Official Review: Eclectic: Ten Very Different Tales
Posted: 01 Sep 2012, 17:04
[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "ECLECTIC: Ten Very Different Tales" by Jonathan Hill.]
ECLECTIC: Ten Very Different Tales is a book of ten short stories roughly 40 pages in length. The stories all vary in genre meaning this book has a story for just about everyone.
This being a book of short stories, it's very difficult to talk about each individual story very much without giving away any spoilers. Its a book I would definitely recommend reading and as such, do not want to ruin any part of it. I can however give a very brief overview of some of the contents.
There are stories of a man forced to live with a traumatic incident from his past who, at times struggles to tell the difference between dreams and reality, a young boy living in hardship while being tormented by bullies at school and even a humorous poem about a medical students trying to diagnose a patient thrown in for good measure. These are just three of the stories of course, but the others are equally as thoughtful.
I planned to read this book slowly over the next few days, however once read the first story I was drawn into the book. Each story, though being only a few pages seemed very long. I read them in a matter of minutes, but by the time finishing felt like I had read an entire book. These are some of the most well paced stories I have read in a long time. They don't start off very slow and drone on only to wrap the entire story up in a few sentences, rather they ease you slowly into the conclusion to each story.
One thing I really appreciated about this book was the suspense. I read the whole thing in one sitting simply because I needed to know what happened next in each story. As each one progressed I would feel the story coming closer to a conclusion, only to stumble across a plot twist at the end. I thoroughly enjoyed each story individually and applaud the book as a whole. I'm giving this book a 4 out of 4 stars and don't feel as though this is a generous ranking at all. Hard as I tried to come up with some gaping flaw that could affect my judgement of this book, I found none significant enough to deter me from giving it a good score. I look forward to reading more works from this author in the future.
***
Buy "ECLECTIC: Ten Very Different Tales" on Amazon
ECLECTIC: Ten Very Different Tales is a book of ten short stories roughly 40 pages in length. The stories all vary in genre meaning this book has a story for just about everyone.
This being a book of short stories, it's very difficult to talk about each individual story very much without giving away any spoilers. Its a book I would definitely recommend reading and as such, do not want to ruin any part of it. I can however give a very brief overview of some of the contents.
There are stories of a man forced to live with a traumatic incident from his past who, at times struggles to tell the difference between dreams and reality, a young boy living in hardship while being tormented by bullies at school and even a humorous poem about a medical students trying to diagnose a patient thrown in for good measure. These are just three of the stories of course, but the others are equally as thoughtful.
I planned to read this book slowly over the next few days, however once read the first story I was drawn into the book. Each story, though being only a few pages seemed very long. I read them in a matter of minutes, but by the time finishing felt like I had read an entire book. These are some of the most well paced stories I have read in a long time. They don't start off very slow and drone on only to wrap the entire story up in a few sentences, rather they ease you slowly into the conclusion to each story.
One thing I really appreciated about this book was the suspense. I read the whole thing in one sitting simply because I needed to know what happened next in each story. As each one progressed I would feel the story coming closer to a conclusion, only to stumble across a plot twist at the end. I thoroughly enjoyed each story individually and applaud the book as a whole. I'm giving this book a 4 out of 4 stars and don't feel as though this is a generous ranking at all. Hard as I tried to come up with some gaping flaw that could affect my judgement of this book, I found none significant enough to deter me from giving it a good score. I look forward to reading more works from this author in the future.
***
Buy "ECLECTIC: Ten Very Different Tales" on Amazon