6 Autobots
allhailgrimlock

Grimlock ♥ Ultra Magnus

I'm a well read grad student who's bluntly honest about all things, although I try to be most honest about myself.   

Currently reading

Separate Orbits
Yael Mermelstein
Progress: 119/427pages
BATMAN #53 ((Regular Cover)) - DC Comics - 2018 - 1st Printing
LeeWeeksBatman53, TomKingBatman53
BATMAN #54 ((Regular Cover)) - DC Comics - 2018 - 1st Printing
MattWagnerBatman54, TomKingBatman54
BATMAN #52 ((DC REBIRTH)) ((Regular Cover)) - DC Comics - 2018 - 1st Printing
LeeWeeksBatman52, TomKingBatman52
BATMAN #51 ((DC REBIRTH)) ((Regular Cover)) - DC Comics - 2018 - 1st Printing
LeeWeeksBatman51, TomKingBatman51
Infinity Wars: Iron Hammer (2018) #1 (of 2)
Al Ewing, Humberto Ramos
Champions (2019-) #4
Jim Zub, Jacinto Benavente
SUICIDE SQUAD #46 ((Regular Cover)) - DC Comics - 2018 - 1st Printing
JosLuisSS46, RobWilliamsSS46
SUICIDE SQUAD #45 ((SINK ATLANTIS)) ((DC REBIRTH )) ((Regular Cover)) - DC Comics - 2018 - 1st Printing
JosLuisSuicideSquad45, RobWilliamsSuicideSquad45
Champions (2019-) #3
Jim Zub, Jacinto Benavente

Successful horror, though not my favorite of Lorn's!

Full Moon Over Cedar Hill - Edward Lorn

This short story has a lot of elements working for it: it ratchets up the tension and I wasn't quite sure where it was going, at least up until near the end.   It creates a full main character, and shows you much of the action without much movement.   (Peter Hoskins is immobile, but you get a good sense of what is going on and how terrifying it is for him and the others around him without him moving at all on his own.  In fact, his immobility is used to great effect, creating even more of a tense, and chilling atmosphere.)

 

It just wasn't one of my favorite of what I've read by E.   One of the reasons is that Peter's dog is referred to a lot during this short.   In the end, I was sure it meant something, but I wasn't sure what, so I was left with the sense that I was being hammered on the head with a joke that I just didn't get.   It was frustrating.   Then again, the fact that I felt so frustrated was a good sign to me, as I'd gotten invested, mostly through and with Peter, and I wanted to get in on whatever E. was trying to tell me. 

 

In retrospect, it was sort of neat.   The constant reference to Peter's pooch made me believe that the ending would be quite different, and I was more shocked by my own expectations being defied than anything.   Then again, I'm still left wondering why the dog was mentioned so often.   There's one really obvious reason that seems too in-your-face to take seriously, but I can't see any other reason.   I've been taught that everything should have some relevance in a short story, and while I don't necessarily believe this is 100% true, I believe that it was something that should have been kept in mind during this story.   If you're going to bring up one element again and again and again in a twenty page short story, it feels like it should have some impact on the story itself.  

 

And even as I'm writing this, I realize that E. was trying to invest me more in this character, to show how lonely and isolated he feels, that his dog loved him best and the dog is now in care of a stranger.   The problem?   It worked the first time, even the second.   It worked to invest me, it worked to show that the creatures roaming around were more animal than human.  It lost that effect after the first couple of times, and made me wonder what else it represented, and I was distracted from the main tension and plot of the story.   

 

Then again, I have all this to mine from a twenty page short story.   And I would take note that my note favorite story/story I have a gripe with is still three and a half stars.   That is, even when I don't feel that E. is at the top of his game, he's still a damn efficient and successful storyteller.   I also have to wonder given the very open, honest, and touching foreword if this was a case of potentially being too close to his subject.   I found the foreword, in the end, more touching than the story itself, and that definitely helped the star rating.   I wanted to know more, although I feel like I'm prying asking for it, too!   His experiences, his connections, with the people he actually know?   There was something incredibly moving in that very short time that he spends talking about them, and how he still remembers them all.  I didn't need names or details, but I wanted to know more about how he felt so connected to the people, how it shaped him.   I'm not sure you can feel that connected to that many people and come out unshaped. 

 

Woud I suggest this?   Yes, definitely.   I think it's a slightly flawed, but very effective story, and it touches upon the helplessness and loneliness that the most vulnerable of people can feel.   It does so in a way that makes you want to comfort them, and keep them safe, and horrifies you when you can't and when you watch death stalk them in this story.   It makes you feel, even with my one gripe.   (That I realize I may have gone into too much detail and analysis about.  Apologies to anyone who didn't want to read a whole thesis on that!)

 

 

PS - this reminded me how much I adore Cruelty and what I've read of Bay's End.  I keep getting distracted by clanky robot sex, but I must read more of Cruelty/all of Bay's End, soon!