Short Story Review – The Hide’s Effect by Frances Ogamba

Frances Ogamba gives us a classic “be careful what you wish for story.” It’s a bit formulaic, but with an interesting new element. The object that serves as a conduit for the wishing is human skin sold by a street vendor. Everything about this situation is “hella sus” as I assume the kids say. The human hides look real. There are stories circulating around town of missing people. On the other hand, there are stories circulating around town of average people coming into sudden wealth.

The temptation proves too much for the main character, who among other issues, seems to have a micro penis. He would really like to not have a micro penis. But when he gets the the hide, he becomes greedy and begins wishing for every minor inconvenience to go away. Needless to say, the already suspicious use of suspiciously acquired human remains is compounded by the equally suspicious results. He gets everything he wishes for. Our main character goes deep into denial with regard to any potential consequences and doubles down on the greed with horrifying results.

I won’t go any farther in the summary. It’s a quick read and you can check it out for free over at The Dark Magazine website, which I recommend you do.

Final Verdict

It’s a well written story, but there’s no surprises here. It’s pretty obvious from the first few paragraphs exactly what is going to happen. Similar to Double Dare, though I think a good horror concept deserves to be told and retold. I love a good urban legend, and this is how we make them.

7 arbitrary stars out of 10 arbitrary stars.