Praise for We Are Always Tender with Our Dead
“it’s hard not to see an insular, frightened contemporary America in “Burnt Sparrow: We Are Always Tender With Our Dead”: Eric LaRocca’s at-times masterful homage to Shirley Jackson.”
Chicago Tribune
“We Are Always Tender with Our Dead is a new level for one of horror’s most important rising voices, and deserves to be remembered as one of the most important novels in the genre in 2025.”
Dread Central
“One of horror’s brightest rising stars is on the other side of the threshold, ready to show us all his first epic in the genre. Step across with LaRocca, and you’ll be rewarded, whether you’re a newcomer or a longtime fan.”
Fangoria
“‘We Are Always…’ is not afraid to get down and dirty, with LaRocca really crafting some visceral horror that will make you wonder why more horror authors are playing it safe.”
Bloody Flicks
“Whilst rich in theme, prose and atmosphere, LaRocca offers no semblance of comfort, reprieve or mercy, and is not sorry for it. This novel is brutal, sickening and depraved, and I’d do it all over again.”
FanFiAddict
“This is shock horror married to literary writing. Its imagery, as brutal as it is poetic, is sure to provoke, engage and repulse in equal measure.”
Ginger Nuts of Horror
“Much like the townsfolk stuck there, you’ll find yourself returning to Burnt Sparrow long after you’ve put down the book.”
Grimdark Magazine
“LaRocca’s masterful blend of literary grace and unrelenting horror reaches new extremes—in every sense of the word.”
Cinema Chords
“The first book in LaRocca’s Burnt Sparrow trilogy of novels might end up being the most brutal book released by a major publisher this year. Combining small-town secrets with absolutely unflinching studies in transgression and depravity, it’s the boldest and best thing LaRocca’s written yet.”
Paste Magazine
“Expertly balancing extreme disgust and awe-inspiring wonder, LaRocca pushes readers to their limit with his use of graphic and illicit sex and violence, making them squirm with intense discomfort, forcing them to confront the truth about the horrors all humans inflict, especially on those they love the most. The results? Mesmerizing. The thought of waiting for book two? Unbearable.”
Booklist, starred review
“LaRocca stretches stylistically with this novel, showing impressive artistic growth and a true feel for characters who seem wildly disparate but are in fact closer than they seem. This book will appeal to horror fans looking for lyrical writing and confrontational self-examination; it feasts on insecurities and fear while reminding readers of their shared humanity.”
Library Journal, Starred Review
“LaRocca creates a lushly gothic atmosphere that smothers both the reader and his characters… Only those with iron stomachs need apply.”
Publishers Weekly
“This is small town hell on steroids: Burnt Sparrow is somewhere around the corner that you never want to even pass by. The beautiful writing of Eric Larocca makes this tale of grief, violence and perversion (a lot of it) a very strangely beautiful journey into darkness. It reminds me of Poppy Z. Brite at her most brutal, vile and best. Unflinching and relentless body and social horror, with a nod to Derry and unspeakable desire.”
Mariana Enriquez, author of Our Share of Night and A Sunny Place for Shady People
“Not since Twin Peaks has there been a town quite like Burnt Sparrow, where nightmares, secrets, cruelty, and longing are the currency. Your visit will be harrowing and it will cut you to the quick, but you’ll want to return as soon as possible.”
Paul Tremblay, author of Horror Movie and A Head Full of Ghosts
“Any time I read an Eric LaRocca book, I feel like I’ve been brutalized. Your reaction to that sentence will determine whether or not this book is for you. Full of transgressive horror and broken people, its greatest strength is in its psychology. How eager are we to be persuaded to see others as inhuman, so we don’t have to care what happens to them?”
Christopher Golden, author of The Night Birds and The House of Last Resort
“The Poet Laureate of Pestilence, Eric LaRocca, impales his readers on the white picket fences of David Lynch country with We Are Always Tender with Our Dead, shifting his transgressive eye toward the toxic-bucolic small town of Burnt Sparrow, where he summons a particular poetry in tragedy, transcendence in grief, and elegance in the most brutal of violence.”
Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Wake Up and Open Your Eyes and What Kind of Mother
“Eric LaRocca is one of the best horror voices to emerge in the last few years. We Are Always Tender with Our Dead is his finest work to date, filled with relentless darkness, but beauty too. The story and characters will stay with you in your dreams long after you’ve finished it.”
Richard Kadrey, author of The Pale House Devil and the Sandman Slim series
“Blending the grotesque and the sublime, We Are Always Tender with Our Dead moves with the callous logic of a nightmare. LaRocca initiates us into his newest trilogy with a haunting meditation on affliction, grief, and the darkness that lurks beneath the bonds that tie—or trap—the residents of Burnt Sparrow to one another.”
Elle Nash, author of Deliver Me and Gag Reflex
“With We Are Always Tender with Our Dead, Eric LaRocca adds to his already remarkable body of work. Wielding his graceful prose with the deftness of a surgeon holding a scalpel, LaRocca cuts to the beating, bloody heart of a small New England town shocked by an act of unexpected brutality, then examines the network of consequences that results. In the process, he finds savagery, sorrow, beauty, and much, much more. The first in a trilogy, this novel signals an exciting new phase in Eric LaRocca’s fiction. I can’t wait for what comes next.”
John Langan, author of Lost in the Dark and Other Excursions and The Fisherman
“LaRocca is a maestro of the horrific, surreal, and uncanny, and his work never fails to illuminate the dark epicenter of the human condition while offering the suggestion of hope—maybe. Every tale is one that will leave you shaking and breathless, yet like a car wreck, you’re helpless to look away.”
Ronald Malfi, author of Senseless and Come with Me
“A devastating, sweaty nightmare from the master of Uncomfortable Things: this book is, as the title suggests, both tender and cruel and written with that signature LaRocca melancholic violence I’ve come to love so much about his work. A beautiful, nasty wee novel.”
Gemma Amor, author of Dear Laura and Itch!
