Thursday, December 20, 2007

Shuan Jeffery Writes Campfire ready horror!


Voyeurs of death by Shaun Jeffrey
Doorways Publications 132 pages

This short trade paperback from the UK’s Shaun Jeffery was a fun read. The most positive aspect about the book that comes immediately to mind is that the stories seem designed less for the page and more for a campfire. That is something I would expect to see more often but you really don’t. I found that aspect refreshing.

I struggled with this review because I came away from the book wanting to read Jeffery’s novel and that should be a good thing right? Jeffery is talented wordsmith who has a lot of wonderful ideas my problems with collection are small but they are enough to prevent me from giving this a glowing review.

I think this deserves discussion. My favorite story in the collection was “The watchers.” It was a beautiful set with a creepy tale about couples who meet in public spaces to have sex and be watched or watch others. Plenty of potential for scares and just when I felt the story was getting going it was over. For me this was the running theme of the book. While many of the positive reviews (I haven’t seen other bad ones) liked the short nature I felt let down.

I liked what was there I just wanted more.

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