Category: Horror

Monstress Vol. 4: The Chosen by Marjorie M. Liu & Sana Takeda

I chose to review this volume separately from the first three, due to it being nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story 2020, but I feel like I don’t have a lot to say separate from my thoughts on the preceding volumes. I feel like Monstress is a bit of an acquired taste …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/06/15/monstress-vol-4-the-chosen-by-marjorie-m-liu-sana-takeda/

Monstress Vol. 1-3 by Marjorie M. Liu & Sana Takeda

While reading the first volume of this series, I realized that it was going to be one of those comic book titles where you have to hang on for dear life and just enjoy the ride as events unfold and things maybe get explained along the way. The first volume, Awakening, drops you in media …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/06/15/monstress-vol-1-3-by-marjorie-m-liu-sana-takeda/

Hugo Awards 2020: Novelette Nominees

For whatever reason, I felt that this slate wasn’t as strong as in the Short Story category, probably because I spent less time being impressed by the entries, bar the one I’m going to vote for. I mean, there weren’t any bad stories here, but I’d expect better from what’s essentially a Year’s Best list. …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/06/11/hugo-awards-2020-novelette-nominees/

Hugo Awards 2020: Short Story Nominees

It’s that time of year again! Doug persuaded me to get a voting membership to the Hugos this year, and I’m taking my duties quite seriously, even if there’s only about a month and a half in which to go over all the materials nominated. Of course, I started with the short stories because they’re …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/06/08/hugo-awards-2020-short-story-nominees/

Hope Island by Tim Major

This page-turner of a slow burn horror novel features one of the most original — and in hindsight, one of the most ubiquitous, after a fashion — villains I’ve ever read. I spent far too much time wrongly guessing what lay behind the bizarre behaviors of the residents of Hope Island, and was dead impressed …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/05/25/hope-island-by-tim-major/

Saffron and Brimstone by Elizabeth Hand

Saffron and Brimstone by Elizabeth Hand

I zipped through the eight stories of Saffron and Brimstone in about a day and a half when I was in the hospital and looking for something fantastical to read. The tales — one novella, a quartet of connected short stories, and three other stand-alones — all bring fantastic or horrific elements into the mundane world, sometimes …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/05/17/saffron-and-brimstone-by-elizabeth-hand/

Threading The Labyrinth by Tiffani Angus

I’m at the stage of the stay-at-home order where I’m craving beauty but am too tired to do the gardening or art that I want to — homeschooling special needs 6 year-old twins is really, really hard, and God bless my 9 year-old for being remarkably fuss-free. So for these difficult times, a novel like …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/05/07/threading-the-labyrinth-by-tiffani-angus/

An Interview with Tim Lebbon, author of Eden

Q. Every book has its own story about how it came to be conceived and written as it did. How did Eden evolve? (No pun intended, but since I like puns, I’m leaving it in there anyway.) A. Ha! I like it. Well, I can remember when the notion of Eden hit me, and I …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/04/16/an-interview-with-tim-lebbon-author-of-eden/

Eden by Tim Lebbon

Y’all, I’m not the outdoorsy type due to a huge respect for how insignificant we as individual human beings are in the great face of Nature, so when I read that this book was about a team of adventure racers illegally trespassing on a nature reserve essentially for kicks, I knew this would not end …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/04/07/eden-by-tim-lebbon/

Cursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales edited by Marie O’Regan & Paul Kane

Modern fairy tale anthologies are 100% my jam, so I absolutely devoured this 300+ page compilation of 20 short stories and poems written by some of the finest contemporary writers of speculative fiction. Absorbing and for the most part well-written, this is a book of re-told fairy tales that are far darker in nature than …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/03/17/cursed-an-anthology-of-dark-fairy-tales-edited-by-marie-oregan-paul-kane/