[Reviews by Annie Dean]

Dear John

Grade: C-

Dane Harley was poor white trash wrapped in Goth girl giftwrap. John Stratton lived in a big Victorian house on the hill. In their misspent youth, they ran wild together. Ten years ago, she left him in the lurch because of some crazy shit John’s daddy said about her ruining John’s future. Okay, so maybe I can buy she would be that simpleminded as a teenager. At 17, I bought into some pretty dramatic shit. So she takes off and cuts ties to her hometown of Chatham Village.

Now she’s back for the high school reunion and she hasn’t seen her best friend Roxy in all those years. They haven’t spoken either. Instead of calling her a thoughtless bitch and slamming the door on her, Roxy invites Dane in for some heavy drinking and girl bonding. They relive old times and go through the yearbook together. Read an old love letter John sent Dane. Of course they decide Dane should look John up and make amends for…yep, you guessed it. Writing him a ‘dear John’ letter.

Ms. Kent’s writing style in this story doesn’t rock my world, but it doesn’t annoy me either, although it occasionally veers toward the purple. On page 23, the heroine “practically screamed at him” and then at the bottom “she screamed at him, trembling with self-hatred”. That’s a little florid for my tastes.

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[Review by Annie Dean]

Grade: D

I think Confessions of a Serial Bitch is supposed to be a chick lit series of connected novellas because despite the warning that this title contains graphic sexual material and isn’t meant to be read by anyone under 18, there was no hot boinking. Talk about false advertising. Shit, I got more action when Brian Wheatley felt up my booblet in the 8th grade.

Instead, we receive a short glimpse into Hadley’s life. She’s 28 and about to divorce a douchebag named Glen, who apparently married her for her money and then proceeded to cheat on her egregiously. Glen isn’t about to let her go easily, though, and Hadley is dumb enough to agree to one last date with him, where he takes out to a desolate location on a “picnic” and then when she won’t succumb to his manly charms, he proceeds to bruise her arms and shoulders, knock her into a tree and then abandon her to walk seven miles back to town.

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Grade: D+

Dear Bam,

So… I read A Witch in Time, and the only reason I don’t regret it is ‘cause I got to read something of Darragha’s, and…color me surprised, I actually liked it! I’m sure everyone’s read your review so I’ll cut to the chase: I can’t figure out what the other two stories were doing in this antho. I know the first is supposed to be a historical witch story and the last should be a futuristic witch story. Say that again? This whole shmegeggie gets a D+. Wow, that’s bad.
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Grade: D+
I’m gonna go ahead and say it: Darragha Foster’s story is the only one in this anthology that didn’t make me want to alternatingly pull my hair out or douse my brain in bleach. Ms. Foster’s previous works have always been a little over-the-top, melodramatic, far-flung, and wacky for me, but ultimately I always find myself enjoying them. Ironically, her contribution to this anthology is the only one with its feet planted firmly in the ground (haunted whalebone dildos notwithstanding), namely because she… and stay with me here… actually tells a full, layered story that has a beginning, middle, and end. That Darragha… what a nut. Imagine telling a real story in an anthology of… stories. Look, it’s right there on the cover. Meanwhile, Robin Danner’s tale of a witch involved in a sex orgy cult had me going, “What? Who are these people? How did… Why did… Whuh?” Xandra Gregory’s story, on the other hand, had a lot of information to share about her characters, their worlds, and all of that good stuff, but… I had no idea what the hell she was talking about most of the time. She seemed to be throwing a bunch of science-y sounding stuff, but none of them really meant anything. Seriously, this anthology is like the Goldilocks of storytelling elements: one had too little, one had just right, and the other had too much… only you can’t actually identify what’s floating around in the porridge, so you don’t really want it. Nice cover, though.
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Grade: D+

Ugh, I hate writing reviews for short stories as I always have a hard time finding things to say. Give me a 400 paged book any time. At least there would be a lot for me to tear into. As short as this is–14 pages–I find that I’m more likely to pick on the little things like dialogue tags. Good god, the dialogue tags! There are so many of them. Observe: “he commented,” “he beamed,” “she laughed,” “I explained,” “he pontificated,” “he pleaded”. Sometimes there are two or three of them in one paragraph! Oddly enough, it’s an eye-opener for me. A good friend who edits my work tells me I too use too many dialogue tags, so now I watch for them like a hawk. I’m a lot more aware of them now, where as before, I used to ignore them. Thanks, Good Friend! Well, enough about me. [By Golly, Tim’s right! I do try to make everything about me!] This short story is more in the vein of Shirley Jackson (if she wrote for Penthouse Letters) with a dash of Harold Robbins [written by a fifteen year old girl trying to sound like a grown-up] than an erotic romance. Actually, it’s a straight up erotica. The sex is hot enough, though it took a little too long to get there (and it’s only 14 pages), and I found myself rolling my eyes on more than one occasion, mostly because of the cheesy dialogue or the overwrought prose. It would have been lurid and scandalous if it were written in the 80’s, I’m sure, especially since there is a dated feel to it. Honestly, I was picturing the characters walking around in my head with heavy-duty shoulder pads and overly teased bangs, carrying around fluted glasses of sham-pag-nee. Ironically, this short story’s one saving grace is its very own cheese factor and luckily for the author, I have a high tolerance for cheese.
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