Being a Chinese Girl in New York, living with OCD, and surviving a pandemic…
Anyone would agree that this is the perfect setup for a horror story.
And indeed, in Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng, author Kylie Lee Baker takes this premise and transforms it into one of the most haunting, dark, and emotionally charged novels of 2025!
The Story
Cora Zeng works as a cleaner, specializing in scrubbing away the aftermath of brutal murders and suicides in Chinatown. But none of it feels truly terrifying—not after witnessing the worst thing imaginable: the death of her sister, Delilah, pushed in front of a train by a stranger.
Before fleeing the scene, the killer shouted only two chilling words: “bat eater.”
The bloody messes don’t disturb Cora as much as the germs on subway railings, the strangers’ hands brushing against hers, the viruses lurking everywhere, or the bite marks on her kitchen table. Ever since Delilah’s death, Cora has been struggling to tell what’s real from what exists only inside her mind.
She suppresses her emotions and ignores her aunt’s advice to prepare for the Festival of Hungry Ghosts, when the gates of hell are said to open. But she can’t ignore the unease in her stomach every time she finds bat carcasses at a crime scene—or the chilling fact that all the recent victims have been women of East Asian descent.
And most of all, as Cora will soon learn, some ghosts simply cannot be ignored.
Review: Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng
When Fear Reveals More Than We’d Like to Know About Ourselves
What many moviegoers—or “casual” horror readers—often fail to understand is that horror was never created just to bombard you with jump scares or make you laugh nervously while you snack on popcorn with your friends. Believe it or not, that was never its true purpose.
Jordan Peele and his impeccable social horrors didn’t invent anything new. Since its earliest days, macabre storytelling has always been a magnifying lens, capable of enlarging everything grotesque, monstrous, or simply unpleasant that hides in the shadows of our collective and individual psyches—dragging it into the light and forcing us to look at it in all its unsettling splendor.
It’s not about “political correctness,” “diversity quotas,” or any of those tiresome labels that certain right-wing voices use to discredit the work of writers from marginalized backgrounds. It’s about giving a voice back to those who have to fight with everything they have not to be silenced. And for us, the readers on the receiving end of that communication, it’s about learning to listen. To listen and to understand that our version of the world is not—and will never be—the only one that exists.
Chills and Adrenaline
That said, Kylie Lee Baker is not one of those authors so consumed by her message that she sacrifices the thrill of storytelling.
On the contrary: in Bat Eater, she draws generously from modern horror classics like The Ring and The Grudge, evoking the rich folkloric imagery of Asian ghost stories to deliver a cascade of breathtaking moments that will remind you exactly how and why you used to be afraid of the dark as a child.
At the same time, she crafts a complex narrative and a cast of tragic yet hilarious characters, allowing her to explore the painful contradictions of a society that’s becoming ever more extreme, inhuman, and paranoid: our own.
To All of Us Who Survived the End of the World…
Funny thing is, I almost gave up on Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng. I had read one of Baker’s earlier YA novels—The Keeper of Night—and found it far too morbid and convoluted for my taste. That would have been a colossal mistake! When she writes for adults, Baker proves herself to be a remarkable storyteller: magnetic, elegant, and imbued with that kind of cathartic melancholy that lingers long after you’ve turned the last page.
Her protagonist is one of the most genuine and touching characters I’ve encountered in years. Baker portrays obsessive-compulsive disorder with disarming accuracy—and I say that as someone who knows exactly what that means.
Those intrusive thoughts that worm their way into your head, the constant effort to distinguish what’s real from what’s only a reflection of your fractured psyche… it’s all rendered with rare sensitivity: without pity, but full of empathy and honesty. It’s a depiction that doesn’t try to “explain” OCD, but rather to make you feel it. Once again, Baker invites you to experience reality (of the pandemic, sure, but not only that) through a new pair of lenses.
In Conclusion
All of this comes together in the perfect atmosphere of a ghost story-slash-creepypasta: a phantasmagoria of shadows moving along the edges of reality, guilt taking the shape of hungry spirits, and a gray urban landscape that magnifies the disconnection and loss of empathy among its inhabitants.
And then, of course, there’s the ending. A gut punch, yes… but also a brilliant meditation on what comes after.
What do you do when the world has ended, but you’re still here?
What do you do when the last mask has blown away and everything has changed… except your own life, still a miserable tangle of injustice, prejudice, and grief?
Do you surrender, endure… or fight back?
To find out what Cora chooses, you’ll just have to grab your copy of Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng! ;D
What to Read Next If You Loved Bat Eater by Kylie Lee Baker
- She Is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran
- Black Water Sister by Zen Cho
- The Eyes Are the Best Part by Monika Kim
- Nothing But Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw
