Obsession

by Elizabeth Hand

First published 2012

This collection gathers nineteen stories that examine how desire can destroy reason and consume lives. The tales span supernatural seductions and purely human obsessions. Sirens call victims to their doom. Demon lovers ensnare mortals in fatal relationships. Femme fatales manipulate their prey through calculated charm. Yet not every obsession involves the supernatural or sexual attraction. Some characters find themselves trapped by their own minds, driven to extremes by unrequited longing. Others become swept into another person's madness, unable to escape the gravitational pull of someone else's delusions. The stories trace how fascination becomes fixation, how attraction transforms into compulsion. Characters cross moral boundaries they never imagined violating. They pursue dangerous liaisons that threaten their safety and sanity. Each tale reveals obsession's ability to overwhelm rational thought and drive people toward irrational behavior. The collection features established masters of dark fiction alongside contemporary voices, creating a tapestry of human vulnerability and the price of surrendering to overwhelming desire.

Genres: short-stories, literary-fiction, horror, dark-fantasy

Vibes: dark, emotional, intimate, suspenseful

Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, femme-fatale, unreliable-narrator

309 pages · Paperback · Prime Books

Content warnings: explicit-sexual-content, violence

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