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Monday, October 31, 2016

Book Review: Shadowed Souls (Anthology) Edited by: Jim Butcher and Kerrie L. Hughes

Shadowed Souls 
Edited by: Jim Butcher and Kerrie L. Hughes
Authors: Jim Butcher, Kevin J. Anderson, Seanan McGuire, Rob Thurman, Tanya Huff, Kat Richardson, Jim C. Hines, Anton Strout, Lucy A. Snyder, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, and Erik Scott de Bie
November 1, 2016
Publisher: Roc
In this dark and gritty collection—featuring short stories from Jim Butcher, Seanan McGuire, Kevin J. Anderson, and Rob Thurman—nothing is as simple as black and white, light and dark, good and evil..

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what makes it so easy to cross the line.

In #1 New York Times bestselling author Jim Butcher’s Cold Case, Molly Carpenter—Harry Dresden’s apprentice-turned-Winter Lady—must collect a tribute from a remote Fae colony and discovers that even if you’re a good girl, sometimes you have to be bad...

New York Times bestselling author Seanan McGuire’s Sleepover finds half-succubus Elsie Harrington kidnapped by a group of desperate teenage boys. Not for anything “weird.” They just need her to rescue a little girl from the boogeyman. No biggie.

In New York Times bestselling Kevin J. Anderson’s Eye of Newt, Zombie P.I. Dan Shamble’s latest client is a panicky lizard missing an eye who thinks someone wants him dead. But the truth is that someone only wants him for a very special dinner...

And New York Times bestselling author Rob Thurman’s infernally heroic Caliban Leandros takes a trip down memory lane as he deals wih some overdue—and nightmarish—vengeance involving some quite nasty Impossible Monsters.

ALSO INCLUDES STORIES BY

Tanya Huff * Kat Richardson * Jim C. Hines * Anton Strout * Lucy A. Snyder * Kristine Kathryn Rusch * Erik Scott de Bie *
Author Kim Butcher as editor and editor Kerrie L. Hughes gives the reader 11 stories, all I assume in worlds the authors had written novels for.

Jim Butcher’s has Molly Carpenter in “Cold Case,” once apprentice of Harry Dresden and now, the Winter Lady, a queen of Faerie. Mab has her going to a contingent of Faerie in Unalaska, Alaska, to get tribute. She runs into wizard and Warden of the White Council Carlos Ramirez in a dive in the town. He was sent to investigate odd activity in the town. And when Molly finds her fae, they tell her of their stolen children that she goes to save, along with Carlos. Right into danger of Lovecraftian proportions.

In “Sleepover” by Seanan McGuire, a not completely human heroine, Elsie Harrington, (her other half being succubus) is abducted by a Bigfoot hunter for a bunch of teen boys because a Bogeyman took a young sister of one of them. So she heads underground to retrieve the child.

Vicki, the vampire P.I. in Tanya Huff’s “If Wishes Were” has her working to find a jinn and stop it, get it back in the lamp it had been let loose from.

In “Solus” by Anton Stout, two agents from the Department of Extraordinary investigate a castle on top of a skyscraper in New York City that may be haunted by a ghost.

Kat Richardson’s Peacock in “Peacock in Hell” is hired to bring back Lennie Redmayne from Hell.

In Kevin J. Anderson’s “Eye of Newt,” undead P.I. Dan Shamble is hired by a one-eyed newt to find out why a rock monster and a golem robbed him of his eye.

Jessie Shimmer and her ferret familiar search for a girl named Alice and what may have hatched from an egg inside a statue of Santa Muerte in “What Dwells Within” by Lucy A Snyder.

In “Hunter, Healer” by Jim C. Hines, Julia Chapel tends to otherworldly beings who come to her apartment hurt or ill, no questions asked, no wars allowed on her turf. She is assisted by a hearth fairy named Hob who cusses lie a sailor (actually refreshing, giving him a bit of odd character). Most of all, she is a double soul-her dead twin’s soul inhabits her body with her soul. Someone from her past, her father, Terrance, comes to visit her, asking for her help- with another double soul like her. But she doesn’t trust him, and not due to their past. Then she meets the deadly Shard for the first time.

Vivienne Cain, aka Lady Vengeance, a former demon-possessed supervillain and now a super hero drinks to keep her fear powers in control in “Baggage” by Erik Scott De Bie. She joins a fight gym and one night stops a guy hitting on the young woman behind the front desk.

In Sales Force by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Kaylee, loses her fiancée due to a car accident. He had promised they be forever, but death took that away. So, she goes back to her job, one she never told him what she did. But it would help her, as killing something day in and out can numb those feelings, so she’d never get hurt again. Except the job she is assigned first day back isn’t quite what she has always done. They want her to see if a love potion guaranteeing someone giving up on love 0r lost too much in life could have their belief repaired.

In the last dark tale, “Impossible Monsters” by Rob Thurman, Caliban came from the first murderers to walk the earth. Except there’s more beneath his human-looking skin. As he planned to let Coach know it.

Nothing is black or white, but again, that makes the hero/heroine a complex character and each story a great autumn read.

I give Shadowed Souls 5 sheep.




Pamela Kinney

2 comments:

  1. Had to pick up a copy of this today! Sounds like just my cup of tea. :)

    ReplyDelete