Book Review: The Gravity of Existence by Christins Sng

The Gravity of Existence by Christins Sng (publication date: December 5, 2022) is a collection of horror poetry aptly described as “tiny terrors”. Each of the short poems in the book is a slice of fear designed to make you think about the world and the monsters that inhabit it.

The collection is divided into sections including “Real Monsters”, “Childhood Tales”, “Ghost Stories”, “The Enlightenment of Science”, “In Sickness, In Death”, and “The End”, and is framed by a “Prelude” and “Requiem”. Although I was less interested in the alien and apocalyptic poems, I delighted in her series of fairy tale poems including “Little Red in Haiku”, “Snow White”, “Sleeping Beauty”, and “The Wizard of Oz”. The poems are almost shocking in their brevity as they allude to the untellable aspects of the stories. I gasped and laughed at her simple but powerful rendition of “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” which reads as follows: “after their walk / the bears discover something / tastier than porridge”. Sng’s sparse style forces you to imagine the atrocities beneath the words so that the poems stay with you long after they have been read.

The collection is dark and filled with eerie humor, but there is hope in the poems as well. In one of my favorites, “A Better World”, Sng writes “I cast a magic spell / To manifest my grief / Creating a new world / Full of rage-filled ghouls / Bent on protecting girls”.

Christina Sng is a three-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author whose collection, The Gravity of Existence, will give you the chills and leave you aching for more. If you enjoy small bursts of horror poetry that will linger long after the lights have been turned out, this collection is for you!

You can pre-order a copy of the book HERE.

Thank you to NetGalley for a free copy of this book in exchange for a fair review.

Kelly Jarvis teaches classes in literature, writing, and fairy tale at Central Connecticut State University, The University of Connecticut, and Tunxis Community College. She lives, happily ever after, with her husband and three sons in a house filled with fairy tale books. She is also Enchanted Conversation’s special project’s writer.