Solstice of Dawn
Well that was hot as fuck. The opening had the perfunctory feel of the professional, but then there’s all the great little descriptive bits about Lydia’s appearance, and walking back, and some awesome FF sex.
This description:
“Felt the movement of hard muscle beneath firm skin. It reminded her of the soldiers that came to the brothel. Not the softness of a woman, noble, or merchant. This was a woman who travelled, who might even have fought.”
So awesome, it just lays out Lydia’s body in a few words and builds so well on the other mysterious standing in the rain, feeding the raven.
So would the hint be that Lydia buried Anora – there not being anybody else around who might do so?
And, heh, I liked how Varia keeps the figure of Aluma close when she too is happy for a little night time seduction from the dark.
Solstice of Dawn by SinfulWolf
I do love this world you've created, and I must admit I have a soft spot for witchy characters. Of course, I almost always comment on writing style when I review something, because that is so important to me, and yours is absolutely fascinating with a beautiful, unusual flow. Melodic yet not too wordy. Of course the sex scene was nicely hot and indulgent, suiting for this anthology's only f/f love scene (currently). Lovely story.
A Xenophiliac’s Christmas Carol, by PlagueClover
The warning about cuss words got me laughing before the story even began.
The world of the story works, even though you only have short-story space to describe it.
I liked the use of a gray as the ghost of Christmas future. Especially when it gives Extany the ol’ needle in the eyeball.
The ending is a bit predictable. Extany never seems to give any thought to changing his ways, so it's no surprise when he ultimately tells Lacuna to suck it.
Speaking of Lacuna, I like that you included one non-humanoid in the mix.
Jello, by Desiderius Price
There's a lot in this story that I didn't understand:
-Nobody acts like it's a big deal that there's a naked guy walking around, yet this can't be a common occurrence in Megan's world, or she would have seen more than two penises by this point in her life.
-Megan didn't know in advance about the bombing, yet she doesn't seem surprised by it, or concerned that all her co-workers are dead. Is she meant to be a psychopath, or something like that?
-Why did the whole family end up dead? And who were those two men?
A Visit From Shota Claus By George Glass
Admittedly I skipped over a lot of this story because of the subject matter, but I did read the beginning and the end. I really love your writing style. It's fluid and elegant without being wordy. Your characters come off naturally. I'm sorry I can't comment on much else, but you are an awesome writer.
Solstice of Dawn is a truly wonderful sequel to the eve of hollow souls. A truly marvelous world. To see the acknowledgement that light is not good and dark is not evil. As the characters are delightfully human.
A quote that best comes to mind.
"Those that fear the darkness have never seen what the light can do."
Outreach – by InvidiaRed
The style is rather interesting. I think anthologies like this really are a great time to experiment. This style of writing, I think it can work really well for a short story (as here) but I don’t think it’d work for anything much longer. Each sentence being a paragraph, especially at the start for the time in the hole, made every bit a little more impactful. Almost like poetry. I think where it was showing it’s weaknesses was when it came to dialogue. It felt a little disjointed, and didn’t flow very well, and since a single character had multiple lines, sometimes I wasn’t entirely sure who was speaking at a given time. Still, a rather nice story with a lovely ending, and your setting is quite interesting indeed. Certainly shows all the work you’ve put into it.
Christmas, Bloody Christmas – by TCR
I told you some of my more specific thoughts already, but overall this is pretty good. Fair bit of action, desperation, and a rather heavy ending. Well done.
Santa’s Sleigh – by DP
I’m not entirely sure what to think of this one to be honest. I mean, we have a character that was damn near indoctrinated by the church and almost committed a terrible act but now seeks redemption, however he still treats his wife like shit and doesn’t seem to be trying overly hard to get that redemption. I don’t know if Isabel acts shrewish because that’s how she is, or because she’s been driven to that point by Fitz.
In contrast to your other story for this anthology, I felt Fitz had some decent emotional weight behind him though. Even though the events were still quick, I think it’s because we’re seeing his reaction to it all in the present as he explains it to a stranger.
Your writing is good, and this setting is unsettling as I’ve said before, but this particular entry left me a little confused to exactly how powerful the church is.
A Visit from Shota Claus – by GeorgeGlass
I didn’t read this one because of the content. I looked over the start and the end, and you had a good hook to get into it and pull the reader in, and the ending was a nice one, but I can’t much else for the remainder.
Christmas, Bloody Christmas
Well, with this and Desiderus’ story the young and innocent aren’t having the best Christmas. I thought the combat action flowed really well, that was a pretty engaging fight scene.
“He aimed his weapon at her with a sickeningly pleased grin, finger wavering over the trigger. Celeste pulled her lips back with a bloody sneer.”
Now that was fuckin’ badass!
Trying to read one story a day with these! Looking at the title and story code I think I might need to give GeorgeGlass's story a miss, but I'm sure it's very well written.
A Visit from Shota Claus
The beginning and end were very well done. I just kind of shut down for the middle, though. But you know I love your writing, aside from that!
Christmas, Bloody Christmas by Tcr
Dude you know I love it when you hit me with the real action. This is nicely teeming with it: death destruction, flawed characters, guns, more guns... I may be all for super strict gun laws in real life, but in fiction, they're fucking awesome. Keep up the good work boi.
Santa's Sleigh by Desiderius Price
Sigh, that father Jordan and his evil gaybashing-but-strangely-very-gay gadgets. If he was in our universe, I bet I know who he'd vote for.
It was nice to see familiar characters even though I haven't read your chaptered fics, having read a couple of your oneshots has given me a little more insight into this world. There were a few moments that made me laugh, a few moments that made me want to strangle a priest, and a few moments of 'awww'.
It was a sweet little flashback story and nobody died. I was totally gonna give you a hard time about that, but then I remembered nobody technically died during the course of my story either, so I guess I'll resist the urge to be a dick, just this once. Awesome story, DP.