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Thomas Ligotti’s My Work is Not Yet Done examines the back-stabbing, sinister office politics and paranoia-tinged mind-games found in a prototypical corporation known as New Product. Middle manager Frank Dominio feels neither welcomed nor valued by his employer because he’s kind of a dweeb; he’s also conniving and disturbed. Frank, however, has a new idea, his “Special Plan:” something so extraordinary that it will single-handedly transform him from corporate zero to badass hero. If only he had the nerve to introduce his Special Plan to the board – The Seven as he calls them: Barry, Harry, Perry, Mary, Kerrie, Sherry, and Richard, the head honcho, sometimes known as “The Doctor.” Once Frank finds the determination to present his Special Plan to the board, things turn from bad to worse in a series of extremely comical and paranoid anecdotes detailing how The Seven react to Frank.

Oh yeah, there’s also some eldritch magic, a demonic entity or two, and a series of gruesomely creative supernatural murders.

This short novella is broken up into two parts, and is told in first person voice from the POV of Frank. The first part focuses on Frank’s life at New Product, and how each of The Seven interact with him. Many have written about Ligotti’s razor-sharp sense of humor, and up until reading this story I never knew how sharp it was; the first part of this story is brimming with one hilarious moment after another, albeit it is quite dark and mean spirited. Whether Frank is describing the oceanic volumes of coffee consumed during one of the weekly board meetings (simultaneously pondering the lack of bathroom breaks taken by the coffee-drinkers), or being accused of stealing his co-worker’s roll of stamps, each vignette serves two purposes: to illustrate the absurdity of day-to-day office life, and to examine Frank’s paranoia. One by one, Frank lists each member of The Seven and relays a story about how much they despise him, or want to see him fail. As he sees it, it’s seven-against-one; he’s a helpless cornered animal.

However, like they say, just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you, and as the second part of the novella shows, Frank may have something legitimate to worry about. But so, too, do The Seven.

Those of you who know Ligotti’s work already know that it is not the most pleasant and comforting; it can be, and often is, disturbing and unsettling. I really wasn’t sure what to expect while reading through the first part of this novella. It was so different than what I was used to from Ligotti. I was reminded more of Office Space than anything else. Where is the horror? Should I really be laughing this much? To which the answers were, respectively: “right around the corner,” and “hell yeah.”

In addition to creating dark and oppressing atmosphere, as well as utilizing humor to great effect, Ligotti also excels at crafting unique and individual voices for his characters. Frank Dominio is written in an absolutely believable manner. He is simultaneously pathetic and small, calculating and self-centered. He’s the kind of guy who is all but totally invisible until he makes his final move, at which point it is too late to do anything but beg for the swine’s (one of Frank’s favorite words) forgiveness. I understood Frank’s dilemma, but I didn’t really like him. He’s the worst kind of social outcast: one that fails to gather any amount of sympathy.

Ligotti is also a master wordsmith. The first-person POV, while appealing and insightful, can also be restricting; it can lead authors into logical problems – especially in supernatural narratives. But here Ligotti handles it with great skill. The POV works because we need to be in Frank’s head; we need to see the world through his eyes; we need to experience his paranoia. However, at a certain point in the story it becomes necessary to move away from Frank’s limited POV. The narrative opens up and calls for an omniscient narrator. Rather than introduce another character to convey the story through, or change POV, Ligotti pulls a golden-rabbit out of his hat and unleashes an ingenious, supernatural solution to the problem. During the second part of the novella I was consistently amazed by Ligotti’s cleverness.

My Work is Not Yet Done offers a unique vision of horror, one that I cannot imagine coming from anyone else but Ligotti. It is, without doubt, a masterwork of weird fiction. Often referred to as the third pillar of American horror (the first two being Poe and Lovecraft), Ligotti has a lot to live up to; he hasn’t disappointed me yet. And if evidence is ever needed to prove his skills, I would not hesitate to point the skeptic towards this work of corporate-horror. It is dark and sinister, working in an uneasy atmosphere rich with gruesome details, and simultaneously comical in its depiction of the all too familiar milieu of corporate office-life.