858 and counting …

• Posted in Books I've Read

Finished My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding. It’s a fantasy anthology of wedding-themed short stories.

I like anthologies for a couple reasons. First, you can try a lot of different authors for not a lot of money. Second, they’re good to read when I’m writing my own stuff because I can still read, but not become wrapped up in a long novel. Read a story here, read a story there, and before you know it, you’ve finished the whole book.

The book features stories by Jim Butcher, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Charlaine Harris, and several other authors. I’m just going to hit the highlights.

My favorite story in this anthology was Dead Man’s Chest by Rachel Caine. This one is about Cecilia, who gets married on a pirate ship, tossed overboard, and falls in love with the sexy, cursed captain. What can I say? I’m a sucker for pirates. This story had all the swashbuckling fun and romance of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. I really enjoyed the story and plan on picking up one of Caine’s Weather Warden books to get another dose of her writing.

My least favorite story? Spellbound by L.A. Banks, in which the Hatfields and McCoys wage a magical war against each other to try and keep two of their descendants from getting married. The story was funny in several places, but Banks had the characters talk in dialect. Ugh. I can see why she did it, but I just don’t enjoy reading dialect. She also portrayed the two families as backwoods and ignorant, another cliche that always makes me roll my eyes. There are backwoods and ignorant people everywhere, not just in the South. But you never seem to read about them being from New York City or L.A. 

But overall, there’s something in this anthology for just about every fantasy fan — vampires, Greek gods, even a story about an Elvis impersonater. So, thumbs up.

Up next: Not sure. Something from my TBR pile.

6 Responses to “858 and counting …”

  1. Chasity says:

    I’m not much on anthologies. For whatever reason, I just can’t get into them. Don’t get me wrong, I own tons of them, and I’ll read them. I always feel shortchanged and rushed when I read one. I like to dig into thick books, with lots of plot. When I read a short story, I don’t feel like I get the complete picture or the story never really reaches it’s potential.

    The only exception I’ve found to this is the Hot Blooded anthology and Angela Knights “Seduction’s Gift”. That one pulled me right in.

    Backwood dialect absolutely drives me crazy. I’ve tried on several occasions to ready Adriana Trigiani Big Stone Gap series and I get completely pissed after the first couple of chapters. It gets under my skin.

  2. Jennifer Estep says:

    I don’t read a lot of anthologies, but I’m usually pleasantly surprised by how good they are. And they always give me new authors to seek out. 😉

    I’ve got one more anthology in my TBR pile right now — Wild Thing. Features Marjorie Liu and some other folks.

    I read the Big Stone Gap series. The dialect didn’t bother me so much in those. I thought the first book was really, really excellent. The other two? Not so much.

    David Baldacci also wrote a book set in the region about a coal company trying to buy someone’s land — Wish You Well. That’s the name of it. A little schmaltzy at the end, but a decent read.

  6. Jennifer Estep says:

    Kerry — I’d never heard of Caine or the WW series before I read the short story, but now that I know about it, it seems like everyone who’s read it really loves it. The first book is definitely going in my TBR pile! 😎

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