Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List} Review for Alex Hunter Series by Greig Beck by Karen S. Wiesner

 

Oldies But Goodies {Put This One on Your TBR List}

Review for Alex Hunter Series by Greig Beck

by Karen S. Wiesner 

 

In 2011, I was looking for supernatural horror books to read that took place in Antarctica (a trio of categories that were and are favorites of mine). Beneath the Dark Ice by Greig Beck came up during my search. In this series, a superhuman takes on supermonsters in life-threatening settings. I absolutely devoured it and the next and the next. I followed it for the next several years as more and more books featuring Captain Alex Hunter aka The Arcadian were released. The first two books were published by St. Martin's Press in very affordable mass market paperbacks. After that, another company took over the series and eventually republished all the books in trade paperback and electronic formats. After Book 5, I found the books far too expensive (in part because they were all so large) to continue purchasing. I bought the prequel, Book #5.5 and #6 as ebooks, but even those were surprisingly expensive (that can happen when publishers don't seem to understand that intangible ebooks which don't take up physical space should be priced lower). I haven't been able to find any of Greig Beck's books on my library apps in any format, other than the first two which were originally published by a mainstream (aka, not small press) publisher. As Beck is an Australia author, I'm sure that's part of why I haven't been able to locate them through libraries. 

Below is a list of the publication order (along with reading order) for what's currently available in the series:

.5 Arcadian Genesis, a prequel (2012)

#1 Beneath the Dark Ice (2009)

#2 Dark Rising (2010)

#3 This Green Hell (2011)

#4 Black Mountain (2012)

#5 Gorgon (2014)

#5.5 Hammer of God (2015)

#6 Kraken Rising (2015)

#7 The Void (2018)

#8 From Hell (2019)

#9 The Dark Side (2021)

#10 The Well of Hell (2022)

#11 The Silurian Bridge (2024)

As I said, the gist of the Alex Hunter Series is that a soldier sustains an injury that should have killed him, yet it, impossibly, made him a super-soldier, unstoppable, a danger to monsters, loved ones, and himself instead. This is a little bit unrealistic, but not outside the realm of believability. Because of his all but inhuman abilities, he and his team are always the ones called in for highest-possible-risk, one-way missions that no one else could survive. They do, time and time again. While the exact situations, settings, and hellish monsters are vastly different, they're all thoroughly researched and unquestionably plausible. This author writes as though he knows about all these things firsthand. Every book in this series that I've read has this basic scenario, yet they're all so unique and flawlessly compelling. 

While Greig Beck is still an author I follow, I've gotten behind with this series. Additionally, because I continue to follow him, I discovered several years after I could no longer afford his books that he started a spinoff series with a character from the first (and 10th) Alex Hunter book: Matt Kerns, the linguist, archaeologist and wary explorer. There are four books available in the Matt Kerns Adventures, the first having been published in 2013 so maybe (but I'm not sure) this new series might take place during Alex Hunter #4 and #5. I also swear that Cate Granger first appeared in one of the Alex Hunter books, and now she has her own series (Cate Granger, currently three novels available, the first published in 2018). I'll have to reread the Alex Hunter books again to find out for sure so don't quote me. It's so frustrating when authors don't include connections between their series titles on their own website, if nowhere else. This kind of thing sells books! 

The ebooks have now come down in price considerably, so I do plan to someday purchase the ones I haven't read yet, and I'd also like to read the spinoffs. Pretty much every one of Beck's offerings sounds fantastic, right up my alley, and I've found him to be a very reliable author, so I go into every purchase certain I'll like what I get. You can find out more about them on his website https://greigbeck.com/. If you're looking for nail-biting horror with a supernatural twist, you'll find Alex Hunter Books all but impossible to pass up, let alone put down once you've started them. 

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website and blog here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

{Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Wood at Midwinter by Susanna Clarke by Karen S. Wiesner

 

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Wood at Midwinter by Susanna Clarke

by Karen S. Wiesner

 

 

Susanna Clarke is the author of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, an enormous, epic fantasy that was the author's debut novel. More of that world is explored in the author's short story collection, The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories. I reviewed both of these previously. You can read them here: 

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2023/09/book-review-jonathan-strange-mr-norrell.html 

The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2023/11/karen-s-wiesner-put-this-one-on-your_02046837301.html 

Clarke's first novel in this alternative history world felt incomplete to most who read it because it ended on what I consider a cliffhanger. The author intended a sequel set a few years after the first. Though readers had to expect the follow-up to take a long time to write (Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell took ten years to complete), we later learned Clarke is plagued by chronic fatigue syndrome. She's reported that the fate of the sequel is still “a long way off” but may also never be finished because of her condition. I truly hope she someday has the strength to complete it. In the meantime, we've been given a new story set within that magical world, The Wood at Midwinter. I purchased the hardcover as soon as it was published in 2024 (it was read on BBC Radio 4 around the time of Christmas 2022). Illustrations were done by Victoria Sawdon (I couldn't find out much about her online, though she's seems to be active on several social media sites I'm not subscribed to). This tale is so brief, anything I said about it would be to practically tell the whole story, so it might be best to just include the back cover blurb as a summary: 

Nineteen-year-old Merowdis Scot is an unusual girl. She can talk to animals and trees--and she is only ever happy when she is walking in the woods.

One snowy afternoon, out with her dogs and Apple the pig, Merowdis encounters a blackbird and a fox. As darkness falls, a strange figure enters in their midst--and the path of her life is changed forever.

The illustrations are elegant, delicate, and pivotal to the story (which makes it a little sad that the illustrator's name wasn't on the cover!). Grounded in folktale, this charming fable sets the scene for winter's frozen beauty. Slightly sad and very sweet, it would make the perfect gift for Christmas. Also, I tried to view it as a simple children's story. In that way, it doesn't require any aspect to be fleshed out more than it is between the few words and breathtaking illustrations included. If you don't go into it expecting more than that, you won't be disappointed. 

If not for the author's afterword (nine pages out of a total of a mere 60), there's simply no way to link this to the world of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell beyond the very tenuous connection to "magic in the midst". As Susanna Clarke is also the author of one of my favorite stories of all time (Piranesi--read my review here: https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2023/10/karen-s-wiesner-put-this-one-on-your_0415966123.html), I'll gratefully take this and any story from her. 

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor 

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Karen S. Wiesner: Combating Big Book Overwhelm with Audiobooks or {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, A Fractalverse Novel by Christopher Paolini

Combating Big Book Overwhelm with Audiobooks or

{Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review:

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, A Fractalverse Novel

by Christopher Paolini

by Karen S. Wiesner

Within an extensive article I wrote called "Presentation is King", previously published on the Alien Romances Blog, I talked about Christopher Paolini's first science fiction mega-novel, To Sleep in a Sea of Stars, which was the first offering in his Fractalverse series, and provided a review for it. While I thought the novel was well-written, I complained about the obscene length that overwhelmed my basic enjoyment of the story. You can read the article here:

               Part 1: https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2022/12/karen-s-wiesner-presentation-is-king.html

               Part 2: https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2022/12/karen-s-wiesner-presentation-is-king_01963401706.html

               Part 3: https://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2022/12/karen-s-wiesner-presentation-is-king_02089261396.html

The weird thing is, I wanted to love that book wholeheartedly instead of just liking it but fervently wished it'd been published as three, manageable, separate stories (which it could so easily have been, given the way the book was conveniently divided into several parts) instead of a massive one. That way my overwhelmed brain could have enjoyed it more.

Within my three-part article, I also talked about Paolini's other series, The Inheritance Cycle, which suffered from the same problem. His stories are too big to allow true immersion and would be so much better presented in multiple parts, allowing the reader time between to recover from the page-overloaded, detail-heavy material. This brings to my mind my favorite fantasy series. Most people who love this genre know that J.R.R. Tolkien intended The Lord of the Rings to be one, exceptionally long novel. Wisely, I think, his publisher thought one book would be cost prohibitive and also they wanted to get the material to eager readers faster, so they turned one book into a trilogy. I might never have read that book--my all-time favorite fantasy--if not for the brilliant presentation. As one volume, I would have been instantly intimidated and deterred from even starting it. Instead, we now have three installments, presented in a way that allows readers to enjoy segments of the story without becoming overwhelmed by the sheer size of the material and ponderous details that need to be absorbed to follow it.

I wondered in the time since I wrote the article/review for To Sleep in a Sea of Stars what other people thought of the book. I found a review by Lotte on The Escape Velocity Collection website, which amused me, though it was a bit too harsh in my opinion--however, I didn't fully disagree with the conclusions drawn. You can read Lotte's review here, if you want: https://escapevelocitycollection.com/fiction-fix-to-sleep-in-a-sea-of-stars/.

Two things stood out for me in that review. First, that the reviewer felt Paolini was a good writer and wanted to love To Sleep… just like I did but didn't quite get there. The second thing that stood out was in the very first sentence of the review: "…I've been listening to the audiobook of To Sleep in a Sea of Stars…" This is how the reviewer managed to get through the enormous amount of material without giving up out of exhaustion. I think one of the biggest reasons people prefer to watch a movie over reading the book is because it's just so much easier to grasp the concepts in that visual form. What may be hard to wade through and grasp in a dense, overloaded read is simpler to see and comprehend playing out on a screen. The brain pulls everything together in a different way that doesn't lead to fatigue, the way it might in reading. I think audiobooks may also provide another means of making sense of a tremendous amount of material--not quite as visual as a film, but I was hopeful this was an avenue that could help my brain fatigue with some large books that I genuinely wanted to love.

I thought about it for months and finally decided to start 2024 with a new willingness to listen to audiobooks, which I confess I tend to think of as cheating for a true reader. But if the sole reason I'm avoiding certain books I know I'd enjoy if they were presented in a different way is because the size overwhelms me, why not try?

The best time for me to listen to an audiobook is while getting ready for the day in the morning as well as while I'm doing household chores at various points throughout the day. Normally, I listen to music during those times, which I'd miss, but it seemed like a worthwhile, temporary swap. I'm not a fan of downloaded audio files, in part because I want something tangible for my money that can be utilized even when technology changes, as it inevitably does and would. Finding cd audiobooks wasn't easy (Amazon doesn't seem to carry them, that I found anyway--only offers Audible.com files, and Barnes and Noble has the same issue) but I did manage to purchase audio cds elsewhere for To Sleep in a Sea of Stars as well as all of Paolini's Inheritance Cycle titles, including the brand new offering in that series, Murtagh, Book 5. I started with Eragon, Book 1, since I received that first. I enjoyed listening each day and looked forward to progressing in the story. As soon as I got the audio cds of To Sleep…, though, I switched to that.

This is a much, much better way of digesting Paolini's brilliant Fractalverse, a way that doesn't strain my brain and make me share in Lotte's hilarious, wearied weeping for reprieve: "Please save me. This book is legitimately 900 pages long and I don't deserve this." Thus far, incorporating audiobooks into my "reading" is a revelation for this diehard, traditional bibliophile. I never would have realized what a difference it would make in dealing with what could otherwise be considered an agonizing endeavor in reading a book too big to be believed.

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars was well-written with exciting and compelling, well-developed characters and plot conflicts, with plenty of universe and contextual detail to make everything logical. I love science fiction, and, when combined with horror…forget about it. Win-win. I do admit with To Sleep…, I wanted more Alien, less Enemy Mine (Dennis Quaid). Regardless, the bottom line is that I highly recommend not just To Sleep… but the whole Fractalverse series to any fantasy and sci-fi lover. I especially enjoyed listening to Jennifer Hale read To Sleep… with the audiobook. Like Paolini, I'm a huge fan of Mass Effect, and Jennifer Hale was the voice actress for fem Shep in that videogame series. I also learned that Hale, with music producer Todd Herfindal, wrote and performed some beautiful music for To Sleep… Find out more here: https://fractalverse.net/works/music-to-sleep/. If you want to dig deeper into anything in the Fractalverse Universe, Paolini's website has a ton of visuals and explanations for anything from lifeforms to star systems, organizations and religions, as well as a fairly detailed timeline.

There's also talk about a film adaptation or possibly a TV series of To Sleep… I strongly believe either of these would make the most of an incredible story that almost can't be enjoyed in its original format.

Over the next two weeks, I'll review Paolini's other two, subsequent offerings in his Fractalverse.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/ 

Karen S Wiesner: {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: Heart's Blood by Juliet Marillier

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: Heart's Blood by Juliet Marillier

by Karen S. Wiesner

A rare single title novel by New Zealand author Juliet Marillier, Heart's Blood was published in 2009. This historical fantasy is loosely based on Beauty and the Beast but it's a richer, more complex tale with a heroine, Caitrin, who flees a home life much more terrifying than anything she might encounter in her search for a safe haven. Her chief ability and means of employment is as a scribe, not a skill most young women in the time period possess. Her father taught his daughter his craft before his death.

Caitrin flees to Whistling Tor and its crumbling hilltop fortress. The chieftain, Anluan, is feared and repulsed by the townsfolk because of the dark curse over the ghost-filled woods that enthralls him. Not surprisingly, Caitrin causes a stir in the shroud that hovers like a dense mist over the household, bringing unexpected light and promise to most of the staff--and the reclusive master of the house caught in the web of sorcery that destroyed his ancestors and will soon claim his life as well. To free Anluan will also release Whistling Tor from the evil surrounding it, but to do so will require sacrifices and something perhaps more terrifying than misfortune: Hope.

This was a beautifully written tale, despite how slow moving (to the point of, at times, plodding). Complete with complicated, fully fleshed out characters and a rich, wonderfully elaborate setting, the Gothic atmosphere of creepiness in a dark castle surrounded by a forest haunted by spirits that may or may not be malevolent kept me guessing about who was actually trustworthy. I was interested, as well, in the plant in Anluan's garden called "Heart's Blood". I found out after reading this book that there's a flower commonly called bleeding heart, Lamprocapnos spectabilis, that's supposed to signify rejected or unrequited love. Too bad the beautiful woodland plant didn't make it to the cover of the book. It's really quite striking! 

Incidentally, while Heart's Blood is sometimes referred to as part of the "Whistling Tor series", the author's website states emphatically that it was intended as a standalone and no follow-up is planned. Bit of a letdown there, as this is an amazing world I would have liked to enter again. But the author does have six other series to immerse her readership in, and I highly recommend giving them a try.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Karen S Wiesner: {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

by Karen S. Wiesner

A novel that took 10 years to write, completed in January 2004, sent to a literary agent in March of that year; two months later (and two days after sending the manuscript to publishers), the first-time author is offered a deal…that she refuses! The rights are auctioned off and finally bought for $2 million. That alone sounds like something made up. Add to the unrealistic quality of such a testament: Elizabeth Kostova's debut novel The Historian was published in June 2005, landed at #1 on The New York Times bestseller list in its first week, and by August of that same year, it'd sold in excess of 900,000 copies and gone through six printings.

I love vampires, Dracula (historical and fictional), and literary novels about people who love books--a particular theme in this book, as described by the main character Paul: "It is a fact that we historians are interested in what is partly a reflection of ourselves we would rather not examine except through the medium of scholarship; it is also true that as we steep ourselves in our interests, they become more and more a part of us." The history and folklore of Vlad Tepes and his fictional equivalent Count Dracula are explored in narratives told by Paul, a professor; his mentor Rossi; and Paul's daughter (who's never named), while utilizing letters and oral accounts, and covering 1930s, 1950s, and 1970s timelines. The goal is to find Vlad's tomb.

Described as a mash of genres including Gothic, adventure, detective, travelogue, postmodern historical, thriller, and epistolary, The Historian's origin centered on the author's father (a professor) telling her "real history" vampire tales when she was a child. Her librarian mother's love of books also had a profound effect on Kostova. Later, the author had a notion to write about a father spinning tales about Dracula tales to an entranced daughter with Dracula listening in--because Dracula's still alive. Two days later, Kostova started writing.

Interestingly, Kostova never wanted her novel to be classified as a horror, nor was she pleased with the comparisons it got with Dan Brown's Robert Langdon series. [Ironically, the reason for the bidding war for the rights to publish The Historian stemmed from the houses believing "they might have the next Da Vinci Code within their grasp" (according to Publishers Weekly).] While I can understand the connection to comparing The Historian to Brown's historical thrillers, better comparisons, I think, would be to Charlie Lovett's The Bookman's Tale or Arturo Perez-Reverte's The Club Dumas, both fantastic novels that won't disappoint readers.

The author intended to write a chilling Victorian ghost story. She chose the figure of a vampire for many reasons, not the least of which was because "our fear of Dracula lies in the fear of losing ourselves, of relinquishing our very identities as human beings." Not surprisingly, the main characters in The Historian become obsessed, all but losing their individual identities in their quest to discover the dark side of human nature in the complex figure of Dracula.

While this novel is large enough to be overwhelming to some readers (nearly 700 pages in the trade paperback), I found myself so riveted by the adventures these learned bibliophiles undertake that span the globe, I barely noticed the pages flying by. It's very hard to imagine that this was the author's very first book, considering how masterfully it's constructed and written. If you haven't already, I highly recommend reading The Historian. If you've already enjoyed it once, maybe it's time to re-read this timeless novel? I've already put it back on my TBR pile.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Karen S Wiesner: {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Woman in Black and Printer's Devil Court by Susan Hill

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Woman in Black and Printer's Devil Court 

by Susan Hill

by Karen S. Wiesner

Susan Hill is one of those authors that effortlessly puts you directly into the fictional settings and personal lives of her characters (many of her stories are ghost and/or horror) with so much atmospheric reality, you're convinced of the authenticity of everything. Two stories that seem to go together extremely well are The Woman in Black and Printer's Devil Court. Both are haunting (forgive me but it's fitting) ghost stories that linger on in the memory long after they're read.

The Woman in Black was published in 1983. Most people have heard of it because of the 2012 film adaption starring (Harry Potter) Daniel Radcliffe, which was excellent but not quite as good as the book. There were changes made to the movie (ones that I think worked there) that weren't in the book, and it’s within the pages of the novel that the story, characters, and unforgettable settings are breathtakingly expanded.

The novel is narrated by Arthur Kipps and follows his life. In this one, we start at the end, and work our way to the beginning. In the initial scenes, we see Kipps settled with his wife and stepchildren. They ask him to tell them his own ghost story. Kipps resists but eventually decides to write it down. He starts at the beginning when he was young  and engaged to be married the following year. As a junior solicitor, Kipps is assigned to attend the funeral of Alice Drablow in Crythin Gifford, a small town on the coast of England. He’s charged with settling her estate, the secluded, desolate Eel Marsh House situated on Nine Lives Causeway, which is surrounded by marshes. At high tide, the property is completely cut off from the mainland.

During the funeral, Kipps sees a mysterious woman in black lurking in the background. As he learns more about his deceased client and her sister, who became pregnant out of wedlock, one of the wealthy landowners from town divulges the horrifying truth that none of the other townsfolk want to talk about--that Jennet has returned often in the years since her death, and a sighting of this “Woman in Black” presages the death of a child.

This story reflects on the deep, indelible impressions death can leave on lives, and the damage that harshness, unforgiveness, and loss can have on the mind. The Woman in Black is everything I love in a ghost tale. It has great potential for re-reading often.

In Printer's Devil Court, a Victorian spooky tale, four medical students discuss the ramifications of interfering with death as it approaches. In truth, they should have talked about whether it's advisable at all. But, in the throes of youth untouched by the taint of regret and uncertainty, so many evils are perpetrated and simply never questioned in the face of imminent exploration and discovery. The experiments the men embark on in the cellar of their lodgings in Printer's Devil Court and a little used mortuary in a subterranean annex of the hospital is unnatural and horrifying.

Hugh, one of the doctors, found he couldn't continue with the unethical undertakings, but years later he's called back to the unpleasant memories of the events he had a unwilling but intrigued hand in bringing about. Now he sees the damage that lives on unceasingly. But is it possible to change the consequences of monstrous actions?

This story reflects on the deep, indelible impressions of life and death, what happens in-between, and how inept man is at playing God in these areas. The reader is forced to consider the frailty and violence inside men. This Frankenstein-like story swept me along, unable to put it down for long. As an author, I couldn’t help marveling at how the author chose the best narrator for this story. If she’d chosen any of the other medical students, the story wouldn’t have any the same impact. Stories like these make for good warnings against getting involved in ambiguous things that make you uneasy and are sure to keep your conscience at full alarm until you extricate yourself.

If you haven’t read a ghost story before or are simply looking for the best of its kind, these two are not to be missed.

Note that these stories are published separately as well as in the author's own collections.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Karen S Wiesner: {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Small Hand and Dolly by Susan Hill

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Small Hand and Dolly by Susan Hill

by Karen S. Wiesner

Susan Hill is one of those authors that effortlessly puts you directly into the fictional settings and personal lives of her characters (many of her stories are ghost and/or horror) with so much atmospheric reality, you're convinced of the authenticity of everything. Two stories that seem to go together extremely well are The Small Hand and Dolly. Both are unforgettable ghost stories.

The Small Hand was published in 2010. In this story, an antiquarian book dealer gets lost in the countryside after visiting a client and ends up at a derelict Edwardian House. While there, he's compelled to the entrance, where he feels a small hand slip into his own. This experience haunts him over the next several weeks, plaguing him with nightmares, unexpected panic attacks, along with further visits from this disembodied, ghostly small hand. His only choice is to delve deeply into the mystery of the house and its desolate, overgrown garden.

While the description of this story may sound vaguely silly, nothing about the story was that. The mere idea of this experience was always rendered as a genuinely chilling occurrence. I invested myself in this tale, as well as into the point of view of the main character with his investigations. I wanted to know what was going on. The answer wasn’t what I was expecting—the twist was even better than I could have hoped for.

In Dolly, published in 2012, the main character is a boy Edward sent to live with his aunt. While there, his like-aged, spoiled cousin Leonora comes to stay for the "holiday" as well. They're the children of siblings who hated each other. Their aunt Kestrel was the older sister of the two siblings. Kestrel's decaying Iyot House is situated in the damp, desolate Fens of Eastern England. Edward is polite and withdrawn, having learned to keep his thoughts private to avoid trouble. What a contrast he is to his bratty cousin who throws a fit about everything and anything. While the reader can't help feeling sorry for her because the girl's mother treats her like possession she's only sometimes in the mood for having around, sympathy can only go so far with such bad behavior. The one thing Leonora has always wanted from her mother is a specific doll. Knowing only that Leonora wants a doll for her birthday, Kestrel makes a special trip to get her a beautiful, expensive one. However, it's not the one Leonora has always wanted. She proceeds to smash it in her terrible rage at again not getting what she wanted (and probably not from the person she'd wanted it from). Edward picks up the pieces and puts it back in the box. All that night, he hears the paper around the shattered doll rustling along with crying. At first he puts the box under his bed, then into a deep cupboard, but the crying so haunts him, he eventually takes it and buries it in the church cemetery not far from the house.

Edward is a character you can’t help but love. The author put us directly into his situation, into his heart and mind, seamlessly. I could feel his shock and even a bit of awe at his cousin, who was beautiful to look upon, but his wariness toward her was warranted. Even as he longed for a companion, she was too selfish and volatile. The story also takes place when they're adult, after their aunt had died and her will is to be read. Even then, the characters are wonderfully brought to life.

The brilliance in this disturbing horror story is in the delicate hand the author displayed in fleshing out the psychology of the characters. Edward and Leonora are opposites--light and dark, good and evil. But light and dark, good and evil aren't easily defined or examined. Using the doll to explore the angle of whether evil is inherent or whether psychological damage causes it leads to a question about forgiveness or the lack thereof passing down through the generations of a family like a dark stain that those who experience it (firsthand, second, and on and on) can never wash off.

Note that both of these stories are published separately as well as in the author's own collections.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor 

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Karen S Wiesner: {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Man in the Picture and The Mist in the Mirror by Susan Hill

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Man in the Picture and The Mist in the Mirror

by Susan Hill

by Karen S. Wiesner

Susan Hill is one of those authors that effortlessly puts you directly into the fictional settings and personal lives of her characters (many of her stories are ghost and/or horror) with so much atmospheric reality, you're convinced of the authenticity of everything. Two of my favorite stories by this author, though it is very hard to choose, are The Man in the Picture and The Mist in the Mirror.

The Man in the Picture was published in 2007. An oil painting depicting masked revelers at a Venetian carnival has the power to entrap and destroy. This story is told from several points of view as those who have experienced the horror give heartrending testimony about what they've gone through, what they've lost. The overarching message of this very complex and well-written story is, Never underestimate the power of fury or the depths people will sink to in order to get revenge or to achieve their own goals. As an unsuspecting bystander caught up with the excitement of the celebrating crowds (a very apt comparison, considering this particular theme), I become ensnare within this novel and all the chilling events. In the process, I was swept along until I was all but lost in the storytelling. Every part of this tale of terror beguiled me. 

Set in the Victorian age, The Mist in the Mirror was published in 1999. The hero Sir Monmouth's life has been filled with travel. He's lived his life mostly alone, and there's an undeniable innocence about him. He believes unwaveringly in the innate goodness of his fellow man. As the story opens, he arrives in England intending to devote himself to learning more about a fellow explorer from the past, Conrad Vane, and perhaps document the adventurer's life. However, as he sets about following this trail, he's warned by many well-meaning others not to go down that road. Apparently, Vane was a man who plummeted the depths of depravity and cruelty and, even after his death, the foolish one who pursued him would become tainted by his evil. Extraordinary, disturbing events plague Monmouth with nightmares, involving a shrouded little boy and an old woman behind the curtain. Despite all this, he stubbornly continued on his course. Monmouth's quest quickly becomes a relentless obsession that threatens to steal his health, his sanity, even his life. Overarching themes in the story point to care being taken to the one you choose to make your idol, as that person may not be who or what you assume him or her to be.

While at first blush, this story didn't seem like there could possibly be enough material to flesh out into a full novel, it quickly became larger than life, frighteningly claustrophobic, the protagonist someone to rail against but also to sympathize—even emphasize—with as he lost control of his own compulsion. I read equally compulsively, lost in the fog that this gothic horror story seemed to conjure, blocking out my own reality. When I finished it, I couldn't shake the chill--and the warning to heed the regrets of the main character--that remained.

Both of these stories provide frightening lessons to be learned about taking anything to the extreme. Addictions can so easily steal and usurp purpose in life, so that a person becomes the opposite of what he or she intends or desires.

Note that both of these stories are published separately as well as in the author's own collections.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/

Karen S Wiesner: {Put This One on Your TBR List} Book Review: The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke

{Put This One on Your TBR List}

Book Review: The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke

by Karen S. Wiesner

 

In my past review of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, I talked about how the author Susanna Clarke signed up for a writing workshop in which students attending were expected to come with a short story they'd written. All Clarke had were "bundles" of materials for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. She extracted a piece of it about three women secretly practicing magic who are discovered by Jonathan Strange. That story is the title one in this collection of eight short stories, The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories, set in the same world as the larger novel, a fictionalized 18th/19th century England in which magic is becoming popular again, thanks to the efforts of Mr Norrell and his pupil (and later rival) Jonathan Strange. In that very in-depth novel, the duo themes are 1) that magic is given or bargained for from powerful and not necessarily moral beings that exist in another realm (faerie) and 2) that magic sometimes manifests in ways the wielder isn't intending.

In all the stories in this "off-shoot" anthology, the overwhelming themes are 1) the commonalities of magic in different time periods, 2) the undeniable (and, at times, even more diabolical) power of "women's magic", something that was taboo in this world, and 3) the ways in which faerie folk infringe on the real world--as if their own isn't exciting enough (and that may well be the case, considering their mischievous deeds).

In the title story, Jonathan Strange visits his brother-in-law, a country parson, where he's challenged by three female magicians. The author has said of this story that she wanted to find a place for these characters within the larger novel but, having read it now, I'm convinced it simply didn't and couldn't fit there. As a short story on its own, it has a compelling connection to the novel that made the author famous.

The second story, "On Lickerish Hill", is an interesting retelling of Rumplestiltskin. The unfortunate, young bride is placed in the demeaning role of wife to a monetary-seeking groom and has to find a clever solution to save herself. While the "archaic spellings" of the plucky heroine's speech were hard to read and decipher, the twist on one of my favorite fairy tales was particularly satisfying.

In "Mrs. Mabb" (the Queen Mab),  an abandoned woman is determined to get her fiancé free of black magic while everyone around her assumes she's hysterical (after being jilted) or insane, which was very common to presume about women of the day.

Interestingly, "The Duke of Wellington Misplaces His Horse" is actually set within the village of Wall, which has its origin in Neil Gaiman's Stardust novel. (For those who didn't read my review of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, the workshop co-host that read the extraction of Susanna Clarke's work from her novel was so impressed by her work, he sent an excerpt to his good friend, fantasy author Neil Gaiman who was astounded by her "assurance" as a writer: "It was like watching someone sit down to play the piano for the first time and she plays a sonata."). In this particular story, I was fascinated by what was considered common women's work being utilized by a pompous duke to bring about a fantastical conclusion.

"Mr. Simonelli, or the Fairy Widower" was a favorite of mine in this anthology, as an amoral faerie aristocrat has to be put down (by his own bastard son!) in order to save five sisters that strongly resemble the distinctive Bennetts from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice.

Three other tales cover fairy culture, including a fictionalized account of Mary, Queen of Scots, learning how to use magic to undertake her political machinations, along with featuring a central character in Jonathan Strange (John Uskglass, aka the Raven King) as Christian peasants revolt against pagan faerie.

While Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell was both compelling and unforgettable, this anthology of parallel stories that were published (separately) while the novel was being edited and prepared for publication and later (after the novel became a hit) collected in one place are much lighter and certainly more subtle--nevertheless, they're undeniably enchanting in their own right.

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

Visit her website here: https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

and https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/karens-quill-blog

Find out more about her books and see her art here: http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor 

Visit her publisher here: https://www.writers-exchange.com/Karen-Wiesner/