One
of my chief complaints about short story collections, particularly those with
multiple authors, is the wild unevenness in the stories. While some are well written and
engaging, others are something to slog through. Overall, this was my experience
with Carnie Punk, an anthology of
stories all centered around small town carnivals.
Each
story is in no way connected to the other, and each is related in some way to
the carnival setting. In some
cases, the authors chose to write a stand-alone story, while others wrote a
story connected to their other urban fantasy works. The stories that are connected to other series are by
Deliliah S. Dawson (the Blud), Kevin
Hearne (The Iron Druid Chronicles),
Allison Pang (Abby Sinclair),
Jennifer Estep (The Elemental Assassin),
Kelly Meding (The Strays), Nicole
Peeler (Jane True), and Kelly Gay (Charlie Madigan). Even though I have never read any of
these series, the majority of the authors did a great job of bringing me up to
speed on their characters and the worlds in which they live.
Since
it is fall and the season of witches, goblins, and werewolves, the setting of
creepy carnivals worked for me.
Each author gave their own spin to the idea of a carnival, but most, if
not all, of the stories were filled with dread, darkness, and fear. With the exception of one story, the
stories focused on the horror aspects rather than humor or romance.
The
stories in this anthology ranged from “ho-hum” to awesome. Truthfully, some were uninspiring. Here is a sampling of those stories I
found to be the best.
My
favorite was one called “The Werewife” by Jane Wells, about a husband who is
tired of dealing with his newly turned wife. I also enjoyed “Painted Love” by Rob Thurman about a
sidekick in love with a carnival woman. Rachel Caine’s “The Cold Girl” was a
well-written story that was fun to read.
Jennifer Estep’s “Parlor Tricks” was enjoyable, as was Jackie Kessler’s “A
Chance In Hell”. “Daughter of the Midway, the Mermaid, and Open, Lonely Sea” by Seanan
McGuire was very different from the other stories, and it was great fun to
read.
The
other stories in the anthology just did nothing for me. Whether the problem was that I have not
read their connected series (in some cases), I don’t know, but I do know that a
30 page short story can take longer to read than a 100 page book if you are not
interested.
Given
that there are 14 stories in this book, and I enjoyed 7 of them, I can say that
I enjoyed about half of the book.
I am not sure that is enough for me to give it the seal of
approval. Given the wild
unevenness of the writing, I say that Carnie
Punk is really for hardcore fans of the urban fantasy genre, those people
that love a good carnival, or devotees of the authors contained within its
pages.
*I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Regina
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