The nitty-gritty: A fun and fast start to a series with spaceships, dragons and plenty of action. I do love when publishers decide to re-release older books in order to make them available to a new audience, and when I heard about Dragon and Thief, a book originally published in 2003, I thought I’d give […]
Translated by Deborah Boliver Boehm The nitty-gritty: An atmospheric and creepy ghost story that kept me turning the pages, but ultimately suffered from awkward writing and plotting. I thought it would be nice to close out the month with a ghost story, especially since today is Halloween! I was initially drawn to The Graveyard Apartment […]
The nitty-gritty: Weird and atmospheric, this short novella will mesmerize some readers, but may be just too strange for others. Her mouth split in a smile, the first expression he’d seen of her other than intent study. She stopped pacing, hands resting on her hips. There was no moon, but Jackson would have sworn (and […]
The nitty-gritty: Potential not quite realized, but a fantastic premise full of hilarious dialogue and some hard-hitting emotional moments near the end. And once again a cool cover and a really good idea grab my attention and I immediately hit that “request” button! Down with the Shine does have a great concept: a girl is […]
The nitty-gritty: A short but powerful twist on the Lovecraftian tale, a story that didn’t quite work for me, but overall an interesting, clever and atmospheric tale. Mystery lingered in the air like the scent of a scorched book. It wasn’t until I had finished reading The Ballad of Black Tom that I found out […]
The nitty-gritty: More literary ramble than horror, Mamatas’ bleak look at a changed world is beautifully written with sharp spikes of sudden violence. I signed up for drilling because I couldn’t get down to Mexico. I needed to experience life, to find something to write about. I needed pocket money. My credit score was immaterial, my […]
The nitty-gritty: A very short but powerful story about a girl leaving home for the first time, with a strong theme of dealing with prejudice, but a little too short, in my opinion, to fully develop that theme. This is the second work of fiction that I’ve read by Nnedi Okorafor, and I have to […]
The nitty-gritty: An Alice in Wonderland re-telling that didn’t quite hit the mark, but a wonderful look at the effect of Victorian society on a handful of memorable characters. So Mama waggled her fingers in the air, Go, go, and settled her crown of hair, the color of browning roses, upon the bolster of the […]
The nitty-gritty: A great start to an exciting new venture in storytelling, all wrapped up in a compact urban fantasy package. She’d met people on this very train who told her with overwhelming conviction that they were the product of genetic experimentation by the United States government using alien DNA, and they’d built a prototype […]
The nitty-gritty: An atmospheric and stylish tale of family secrets written in blood, with elements of horror that weren’t quite scary enough for me. “Which way?” he asked as we stood in the center of the barren patch of earth. As if answering his question, the breeze whipped through the field, revealing a path and […]