The Monster's Corner

August 8, 2011
Spotlighting monsters of all varieties (other than the explicitly proscribed zombies and vampires), Golden (The New Dead) assembles a solid variety of tales. The best is Gary Braunbeck’s gonzo, metafictional “And You Still Wonder Why Our First Impulse Is to Kill You.” Simultaneously hilarious and heartbreaking, it gradually transforms into elegant musing on the nature of monsters in fiction even as the prose becomes deliberately chaotic. Other highlights include Tom Piccirilli’s “The Cruel Thief of Rosy Infants,” an intriguing faerie changeling tale; Sarah Pinborough’s “The Screaming Room,” a nice twist on the gorgon myth; Jeff Strand’s “Specimen 313,” an effectively funny tale of love and plant monsters; and Tananarive Due’s “The Lake” and David Liss’s “The Awkward Age,” both of which explore the nature of sexual predators. The few stories that miss the mark are well outnumbered, and readers will appreciate the diverse monsters, including radioactive giants and an Indian Rakshasi.

August 1, 2011

From Kevin J. Anderson's poignant chronicle of Frankenstein's monster brought forward to Germany in 1938 ("Torn Stitches, Shattered Glass") to Simon R. Green's reenvisioning of Christ's temptation by Satan ("Jesus and Satan Go Jogging in the Desert"), the 19 stories in this collection, edited by horror writer and editor Golden, are told from the point of view of the monsters rather than the heroes. A rakshasa seeks freedom after 200 years of servitude in Kelly Armstrong's "Rakshasi," while the tragedy of a monstrously large man, victim of an experiment gone wrong, plays out to its inevitable conclusion in David Moody's "Big Man." VERDICT Contributions from Sharyn McCrumb, Tananarive Due, Heather Graham, and others make this a strong themed anthology that should have general appeal.

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2011
This collection is powered by an excellent concept: let monsters be the viewpoint characters in their stories and thereby encourage regarding the ravening beast, the grave robber, even the ghoul with hitherto unlikely sympathy. David Liss' The Awkward Age ghoulishly riffs on a reversed Lolita theme. Lauren Groff's Rue touchingly retells a familiar fairy tale from the perspective of an old witch whose garden is more practical for those who steal flowers from it than the standard telling has led us to believe . In Torn Stitches Shattered Glass, Frankenstein's monster becomes the Golem and is still reviled and misunderstood, even though all he wants to do is help. The volume-closer, Simon R. Green's Jesus and Satan Go Jogging in the Desert, is an irreverent and charming piece that takes Jesus' temptation by Satan in the desert and gives the characters a chance to develop a very interesting relationship. All in all, a successful anthology with a broad variety of applications of its premise.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)