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3.81 AVERAGE
3.81 AVERAGE
Unlike most of the reviewers here, I preferred My Heart Struck Sorrow over the first tale. I think the first story bogged me down and did not make me feel compelled to read it, but rather I slogged through it to get to the second story. I am not a true connoisseur of cosmic horror- I'm not even sure what that means. I can only say I felt the story was too tangential and veered off track. The true horror was going down the obsessive rabbit hole but the author seemed to rely more on gore and sex to convey the horror.
My Heart Struck Sorrow was much more compelling to me, most likely due to my love of music. I found myself looking up a lot as I read and was fascinated by the real history of Stagger Lee. I thought the suspense was fitting and could feel the descent into darkness. I too found the ending to be a little abrupt but it leaves it open to the reader to fill in some blanks. Overall I would give that story 4 stars and the first 2.
My Heart Struck Sorrow was much more compelling to me, most likely due to my love of music. I found myself looking up a lot as I read and was fascinated by the real history of Stagger Lee. I thought the suspense was fitting and could feel the descent into darkness. I too found the ending to be a little abrupt but it leaves it open to the reader to fill in some blanks. Overall I would give that story 4 stars and the first 2.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Body horror, Confinement, Racial slurs, Racism, Torture, Violence, Kidnapping
Moderate: Child death, Death, Infidelity, Sexual content, Grief
Minor: Murder, Fire/Fire injury
While the first story was alright, I found the second story to be fantastic.
Perhaps it's because it deals with a gentleman collecting folk music recordings for the Library of Congress -- a pair of themes that hover close to my heart. But the writing, in my opinion was also excellent.
Perhaps it's because it deals with a gentleman collecting folk music recordings for the Library of Congress -- a pair of themes that hover close to my heart. But the writing, in my opinion was also excellent.
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
reflective
tense
medium-paced
First short story didn't pay off the build up. Characters made odd choices that didn't make sense. Slow to start but ended very abruptly. Second short story was pretty good. Fairly spooky and kept me engaged. Ending could have been nailed home a little better.
John Horner Jacobs’s A Lush and Seething Hell is a fantastic pairing of two novellas: The Sea Dreams it is the Sky and My Heart Struck Sorrow. Both stories are excruciatingly beautiful and horrible at turns, probing common themes of cosmic horror through the wound of deeply personal traumas. The writing is extremely sharp and rife with everything fans of cosmic horror come to expect: mind-numbing songs, ethereal and unknowable entities (understated but chilling in both tales), eerie tomes, forbidden knowledge... But these stories explore the emotional core of their protagonists in a way that the genre does not commonly do. In this book, Jacobs does so to incredible effect; the characters are real and so their trepidation and fear becomes our own. On top of that, the obvious care and research Jacobs takes with the subject material, plus the efforts of his multiple sensitivity readers, results in a keenly felt and powerful backdrop for the characters and their stories. If this is the direction cosmic horror will be taken in the future, then fans of the genre have a great deal to look forward to!