Take his hand and follow him into the darkness ...John Connolly, bestselling author of five brilliantly scary mystery novels, now turns his pen to the short story to give us a dozen chilling tales of the supernatural. In this macabre collection, echoing masters of the genre from M R James to Stephen King, Connolly delves into our darkest fears - lost lovers, missing children, subterranean creatures and predatory demons. Framing the collection are two substantial novellas - "The Cancer Cowboy Rides" charts the fatal progress of a modern-day grim reaper, while "The Reflecting Eye" is a haunted house tale with a twist and marks the return of private detective Charlie Parker, the troubled hero of Connolly's crime novels. "Nocturnes" is a masterly volume to be read with the lights on - menace has never been so seductive ...
This was my first experience with John Connolly, and I think it was a really good place to start. His short stories are very Lovecraftian, and while I don't think they were as good as [author: Neil Gaiman]'s short story collections, I still enjoyed most of them. The opening story, The Cancer Cowboy Rides, is the weakest - I'd have preferred to see it pushed towards the end, or not included at all.
The novella at the end is part of Connolly's Charlie Parker series. I thought it was easy to enjoy without having read any of the rest, although I could see threads of stories that fans probably recognized. In any case, I liked it so much that it was the deciding factor in giving this collection 4 stars instead of 3. I will definitely be checking out more Charlie Parker novels in the future.
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23 June, 2008:
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23 June, 2008:
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