Review: Scary Tales for Discriminating Readers
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 10 26, 2013
I love short stories, and these did not disappoint. Although not particularly scary, they were all weird, strange, and thoroughly delightful in the slanted perspective they provided. Most were quite short and covered territory from ancient Greece (the fall of Troy from Cassandra’s perspective), in Prophetess, to the present day. Some, like Each Stone, A Life, could be classified as fantasy, while others, The Bridge Chamber, Seagulls, and Normal, Considering the Weather, border on horror. None is so horrific as to be off-putting, though, for which I was grateful, since I dislike gore.Many of the stories are set in the UK and I enjoyed the tidbits of British society that I picked up from this collection. The author is versatile in both her subject matter and her style. She has a great ability to bring alive many types of characters and situations. My favorite stories in the collection were Black Karma, about a ferocious dog working off its karma and the last story in the collection, Burning, which captured a child’s empathy for the victims of tragedy in the face of the racist indifference of adults.This collection is recommended for anyone who enjoys intelligent dark fantasy.