Review: Intriguing tale...but a few concerns 3 1/2 Stars
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 02 3, 2012
"Blood Spatter -- A Short Story" is a short horror by author Guy James. This is a Kindle e-book that was a 61 Kb download (approx 10 pages) and was free at the time of writing this review.SPOILERS throughout...General theme...Logan Jennings is a serial killer who uses his incredible gory crime scenes as a photo-op for his fairly success business of providing Cover Art for some about to be published horror books. However, it appears that most of the 'inspiration' for the creativity is not really his own, rather the skill in taking these unusually 'stunning' pictures comes from an old demon's mask he had in college...a mask tainted with some evil magic.A few thoughts...some pros and cons1.) an unusual plot that was original and had definitive possibilities for an intriguing horror tale.2.) some use of repetitive words ('crispy' comes to mind) and some dialogue seems contrived and forced.  The conversation between with his daughter and wife reminded me of a talk between friends rather than family.3.) the time sequencing used within the story seemed odd...within a space of nine minutes, Logan has called Detective Labrusca, then goes and hacks up his victim, and finally the detective arrives at the scene of the crime...all in 9 Minutes!!!3.) I could not quite figure out what really happened to Detective Labrusca.4.) the last paragraph...a comment from the Demon's mask. Was this the end or just the beginning of a new series of killings?5.) Cover Art...bland and unappealing. Given the nature of the subject matter, one would have expected something a little more imaginative.Impression:I read this tale a couple of times (a few sections several times) and I still came away not really comprehending what was actually happening...yes the murders were quite obvious of course, but some of the details surrounding these horrific events left me puzzled (some mentioned above). I'm not sure, but I assumed Logan knew what he was doing under the influence of the mask...but let's say he didn't, would he not wonder where the grisly pictures that appeared on his camera came from?Conclusion:I liked this story and its basic premise.That being said, I think James' biggest shortcoming is in his character dialogue and the lack of tying up loose ends so that the reader can get some sense of conclusion at the end of the tale...something I was unable to find with this short work.As it is...3 1/2 Stars (but had potential for more)Ray Nicholson