Audiobook Review: Out of Tune Edited by Jonathan Maberry

This is a short story collection of horror and dark fantasy tales based on old ballads.  The audio book is narrated by Peter Bishop and Lesley Ann Fogle.  Each story is followed by a short commentary on the folklore associated with the ballad by Nancy Keim Comley.

I found Mr. Bishop’s narration pleasant to listen to, while his voices didn’t change much from the narration.  Ms. Fogle’s voice was too monotone for my tastes, though after a few minutes I was generally enthralled by the story and it didn’t bother me anymore.  I loved her character voices, which were excellently done.

I didn’t find any of the stories particularly scary, though some were creepy and unsettling.  Familiarity with the ballads increased my enjoyment of the stories.  Having said that, I didn’t feel any detriment when I wasn’t familiar with the ballads, and in a few cases I’m sure it helped with suspense.

The stories are all excellent quality, though individual tastes may have you disagreeing with my ratings.

***** “Wendy, Darling” by Christopher Golden

This story combines a ballad theme about mothers with Peter Pan as Wendy prepares for her wedding. - I wasn’t familiar with the ballad theme this riffed off of, so it was delightfully creepy learning Wendy’s secret and the truth of the Lost Boys.

**** “Sweet William’s Ghost” by David Liss

A woman cheats on her fiancee and comes to regret it. - The story is told from the lover’s point of view and he’s quite a piece of work.  There’s black humour in his beliefs about women, though his sentiments and swearing may offend.

**** “Black is the Color of my True Love’s Hair” by Del Howison

A man must make a difficult decision when the daughter he wanted so badly turns out to be as prophecised. - While I would have liked more background information on the wife, I found this story quite creepy with a horrifying ending. 

***“John Wayne’s Dream” by Gary Braunbeck

The unnamed narrator arrives for their AA meeting only to find it cancelled and a special concert being shown instead. - The story is slow as it mixes what’s happening in the present with flash backs of the protagonist’s childhood.  I’m not a fan of cowboys or ‘real men’ rhetoric, and while the story shows their potentially caustic nature, it wasn’t a story I particularly liked. 

**** “Bedlam” by Gregory Frost

Tom, captain of The Bedlam, journeys home with his crew to find the woman he loves but hasn’t seen in years. - This story changes part way through, making it feel like two stories.  While the change took me a moment to comprehend, it made the story something other than a prose retelling of the ballad it’s inspired by.  

**** “Awake” by Jack Ketchum

A jazz musician struggles with a respiratory disease and marital problems. - It starts slow and ends dark.

*****“John Henry, the Steel Drivin’ Man” by Jeff Strand

The bigger and bigger exploits of John Henry are told. - This story’s a lot of fun.  I was left thinking that the few hints you get of the narrator’s story sound creepily interesting and might make a great story too.

**** “Fish Out of Water” by Keith R. A. Decandido

A dive tour operator helps find a missing vessel that reported seeing a mermaid before losing contact. - This is a short story featuring Cassie Zukav, a character Decandido has written about several times.  No knowledge of the other stories is necessary to understand this tale as everything is explained, though some mention is given to previous events.  In addition to mermaids, expect some Norse characters.

**** “Making Music” by Kelley Armstrong

A female lyrics writer gets a commission to write for a famous musician. - An entertaining story with a great ending.

***** “Tam Lane” by Lisa Morton

A young architect in training’s father buys an old haunted house she greatly admires, where she has an unusual encounter. - Knowing the ballad this was based on meant I could better appreciate the ways the author subverted the story.

***** “John Barleycorn Must Die” by Marsheila Rockwell and Jeffrey J. Mariotte

A recovered alcoholic is sent to do an interview with three sisters who have started their own brewery. - Highly descriptive writing.  While it’s easy to figure out where the story’s ultimately going, it’s interesting seeing the protagonist struggle with his own demons first.

***** “In Arkham Town, Where I was Bound” by Nancy Holder

Edgar Allen Poe visits some rich ‘relatives’ in hopes of some money or a loan to help with food and medicine for his dying wife. - A sad story of love, trust and betrayal.

**** “Driving Jenny Home” by Seanan McGuire

Lee has trouble letting go of her dead girlfriend. - Another sad story, this time one of grieving.

**** “Hollow is the Heart” by Simon R. Green

A reporter is trying to get his job back by writing a story about a local legend.  The hollow women are mysterious women who prey on unattached men. - A few things about the story were predictable, but it’s well told and the hollow women legend is quite interesting.

Audiobook Review: War of the World by H. G. Wells

Read by: Christopher Hurt

This review requires a preface.  I listened to this on vacation in the Dominican Republic, where it was very hot and sunny.  I also wasn't sleeping well.  As a result of listening, rather than reading, I often closed my eyes to avoid the glare of the sun on the beach and, would subsequently, fall asleep.  So I got through this book rather sporadically, having to rewind and listen to things twice because I wasn't paying attention the first time and making a general mess of the experience.  Please keep that in mind as you read this review.

Pros: lively narrative (audiobook version), pseudo-science, lots of detail

Cons: disjointed reading made it hard to remember the numerous details Wells peppered the novel with, pseudo-science

A professor & writer of philosophy details what he witnessed during the Martian attack of London and its environs.

As with other books of the period, The War of the Worlds is presented as the narrator's account of true events.  The book tries to make the science plausible, explaining what the Martians must have been thinking, why they attacked and how they got their ships to Earth.  The story pauses at times to explain what the Martians look like, how their machines work and how quickly the red weed they brought with them grows.  While Wells tries to get his science right he ultimately fails since there was so much he didn't understand about space travel, etc.

The ending of the book, which always seemed so strange given the obvious advanced knowledge of the Martians makes sense here, given their evolution and difficulty in examining the Earth at close range (based on the science of the time).  In other words, if, like me, you've only seen the film (and I mean the 1953 version), then you don't know the real story.  In fact, much that happens in the film is not in the book and vice versa, particularly the love story (in the book the protagonist spends most of his time trying to rejoin his wife, whom he fears has died in his absence).  Similarly, the book has only minor religious overtones, much less than the film.

The book includes a lot of details about the Martians, their looks, actions, etc. but there are few details about their feeding, which is presented as a horror and then ignored.  I'd have liked to know more about that, as it played a large role in their invasion.

I highly recommend the audiobook.  I've found from reading other Wells novels (Invisible Man, Island of Dr. Moreau) that his narrative style is rather dry and hard to read at times.  But listening to the book, well, that was an experience.  The narrator really made this come alive (my fatigue notwithstanding).

Audiobook Review: The Thirteen Hallows by: Michael Scott and Colette Freedman

Read by: Kate Reading

Pros: fantastic narration, interesting interpretation of British and Christian mythology, good pacing, suitably evil bad guys

Cons: minor character and plot problems, lots of repetition

Judith Walker is aware that the other Keepers of the thirteen Hallows are being killed and her turn is coming.  So she's not too surprised when she's accosted one afternoon.  She is surprised that a young woman comes to her rescue.  

Sarah Miller's life changes forever when she helps an old lady.  Her kindness leads shady characters to her home who later threaten her life, asking for what Judith Walker gave her.  Sarah must figure out what they want and honour a dying woman's wish to pass on and protect an ancient artifact.

The narrator, Kate Reading, did a fantastic job.  Her reading is crisp with different voices for each character, including accents.  And you don't understand just how jarring curses can be until you hear a woman playing a man, swear.  

The book has good pacing, alternating between chase scenes, attacks and down time where you got to know the characters - both good and bad - as well as, eventually, more about the Hallows themselves.  I would have loved to learn more about each individual Hallow, but thought their background blended British mythology and Christian religion together in a fascinating way.  Perhaps the next book will explain more about the various holy objects and their powers.

A few things about the characters and the plot bothered me.  They weren't inconsistencies per say, but they did come accross as strange.  Sarah's actions with the sword for one, and her lack of care concerning the damage she does with it.  This is partly explained but I imagine she would still have a stronger reaction, given her character and the seriousness of her actions.

Another regarded the Dark Man.  He's been searching for the Hallows for years, slowly killing the keepers.  And yet, he plans his finale when he still has several Hallows left to acquire.  Seemed to me he should have waited a bit and secured the last ones before starting his final plans.

Given how fascinating the mythology of the book was, I was disappointed it took so long to dole out some of that information.  While the chases and attacks were interesting, if often gorey, I found the history of the Hallows a lot more compelling with regards to finishing the book.

I probably noticed this more because I listened to an audiobook rather than read the text, but the authors repeated information a lot.  It made it easier to pick up the story after a week, but it was also a bit irritating when I listened to long stretches at once to hear basic information repeated several times.

If you liked The Da Vinci Code, this is the book for you.

Audiobook Review: Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson, narrated by Michael Kramer

Pros: fantastic narration with individual voices, good pacing, lots of action and intrigue, highly visual

Cons: characters keep fighting despite serious injuries

Waxillium Ladrian has been called back to the metropolis of Elendel from the Roughs to take over his deceased uncle's business.  No longer accustomed to life in the city, after spending so much time as a law keeper in the Roughs, Waxillium tries to subvert his natural tendencies in order to be a good lord.  But those intentions fall away when the latest in a spree of robberies and kidnappings hit too close to home.  Joined by his former partner Wayne and a clever young woman studying law at the university, Wax is determined to solve this case.

Sanderson has created a fantastic world.  The Alloy of Law takes place some 300 years after his Mistborn trilogy, but you don't need to read that in order to enjoy this novel.  A cross between fantasy and western - with a little steampunk thrown in - it's helped usher in a new subgenre of fantasy (others that do the same thing would be Gemma Files's A Book of Tongues, Christine Cody's Bloodlands and Mike Resnick's Buntline Special).  The mythology is touched on briefly, but the real treat here is the 'magic' of Allomancy and Feruchemy, both ways to manipulate metals.  Wax is a twinborn, meaning he can do both forms of magic - using his metal minds he can manipulate his weight and as a coinshot he's able to push on steel.  These abilities, combined with a steady hand and sharp wits make him a formidable lawman.

Wayne acts as necessary comedic relief from Wax's melancholy and seriousness.  Wayne's abilities are to create a speed bubble in which time flows faster for him (allowing him to dodge bullets and have private conversations in a room full of people) and the ability to heal himself quickly, provided he has health built up (done by being sick for an equivalent amount of time in advance).

The audiobook narrator, Michael Kramer, does an amazing job.  Not only is the narration crisp and clear - properly enunciated and easy to follow - but he does voices too!  Each character, when speaking has their own individualized voice.  And Wayne, who uses disguises throughout the book, is voiced with various accents.  It's absolutely remarkable and made listening to the book such a pleasure.

The book is well paced, with downtime and action all culminating in a great showdown.  And so much of the story is easy to visualize.  When Wax flies through the mist in his billowing mistcoat, guns blazing...  This book would make a fantastic film.

The only real 'complaint' I had, was that Wax managed to keep fighting even when subject to multiple injuries.  Given that he has no healing abilities (unlike Wayne) it seemed a bit far fetched that getting shot wouldn't faze him beyond a little bit of pain.  But that didn't detract from my enjoyment of the book at all.

If you want a different kind of fantasy, like westerns or just good storytelling, pick this one up.  It's the first in a series but wraps up nicely so if you don't feel like continuing you don't have to.  Though, the fantastic writing and fun characters will probably have you waiting impatiently for book two.