Shadowed Souls Anthology: Jim Butcher, Seanan McGuire, Tanya Huff, Anton Strout, Kat Richardson, Kevin J Anderson, Lucy A Snyder, Jim C Hines, Erik Scott De Bie, Kathryn Rusch, Rob Thurman

This anthology has a theme – and it’s generally a theme it’s handled quite well. Shadowed Souls are people who do not stand neatly in black and white morality and definitely straddle that uncomfortable grey shadow zone (ooooh title reference).

Firstly we have Cold Case by Jim Butcher with a story from the Dresden Files series. And if anything this is the story that defines the meaning of the book.

I like the exploration of Molly, now one of the younger Winter Queens with all the power and moral ambiguity of the Winter Court. The Winter Court has always been savage and dangerous and vicious – by design. It’s the bulwark against terrible outsider evil, it’s a court that has been built to fight an eternal, brutal war against monsters. The Winter Court is the very essence of dubious morality; of using monsters to fight monsters

I also like the how we go some way to explaining the rather bizarre horniness of the Winter Court. After all, Winter =/= generally mean sexytimes (except in Canada when hockey is cancelled). The bleak idea that Winter fae are super horny because of the war – because of the need to constantly breed because the war inflicts atrocious attrition on them is horrifying, bleak and very much in line with the theme of the court and the book.

So we have Molly, a character we know is a good and ethical and moral now with a whole lot more power and urges she has to learn to control – and having to do some really terrible things and make some really terrible choices for The Greater Good. Which is all the harder because Molly is a child of one of the Knights of the Cross, a man so good he gave literal demons multiple chances to repent. That’s a hard path to follow. We see both the good – upholding her duty to her people – and the terrible, her having to enforce the rules and sacrifices of the Winter court. And it is brutal. I love it

I am less thrilled with HOW Molly’s sexualness is portrayed here. So, yes, the Winter Court is horny, we know this – but in Molly this is interpreted by lots and lots of flirting. Which is fine, flirtiatious and sexually charged female characters are not a problem: but when Harry had the Winter Mantle he wasn’t sexually flirting – his thoughts were creepy and outright pushing for rape. It’s a stark contrast between male and female sexuality – especially when Molly also comes with a celibacy contract. And, yes, the story of sacrifice and suffering inherent to the Winter Court is powerful – but the backstory sets it in dubious light.

We do have a latino mage and several Native American supernaturals who play a decent role in the book

Sleepover by Seanan McGuire

While the opening story defines the theme of the book, I don’t see this book as fitting into the theme. The protagonist is a succubus but not inherently or unduly evil nor forced to make evil choices. She is coerced into a mission – but the mission is to rescue a child. That’s not morally ambiguous. And while we have a definite misunderstanding about why that child went missing, again there’s no real grey area so much as just a complete misunderstanding on the part of the humans as to how these beings work

I do love the whole concept of the world created – so much so that I think this book would be an absolutely awesome lead in to a new series so we could look at the Lilim and the Bogeymen and the culture and societies that are there that people have completely gotten wrong. If this is an excerpt of a longer series, count me in because the introduction of the main character and the world building definitely has me hooked

Also, lesbian protagonist who nods at LGBT cultural milestones without being defined by them – definitely here for this.

Carniepunk Anthology

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