For this particular review I am going to be say something that I liked and did not like about each short story in one blurb, just to keep things simple and not too crazy. As usual, I hope you enjoy!
When you crack open this book you are greeted to an introduction by R.L. Stine and it was a short and simple one. It actually got me pumped to read these short stories. From there on, in reading order, there is Welcome to the Club by R.L. Stine, She's Different Tonight by Heather Graham, Suckers by Suzanne Weyn, The Perfects by Jennifer Allison, Shadow Children by Heather Brewer, The Poison Ring by Peg Kehret, Dragonfly Eyes by Alane Ferguson, Jeepers Peepers by Ryan Brown, Piney Power by F. Paul Wilson, The Night Hunter by Meg Cabot, Tuition by Walter Sorrells, Tagger by James Rollins, and lastly Ray Gun by Tim Maleeny.
Welcome to the Club was a really great opening short story. It was like welcoming you to the coming short stories of horror and suspense. I don't have a con to talk about because the short was well put together and really had me speeding through to get to the end from the first page.
She's Different Tonight had me wondering at first. Was the plot really going to be that straight forward to the very end? Thankfully no and just the hint of supernatural beings was enough to make me wish it were just a little bit longer. Yet again I don't have anything negative to speak about this short.
Suckers was my favorite story by far. I never thought it would end the way it did, and it was a twist I love greatly. I was hooked from the first page and I didn't want it to end. It was the future based but not so future base that made me love it from the beginning. Different perspectives are really wicked once you know certain details from who's perspective it is coming from.
The Perfects reminded me of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, in a way except the whole town was in on the murdering. If Entrails Michigan were a real place I will be far away from it. This short also happens to take place on Halloween like She's Different Tonight. I wasn't too taken with this short but I didn't not like it.
Shadow Children was the one that I was most looking forward to in this compilation but I wasn't too happy with it. It was a great plot, had great characters, had a great everything, but I just couldn't really get into it. It was also very short and I know "short stories" but this is 16 pages long. I feel as though if it were just a little longer I would have enjoyed it more.
The Poison Ring didn't go how I thought it would go. I thought it would end up like Skeleton Key where the old lady takes over the body of the younger girl, but nope. I'm glad it didn't, but I am glad that this was more of a suspense story, it fitted it nicely.
Dragonfly Eyes was another story that I thought would take a whole different path then what it did take. I was hooked from the beginning with just the first sentence. It is another perspective-type story but this time it's because of a traumatic experience that the perspective changes. This is another short that would be really amazing leading into a bigger series or another book. This was the shortest story in the book with being only 8 pages long. I wanted so much more but at the same time I was content with what was given.
Jeepers Peepers I expected to have murder in it especially with the way it started. It ended up being really sweet, and I loved how it ended. I loved the little boy and I loved how special people need someone to ground them when things start to go wrong. It just goes to show that your imagination can get the better of you if you let it.
Piney Power was a short that I basically knew what was going on and what was going to happen within the first few pages. I would have been more upset if it were a full book, but since it was a short it was tolerable. I do have to say that the characters made the short completely worth the read, for me.
The Night Hunter ended up being a whole bunch of sweetness. I loved the ending and who ended up being who. I would say that this one was another that if the characters where different I probably wouldn't have liked the short as much as I do.
Tuition, I'm not too sure how I feel about this short. I liked the end a lot and the plot that was going for it, but I didn't like much more than that. Again, I know. The characters and the plot are what count (for some), but I also look forward to how it is all put together.
Tagger reminded me of a mixture of Anna Dressed in Blood and The Black Tattoo. Bittersweet till the end, I don't know what to say about this short either. It was a little plain to me, and very easy to read. Overall I was able to just skim through it and know what was going on. I don't exactly not like this short, I am just not crazy about it either.
Ray Gun, as the final short, I have to say that I liked it very much and wish it were a full length book. The back story to it and it's 'anything can happen'-ness is what made me get sucked in, and the beginning as well.
I had pretty mixed emotions about the whole compilation, but I would read these shorts again. I do recommend this book to others who like a little bit of horror and suspense in their reading. I wasn't completely unhappy with any of the shorts, which is great. I don't know if I would buy this book or just be content with having to borrowing it from the library when I want to read it. I also recommend that you check out some or all of these authors if something intrigues you about them. I do read from a handful of these authors.
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Page Count: 306 pages, including About the Authors (hardcover)
Price: $16.99
Next Book: OCD Love Story by Corey Ann Haydu
Thank you for reading!
~Jade
Showing posts with label 13 short stories. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 13 short stories. Show all posts
Monday, May 26, 2014
Friday, March 7, 2014
The Eternal Kiss-13 Vampire Tales of Blood and Desire
This is the second book of two, dealing with short stories. Much
like the last one I will only say what I liked and disliked about
each short story. Want to know why? Go read the first paragraph in my
review of Eternal (Six Short Stories). Warning this is going
to be a longer entry too because there are 13 short stories in it.
Okay here we go!
There was a one page introduction done by Trisha Telep. It wasn't overly long, or too short I think. It makes the reader think about "the eternal kiss" that one could receive from a vampire. The only thing with the introduction being a page long is that all anyone knows about the 13 short stories is that they are about vampires. I would have loved to have had a little overview of what the short stories were going to be about.
From the first book to the second there were a few authors that were the same for both books but wrote a different story. Those authors are: Lili St. Crow, Rachel Caine and Nancy Holder. Though Nancy Holder co-writes with Debbie Viguié.
In this collection of vampire short stories there are (in order that they are read in this book): Falling to Ash by Karen Mahoney, Shelter Island by Melissa de la Cruz, Sword Point by Maria V. Snyder, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black, Undead is Very Hot Right Now by Sarah Rees Brennan, Kat by Kelley Armstrong, The Thirteenth Step by Libba Bray, All Hallows by Rachel Caine, Wet Teeth by Cecil Castellucci, Other Boys by Cassandra Clare, Passing by Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguié, Ambition by Lili St. Crow, and lastly, All Wounds by Dina James.
Falling to Ash was a very nice read, though once it really got going it ended. Which I did not like because I wanted to read a little more, but now thinking back on what was read, it ended at a decent spot. More could have been written, but over all it was okay for the first short story.
Shelter Island I read this before in another book, though where I am not sure. It is an anthology for Dylan in her Blue Bloods series. It is not in his POV but a girls. I liked that the reader got to see a different side of Dylan that you really can't see in the other books. The ending was bittersweet because if anyone has read the rest of the series, they know what goes on. It wasn't very long also and I wanted it to be a little longer just to be able to hold onto Dylan as a character.
Sword Point was a break from the norm when it comes to vampires and I liked that. I would have loved for this to be longer, maybe novel length. I loved the two main characters Ava and Jarett. The ending was very good in my opinion, I just wanted more from Snyder before she ended it.
The Coldest Girl in Coldtown if I could only have one of these short stories be made into a full length novel it would be this one right here. When I started this short story I did not put down the book until I finished it. This is again, a different take on vampires. Instead of being changed within a few seconds to a few days after being bitten, the person has 88 days to either drink blood and become a vampire or literally sweat it out. The ending leaves you hanging and craving more. I loved this short story the most.
Undead is Very Hot Right Now, had me laughing a number of times. It was the comic relief needed after reading the last short story. Though it has a sad ending the reader can't help but hope that a happier ending would have came if this were longer, of course. The characters are all very different from each other and that is what makes some things so funny, and being able to picture it happening.
Kat, it was back to being serious in this short story. The reader gets to know a lot about the main character Kat, and why things are happening in the story. The reader is not just dropped in and left wandering and wondering what is going on. The ending is good, I can handle this one being a short story it fits almost perfectly.
The Thirteenth Step, get a little racy at one point in time but doesn't go into hardly any detail. Once again this is a different take on vampires and how they come to be, and again I could handle this being a short story. It was a little drawn out at times and that bugged me because something would happen and then calm for a while. The ending didn't really surprise me too much, the reader almost knows what is going to happen after a little bit.
All Hallows is a continuation almost of the last short story by Caine. The characters are the same, there is just a new adventure for them. This is something that would be great for a younger teen though profanity is said and a few lewd comments are made about a Halloween costume. Otherwise it is a pretty innocent read.
Wet Teeth is sad. At first the reader thinks that it is going to be another happy ending. Not really. I was saddened by the ending and almost was glad that the next short story came along. But not all stories have happy endings, and this is just proof of that.
Other Boys is another on the sad side story. But at the same time the ending made me say "you go girl this is your life and you have had secrets kept from you that shouldn't have and now you are going to make your own path." Though I kept confusing all of the characters till the end came. I had to reread a few spots just to really understand who said what, or who was thinking what. I didn't really like that but it wasn't the worst that I have read.
Passing is another short story that I could handle being a short story. It was almost perfect, and a full length novel would have been too wordy or just too much. A very imperfect alliance is made in the end and it works, kinks and all. I liked the ending it was a great way to end. The reader isn't really left hanging, they sort of know what could come next and I liked that.
Ambition almost had me wondering if it was the same characters from St. Crow's last short story. But they weren't, and it does almost take the same rout as the last one did. I wasn't too happy about that but St. Crow kept it interesting which helped out a lot in keeping me reading. And it was very sweet in parts almost too sweet but that line wasn't really crossed, just danced very close to.
All Wounds, I am not really sure what to say with this one other than it was not what I expected. It isn't a love story at all that I read, which was a good different. I looked up this particular short story on Fictiondb.com and they do not put "(ss)" next to the title meaning that it is a novel so I will have to check that out and see if my library has it.
All in all this was a good compilation of short vampire stories. Not all are from the POV of a vampire, some are from a human, a vampire hunter, an vampire that does not know they are a vampire, and more. Happy endings are not always a given which is again something different. I would buy this book to own if I ever found it being sold near me.
Rating: 4.9 out of 5.
Page Count: 416 (including Introduction, Acknowledgments, and Author Biographies)
Price: $9.95
Next Book: Bled Dry by Erin McCarthy
Thanks for reading!
~Jade
There was a one page introduction done by Trisha Telep. It wasn't overly long, or too short I think. It makes the reader think about "the eternal kiss" that one could receive from a vampire. The only thing with the introduction being a page long is that all anyone knows about the 13 short stories is that they are about vampires. I would have loved to have had a little overview of what the short stories were going to be about.
From the first book to the second there were a few authors that were the same for both books but wrote a different story. Those authors are: Lili St. Crow, Rachel Caine and Nancy Holder. Though Nancy Holder co-writes with Debbie Viguié.
In this collection of vampire short stories there are (in order that they are read in this book): Falling to Ash by Karen Mahoney, Shelter Island by Melissa de la Cruz, Sword Point by Maria V. Snyder, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black, Undead is Very Hot Right Now by Sarah Rees Brennan, Kat by Kelley Armstrong, The Thirteenth Step by Libba Bray, All Hallows by Rachel Caine, Wet Teeth by Cecil Castellucci, Other Boys by Cassandra Clare, Passing by Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguié, Ambition by Lili St. Crow, and lastly, All Wounds by Dina James.
Falling to Ash was a very nice read, though once it really got going it ended. Which I did not like because I wanted to read a little more, but now thinking back on what was read, it ended at a decent spot. More could have been written, but over all it was okay for the first short story.
Shelter Island I read this before in another book, though where I am not sure. It is an anthology for Dylan in her Blue Bloods series. It is not in his POV but a girls. I liked that the reader got to see a different side of Dylan that you really can't see in the other books. The ending was bittersweet because if anyone has read the rest of the series, they know what goes on. It wasn't very long also and I wanted it to be a little longer just to be able to hold onto Dylan as a character.
Sword Point was a break from the norm when it comes to vampires and I liked that. I would have loved for this to be longer, maybe novel length. I loved the two main characters Ava and Jarett. The ending was very good in my opinion, I just wanted more from Snyder before she ended it.
The Coldest Girl in Coldtown if I could only have one of these short stories be made into a full length novel it would be this one right here. When I started this short story I did not put down the book until I finished it. This is again, a different take on vampires. Instead of being changed within a few seconds to a few days after being bitten, the person has 88 days to either drink blood and become a vampire or literally sweat it out. The ending leaves you hanging and craving more. I loved this short story the most.
Undead is Very Hot Right Now, had me laughing a number of times. It was the comic relief needed after reading the last short story. Though it has a sad ending the reader can't help but hope that a happier ending would have came if this were longer, of course. The characters are all very different from each other and that is what makes some things so funny, and being able to picture it happening.
Kat, it was back to being serious in this short story. The reader gets to know a lot about the main character Kat, and why things are happening in the story. The reader is not just dropped in and left wandering and wondering what is going on. The ending is good, I can handle this one being a short story it fits almost perfectly.
The Thirteenth Step, get a little racy at one point in time but doesn't go into hardly any detail. Once again this is a different take on vampires and how they come to be, and again I could handle this being a short story. It was a little drawn out at times and that bugged me because something would happen and then calm for a while. The ending didn't really surprise me too much, the reader almost knows what is going to happen after a little bit.
All Hallows is a continuation almost of the last short story by Caine. The characters are the same, there is just a new adventure for them. This is something that would be great for a younger teen though profanity is said and a few lewd comments are made about a Halloween costume. Otherwise it is a pretty innocent read.
Wet Teeth is sad. At first the reader thinks that it is going to be another happy ending. Not really. I was saddened by the ending and almost was glad that the next short story came along. But not all stories have happy endings, and this is just proof of that.
Other Boys is another on the sad side story. But at the same time the ending made me say "you go girl this is your life and you have had secrets kept from you that shouldn't have and now you are going to make your own path." Though I kept confusing all of the characters till the end came. I had to reread a few spots just to really understand who said what, or who was thinking what. I didn't really like that but it wasn't the worst that I have read.
Passing is another short story that I could handle being a short story. It was almost perfect, and a full length novel would have been too wordy or just too much. A very imperfect alliance is made in the end and it works, kinks and all. I liked the ending it was a great way to end. The reader isn't really left hanging, they sort of know what could come next and I liked that.
Ambition almost had me wondering if it was the same characters from St. Crow's last short story. But they weren't, and it does almost take the same rout as the last one did. I wasn't too happy about that but St. Crow kept it interesting which helped out a lot in keeping me reading. And it was very sweet in parts almost too sweet but that line wasn't really crossed, just danced very close to.
All Wounds, I am not really sure what to say with this one other than it was not what I expected. It isn't a love story at all that I read, which was a good different. I looked up this particular short story on Fictiondb.com and they do not put "(ss)" next to the title meaning that it is a novel so I will have to check that out and see if my library has it.
All in all this was a good compilation of short vampire stories. Not all are from the POV of a vampire, some are from a human, a vampire hunter, an vampire that does not know they are a vampire, and more. Happy endings are not always a given which is again something different. I would buy this book to own if I ever found it being sold near me.
Rating: 4.9 out of 5.
Page Count: 416 (including Introduction, Acknowledgments, and Author Biographies)
Price: $9.95
Next Book: Bled Dry by Erin McCarthy
Thanks for reading!
~Jade
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