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neko_cam's review
3.0
As is always the case with anthologies, the stories in 'Delta Green: Tales from Failed Anatomies' vary substantially in style and quality from one story to the next.
My favorite of the lot was almost certainly 'Coming Home', as it features an early look at a character who goes on to become a heavy hitter in some of the other DG novels and it serves as a fantastic depiction of the specific flavor of insanity experienced by someone who'd been confronted with Cosmic Horror and have later found themselves back in normal life. I loved it.
'Contingencies' was also great, tying itself into the existing mythos logically, exploring an existing and popular thought exercise deftly, and remaining personable enough to stay engaging through it all.
Though I'd read it elsewhere before, 'Drowning in Sand' is brilliant too, touching on some of the most pivotal events in the Conspiracy and showing things from a point of view that could otherwise be easily overlooked.
'Punching' also deserves a mention as it was remarkably subtle for a DG story. If it weren't appearing alongside the others, and if it shirked its single overt reference to the Horror, one could easily mistake this as concerning nothing but one man's troubled time at college and it's fallout.
These stories arethe highlights, and they are worth the price of admission.
My favorite of the lot was almost certainly 'Coming Home', as it features an early look at a character who goes on to become a heavy hitter in some of the other DG novels and it serves as a fantastic depiction of the specific flavor of insanity experienced by someone who'd been confronted with Cosmic Horror and have later found themselves back in normal life. I loved it.
'Contingencies' was also great, tying itself into the existing mythos logically, exploring an existing and popular thought exercise deftly, and remaining personable enough to stay engaging through it all.
Though I'd read it elsewhere before, 'Drowning in Sand' is brilliant too, touching on some of the most pivotal events in the Conspiracy and showing things from a point of view that could otherwise be easily overlooked.
'Punching' also deserves a mention as it was remarkably subtle for a DG story. If it weren't appearing alongside the others, and if it shirked its single overt reference to the Horror, one could easily mistake this as concerning nothing but one man's troubled time at college and it's fallout.
These stories arethe highlights, and they are worth the price of admission.
johnwillson's review
3.0
I really like the Delta Green setting/genre: secret agents meet cosmic horrors. Chris Carter either co-discovered the genre or ripped off Delta Green when he created The X-Files a year later.
But I really dislike the "agents must kill everyone and each other and themselves at the end of every story" conceit that DG inherited from its pappy, the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game. And this collection of short stories leans hard into that conceit. It's gross and tiresome.
There are some cool nuggets of mythos lore in this volume. But they're buried in a lot of aimless prose and military wankery, and outnumbered by awful atrocities, lovingly described and slotted in between the senseless killing sprees and suicides. I'm not even talking about monsters from beyond the stars; that would be cool. I'm talking about the very worst things that human beings can do to each other. It spoiled my enjoyment of the book.
I recommend the stories "Dead, Death, Dying (1955)", "The Thing In the Pit (1977)", "Contingencies (1984)" and "Drowning in Sand (1997)". And I recommend skipping the rest.
But I really dislike the "agents must kill everyone and each other and themselves at the end of every story" conceit that DG inherited from its pappy, the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game. And this collection of short stories leans hard into that conceit. It's gross and tiresome.
There are some cool nuggets of mythos lore in this volume. But they're buried in a lot of aimless prose and military wankery, and outnumbered by awful atrocities, lovingly described and slotted in between the senseless killing sprees and suicides. I'm not even talking about monsters from beyond the stars; that would be cool. I'm talking about the very worst things that human beings can do to each other. It spoiled my enjoyment of the book.
I recommend the stories "Dead, Death, Dying (1955)", "The Thing In the Pit (1977)", "Contingencies (1984)" and "Drowning in Sand (1997)". And I recommend skipping the rest.
ramonnogueras's review
5.0
No le doy 6 estrellas porque no puedo. Lovecraft estaría orgulloso, probablemente.
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