14/10/2011

"This is the quickest way down" by Charles Christian - Review

Christian has put together an intriguing collection of stories here. Its a short book, with eleven stories, but its a classic example of quality over quantity.

Particulary worth noting are "Waiting for my Mocha to Cool", "Already Gone" and "Empire State of Mind", but I'm not going to tell you anything about them. Its too easy to accidentally give out spoilers on short stories, but the book is a great collection of ghost stories, supernatural and sci-fi.

What I will say is I love the way Christian writes. Its smooth and elegant without being overly literary. Sometimes it feels as though literary authors can be shoving how clever they are down your throat, but Christian eases you along and makes it very difficult to put the book down.

If there is one slight smudge on the shine, its the last story. "By the Steps of Villefranche Station" is not a bad story, but it doesn't quite have the polish of the others. It feels as though it might have been written some time before the others. 



Not enough to stop me giving this a full five stars, though. Nice work, Mr Christian :)

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