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A review by hopedecays
Isolation: The Horror Anthology by Dan Coxon
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
A gorgeous cover of a remote mountain top and a person standing alone. Unfortunately, these stories don’t really align with that type of physical and literal isolation. I went into this expecting something other than it was, which definitely shaped my reading experience. This book would have been better served with a title and cover indicating that these stories were birthed during the pandemic and are almost all allegories for COVID-19.
Like the majority of anthologies, there were stories that were five stars for me and stories that were total duds (or worse), so an overall review of 3 stars.
Some of my favorites:
Alison Littlewood - The Snow Child
A.G. Slatter – Solivagant
Owl Goingback – Full Blood
Ramsey Campbell – The Blind House
Lisa Tuttle – Fire Above, Fire Below
The remaining stories were a mixed bag. Some were good, but not great. Others struggled to put together a cohesive ending or otherwise didn’t break any new ground. There were two stories that drove me up a wall in the worst way. I know folks LOVE these authors, so this is definitely a Your Mileage May Vary thing, but Paul Tremblay’s story was so disjointed, pointless, and uninteresting to me. And Laird Barron… oof. I know he’s known for poetry and prose, but this doesn’t read like that. There is no Ligotti, Bradbury, or Khaw in this prose. This reads like a first time writer discovering a thesaurus and then throwing as many multisyllabic words into a sentence as possible, regardless of whether they actually make any sense together. The most frustrating part is that the actual plot is great but the language usage is about as digestible as drywall.
Also, M.R. Carey, this is only the second of his stories I have read and both have just happened to graphically mention a woman pissing. No kink shame, but definitely not kink same, my dude.
Overall, I really loved some of these stories, but I don’t know that I’d recommend the anthology in its entirety.
Like the majority of anthologies, there were stories that were five stars for me and stories that were total duds (or worse), so an overall review of 3 stars.
Some of my favorites:
Alison Littlewood - The Snow Child
A.G. Slatter – Solivagant
Owl Goingback – Full Blood
Ramsey Campbell – The Blind House
Lisa Tuttle – Fire Above, Fire Below
The remaining stories were a mixed bag. Some were good, but not great. Others struggled to put together a cohesive ending or otherwise didn’t break any new ground. There were two stories that drove me up a wall in the worst way. I know folks LOVE these authors, so this is definitely a Your Mileage May Vary thing, but Paul Tremblay’s story was so disjointed, pointless, and uninteresting to me. And Laird Barron… oof. I know he’s known for poetry and prose, but this doesn’t read like that. There is no Ligotti, Bradbury, or Khaw in this prose. This reads like a first time writer discovering a thesaurus and then throwing as many multisyllabic words into a sentence as possible, regardless of whether they actually make any sense together. The most frustrating part is that the actual plot is great but the language usage is about as digestible as drywall.
Also, M.R. Carey, this is only the second of his stories I have read and both have just happened to graphically mention a woman pissing. No kink shame, but definitely not kink same, my dude.
Overall, I really loved some of these stories, but I don’t know that I’d recommend the anthology in its entirety.