A sharply imagined, emotionally intelligent collection about the quiet terrors of the human condition.
An unsettling and skillfully curated anthology exploring the price of secrecy and the psychological terrain of those who carry it.
Across 12 stories, this collection, edited by Visosky and Vislay, plunges readers into realms where ordinary lives meet the uncanny, and where truths unravel with quiet violence. The entries span genres, from literary horror to speculative SF and dark fantasy, but all share a common preoccupation: what happens when hidden things come to light. In Laura Foley’s “Rare Steaks,” one of the most gripping tales, a man navigates a deadly banquet with a tyrannical king, where “revenge is [a] dish best served rare, and the secret of the nation prevailed.” In rich, tactile prose, the piece explores political defiance masked as ritual; it reads like myth, but cuts like history. Another standout, “Alone / Together” by Adam Bassett, explores grief and memory via speculative technology. When a woman opts to erase her trauma, she finds herself haunted not by what she remembers, but by the knowledge that something is missing: “She felt as though she’d been handed a live grenade. The pin was still in, but it seemed too feeble a way to prevent an explosion.” Soon, the boundary between love and loss becomes disturbingly porous. Elsewhere, stories probe strange pacts (as in C.W. Stevenson’s “More Than a Lamb for Súile Buí”), and internalized guilt; Rowan Wolf’s “Remedy,” for instance, features subtle, devastating scenes of a mother tending to her daughter’s burn while whispering, “We practiced what to say….You remember?” These quieter moments often hit hardest, revealing the anthology’s strength, not just in its concept, but in its psychological precision. Katie Hallee’s foreword effectively frames the collection’s thematic concern: “Secrets are born out of necessity….Left unattended, however, they can turn on us.” This idea recurs throughout, not only in content but in form, as many stories withhold as much as they reveal, mirroring the opacity of the human psyche. The prose often favors restraint over spectacle, making the horror feel personal and the speculative elements intimate.
A sharply imagined, emotionally intelligent collection about the quiet terrors of the human condition.Pub Date: April 22, 2025
ISBN: 9781963029062
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Alex Parker Publishing
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
Engrossing worldbuilding, appealing characters, and a sense of humor make this a winning entry in the Sanderson canon.
A fantasy adventure with a sometimes-biting wit.
Tress is an ordinary girl with no thirst to see the world. Charlie is the son of the local duke, but he likes stories more than fencing. When the duke realizes the two teenagers are falling in love, he takes Charlie away to find a suitable wife—and returns with a different young man as his heir. Charlie, meanwhile, has been captured by the mysterious Sorceress who rules the Midnight Sea, which leaves Tress with no choice but to go rescue him. To do that, she’ll have to get off the barren island she’s forbidden to leave, cross the dangerous Verdant Sea, the even more dangerous Crimson Sea, and the totally deadly Midnight Sea, and somehow defeat the unbeatable Sorceress. The seas on Tress’ world are dangerous because they’re not made of water—they’re made of colorful spores that pour down from the world’s 12 stationary moons. Verdant spores explode into fast-growing vines if they get wet, which means inhaling them can be deadly. Crimson and midnight spores are worse. Ships protected by spore-killing silver sail these seas, and it’s Tress’ quest to find a ship and somehow persuade its crew to carry her to a place no ships want to go, to rescue a person nobody cares about but her. Luckily, Tress is kindhearted, resourceful, and curious—which also makes her an appealing heroine. Along her journey, Tress encounters a talking rat, a crew of reluctant pirates, and plenty of danger. Her story is narrated by an unusual cabin boy with a sharp wit. (About one duke, he says, “He’d apparently been quite heroic during those wars; you could tell because a great number of his troops had died, while he lived.”) The overall effect is not unlike The Princess Bride, which Sanderson cites as an inspiration.
Engrossing worldbuilding, appealing characters, and a sense of humor make this a winning entry in the Sanderson canon.Pub Date: April 4, 2023
ISBN: 9781250899651
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: April 11, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2023
SEEN & HEARD
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