My perennial statement about anthologies: they’re a mixed bag.  This book definitely holds to that.  It’s got a lot of stories, from a lot of different creators.  Some stretch the boundaries of theme, some are solidly in place.  Some are pretty good.  Some are kinda meh.  And there’s a bunch of poetry.  I’ll say, as I have in some other reviews, I just don’t get poetry, so I’ll leave it at that.

‘Postflesh’ by Paul Jessup was good and very weird.  I didn’t especially like A.C. Wise’s ‘Venice Burning,’ but I think it was well written and conceived.  ‘Dark of the Moon’ by James Dorr had a nice, weird Cold War-rooted story.  ‘Lottie Versus the Moon Hopper’ was interesting.  I felt like I wanted to look around in the universe Pamela Rentz created, just a bit more.  And the best story in the book, though a story I think didn’t fit in the anthology, was ‘The Last Man Standing,’ by Ezeiyoke Chukwunonso.  I could have seen this in any of a dozen apocalyptic anthologies I’ve read, but I didn’t read Lovecraft in it at all.  Still, a darned fine story.

The one story in the book I really didn’t like was ‘The Library Twins and the Nekrobees’ by Martha Hubbard.  It has this Hot Topic, Goth-Cutsie thing that I found excruciating.

I can’t really recommend the book.  There’s just not enough good, or good enough to go out of your way to read.  But I would seek out Chukwunonso’s story.  He’s someone to keep your eye out for; a clear talent.  On a technical note, the table of contents is incorrect, with the story start pages off by a couple.  There were a few other editing issues, but nothing major.

This post is sponsored by Tom Constantine (my dad). You can read some of his thoughts over at his blog: http://tom-constantine.blogspot.com/

As always, you can find me on Twitter at @TheOmegaDork.

And you can check out my Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/matthewjconstantine.