Malcolm9989818’s Reviews > Novus Monstrum > Status Update

First Day jitters at Slappy's - teen from abusive family, on the first day of his theme park maintenance job, runs into creepy mascots who obviously are not costumed humans, but remains gullible enough to accept the offer of a mascot job, which leads to a gory sequence where magical cotton transforms him into a mascot, predictably. Body horror, not monster horror. I hate "humans are the real monsters".

Lizard War by Joe R. Lansdale - astronauts crashed on a planet where they're swarmed at night by giant carnivorous lizards that are translucent, easy to kill, but overwhelming in number. So really they're just big animals, not monsters. And the plot is a sci-fi action adventure thriller about the astronauts fighting / escaping them. Didn't finish it, stopped caring.

Brother Bone - Donna J.W.Munro. Hillbillies in the Ozarks who've made a deal with the eponymous monster, making (sometimes human) sacrifices to it. It eats the bone, and they eat the flesh for immortality.
Wonce Was a Woman - short enough to finish, but hated it. "Monster" wasn't the antagonist. Was just a metaphor for patriarchal oppression, and was there for overshadowed by human versus human conflict.