A review by matosapa
Carniepunk by Nicole D. Peeler, Jennifer Estep, Hillary Jacques, Seanan McGuire, Jaye Wells, Delilah S. Dawson, Kelly Meding, Rob Thurman, Jackie Kessler, Allison Pang, Kevin Hearne, Kelly Gay, Mark Henry, Rachel Caine

2.5

I'm not a fan of Caine's (the editor of this book) work so it's not surprising that this anthology didn't impress me overall. Apparently, I'm one of the few that doesn't want bodice-ripping lust and romance in their urban fantasy. I blame Armstrong for this :-p). A handful of the tales in here are shorts from urban fantasy book series. While the "worlds" are explained in the beginning, I had little interest for the characters and story lines.
However, there were some standouts - namely Painted Love by Rob Thurman and Daughter of the Midway ... by Seanan Maguire. These two were worth the cost and time spent slogging through the others.
If you want to read some seriously brilliant anthologies, look up Ellen Datlow's collections. I've read a lot of them and they are all high quality.