Short Stories – Page 97 – Cannonball Read 17

Oftentimes these ministers of darkness tell us truths in little things, to betray us into deeds of greatest consequence

Tales from Shakespeare by Mary and Charles Lamb

January 14, 2019 by vel veeter Leave a Comment

I read this book because of how often it’s mentioned in 19th century Victorian novels (as well as novels about Victorian England) as being just one of those novels on the shelves in houses for children. There’s something fascinating about this book in a kind historical sense, and relatively boring in a literary sense. So the book was published in 1807 and is a prose version of a handful of Shakespeare plays: King Lear, Othello, Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Much Ado about Nothing, […]

I wish for more

The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories by Mahvesh Murad, Jared Shurin, eds.

January 5, 2019 by ElCicco Leave a Comment

I picked up this 2017 collection of short stories because it featured contributions of several writers whose work I’ve reviewed before and liked, and the subject of djinn (or jinn or genies, whatever term you prefer) has been popping up on my radar quite a bit lately. The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories was a brilliant way for me to start CBR11 — immensely entertaining, sometimes provocative, and an entree to the works of writers new to me but whose work I will definitely be tracking down. The stories are a wonderful mix of styles and settings and shed light not only on the nature of the djinn but on human nature as well. The djinn, created by Allah from smokeless fire, are sometimes depicted as tricky and/or evil, but in some ways they are no different from humans.

Lyndsay Faye is the best.

The Whole Art of Detection: Lost Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes by Lyndsay Faye

January 4, 2019 by narfna 12 Comments

I’ve read quite a bit of Sherlock Holmes pastiche, though by no means even close to all of it, and so far, I think Lyndsay Faye’s version of Holmes and Watson is my favorite. This collection, which was gifted to me by Bunnybean for Book Exchange in CBR9, is made up of fifteen stories published over a period of ten years, many of them in The Strand, the very same magazine that published Conan Doyle’s original stories. All of the stories mimic Conan Doyle’s style, […]

Good, eh, okay, and sweet

A Very Austen Christmas by Robin Helm, Laura Hile, Wendi Sotis, Barbara Cornthwaite

January 4, 2019 by crystalclear 1 Comment

So I was inspired by my lovely book exchange gifts to attempt to read through all of the Pride and Prejudice variations I currently own. I say “attempt” because it’s a lot. I started off with A Very Austen Christmas, an anthology of Christmas stories, because it’s seasonal I guess. And the wifi is broken at my house, so that means more reading at home instead of noodling around on the internet! “Her Christmas Gift” by Robin Helm This is a Pride and Prejudice story, […]

I have now conquered the complete Sherlock Holmes.

The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes (Sherlock Holmes, #9) by Arthur Conan Doyle

December 31, 2018 by narfna 2 Comments

I’m glad he went for one more round. I liked all of these better than the ones in His Last Bow. Because I’m fast running out of review posting time, I’m copying and pasting all my mini-reviews for this book. I will hopefully put up a real review on Goodreads HERE within the next couple of days, and also a full review of The Complete Sherlock Holmes HERE. I’m not posting it on CBR because I’ve already counted all nine books to my tally this […]

Tony, informed, said: They love funerals.

The New York Stories of Elizabeth Hardwick by Elizabeth Hardwick

We Live In Water by Jess Walter

Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk

Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk

Goodbye Mr. Chips by James Hilton

Lyra's Oxford by Philip Pullman

Elementals by AS Byatt

December 31, 2018 by vel veeter Leave a Comment

New York Stories – 4/5 Stars I read Elizabeth Hardwick’s collected essays earlier this year. I also read her novel Sleepless Nights last year. This is a collection of stories that encompasses about 45-50 years worth of short stories edited and selected by Darryl Pinckney, another novelist and critic who also famously worked with and was friends with Hardwick. I read these stories in a variety of orders, and since they are not part of an intentional collection this blending and mixing up of the […]

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