Blood, Sweat, and Trees: Five Horror Stories Set in Jungles and Rainforests - Reactor

James Falmer and Roderick Thone are orchid hunters who—with the help of a couple of guides—are winding their way along a small branch of the Orinoco River in Venezuela. Before the start of the story, the pair had decided to briefly divert from their flower-hunting mission to seek out an ancient ruined city said to contain a burial pit full of treasure. The story picks up with Falmer returning to Thone, who fell ill on the journey and had to stop and rest. But instead of being laden with gold and gemstones, Falmer comes back bearing a tale about a strange plant that had woven itself through a skeleton.

“The Seed from the Sepulchre” may be short on word count, but Clark Ashton Smith doesn’t skimp when it comes to describing the grotesque body horror that results from Falmer’s excursion into the eerie tomb.

The Amazon rainforest and the Indigenous peoples who live there have long been subject to exploitation and destruction. “How Spoilers Bleed” takes one of the scenarios that has played out time and time again in this location—a group of greedy mercenaries buys a piece of land that is home to a tribe of people and then ruthlessly ejects them by any means possible—and gives it a supernatural twist.

Locke is the leader of the mercenaries and while he initially hopes to displace the tribe through peaceful methods (i.e. yelling at them to leave), the confrontation quickly gets out of hand and a child is shot and killed. In response, the tribe’s elder utters a curse—one that dooms the recipients to becoming so fragile that the slightest touch causes their skin to break apart. Given the set-up, it’s not unexpected to see retribution meted out via bloodshed, but Clive Barker’s unique spin on the conflict and its consequences is distinctly more creative and horrifying than is usually the case.

If you’re going to go exploring in the jungle, it’s best to be prepared—that means wearing appropriate clothing, bringing plenty of food and water, and following a knowledgeable guide to make sure you get safely back out. The main characters in The Ruins foolishly do none of these things.

Two couples are in Mexico enjoying a sun-and-booze-soaked vacation. When the brother of one of their new friends goes missing, they decide to leave the resort and take a day trip to his last known location—an archaeological dig deep in the jungle—to see if they can find him. But once there, the group of foolhardy explorers wind up trapped on a hill covered with vines that might just have a taste for blood.

Every element in The Ruins is vividly described—from the sun that oppressively beats down to the vast amounts of blood, guts, and gore that are spilled. There are also no chapter breaks, which gives the whole nightmarish narrative a breathlessly propulsive energy.

Scottish sisters Ana and Rachel (along with Rachel’s insufferable boyfriend) are on vacation in Thailand in an attempt to reconnect with each other. After a very drunken Full Moon party on the beach, they wake up—along with a few other hungover people—on a boat that is drifting towards an island. Hoping to find people there who can help them get back to the mainland, they start exploring. The massive spiderwebs strung between the trees are admittedly a little concerning, but they have no choice but to forge ahead through the jungle.

The Forgotten Island feels like a B-movie creature feature blended with a cosmic Lovecraftian nightmare. There’s a fun and comedic tone throughout, but the skin-crawling horror definitely increases in intensity as the story progresses, and by the final act, full-on eight-legged mayhem has broken out on the forsaken island.

Rainforest is an epistolary novel that is told via diary entries written by English scientist Simon Corbett during a jungle expedition in 1973. Looking to study mantids, Simon has joined a camp deep in the Mexican rainforest that is mostly occupied by workers for a nearby archaeological dig. But Simon keeps finding himself distracted from his academic research by his guilt over an incident in his past. Oh, and it seems that he’s being haunted too.

Michelle Paver excels at crafting an atmospheric setting: The vegetation is lush and dense, the air is hot and sticky, and there’s a plethora of nasty creepy crawlies to contend with. If you aren’t already grossed out by the idea of a botfly larva wriggling around under your skin, Rainforest will definitely get you there.

Simon is a deeply unlikeable character—he looks down on those whom he deems less intelligent than himself and he’s often casually racist—but that’s by design. Such a character might be off-putting for some readers, but for me it just meant that I happily found myself rooting for the jungle and the ghosts to put him firmly in his place.