Big thanks to Adam Groves of The Bedlam Files for his recent review of The Neo-Decadent Cookbook, edited by Brendan Connell and Justin Isis! And while you’re there, check out the VAST archive of book and film reviews – a fantastic reference!
You can find out more and order the book here: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/books/books_neo-decadent.htm
“Shorter fiction is often an incubator of thought experiments and this proves to be the case with Rosanne Rabinowitz’s first collection, Resonance and Revolt (Eibonvale Press). These stories span historical European settings, contemporary Britain and the near future. The collection is thematically linked around the concepts of resistance and Lynda Rucker discusses in her introduction how Rabinowitz’s evocative prose gifts the reader with a sense of history and also a present that feels layered by the lives of those now past.”
Grab the book here: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/books/books_resonance.htm
A review of Hal Duncan’s Testament has been published on The Future Fire website.
“Ultimately, Testament is a fascinating exercise in reconsidering revealed truth. Duncan’s book ends with the Fall of an Empire, a Pilate in riot gear, and the Everyman on the precipice of a new world in the making. Given how profoundly we, too, are on the brink, with rising fascism and global catastrophe edging ever forward, it’s well worth considering what roles we ourselves want to play in this new world, whether as readers or revolutionaries.”
Thanks to Cait Coker for this one!
http://reviews.futurefire.net/2016/03/duncan-testament.htmlhttp://reviews.futurefire.net/2016/03/duncan-testament.html
Order the book here: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/books/books_testament.htm
A great new review of Quentin S Crisp’s collection Defeated Dogs.
http://www.britishfantasysociety.org/reviews/defeated-dogs-by-quentin-s-crisp-book-review/
“Quentin S. Crisp delights, informs, disturbs and confuses in equal measure. Really, what more could a discerning reader ask for?”
Thanks to Craig Lockley for this one!
An absolute rave review of Alexander Zelenyj’s Songs for the Lost from Rising Shadow – this book definitely seems to be having an effect on those who read it. Maybe you will be next? 🙂 Click through to http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk to try this strong medicine for yourself!
“Every once in a while – if you’re lucky – you’ll come across a short story collection that is so unique and stunning that it’ll make you marvel at its contents. Alexander Zelenyj’s Songs for the Lost is such a collection. It’s an exceptionally good and original collection of speculative fiction stories that are marked by intelligent storytelling, supernatural elements and beautiful and eloquent literary prose.”
http://www.risingshadow.net/articles/433-a-review-of-alexander-zelenyj-s-songs-for-the-lost
The first review in of Alexander Zelenyj’s Ballads to the Burning Twins is up.
Though it was technically a companion piece to Songs for the Lost, this is indeed Eibonvale’s first ever poetry collection available for general release, so a bit of a landmark! Click here to have a read.
Our first review of ‘Caledonia Dreamin’ came in last week, Eibonvale’s groundbreaking anthology of dark fiction of Scottish descent exploring some of the wonderful words afforded us by the Scots dialect. That our first reviewer’s first language is not even English, never mind Scots, is just one reason for us to take our hats off to her. Margrét Helgadóttir writes:
“These tales are weird, terrifying, dark, beautiful, disturbing and funny. It was quite a thought-provoking read. Some of these stories are amongst the best stories I have read for quite a while and I recommend the book for not only the lovers of Scotland, the Scots language or linguistics in general, but for all fans of the weird and unexplainable, or people who enjoys plain good writing…
…There is a sincere voice throughout Caledonia Dreamin’, either the characters speak directly to you or whisper to you as if from the corner of a bizarre dream. In hindsight I think that this is the main reason why I spent such a long time reading this book. It’s such a challenging voice, difficult to not be moved or troubled by. And I can’t help but wonder if it’s the Scottish language that creates this feeling of the sincere and true voice. The editors have done a fine job creating this flow and expression.”
Read Margrét’s review in full over at the Future Fire review site.
Pauline Masurel has handed in a rave review of Eibonvale’s railway anthology ‘Rustblind and Silverbight’ over at The Short Review website. Pauline writes:
“There are twenty-four stories in this chunky book, which is billed as A Slipstream Anthology of Railway Stories. Many of the stories take liberties with reality, slipping effortlessly into fantastic worlds, but many of them are also quite strongly rooted in reality. This seems appropriate, given that railways are part of the edgelands, borderline places that divide landscapes. The book isn’t a cyberpunk, geek-fest of futuristic fiction but more of an insidious virus eating away at veracity. If ‘strangeness’ is the primary defining feature of slipstream literature then this collection has it by the carriage-load…
…This book may not be the ideal Christmas gift for a trainspotting old buffer (although it might be just the ticket if he or she has suitably open-minded, eclectic reading tastes). But I think it could induce at least a modest portion of train-appreciation in the most vehement rail-deniers. Reading this anthology I became convinced that every story should have a railway in it somewhere; it’s just that no one has realised this before. Try it out for yourself, but don’t forget to mind the gap…”
Our thanks to Pauline. Please do support her website by reading the review in full.
Our stalwart American follower, Adam Groves of The Fright Site has posted a glowing review of Dan Watt’s extraordinary tour de force “An Emporium of Automata”. Adam comments
“A most welcome reprinting of a collection originally published in 2010 by Ex Occidente Press, who specialize in extremely expensive limited editions. For this trade paperback version Eibonvale Press provided a gorgeous cover design, but of course it’s the content that really makes this book one of Eibonvale’s finest publications to date…
D.P. Watt has a decidedly unique imagination and a love of esoteric wordplay (sample sentence: “I had not taken you for one who skulks behind the scenes to see God’s entrance debased to pure mechanism”). His writing is reminiscent of horrormeisters like Thomas Ligotti and Robert Aickman, yet it displays the verve, literary mastery and idiosyncratic worldview that denote a standalone master of the form…”
Please do check out Adam’s review in full at: http://www.fright.com/edge/AnEmporium.htm
Our very first review of Brendan Connell’s Miss Homicide Plays The Flute is in, and Adam Groves of The Fright Site seems to have been knocked sideways by it. Adam writes:
“Here’s how Eibonvale Press categorizes this typically atypical novel by Brendan Connell: “Fiction, Mystery/Thriller, Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror.” Content-wise it’s sold as “A relentless symphony of pleasantries and things unpleasant sketched with the inimitable style of a master’s hand.” I couldn’t have put it better myself!
…The insanity of the story is complimented by the author’s miscellany, if miscellany is even the correct term for the odd dreams, lengthy “recipes” of murderous methodology, brief glimpses of Hell (“…and the sinners suffering therein–them being fried in great pans, chopped into little bits with huge hatchets”), lengthy descriptions of the artwork the heroine admires and overall obsession with ancient Greece (evident in passages like a description of a nightclub that devolves into a highly eccentric dissertation on Greek dance). Such things may qualify as deviations from the main narrative, or perhaps it’s the other way around. Either way this is a fascinating oddity that resembles nothing so much as itself.”
Thanks, Adam!
The Eibonvale Press Blog 