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juushikaTitle: Bloodstones
Editor: Amanda Pillar
Published: Western Australia: Ticonderoga Publications, 2012
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 295
Total Page Count: 129,463
Text Number: 377
Read Because: review copy sent to me by contributor Stephanie Gunn /azhure
Review: Seventeen stories of monsters more unique than vampires: ghosts and gorgons and shapeshifters, hidden in plain sight on the fringes of the mundane and urban. Each story appears in Bloodstones for the first time, making it welcome exposure to new fiction (and writers, most of them female!) that unfortunately falls into the pitfall of purpose-written stories: transparency and redundancy. About half the stories walk a single path: Wikipedia-based research, a culturally-appropriative monster and a white protagonist and/or setting, a suburban plot, and a final reveal that the protagonist, not the mythological creature, is the "real" monster. Each story ends with an afterword which, more than redundant, is actively harmful, highlighting its ad hoc roots. The effect is formulaic but the potential of the premise is there—and 100 pages in with Anderton's original and finely detailed "Sanaa's Army" the collection takes an upswing; Maric's "Embracing the Invisible" has a strong sense of place which plays well off its fantastic elements, Rabart's "The Bone Plate" has a powerful and grizzled voice, and Gunn's "The Skin of the World" is a somewhat stilted but resonant end to the collection. It takes more than a unique monster to make a unique story, and some of these have that—but too few do, making Bloodstones middling on the whole: readable, in some ways a refreshing twist on urban fantasy, but also a squandered opportunity. I enjoyed some of the offerings but don't recommend the collection on the whole.
Review posted here on Amazon.com.
Editor: Amanda Pillar
Published: Western Australia: Ticonderoga Publications, 2012
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 295
Total Page Count: 129,463
Text Number: 377
Read Because: review copy sent to me by contributor Stephanie Gunn /
azhureReview: Seventeen stories of monsters more unique than vampires: ghosts and gorgons and shapeshifters, hidden in plain sight on the fringes of the mundane and urban. Each story appears in Bloodstones for the first time, making it welcome exposure to new fiction (and writers, most of them female!) that unfortunately falls into the pitfall of purpose-written stories: transparency and redundancy. About half the stories walk a single path: Wikipedia-based research, a culturally-appropriative monster and a white protagonist and/or setting, a suburban plot, and a final reveal that the protagonist, not the mythological creature, is the "real" monster. Each story ends with an afterword which, more than redundant, is actively harmful, highlighting its ad hoc roots. The effect is formulaic but the potential of the premise is there—and 100 pages in with Anderton's original and finely detailed "Sanaa's Army" the collection takes an upswing; Maric's "Embracing the Invisible" has a strong sense of place which plays well off its fantastic elements, Rabart's "The Bone Plate" has a powerful and grizzled voice, and Gunn's "The Skin of the World" is a somewhat stilted but resonant end to the collection. It takes more than a unique monster to make a unique story, and some of these have that—but too few do, making Bloodstones middling on the whole: readable, in some ways a refreshing twist on urban fantasy, but also a squandered opportunity. I enjoyed some of the offerings but don't recommend the collection on the whole.
Review posted here on Amazon.com.
