A Chorus of Wolves
by
Alex Kimmell
190 Pages
Published by Booktrope Editions, October 7, 2013
Genre: Horror, Short Stories
Reviewed by Albert Garcia
In an uncertain world, we cling to familiar things to make us feel secure: Baseball, a local watering hole, a friendly town sheriff, man’s best friend, a nicely landscaped backyard, love…
What happens when these safe havens become unsafe? When the familiar turns outlandish and incomprehensible? Come join the choir of surreal dark melodies that lurk in the wilderness of Alex Kimmell’s imagination. Six unforgettable tales plus the mind altering first chapters of the upcoming new novel Down the Sunday Hole where a young boy finds himself shoved beyond the borders of perception.
What happens when these safe havens become unsafe? When the familiar turns outlandish and incomprehensible? Come join the choir of surreal dark melodies that lurk in the wilderness of Alex Kimmell’s imagination. Six unforgettable tales plus the mind altering first chapters of the upcoming new novel Down the Sunday Hole where a young boy finds himself shoved beyond the borders of perception.
A Chorus of Wolves by Alex Kimmell is a collection of short tales, vignettes of life not as we know, but how we hope it will not be. These are not sweet bed time stories to sooth the restless night. No in fact they are exactly the opposite.
In A Chorus of Wolves, Kimmell has put together short stories and excerpts from novels to come of that world that exists on the periphery of our mind. The world where darkness creeps just a little closer to the light and in response the light retreats.
There is Pall. Death. Who in his duties and travels finds the one thing worse than himself. Love. Kodi the faithful dog that protects those he loves in the only way he can. Lowell and Danika and the torrid nights they share in hopes of saving a dying species. Love means being strapped to bed but not in ways most of today's novels explore. Will Danika survive until the next full moon begins to wane?
There are old women in this book. Women who shed the maternal grandmother stereo type. Women to beware. The old drunk woman at the corner of the bar. Don't buy her a drink and don't let her buy you one. Or the old spinster down the street in the small town you grew up in. The old lady who's massive trees always seem to be bending in the wrong direction, as if somehow they were following you.
The stories in this book are appetizers. Teases of a larger tale to come. And perhaps that is the one lone fault with A Chorus of Wolves. Each story, though it stands on its own, leaves you wanting for more. The rest of the tale. The sense that something must come next. That they are just a glimpse of a much bigger story.
But that is always the thing with a good short story. It leaves you wanting more. Like a stolen kiss in the back seat of your dad's car. Enjoyable but the mystery of what is yet to come lingers. Each tale in A Chorus of Wolves is not a full meal but instead a well-crafted and paced series of tapas delivered to your table for you to try. So pour a nice glass of wine and enjoy. It may not fill you, but you leave satisfied.
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About the Reviewer:
I am a sometime poet and writer and a gluttonous reader. I love to read and am grudgingly accepting ebooks as part of the medium but with fingernails dragging trenches through the concrete as I am pulled into the 21st century. But I read almost everything. Horror, SciFi, Mystery, Historical novels and occasionally will threaten my man card with a good romance. As long as there is a dead body somewhere in there.
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