Review: Lacks Spirit
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 06 5, 2011
After a long introduction about the downfall of the horror novel, how few horror stories they are left, and how this book had "real, haunting horror", I was preparing myself for a collection of really stellar, frightening short stories, and instead I got... well, while none of them are what I would call poorly written, they also aren't what I would call particularly memorable or scary in the slightest. Nearly every story herein is some sort of ghost story, but it's less "The Grudge" and more "here are some ghosts, they have some unfinished business, but they're trapped, sorta, and that's sad I guess?" It should be said, naturally, that horror is entirely subjective, and what one person finds scary another will find boring, but all of the stories within Ashes don't actually seem to be trying to be scary, unless all of the writers have some sort of different definition of the word than I do.The problem with most of them is that they seem to lack any real point... there is rarely any sort of resolution, usually only a sort of token conflict, and most of them just kind of peter out with an "oh well" sort of vibe. One story, revolving around a pregnant woman abandoned on a farm, actually felt pointless, confusing, and downright silly to the point where I actually went back over it to see if I was missing something, or if a few pages had stuck together. Ashes makes for an entertaining read if you're looking to pass the time and relax for a few minutes, but there isn't much substance here, ghostly or otherwise.