5/14/26
Women In Horror Year: Day 35
All The White Spaces by Ally Wilkes
Hardcover - Paperback - eBook - Audiobook
Something deadly and mysterious stalks the members of an isolated polar expedition in this haunting and spellbinding historical horror novel, perfect for fans of Dan Simmons’s The Terror and Alma Katsu’s The Hunger.
In the wake of the First World War, Jonathan Morgan stows away on an Antarctic expedition, determined to find his rightful place in the world of men. Aboard the expeditionary ship of his hero, the world-famous explorer James “Australis” Randall, Jonathan may live as his true self—and true gender—and have the adventures he has always been denied. But not all is smooth sailing: the war casts its long shadow over them all, and grief, guilt, and mistrust skulk among the explorers.
When disaster strikes in Antarctica’s frozen Weddell Sea, the men must take to the land and overwinter somewhere which immediately seems both eerie and wrong; a place not marked on any of their part-drawn mapsof the vast white continent. Now completely isolated, Randall’s expedition has no ability to contact the outside world. And no one is coming to rescue them.
In the freezing darkness of the Polar night, where the aurora creeps across the sky, something terrible has been waiting to lure them out into its deadly landscape…
As the harsh Antarctic winter descends, this supernatural force will prey on their deepest desires and deepest fears to pick them off one by one. It is up to Jonathan to overcome his own ghosts before he and the expedition are utterly destroyed.
Ally Wilkes is an incredibly versatile writer. There’s a night and day narrative and stylistic difference between something like Jamie Hallow And The End Of The World and her more horror/thriller fare. But readers new to her work who have only read All The White Spaces and Where The Dead Wait might think that all she writes is arctic horror. It’s not, but even if it was, how fucking lucky would we be?
Beginning with Poe’s The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, through Lovecraft’s At The Mountains of Madness, and into modern day with books such Dan Simmons’ The Terror and Tim Curran’s Hive, the polar wastes have always made a great setting for horror. Even books like Alma Katsu’s The Hunger and Stephen King’s The Shining, while not set in such a place, have made effective use of the cold, the isolation, and the creeping, gnawing loneliness and desperation that comes with it.
With All The White Spaces, Ally not only carries on that fine tradition, but does new and interesting things with the tropes. Her writing is sharp and the world-building is totally immersive. If you’ll pardon the pun, it makes for a chilling read that pulls no punches and offers no quarter. There’s a reason this book was heralded by everyone from Esquire to Paul Tremblay. A wonderful debut. If you haven’t read it, you need to correct that. All The White Spaces is available in hardcover, paperback, eBook, and audiobook. Vortex Books also has copies of the paperback here.
