One of the stranger parts of the human condition may be our deep fascination, and at times troubling exploration, of the darker aspects of our nature. Our hunger for this subject has created a seemingly never-ending stream of television shows, movies, books, and other forms of media that dive into the heart of some of our most deplorable actions.

But when it comes to literature, no other author explores the ugly, and at times, blazingly unapologetic underbelly of these impulses quite like Joyce Carol Oates in “The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror.” This is a collection of six frightening — and deeply disturbing — short stories that defy what even the most hardened booklover might expect from tales of horror and crime. Stories that, for better or for worse, stay with the reader long after they’ve turned the final twisted page.

The typical author who specializes in mystery and suspense will choose to have an investigator or anonymous third person narrate the story with a sense of detail and calculation — not so with “The Doll Master.” Ms. Oates has taken the path less traveled, by having the majority of the short stories told by the perpetrator themselves. By utilizing the first person, Ms. Oates quietly pushes the readers to empathize with these characters, no matter how unsympathetic they can appear at first glance, leading to some potentially unsettling realizations.

However, that’s not to say that the narrators who are also the killers are automatically — and wholly — terrible people. There are no clichéd evil doctors or slasher characters that only come out under the cover of night in “The Doll-Master.” Instead, Ms. Oates imbues each victim and perpetrator with an uncomfortable familiarity — it could be easy to imagine that we could walk by many of these characters on our way to pick up some groceries. That tangibility and realness is where the true terror in these stories can be found. And many horror fans, no matter how devout, may find it to be not exactly to their taste.

Perhaps the most striking tale in this collection is narrated from the perspective of a white man who has apparently shot a black teenager in what he claims is self-defense. Though the premise of the story as a backdrop for horror may seem queasily obvious, it’s the details, such as the sycophantic letters of support and the money he receives in droves — despite the ambiguous and horrendous nature of the crime — that make your hair stand on end.

The type of chills that Ms. Oates conjures throughout “The Doll-Master” are quite different than those we get upon hearing a ghost story told around a campfire, or even reading about a serial killer in a time gone by. The horror she creates comes from a particular subset of the genre that Ms. Oates is a master of — a terror that’s tangible, that’s entrenched in the reality of our day to day lives.

For those who are looking to read a slightly more conventional, yet still fiendish tale, the titular story, “The Doll-Master,” is the closest Ms. Oates gets. But like all of her stories, the author imbues it with deep psychological pangs, and a scattered, almost uncomfortable prose that proves she is at her best when pushing the genre’s boundaries.

Readers who hunger for clean-cut stories with definitive endings, for solid lines between victim and perpetrator, good and bad, will not find what they’re looking for in “The Doll-Master.” Instead, this particular collection of short stories gives those of us who are fascinated with the more sinister aspects of human behavior the type of release we perhaps, begrudgingly, crave.

Mia Bencivenga is a freelance writer and editor based in Pittsburgh (miabencivenga14@gmail.com).

First Published: July 10, 2016, 4:00 a.m.