Is The Willows a Science Fiction story?
Once I read that The Willows by Algernon Blackwood scared cosmic horror writer, H. P. Lovecraft, I knew I had to try it out. The story follows two men canoeing on the Danube River aiming to reach the Black Sea. They reach an area between present-day Bratislava and Budapest devoid of human civilization and decide to stop to camp on a sand bar while the river swells because of flooding. There, they have a creepy experience with something not of our world, something hiding in the willow trees. Is it something supernatural or something that can be explained by science? It is more horrifying if it has a scientific explanation. There is a mystical explanation for the creatures. Blackwood was into the occult and theosophy and believed in other realms. He believed that sometimes the line between our realm and the realm of the beyond is thin and things can seep through. That is why we see ghosts, etc. However, if they are creatures from another dimension, a fourth dimensi...