The Merry Spinster

by Mallory Ortberg

[leahrosereads]

The Daughter Cells - 3/5 - I wish it was longer and filled with more gore and horror. I'd love to see this story explored as a full-length novel.

The Thankless Child - 2/5 - I may not have the necessary smarts to really get this story, but I found it boring and not all that horrific. There are elements of it, but this definitely needed to be a couple more pages to really flesh it out fully.

Fear Not: An Incident Log - 1/5 - Religious retellings are usually not my cuppa tea to begin with, but I always try keeping an open mind. I read recently on Twitter to avoid using "boring" to describe books, so I'll try to explain why I disliked this so much outside of that word. I didn't feel like there was any depth to the narrator, and since this is called Tales of Everyday Horror, this story is probably the most lacking in horror. It wasn't horrific. It wasn't depressing. It didn't make me think. It just left me unimpressed.

The Six Boy-Coffins - 5/5 - The Merry Spinster may be the catchier title, but this IS the book. It's got the horror, it's got great characters, awesome narrative, and it's all in all some fantastic storytelling. This is the story I wish all the others were like.

The Rabbit - 5/5 - Easily the second best story in this collection, following The Six Boy-Coffins. Oh, the rabbit is one of the creepiest characters I've met in books/short stories/movies/what have you.

The Merry Spinster - 3/5 - A bland retelling that once again needed more pages to develop fully, and it needed probably better placement in the collection. It followed to fantastic stories, and it was completely lackluster compared to them.

The Wedding Party - 1/5 - I can't remember this story, and that's not a good thing. Most unremarkable story in this collection.

Some of Us Had Been Threatening Our Friend Mr. Toad - 3/5 - I don't know the original story/inspiration for this, but it was OK.

Cast Your Bread Upon the Waters - 4/5 - The characters, mainly the mother, absolutely made this story. The plot and whatnot isn't great, but she's fantastic.

The Frog's Princess - 2/5 - Very disturbing, and I don't normally have issues with stories like this, but this one bothered me a bit. I'd say it could even be triggering for some people. Without spoiling anything, if you want to know, I can talk about it in DMs.

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors - 3/5 - Another meh, not so horror-y story.

I really wish this wasn't labeled as Horror, because it's what I was expecting going into it. Ortberg can tell tales, but not always that convincing.