This is my second read by Brian Evenson. The first one made a very strong impression, and this one didn't fall too far behind. 
Evenson certainly continues to live up to his reputation as a master of the literary horror. His writing style draws directly on the old-time genre masters like M.R. James and company. Except that those stories have never quite worked for me: too slow, too dense, too soporific.
Evenson uses similar style and tone, but his writing is better paced and much more engaging. 
Branching out here, a number of stories were science fiction. They were more or less tangentially related but interspersed throughout the collection with seemingly no rhyme or reason. They took a bit to get into.
What Evenson excels at most is a sort of quiet unease - oh how they creep :)
The only drawback I can think of is that sometimes his stories are a bit dullish or stodgy. But this is ever so minor and occasional. 
Overall, a lovely collection for bedtime reading for discerning genre fans. 

​I don't care for fantasy and I'm highly selective about sci-fi, but this collection featuring stories of both those genres turned out to be a real winner.
I picked up this book because I've been meaning to check out Swanwick's writing and found the title and cover difficult to resist. Besides, I've always believed that a talented author can make any genre (within reason) appealing. And right I am, because Swanwick's natural storytelling ability and wonderful imagination made these tales of strange and fantastic sing, irrespective of their genre. 
Even high fantasy works here. 
Every story was engaging and interesting. Tale after tale delighted and entertained. What a terrific introduction to the author.
I enjoyed this collection immensely and would recommend it to all fans of speculative fiction. Thanks Netgalley.

​The elegant gilded cage on the cover makes light of the grotesqueness of the subject, but the title does it justice. Slashed beauties were the anatomical specimens of yesteryear, and the author squeezes out the most oomph out of the macabre pulchritude of them.

The dual timeline plot revolves around three women of the past, trying to make their way in a man's world by plying the world's oldest profession, and one woman in the present, determined to finally set them and their story to rest.

And yes, this is yet another one of those "wronged women fight back against wicked men" sort of book, but that's all the market seems to want these days. Gender dynamics stopped requiring nuance a while back - now it's all about the convenient, easily digestible binary of good and evil.

This was a debut novel, and, as debuts often do, it tried to cram too much into itself. Some things worked better than others for me. The past timeline was much more compelling than the present. The witches thing came across nonsensical and unnecessary. The ending was way overexplained and dragged out. The final twist/character revelation was nicely done. As was the historical fiction aspect. 
As a result, the read was a bit of a mixed bag. but overall, the writing was strong, and the book entertained sufficiently. So I'm going to round up my rating. 
Thanks Netgalley.

I love object histories. An axe, for all its numerous practical applications, has long been inseparable in public consciousness from murder. Thanks, Lizzie Borden.
But hey, she didn't start this. In fact, there's a long, time-honored tradition of whack jobs and ... um ... all their whacking that goes back to the olden days. For convenience or pragmatism or a myriad other reasons, time and again people have ... well, cleaved other people. Or chopped them. 
There are many ways to describe this, although the book's title does it best.

Though relatively slender, this account took six years from idea to print. The end product is very much worth a read. Well researched, engagingly written, and thoroughly informative, it'll ensure you never look at an axe the same way again.
Recommended.
Thanks Netgalley.

I was always going to love this. But seldom does my love for books hinges so heavily on the main characters and so lightly on the plot as it does with this series. I don't even read series. Or spy fiction.
I'm just that into Villanelle. She's an absolutely fantastic fictional creation, a true stroke of genius.
The books themselves ... well, they are okay, plot-wise. Especially if you like spy fiction. Which I really, really don't. All the endless double crosses, half-baked political intrigues, and power games get tiresome very quickly. 
The writing is solid, better than okay, and occasionally out-of-the-blue funny in a way I appreciate. There's a great nod to the BBC show's all-time-worst ending, too.

But then you have Villanelle (and Eve, of course) who are so much more than okay. For all their numerous faults, they are vibrantly, viciously alive. Not to mention maddeningly in love in a way that confounds them both. Apart, they are interesting. Together, they are magic.

So yeah, I'm so there, for this and any other adventures Luke Jennings will conjure up for those two.  
Thanks Netgalley.

Only Forward is difficult to describe, because it's kind of nuts. In the best possible way.
This was MMS' much-acclaimed, award-winning debut, and he threw all he had into it. The result is a kind of awesome kitchen-sink adventure, constantly propelled in the titular direction.

On a surface, it's about a guy named Stark hired to look for a man who disappeared. But that makes it seems like a sort of detective story and tells you nothing of a wild, wild world Stark lives in, with fascinating pocket neighborhoods and their "choose your own reality" modus operandi.

MMS infused his novel with mad energy, stunning worldbuilding, and some killer plot twists too. The writing is funny, imaginative, clever. There's so much to love about this book.
​
I've no idea how it would be published today, in this formulaic publishing industry. Because this book plays by its own rules. As good books do. And all books ought to. Recommended.

This book reads like a tongue-in-cheek joke that goes on too far. That's the tricky thing about getting meta just right. 
The story takes place over a single morning of a nameless author putting off writing his novel while obsessing over a popular author named Jordan Castro. Sounds clever, doesn't it? Or at least, precocious.
It sort of veers toward the latter, as Castro proceeds to heavily rely on minute detail to make what is essentially a sketch of a short story at most into a small novel. If you're into spending pages upon pages reading in exhaustive detail about the protagonist making coffee and pooping, you'll struggle to find a better read.
And sure, it's yet another cleverly jocular trick of trapping the readers in the unpalatable and unexciting to punch up the point. But also ... what is the point?
Castro, also a poet, can write and rather well. That much is obvious. What's less obvious is what he's trying to say.
For the writers in the audience, a lot of his musings and procrastinations will strike all too true. For the general public, it's difficult to say what the book will do. But it is, at least, a quick read.