This week, I’m reading unsettling tales from two writers whom I always enjoy. I’ve picked Stephen King’s latest novel and a collection of twelve short stories from Angela Slatter.
Both books count towards my target of reading ninety of the books I bought in 2023.
I’m expecting to lose myself in their stories and also to find myself admiring their storytelling craft.
‘Holly’ (2023) by Stephen King
Holly Gibney seems to have won a place in Stephen King’s heart.
She was a recurring character in the Bill Hodges trilogy but I didn’t meet her there as ‘Mr Mercedes‘ was a bit too much for my tastes.
I first encountered her in HBO’s excellent TV adaptation of ‘The Outsider’, the first novel in which Holly was the main character. I found her fascinating and wanted to know more so I read ‘If It Bleeds‘ and was hooked.
I’m looking forward to seeing how Holly develops when she’s at the centre of a 440 page novel.
Stephen King made his first professional short story sale in 1967 to Startling Mystery Stories. In the spring of 1973, Doubleday & Co., accepted the novel Carrie. He has since published over 50 books and has become one of the world’s most successful writers.
King is the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to the American Letters and the 2014 National Medal of Arts.
Stephen lives in Maine and Florida with his wife, novelist Tabitha King. They are regular contributors to a number of charities including many libraries and have been honored locally for their philanthropic activities.
‘Winter Children and other chilling tales’ (2016) by Angela Slatter
I started out with Angela Slatter’s Urban Fantasy novels ‘Vigil‘ and ‘Corpselight‘ which felt fresh and fun to me. It was her novella, ‘Of Sorrow And Such‘ that really turned me into a fan and made me go looking for her back catalogue.
I have her novels ‘All The Murming Bones‘ and ‘The Path Of Thorns‘ in my TBR and I intend to read them this year but first I want to dive into her short stories and let the breadth and depth of her imagination take me to new places.
Angela Slatter is an Australian wroter based out of Brisbane. She is the author of the gothic fantasy novels All the Murmuring Bones (2021) , The Path of Thorns (2022) and The Briar Book of the Dead (2024), and the supernatural crime novels Vigil, Corpselight and Restoration She’s also written twelve short story collections, including The Girl with No Hands and Other Tales, Sourdough and Other Stories, The Bitterwood Bible and Other Recountings, and A Feast of Sorrows: Stories, and the novellas, Of Sorrow and Such, Ripper and The Bone Lantern.
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