A troubled young couple on a cross-country road trip takes a wrong turn in the Nevada desert. A voodoo spirit makes a bloody pact with a house cat.
A father’s confrontation with his young son’s bully turns violent. An elderly man gets personalized messages in a fortune cookie. A home invasion takes an unexpected turn. A medieval monastery is infested with an ancient, predatory evil. A used car salesman makes a purchase from a time-traveling madman.
These are nine odd tales. No more, no less.
Stories included:
-Killer on the Road
-Traffic
-A Song of Sixpence
-The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down
-Daetana Dash
-Bully
-Precious Blood
-A Moment of Clarity
-Fred and Ol’ Mama
Odd Tales by Jonathan Face. Published independently, June 7th, 2019. Kindle version runs 366 pages. I received a free copy of this book from BookSirens in exchanged for an honest review.
*Triggers* Slight child abuse and animal death in the story Bully.
Wow, ok, this was a super fun book! Seriously. I almost never read short story collections (from one author, I do read anthologies though) because it’s always so up and down, hit or miss. Even when it’s an author you love, sometimes the short story collections just don’t work out as well as their full length books.
I picked up this book to read, though, because of the gorgeous, eye catching cover it has. Love the retro pulp style of it. I also like the old school feel of the cover because the stories take place in a bunch of different time periods. It felt like the vibe of the cover and the stories fit really well together. The title is also perfect, because these are definitely some odd stories!
Odd Tales is a super quick novel to read. Even the longest story was pretty fast to fly through. None of the stories felt too bogged down or boring. The pacing was pretty perfect.
A few stories really stood out. Loved Traffic, Song of Sixpence, Daetana Dash, A Moment of Clarity, and Fred & Ol’ Mama. Fun, fast, and clever. My favorite might be Fred & Ol’ Mama? Makes me wonder about what my pets REALLY think of me. 😮
Like I mentioned earlier, it’s hard to find a collection of short stories or anthologies where all the stories are pretty good. Odd Tales is one of those books. I really liked all of them. I rated each one with a 4 or a 5. There were only two that had a score of 3, but not because they were bad. One, Bully, had a lower score because a pet was killed (which always gets a point taken off from my rating) and it felt like it was a little bit too abrupt with the ending. I would have liked a little bit more meat to the story. The other 3 star rating, Precious Blood, just wasn’t my type of story. I don’t want to say why, because that would be a huge spoiler! I’ll just leave it with it is not my favorite type of horror monster. So, even the ones I rated lower, it isn’t because the stories were bad. Except killing the pet bunny. 😡 Don’t kill the pets! Ever.
This was a great book. I really enjoyed it and I would highly recommend it. So glad I got a chance to read this book. 🙂
Creature From The Book Lagoon 