Sympathy for the Devil

June 21, 2010
Hugo winner Pratt turns his Locus-honed editing skills to the crowded field of themed anthologies. His chosen unifying element is the Devil, or devils, broadly interpreted in 36 original and reprinted works. Bygone days are represented by an excerpt from Dante's Inferno; well-known 19th-century tales such as Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown" and Stevenson's "The Bottle Imp"; and stories from the golden age of pulp fantasy, such as Bloch's "That Hell-Bound Train" and Sturgeon's "The Professor's Teddy Bear." The newer offerings are equally wide-ranging, including Kelly Link's poignant, recursive "Lull"; Holly Black's giggle-out-loud "A Reversal of Fortune"; and China Miéville's vividly creepy "Details." Anyone delighted by con games, terrified of damnation, and not offended by Pratt's cheeky dedication ("Thank you, Satan! I couldn't have done it without you") will find plenty to enjoy.

May 23, 2011
In the third volume of this annual series, famed editor Datlow brings together 17 stories published in 2010 in a variety of sources both popular and obscure. In Cody Goodfellow's "At the Riding School," a veterinarian makes a strange house call at a girls' school. Catherynne M. Valente's "The Days of Flaming Motorcycles," one of several zombie stories, sketches the life of the only living woman among the undead horde. John Langan uses self-conscious narrative to twist the werewolf story in "The Revel." The usual lists of honorable mentions and award-winners and a thoughtful assessment of the field will encourage readers to seek out the year's other notable horror stories. As always, Datlow delivers a top-notch anthology with a nice balance of new and established writers.

February 1, 2010
Adult/High School-This extraordinary compilation can be read as a coherent, unified text. Mainly composed of slow-burning tales with a deep sense of historical/political setting, the collection focuses on the horror to be found in the mundane facts of life, particularly family life: relatives who have died, broken homes, families struggling to hold together. The stories also challenge the traditional connection between horror and the supernatural. Many of them, such as Margo Lanagan's chilling "The Goosle," have no elements of the supernatural at all, and those that do, such as Steve Duffy's exquisite, heartbreaking "The Clay Party," often feature neutral or actively positive interactions with the Beyond. Instead, in almost every story, the horror comes directly from the evil or misguided intentions of humans. Inevitably, the pieces vary in quality, and one might have preferred a more critical introduction from Datlow, but this collection is not to be missed."Mark Flowers, John F. Kennedy Library, Vallejo, CA"

Copyright 2010 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2010
From a tale by Neil Gaiman about a black cat's involvement with his life ("The Price") to John Collier's story of a young boy's "imaginary" playmate ("Thus I Refute Beelzy"), this anthology brings together 36 stories, including Longfellow's translation of Dante's "Inferno: Canto XXXIV" featuring the devil in all his guises from Lucifer to Old Nick. Including classics such as Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown" and Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Bottle Imp" as well as more recent tales such as China Miéville's "Details" and Holly Black's "A Reversal of Fortune," the stories range from the humorous to the macabre. VERDICTThis collection should appeal to fans of dark fantasy and horror.

Copyright 2010 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2009
During a prolific editorial career, Datlow has published many colorful thematic collections of horror. Until now, though, she has never put her stamp on a best-of-the-year horror anthology. True to her expansive vision, this inaugural volume of a projected annual series casts a wide net over the genres many outlets, from magazines and single-author collections to webzines and literary journals. It opens with Datlows own comprehensive overview of genre highlights and trends, then offers a smorgasbord of creative voices in 21 tales and poems. E. Michael Lewis unsettling Cargo eavesdrops on the duties of a military cargo planes loadmaster as he chaperones the restless coffins being shipped from Jonestown after the infamous mass suicide. Steve Duffys The Clay Party provides outstanding period detail in a pioneer womans account of a werewolf-plagued wagon train in 1846. There are stories about strange finds in a book depository, a Wisconsin town besieged by a legendary monster, and a grown-up Hansel returning to the witchs house. Datlow delivers the gold again with a first rate compilation.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)