everything felt so natural and common, that I never once questioned anything crazy that was happening, which is good, since this book continued those themes and upped the crazy.
I loved the gangster themes and enjoyed learning more about Maggie in this novella. Although I wish Veronica made a bigger appearance. But it is clear to me that this story is aligning all the stars in place for the final book and I can feel that the final installment is going to be a show stopping finale.
Overall, this made for a quick and entertaining read. I did enjoy the identity themes laced throughout this one, but as a whole, I personally enjoyed the first book more. The final book is set to release in 2026, and I can’t wait to see how Ballingrud finishes this series!
Thank you so much to NetGalley, Tor Publishing Group/Tor Nightfire, and Nathan Ballingrud for the eARC of the second book of The Lunar Gothic Trilogy in exchange for my honest review!
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August 11, 2025Thank you to Tor Nightfire for an ARC!
"Thrilling and haunting in equal measure. Cathedral of the Drowned is a noir-tinged phantasmagoria. Ballingrud writes with purposeful lyricism: a hybrid that is at once gothic and period piece. The result is a Stygian black reinvention of the genre that, when it waxes into its power as a period piece, is where it truly shines." — Sofia Ajram, author of the Bram Stoker Award-winning novella, Coup de Grâce
"Thrilling and haunting in equal measure. Cathedral of the Drowned is a noir-tinged phantasmagoria. Ballingrud writes with purposeful lyricism: a hybrid that is at once gothic and period piece. The result is a Stygian black reinvention of the genre that, when it waxes into its power as a period piece, is where it truly shines." — Sofia Ajram, author of the Bram Stoker Award-winning novella, Coup de Grâce
August 25, 2025
This book was such a ride. I accidentally received this without realizing it was a sequel. I went to work getting book one on KU and spent the weekend with that and the sequel. Everything from the first is ratcheted up in this one and it really does open more of that lore. If you have issues with spiders or creepy crawlers this will not be a good one for you but it’s a great time for us horror lovers and I am excited for the third book!
August 22, 2025
“I am of the loam.”
The second book in Ballingrud’s Lunar Gothic Trilogy was everything I didn’t know I needed. I vividly remember finishing book one and not being able to go to sleep that night. Cathedral of the Drowned delivered that same creeping horror, but really expanded the universe of the moon spiders to a scale that is hard to fathom.
Every POV in this story was shocking and hard to read at times but I couldn’t stop. Between the Earth, the moon, and Io, I don’t know which was a scarier place to be. I would definitely recommend reading Crypt Of The Moon Spider first, and even giving yourself a refresher on it if you have read it already. Going into this book blind is ~possible~ but you definitely won’t get as much out of it that way.
I finally got to The Strange by this author earlier this year and will 100% be stalking the rest of his backlist ASAP. His scifi elements are perfect and the weird horror really works for me as well. Check out this trilogy if you love spiders, body horror, space, and goo!
**Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the eARC of this creepy a$$ title!**
The second book in Ballingrud’s Lunar Gothic Trilogy was everything I didn’t know I needed. I vividly remember finishing book one and not being able to go to sleep that night. Cathedral of the Drowned delivered that same creeping horror, but really expanded the universe of the moon spiders to a scale that is hard to fathom.
Every POV in this story was shocking and hard to read at times but I couldn’t stop. Between the Earth, the moon, and Io, I don’t know which was a scarier place to be. I would definitely recommend reading Crypt Of The Moon Spider first, and even giving yourself a refresher on it if you have read it already. Going into this book blind is ~possible~ but you definitely won’t get as much out of it that way.
I finally got to The Strange by this author earlier this year and will 100% be stalking the rest of his backlist ASAP. His scifi elements are perfect and the weird horror really works for me as well. Check out this trilogy if you love spiders, body horror, space, and goo!
**Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the eARC of this creepy a$$ title!**
July 21, 2025
TL;DR: Wonderful with one big icky
Source: NetGalley - Thank you to the publisher!!
Plot: Veronica’s revenge! This is one you definitely need to read the first book first.
Characters: This one focuses in on Doctor Cull, Charlie, and a new female character. I didn’t expect to enjoy our two men from book one but I really did.
Setting: There is less Moon time here and more Earth/Jupiter time. The Jupiter setting more than made up for this.
Horror: All the creepy crawlers you could want and we really get more of the space horror which is deeply exciting.
Thoughts:
This was going to be a 5 star read. In fact, if we could have removed one scene from this book it would still be a 5 star, new favorite read. We have creepy crawlers, giant space spiders, a moon full of webs, space horror, and then Io and the goodies there! So much of what this had is things I love. Unfortunately one scene did leave a bad taste in my mouth.
My one and only complaint about this is the on page rape scene. I don’t care who is getting violated, and in this case it is a man, it’s still a rape. So while I can maybe stretch my imagination to see why the argument could be had for this, I still think if we completely lifted the scene from the book it wouldn’t have been missed. It seemed to come from no where, and added very little to nothing to the characters of those involved. Could there be some repercussions in book three? Maybe. Would there have been a better way to reach whatever those were? Yes, probably.
These sort of things happen in real life, and I’m not for completely washing our literature free of everything I find uncomfortable or distasteful, but I want it to have meaning and substance. This felt like it was there to shock. The rest of this novella is fantastic. It’s filled with horror, intrigue, gore, everything you could want. Yet we still had to push to something that’s not useful to the narrative. I’m very disappointed to say the least. I will continue! I can’t tell you how much I loved the rest of this! But wow, do I wish that one/two page scene never existed.
Source: NetGalley - Thank you to the publisher!!
Plot: Veronica’s revenge! This is one you definitely need to read the first book first.
Characters: This one focuses in on Doctor Cull, Charlie, and a new female character. I didn’t expect to enjoy our two men from book one but I really did.
Setting: There is less Moon time here and more Earth/Jupiter time. The Jupiter setting more than made up for this.
Horror: All the creepy crawlers you could want and we really get more of the space horror which is deeply exciting.
Thoughts:
This was going to be a 5 star read. In fact, if we could have removed one scene from this book it would still be a 5 star, new favorite read. We have creepy crawlers, giant space spiders, a moon full of webs, space horror, and then Io and the goodies there! So much of what this had is things I love. Unfortunately one scene did leave a bad taste in my mouth.
My one and only complaint about this is the on page rape scene. I don’t care who is getting violated, and in this case it is a man, it’s still a rape. So while I can maybe stretch my imagination to see why the argument could be had for this, I still think if we completely lifted the scene from the book it wouldn’t have been missed. It seemed to come from no where, and added very little to nothing to the characters of those involved. Could there be some repercussions in book three? Maybe. Would there have been a better way to reach whatever those were? Yes, probably.
These sort of things happen in real life, and I’m not for completely washing our literature free of everything I find uncomfortable or distasteful, but I want it to have meaning and substance. This felt like it was there to shock. The rest of this novella is fantastic. It’s filled with horror, intrigue, gore, everything you could want. Yet we still had to push to something that’s not useful to the narrative. I’m very disappointed to say the least. I will continue! I can’t tell you how much I loved the rest of this! But wow, do I wish that one/two page scene never existed.
September 5, 2025
Disclosure Statement: I received an ARC of this book from the publisher. My opinions and thoughts are authentically my own and have not been influenced in any way by either author or publisher.
The Lunar Gothic novellas are some of the weirdest shit I've ever read, but they are astonishingly good. Whereas I felt like Crypt of the Moon Spider was almost surrealist, focused on struggles of agency and authority, Cathedral of the Drowned feels like a deep, character-driven exploration of the psychology of being. The book looks at three major characters specifically in an effort to break apart who they are and what drives them.
If the first novella introduced some psychological horrors, this second one deepens that overarching theme, focusing in tightly on issues of consciousness, of bodies and reflections, on projections and reflections of self, and issues of the war between desire and reality. The book is a torrent of oppositions, push and pull, desire and satisfaction, culminating in a splash finale that makes me hunger for the conclusion to this trilogy.
I still hunger for more of this setting, and definitely more of what Ballingrud seems to be on the hunt to explore, but just as I loved the first novella, this second chapter has a ton to offer for close readers and pulp enthusiasts alike. I fucking love this series.
The Lunar Gothic novellas are some of the weirdest shit I've ever read, but they are astonishingly good. Whereas I felt like Crypt of the Moon Spider was almost surrealist, focused on struggles of agency and authority, Cathedral of the Drowned feels like a deep, character-driven exploration of the psychology of being. The book looks at three major characters specifically in an effort to break apart who they are and what drives them.
If the first novella introduced some psychological horrors, this second one deepens that overarching theme, focusing in tightly on issues of consciousness, of bodies and reflections, on projections and reflections of self, and issues of the war between desire and reality. The book is a torrent of oppositions, push and pull, desire and satisfaction, culminating in a splash finale that makes me hunger for the conclusion to this trilogy.
I still hunger for more of this setting, and definitely more of what Ballingrud seems to be on the hunt to explore, but just as I loved the first novella, this second chapter has a ton to offer for close readers and pulp enthusiasts alike. I fucking love this series.
June 19, 2025
I actually liked this a lot more than Crypt of the Moon Spider. I did enjoy that book too, but I was expecting something a lot different than what it was. Knowing that this is more sci-fi gangster book than straight up horror really helped me enjoy it more. I think the only gripes I have with it are things that are just gonna happen with novellas sometimes since they're so short. Like, I got a little confused a few times because things happen so fast and there were a few parts that I wish I could have spent more time with. Wanting more of something is usually a good sign that what is there is super fun, though. The imagery in particular is super cool with the creepy cathedral spaceships and teleporting assassins and everything. I actually think this would make a really neat graphic novel. I have no idea where it's going to go in the final book, but I'm definitely going to be on the lookout for that. Thanks for the ARC! I enjoyed this quite a bit!
June 12, 2025
You might not expect poignant sub-text and strong theme from a novella that includes a washed-up mad scientist, gangsters in the spider silk trade, a giant centipede, and Catholic missions that involve launching cathedrals into space. But Ballingrud delivers on all of this in his pulpy and intelligent sequel to Crypt of the Moon Spider. Not only do we learn more about the moon spider silk introduced in Crypt, but this is a story about people struggling with their identity when they recognize that the different sides of their personalities and psychologies stand in deep tension with one another. The novella manages to breathe fresh life into the old sci-fi fixture of a collective mind by taking it on in the context of individuals trying to integrate their own fragmented personalities into a cohesive whole. Enjoyable on so many levels!
July 13, 2025
“𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒐𝒐𝒏 𝒄𝒍𝒂𝒊𝒎𝒆𝒅 𝒉𝒊𝒎”
Brutal and beautiful
There’s something about the way Ballingrud writes, it’s just incredible… I mean wow…. WOW. This book was gruesome, wonderfully unhinged and at parts had me squirming 🤢yet it was completely BEAUTIFUL.
My favourite horror Novella this year BY FAR!
It was just as good if not better than The Crypt of the moon spider, I can’t wait to see what we get next 🕷️ 𓆨
Thank-you titanbooks! This is expected to be released 21 October this year 🕷️🕸️🌕 Perfect for Halloween!
Brutal and beautiful
There’s something about the way Ballingrud writes, it’s just incredible… I mean wow…. WOW. This book was gruesome, wonderfully unhinged and at parts had me squirming 🤢yet it was completely BEAUTIFUL.
My favourite horror Novella this year BY FAR!
It was just as good if not better than The Crypt of the moon spider, I can’t wait to see what we get next 🕷️ 𓆨
Thank-you titanbooks! This is expected to be released 21 October this year 🕷️🕸️🌕 Perfect for Halloween!
September 6, 2025
This book was excellent. It was similarly written to 'Crypt of the Moon Spider' in that wonderfully weird and unsettling way, though this has more of an almost noir atmosphere at times.
Everything feels a bit grim and gritty but still quite surreal, while the descriptive prose brings the bizarre alien environments to life. There is a distinctly vivid and visual storytelling style that I love with both of the books in this series.
If you want something strange and horrific with a classic pulp feel, then you definitely need to read this book. I can't wait for the final part of the trilogy. 4.5⭐️
Thanks to Tor Publishing Group | Tor Nightfire for providing this book for review consideration via Netgalley.
Everything feels a bit grim and gritty but still quite surreal, while the descriptive prose brings the bizarre alien environments to life. There is a distinctly vivid and visual storytelling style that I love with both of the books in this series.
If you want something strange and horrific with a classic pulp feel, then you definitely need to read this book. I can't wait for the final part of the trilogy. 4.5⭐️
Thanks to Tor Publishing Group | Tor Nightfire for providing this book for review consideration via Netgalley.
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July 19, 2025This was just not for me. I’ll probably pick it up again eventually but DNF at pg 68 for now. I’m gonna go peel my skin off because I feel the spiders on them😅
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