History Literature / HumanResources2018

* AnAesop: "Sweet Tooth" and "Vestibulum Horridus" are both SciFiHorror allegories about the objectification of women. ''Les Amoureux'' is arguably also an aesop about expecting relationships to solve all of your problems.

* CyberneticsEatYourSoul: Dero, the antagonist of the eponymous story.

* FantasticCasteSystem: In "Vestibulum Horridus", the queen of an extradimensional species can breed anything she chooses to, provided she absorbs the right genes from native fauna. She breeds various offspring into existence, all female, whom each have a caste in the OneWorldOrder. Meanwhile, in "Human Resources", Dero does the same thing to the whole world; leaving one last unaltered human whom he torments for fun.

* WorldOfWeirdness: As in all of Kent Starrett's works.

''Human Resources'' is an anthology of horror stories by [[Creator/KentJStarrett Kent J. Starrett]], released on October 30th, 2018. It is a collection of [[SurrealHorror Surreal]] and BodyHorror Science Fiction and fantasy, most based around the general theme of [[BioAugmentation what it means to be human.]] One of the stories, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfb1rtUJ7Lg 'Immunity,' has been adapted for narration on youtube.]]

* AmbiguousTimePeriod: Unless set in the far future, most of the stories don't specify when they occur. The car owned by the Gray Family in ''The Backwater Roads'' doesn't have air conditioning, Tricia in ''The Secret Game'' has a bunny-ears television set, and Anton in ''Les Amoureux'' doesn't own a television and relies on public transport in the suburbs. Only ''The Order of Creeping Things,'' are set in a specific era, one told through dated journal entries in the year 1997, and ''School Day'' taking place TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture.
* AnAesop: ''Sweet Tooth'' and ''Vestibulum Horridus'' are both SciFiHorror allegories about the objectification of women. ''Les Amoureux'' is arguably also an aesop about expecting relationships to solve all of your problems.
* ArchEnemy: Dero, the omnipotent genetic engineer, and Nameless, the last pure Homo Sapiens in existence.
* AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: [[spoiler: Tricia, in ''The Secret Game.'' Subverted in that the higher plane [[CruelTwistEnding divorces one from their human emotions and minds]] until they are incomprehensible {{Eldritch Abomination}}s.]]
* AuthorTract: ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' ''Sweet Tooth,'' and, arguably, ''Les Amoureux.''
* BalefulPolymorph: ''The Secret Game'' is themed entirely around this, as well as ''Human Resources.'' ''Vestibulum Horridus'' and ''Children of Light and Darkness'' touch upon it as well.
* BeeAfraid: Bees are hateful antagonists in both ''The Order Of Creeping Things'' and ''Sweet Tooth.''
* BioAugmentation: In ''Human Resources'' a deformed geneticist hunts down the last unaltered human with his [[UncannyValley surgically and biologically altered human monsters.]] [[DarkIsNotEvil Alternately]], two posthumans in the titular tale are sympathetic to the human protagonist, and help him to escape Dero's hunt [[spoiler: temporarily.]]
* BlackComedy: The only kind, and most prevalent in ''School Day,'' ''The Backwater Roads'' and ''The Secret Game.''
* BodyHorror: Present in virtually every story save ''School Day.''
* {{Bookends}}: ''The Backwater Roads'' features this most prominently, but ''Immunity,'' ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' and ''Sweet Tooth'' use it as well.
* ButterflyOfDoom: [[spoiler: Nameless, the last human in the world, maimed Dero, the ruler of the world, in a past life. The inherited trauma has driven Dero to destroy the world and genetically alter the human race into something unrecognizable to prevent the same thing from happening.]]
* CardboardPrison: The dream-devils in ''The Secret Game'' are rendered almost comically impotent in waking life. [[NightmareFuel If only sleep wasn't necessary.]]
* CrappyHolidays: ''The Secret Game'' takes place in December, and is [[TheGrinch Kent Starrett's attempt at a Christmas story.]]
* CreepyChild: All of them. Addressed in ''The Backwater Roads,'' in that the protagonist - Charlie Gray - is socially isolated for being a creepy child.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: All of them. But especially in ''Children of Light and Darkness.''
* CyberneticsEatYourSoul: Dero, the antagonist of the eponymous story.
* DeadlyRoadTrip: ''The Backwater Roads.'' ''Immunity'' features one, though not as severely.
* DreamingOfAWhiteChristmas: The predators "[[PurpleProse that suspend the curtains of reality]]" can be seen in thick snowstorms, forming out of the whiteout.
* DownerEnding: Arguably all of the stories, to some degree or another. Some of them, like ''Immunity'' or ''The Backwater Roads'' might be considered to have a BittersweetEnding, but only FromACertainPointOfView.
* DidWeJustHaveTeaWithCthulhu: Styrax and Spyrax are [[HappilyMarried a married couple]] of gargantuan, asymmetrical post-humans in the title story, who treat the protagonist [[CloudCuckooLander in a friendly if eccentric manner throughout the story.]]
* DissonantSerenity: The contrast of [[CrappyHolidays the cold, sterile holiday season]] and the surreal MindScrew horror of ''The Secret Game.''
* EyeScream: Prevalent, but most colorfully used in ''Les Amoureux.''
* FantasticCasteSystem: In ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' the queen of an extradimensional species can breed anything she chooses to, provided she absorbs the right genes from native fauna. She breeds various offspring into existence, all female, whom each have a caste in the OneWorldOrder. Meanwhile, in ''Human Resources,'' Dero does the same thing to the whole world; leaving one last unaltered human whom he torments for fun.
* FantasticRacism: The marauding alien race in ''Vestibulum Horridus'' can't see human men as sentient, and set about lobotomizing, disfiguring and vivisecting them.
* GodIsEvil: In [[spoiler: ''The Secret Game'' and ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' anyway.]] In ''The Order of Creeping Things,'' the protagonist has this viewpoint because only a malicious and insane deity would fill the world with so many insects and arthropods.
* GratuitousFrench: ''Les Amoureux'' makes use of this, through its [[MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold reclusive, overtly romantic protagonist.]]
* GrayAndGreyMorality: There's never a clear idea of who's in the wrong or right in any of the stories, save perhaps in ''Sweet Tooth.'' ''Vestibulum Horridus'' makes especially good use of this trope.
* TheGrinch: Christmas gets a rather, well, honest evaluation in ''The Secret Game,'' which is set during Christmastime. The opening line even indicates that "Christmastime is an odd time for the Secret Game," which, instead of emphasizing the societally mandated task of human goodwill, emphasizes [[DownerEnding human insignificance in the vast and unfeeling universe we inhabit.]]
* IAmAHumanitarian: ''Sweet Tooth,'' which is about a woman who attracts all of her city's vermin [[spoiler: human and otherwise]] with a rare genetic mutation that results in addictive pheromones, which by extension results in everything trying to kill and eat her. [[spoiler: This eventually includes her friends, family, and herself.]]
* ManicPixieDreamGirl: Viciously deconstructed in ''Les Amoureux.''
* MedicalHorror: ''Children of Light and Darkness.''
* MercyKill: [[spoiler: the last Homo Sapiens in the world decides to kill himself to stop Dero, the genetic engineer who has destroyed the world with his surgically altered posthumans, from continuing to breed monsters and ravage the world endlessly in the title story. In ''Sweet Tooth,'' Marissa commits suicide through autocannibalism.]]
* MindRape: The predatory beings in both ''The Secret Game'' and ''Vestibulum Horridus'' do this.
* NeverendingTerror: [[spoiler: Tricia's fate in ''The Secret Game.'']]
* NightmareFuel: ''The Secret Game'' takes this phrase literally. Also:
** In ''Human Resources'', the level of pure, unfiltered hate that Dero feels for Nameless; taken to the level that Dero has literally destroyed the whole world just to torture him. The level of depth to which Dero's all-reaching sociopathy has reached is uncomfortable both in how vast it is, and how realistically it's portrayed. Dero's horribly scarred body and the uncompromising misery Nameless experiences are truly harrowing.
** All of the creatures in ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' but especially the she-thing whose bottom half resembles a ballroom dress full of holes, [[BodyHorror all which are independent mouths.]] Trypophobia, anyone?
** The descriptions of infected stitches, poorly pulled-off surgeries and people suffering from them lend ''Children of Light and Darkness'' an air of realism that lingers long after the book's been closed. [[AndIMustScream The idea of being trapped with said disfigured children forever is equally unnerving.]]
** The idea of decaying to the point of immortality, as portrayed in ''Immunity.''
** While Literature/LordOfTheFlies and other works explore the idea of a TeenageWasteland well, the descriptions of pregnant teenagers dying in childbirth and killing each other in vigilante fury in ''School Day'' are fairly upsetting in their realism; by contrast to, say, Film/ChildrenOfTheCorn and other wish-fulfillment fantasies of a world without parents.
** Anyone who loves the holiday season will probably feel more than a little depressed by the sheer nihilism of ''The Secret Game.''
** Anyone who fears insects or arachnids had better avoid ''The Order Of Creeping Things.''
** ''Les Amoureux'' is both heartbreaking tragedy about losing your love for somebody and an EyeScream nightmare fit to kill the faint-hearted in one sentence. That one of the lover's deaths can be considered analogous to a loved one dying of some terminal illness is even more devastating.
** ''The Backwater Roads'' is a pretty vicious [[SatireParodyPastiche satire]] on nostalgia, the loss of childhood innocence and how abuse can destroy a person's life.
* NothingIsScarier: Used in ''Immunity,'' ''The Secret Game,'' and ''The Order Of Creeping Things.''
* OmnicidalManiac: Dero in ''Human Resources.''
* OurMonstersAreWeird: ''The Secret Game'' revolves around a girl forced to fight surreal dream-demons by warping her physical body in her own nightmares to combat them. At one point, one of the predators hunts through the girl's childhood home.....[[TransformationHorror only to realize the house itself is the girl, which then begins growing hands from its walls and teeth in its doors and windows.]] Similarly, ''Human Resources'' and ''Vestibulum Horridus'' both revolve around antagonists with the ability to breed nightmarish morphologies into their offspring at will, and the [[SurrealHorror endless parade of living nightmares they spawn as a result of this.]]
* ParanoiaFuel: In ''The Order Of Creeping Things'' the main character becomes convinced that the insect kingdom is out to get him. In ''The Secret Game,'' the main character becomes convinced that ''reality itself is out to get her.'' ''Sweet Tooth'' features a woman openly assaulted by every man in the world for the purposes of cannibalism, which is, believe it or not, less frightening than the other two stories in that the threat is objectively real.
* PreserveYourGays: There are three protagonists in ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' two of whom are lesbians in a happy, healthy engagement.

* {{UsefulNotes/Seattle}}: Setting of ''Sweet Tooth.''
* TheSpook: Karen in ''Children of Light and Darkness,'' as well as [[spoiler: Tricia's fate in ''The Secret Game.'']]
* TeenageWasteland: ''School Day'' and, to a lesser degree, ''The Secret Game.''
* {{Terraform}}: What Mother Superior does to England in ''Vestibulum Horridus.''
* TransformationHorror: ''Children Of Light And Darkness,'' in a way that mirrors [[RealLifeWritesThePlot real world atrocities, particularly lobotomy, Unit 731 and the Albert Bandura Experiments]]. In a more speculative way, all of the stories except ''School Day'' feature this.
* UnreliableNarrator: ''The Order Of Creeping Things'' is the diary of a man who believes the world's insects are conspiring against him. ''The Secret Game'' is about a girl who thinks godlike entities are hunting her in her dreams. It's left up to the reader if either of them are telling the truth, or simply insane.
* WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds: Dero, as well as Karen from ''Children of Light and Darkness.''

** ''Les Amoureux'' is both heartbreaking tragedy about losing your love for somebody and an EyeScream nightmare fit to kill the faint-hearted in one sentence. That one of the lover's deaths can be considered analogous to [[AdultFear a loved one dying of some terminal illness]] is even more devastating.

* AdultFear: ''School Day,'' about the revolution of armed children against their teachers and parents. Also ''Children of Light and Darkness,'' which revolves around [[CrossesTheLineTwice inhumane surgical experiments on kidnapped children.]]

* GratuitousFrench: ''Les Amoureux'' makes use of this, through its [[TheLoner reclusive,]] [[BookWorm overtly romantic protagonist.]]

''Human Resources'' is an anthology of horror stories by [[Creator/KentJStarrett Kent J. Starrett]], released on October 30th, 2018. It is a collection of [[SurrealHorror Surreal]] and BodyHorror Science Fiction and fantasy, most based around the general theme of [[BioAugmentation what it means to be human.]] One of the stories, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfb1rtUJ7Lg 'Immunity,' has been adapted for audio.]]

''Human Resources'' is an anthology of horror stories by [[Creator/KentJStarrett Kent J. Starrett]], released on October 30th, 2018. It is a collection of [[SurrealHorror Surreal]] and BodyHorror Science Fiction and fantasy, most based around the general theme of [[BioAugmentation what it means to be human.]] One of the stories, 'Immunity,' has been adapted for audio. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfb1rtUJ7Lg]]

''Human Resources'' is an anthology of horror stories by [[Creator/KentJStarrett Kent J. Starrett]], released on October 30th, 2018. It is a collection of [[SurrealHorror Surreal]] and BodyHorror Science Fiction and fantasy, most based around the general theme of [[BioAugmentation what it means to be human.]]

* FantasticCasteSystem: In ''Vestibulum Horridus,'' the queen of an extradimensional species can breed anything she chooses to, provided she absorbs the right genes from native fauna. She breeds various offspring into existence, all female, whom each have a caste in the NewWorldOrder. Meanwhile, in ''Human Resources,'' Dero does the same thing to the whole world; leaving one last unaltered human whom he torments for fun.

* AmbiguousTimePeriod: Unless set in the far future, most of the stories don't specify when they occur. The car owned by the Gray Family in ''The Backwater Roads'' doesn't have air conditioning, Tricia in ''The Secret Game'' has a bunny-ears television set, and Anton in ''Les Amoureux'' doesn't own a television and relies on public transport in the suburbs. Only ''The Order of Creeping Things,'' told through dated journal entries in the year 1997, and ''School Day'' takes place TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture.

* SchrodingersButterly: Some of the stories leave it up to the reader to decide if the protagonists are really being hunted by [[MindScrew reality-warping monsters]], an insect conspiracy, or a conclave of masochistic immortals, or if the protagonists are simply suffering from some form of mental illness or delusions.

* WorldOfChaos: Most of the stories take place in one.

* WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds: Dero, as well as Karen from ''Children of Light and Darkness.''