By: Rachel Caine, Delilah S. Dawson, Jennifer Estep, Kelly Gay, Kevin
Hearne, Mark Henry, Hillary Jacques, Jackie Kessler, Seanan McGuire, Kelly Meding, Allison Pang, Nicole Peeler, Rob Thurman, Jaye Wells
When I first saw this anthology I leaped to request it –
so many of the authors included in it are the authors I already read and
already love, a collection of stories by them was definitely something I was
sure I’d be able to devour in seconds, loving every word.
I preface the review with this to make it clear that my expectations were very very high – perhaps too high given my oft mentioned dislike of short stories. This left me feeling a little disappointed.
Firstly, on the book overall I was impressed by the unity
of theme,
short story compilations by different authors can feel very disjointed as
you are buffeted from epic story to laughing comedy to heart wrenching tragedy
that makes them almost impossible to read in one sitting because they’re so
different. While the writing style of
this book was, obviously, very varied the overall theme not just of Carnivals
but of something sinister, dark and something pretty creepy was generally well
maintained throughout. I don’t know if it was intended or if the authors just
find carnivals as creepy as I do – but nearly every story had a strong sense of
the creepiness, the alien and the outsider about them that helped keep the
whole book together as a coherent whole which I appreciated.
In terms of the stories, the ones by the authors that
drew me in were very much their style, but also nothing special and didn’t form
much of a useful addition to their own stories:
Kevin Hearne’s The
Demon Barker of Wheat Street, was a fun ride with characters I’ve come to
know and love. Atticus, Oberon and Granuaile are always immensely fun romp
around a Carnival, fighting evil with humour and flair with odd moments of
depth and emotion to it that so characterises Kevin Hearne’s work; it’s good
but not his best, lacking in style or real relevance to the world he has… if you’re not a fan of the series already
you’re going to be a little lost reading this one – and a little Spoilered as
well, which is a bad choice for a short story, I think.
Jennifer Estep’s
Parlor Tricks, is much the same. If you know her world and her characters
then it’s a great read, a nice continuation and nice to see Gin in some
semi-downtime. If you don’t know her world then you’re probably going to be
more than a little lost as the full weight of her massive Ashland world is
thrown at you. As a fan and a current reader of her series, I enjoyed it while
still feeling I wouldn’t have missed anything if I hadn’t read it. That’s a
good thing in the sense that I don’t want my series to depend on me tracking
down anthologies, but bad in that I left the story feeling I hadn’t gained
anything.
Seanan McGuire’s Daughter of the Midway, the Mermaid and
the Open, Lonely Sea, surprised
me in that it didn’t seem to be related to any of her actual series. While I liked
this story, I also felt that it was the only one that didn’t fit the overall
theme of the book, though I quite liked the subversion of finally presenting
the Carnie’s point of view and taking their otherness that had been so pushed
through the rest of the stories and making that a strength rather than the
sinister nature that had been pushed so far. It was an excellent close to the
book.
Notable
others were Painted Love by Rob Thurman,
it was the first story in the book and did a very good job of setting up the
dark and sinister theme; the fantastic and the other, the evil and the cruel,
the hidden threats as much as the hidden wonders. It was an excellent choice
for the first story. But, as far as the story itself goes, it didn’t work for
me. It had a nice twist ending but to make that work it forced a lot of
character interaction that didn’t make a lot of sense and some very stilted
descriptions. The story also had an over-wordy, over-introspective style that
I’ve never particularly cared for. It did really set up the sense of the other –
in ways that go beyond the simple supernatural creatures we’ve already known - and
definitely laid the groundwork for the creepy, the evil and the sinister
