![]() Everyone Is A Moon Author Sawney Hatton Boy, this book was a challenge from beginning to end. Not all in bad ways. I received this book as one I requested to read from Blackthorn Book Tours. I, as most of my readers know, love anthologies. So, any time I get the opportunity to read any kind of short horror story collection, I’m on it. ![]() This was unique because the author had hand-picked writings from over twenty-five years of writing. Can I just point out serious respect to the author for having that kind of devotion and conviction to their craft and passion? That right there is a WOW factor for me. As a writer myself I still have a box of stuff I wrote well over twenty years ago and I think it takes a lot of resolve and determination not only to make sure that kind of stuff stays safe over the years but also the pure guts it takes to go back and revisit earlier work. As an artist of any kind, sometimes going back to a previous creation takes you back to what inspired that creation and well, that’s not always pleasant. Some of the most precious and beautiful works that we consider the talent of someone truly gifted are also the results of some very tortured souls, and in more ways than one. So, I raise my fountain pen to this author with respect, from one writer by nature to another, you deserve recognition for the battle that is keeping your drive and work alive over the course of more than two decades. Mad respect. Now, having paid proper and most assuredly deserved tribute, down to the review. As you all know, as with any anthology, not every story is going to be a hit and not every story will be well received by the audience because well, we just can’t please every single one of you out there, Which is a good thing. It shows the true diversity of individuals. Imagine how boring life would be if we all agreed on everything and everybody liked all the same things and there were no individuals to make life interesting and exciting and throw in the unexpected and the unique. So, with that in mind, I rated this anthology how I’ve rated the others I’ve reviewed. I read each story and rate it individually and then I take the average of the scores as the overall rating for the whole book. There were three stories that got 5/5 ratings and really stood out to me. There were two stories that actually got 0/5 ratings, which is rare. I don’t do that a lot. One of them was a story that was nine pages, had five sentences and six, count them SIX blank pages. Now, I know what the author was trying to do because the story was about a blizzard and they were trying a visual and aural effect, but it didn’t work for me. I thought it was a good effort but it didn’t seem to have the desired effect for me. This author seems to get tied up and lost in the innocuous details and not as much time on the meat and grit of the true horror. Which isn’t always a bad thing. I mean, Stephen King has been taking up whole chapters to tell you about the main character’s best friend’s friend who has a buddy whose cousin’s girlfriend’s parent’s business partner’s daughter’s boyfriend’s main rival likes to wear leather jackets by night and cashmere sweaters by day and then we get to go into detail of someone else’s life two hundred miles removed from the story and their dog and what kind of dog food the dog eats. I get it. But for me, it’s too much. I love Stephen King and all but his long windedness and micro detailing can be a little tedious. But it also seems like this author seems a little reserved with their horror parts of their stories. It seems they like to imply a lot rather than actually give you the gruesome and gory details. An that’s okay but it does take away from the whole horror aspect of the story and the book somewhat. A few stories like The Good Touch, Cutting Remarks and FYVP were all very good stories and I was really pleased with those. I think those are the real highlights of this collection. The rest were mostly 3/5 ratings and 2/5 ratings. In all honesty, I don’t think that this author is actually a bad author. I think the style just doesn’t click for me. But, nevertheless, I always give you guys my honest thoughts and there they are. The total score for all thirteen stories was 35/65 which comes to about 54%. Now, that’s more than a 2.5/5 which is 50% and not quite the 3/5 which is 60%. So, I guess it’s about a 2.75 but since I never really rate like that, it’s a 3/5. I mean, come on. Let’s not get too bogged down in numbers and mathematics, okay? So, that would make this an average anthology. Nothing wrong with that. Pretty normal actually. I hope if you choose to read it you do enjoy it! Maybe you are the audience it’s meant for! RATINGS 3/5 Stars Book blurb:
“Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody.” —Mark Twain From the devilishly inventive mind of Sawney Hatton comes this twisted collection of 12 Dark Fiction tales featuring a magical finger, a cannibalistic memorial, an extreme piercing parlor, a Space Age monastery, a budding serial killer, and more. Presenting three new, never-before-published stories, as well as re-mastered versions of earlier works, this collection is sure to disturb and delight readers who like to play in the dark. Trigger warnings ‘Pet’: animal abuse ‘The Dark at the Deep End’: explicit torture ‘Suitable for Framing’: sexual assault Not suitable for readers under 18 About the Author: Sawney Hatton is an author, editor, and screenwriter. His published credits include the Dark Comedy novel Dead Size, the YA Noir novella Uglyville, and his Dark Fiction short story collection Everyone Is a Moon. His most recent novella The Devil’s Delinquents appears in the Noir-inspired anthology Murder in Montague Falls. He also edited the Sci-Fi Horror anthology What Has Two Heads, Ten Eyes, and Terrifying Table Manners? Other incarnations of Sawney have produced marketing videos, attended all-night film festivals, and played the banjo and sousaphone (not at the same time). He fancies himself as somebody you can relax and have a beer with, and encourages people to buy him beer in exchange for his company. As of this writing, he is still very much alive. You can become better acquainted with him at www.SawneyHatton.com. You'll also find him lurking on Facebook and Twitter.
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