Glen HirshbergAnmeldelser

Review of eBook

A documentary [ghost-hunting] filmmaker finds himself tapped for jury duty where a strange fellow juror [who works night security] engages him in a strange conversation. And then the strange fellow, inexplicably excused from jury duty, wanders out of the courtroom looking forlorn.

A couple of weeks later, the filmmaker finds himself thinking about the strange almost-juror, tries to track him down. Eventually, Look Outs, Incorporated [where, according to the cursive name on the uniform shirt he’d worn] identified him as Bulan, and the filmmaker takes a trip to where the man was working.

An abandoned mall. In the dead of night.

After several missteps and a startled fright or two, he finds Bulan.

And something else.

This short horror story, dark and unnerving, is set, for the most part, in a gloomy, abandoned shopping mall . . . in the middle of the night. The filmmaker, recounting the story from memory, gives the reader enough information to create that creepy sort of tension that all good horror stories seek to bestow upon the reader.

The telling of this spooky tale is from the point of view of the never-named filmmaker. Bulan speaks with the filmmaker only in the jury waiting room, mentioning several eerie encounters he’s had during his nighttime work. But finding him at work turns out to be a difficult proposition for the filmmaker . . . and then comes the terror.

Highly recommended.

Completely mischaracterised as horror, these are in fact deftly-written contemporary short stories with varying degrees of eeriness. The title story, in which a breakdown on the autostrada exposes the fragility of an American couple's relationship, is particularly unsettling. The other stand-outs for me were "Safety Clowns" and "Flowers on their Bridles, Hooves in the Air" with its King-esque journey into a haunted amusement arcade and background love triangle. The last two or three tales didn't grip me as much but Hirshberg is clearly a talent.½

REVIEWED: Motherless Child
WRITTEN BY: Glen Hirshberg
PUBLISHED: May, 2014 by Tor Books (originally in 2012 by Earthling)

Motherless Child may be classified as a vampire book, but it is not related to the well-worn tropes familiar to most readers. Glen Hirshberg’s writing is as literary as any classical author, filled with pathos, explorations of the human condition, and a contrast of the good vs. evil theme, but with unexpected outcomes. Two young mothers, Natalie and Sophie, who have been turned into vampires, must leave their beloved children behind to travel the country searching for answers, trying to fight the effects of what they’ve become, until the inevitable showdown with those who changed them forever.

Four-and-a-half out of Five stars

This book is adult fiction, described as psychologically intense, and that is an apt description of how the story unfolds. In Detroit, in the 1970's, Mattie, Spencer and Theresa were in the "gifted" program at their school. At that same point in time, a serial killer known as "The Snowman" was picking and choosing young victims with impunity. How those horrific murders affected families, neighborhoods and these three "exceptional" children, both at that time, and thirty years later is the framework of this story. A bit slow in the first part of the book, the intensity picks up and the story and character connections unfold in interesting ways. The author's view represents a kind of backward domino effect where we see the grand crash first and then the intricately arranged pattern leading up to it.

Karen J. / Marathon County Public Library
Find this book in our library catalog.

Review from Tenacious Reader: http://www.tenaciousreader.com/2016/02/29/review-good-girls-by-glen-hisrhberg/

3.5/5 stars

Good Girls is the second book in the Motherless Children trilogy by Glen Hirshberg. I haven’t read Motherless Child, the first book in the series, but was assured this one can be read on it’s own as a standalone sequel. Having read it now, I think that, yes, it can be read without having read Motherless Child first, but I suspect my own enjoyment of this story would have been greatly enhanced had I read the first book prior to this one.

One of the storylines in this picks up immediately after something very traumatic and horrific. Like seriously, standing in the carnage type of start to a story. I don’t know for sure, but I felt like this could have been the end of Motherless Child. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to verify this, but I was able to verify some of the characters involved in this scene were primary characters in the first book, so it is definitely possible. Maybe it is just me knowing that there was as story prior to this, and so when we are “dropped into the action”, I can’t help but wonder if this the end of the first book. Either way, I may have had some serious WTF just happened moments with this scene, but it was also something to draw me in and make me wonder just exactly what caused the devastation this story starts with. It gave me compelling reasons to want to read on so I could learn about these characters and figure out exactly what was going on.

There are several perspectives and stories going on in this book. Jess, who lost her daughter and is trying to piece a life together for herself and a few other characters. I really don’t want to reveal much more about Jess’s storyline. We also get the story of Rebecca, an orphaned college student that works in a crisis center. She has a close group of friends that she seems to feel slightly on the outside of, and we also get to see the foster family that cared for her most recently before she moved on to college. Jess and Rebecca are both somewhat broken people (broken in different ways), they are both trying to get through their days. I really enjoyed Rebecca’s sections the most. She was quite likable, her friends were fun and you just wanted to root for her as you could see she really was starting to come into her own. I also worked at a crisis hotline for a while, so that aspect of it was a nice familiarity for me and probably helped me connect with this group even more.

There are also sections with Caribou and Aunt Sally. These are the sections where I really wondered if I was missing something from the previous book. They felt very disjoint from everything else which could just be because they are in a different location and are completely different from our human protagonists, but also felt like maybe it was because I was missing a bit more of the story. Caribou and Aunt Sally live in a camp full of “monsters” (and are, in fact, monsters themselves). I felt like these sections should be quite interesting, but I hate to admit, I felt my attention waver almost every time I read a Caribou and Aunt Sally section. I could see how they might tie into the other story lines and later in the book it becomes clearer how they will fit in, but I somehow never felt very interested or vested in Caribou or Aunt Sally.

And then there is The Whistler. The monster that ties them all together. The monsters are never labeled as anything more specific, but you will find them quite familiar and will be able to come up with a label for them yourself. But I will leave that to the reader as I always enjoy knowing as little as possible about monsters. It’s just more fun that way. The Whistler provides some seriously creepy and eerie scenes. And some gore as well, though it never felt like gore for the sake of gore. And The Whistler is also good for the bringing in the unexpected.

Even though there were times where I did feel maybe I should know a bit more history than I did, I was able to enjoy this one in the end. Everything did come together, but I couldn’t help but wonder if I would have connected more had I read Motherless Child first. No matter what, it is clear that Hirshberg is able to craft a very compelling

First, allow me to comment on the cover. It's what made me purchase this novella, that and I recently read Good Girls by Glen Hirshberg which I thoroughly enjoyed. Kudos to Greg Ruth who really captured the essence of the author's work with his art.

Freedom is Space for the Spirit is far from horror, more fantasy than anything, but it is definitely one of my favorite reads so far this year.

After receiving a telegram, calling him back to Russia, Thomas returns to the place of his youth, a place of so many memories, so many friends left behind. "The names chimed in Thomas like bells rung for the dead, even though he had no reason to think any of them had died. They just stopped being who they were, same as he had. Grown up, given in, gotten married, gotten tired, gotten sane."

Called back to St Petersburg by his former friend and mentor, what Thomas finds is far from anything he expected. Free bears. free as in roaming the streets, riding on buses, left to wander, they had become a part of the landscape. What does it all mean? For me, it means an extremely enjoyable read.

Freedom is Space for the Spirit is currently available as an e-book from Tor Books.

Recommended.

Glen Hirshberg has won three International Horror Guild Awards (including two for Outstanding Collection), and his novella, The Janus Tree, won the inaugural Shirley Jackson Award in 2008. He also has been a Bram Stoker Award finalist and a five-time World Fantasy Award finalist. He lives in the Los Angeles area with his wife, son, daughter, and cats.

Review copy

Top notch writing, enjoyable prose, a twisted and demented story, but I was a bit lost at times. Seems Good Girls is book 2 in the Motherless Children Trilogy. Something the publisher failed to mention when promoting the book. Now that it's for sale to the public, I see that it's listed that way, but it's also being touted as a stand-alone novel. I, personally, would have preferred reading Motherless Child first.

That being said, there is some wonderful story-telling going on here. From the opening line, there's magic in the words...

"In the heart of the hollow, at the mouth of the Delta, the monsters were dancing."

There are some strange goings on in this story, with multiple story-lines tied together deftly, plus there's human curling. I'd love to see that as an Olympic event. It's got to be more exciting than the actual sport.

All-in-all, Glen Hirshberg has written a dark and disturbing tale. My kind of stuff. I'll just have to read Motherless Child before reading book 3 in this series.

Good Girls is published by Tor/Forge and is currently available as an e-book. If you're interested in reading this one, I'd highly recommend you do so after reading Motherless Child.

Glen Hirshberg has won three International Horror Guild Awards (including two for Outstanding Collection), and his novella, The Janus Tree, won the inaugural Shirley Jackson Award in 2008. He also has been a Bram Stoker Award finalist and a five-time World Fantasy Award finalist. While teaching at Cal State San Bernardino and at Campbell Hall in Studio City, he developed the CREW Project, through which he trains his advanced students to run intensive creative writing workshops for secondary and elementary schools that have no programs of their own. He lives in the Los Angeles area with his wife, son, daughter, and cats.

Absolutely wonderful! Characters were so real, I wouldn't have been surprised to see them walk into my house.

Issue 65 (December 2011) of the always enjoyable "Cemetery Dance" is a Graham Masterton special and in addition to a long interview with the author and a number of overviews / thought-pieces on his work, there are two new Masterson stories: "Anka" and "Saint Bronach's Shrift". Both are solid and enjoyable, despite the first revolving around child neglect and the second involving warring brothers and incest. In addition to the Masterton stories there is plenty of other fiction on offer. Maurice Broaddus appears in the "New Voices" section and an interview with him is followed by his neo-noir story "Rainfall". Next up is "Afterwords: The Second Book Depository Story" by Glen Hirshberg, which is a strange, affecting story about the power of books, their drug-like qualities and the "diseases" they can spread. "Manskin, Womanskin" by Lisa Tuttle is a brilliantly creepy and fascinating story about two "skins" found in a garden and impact they have on the couple who wear them. This is a great story about the importance of love; the secrets within us all and the information we're willing to share and perhaps, more importantly, not to share within a relationship. Tuttle's writing is elegant and subtle, but with plenty of sting when required. Finally "The Town Suicide" by S. Craig Renfroe, Jr. is a weird, haunting and ultimately unresolved story about the small town of Summerville where people begin to inexplicably commit suicide. It is an evocative, symbolic story of a town being passed by and slowly choked by a changed economy and changed circumstances. It offers little hope even after the narrator saves the life of his girlfriend. The magazine also has a number interviews including with the increasingly popular Michael Koryta, which is followed by an excerpt from his novel "The Cypress House". Ray Bradbury, interviewed shortly before his death, is surprisingly conservative about e-books and even more surprising (and shocking) is his contention that the United States has never censored or banned a book. The interview with legendary editor Ellen Datlow offers a fascinating insight into her approach to the editing and putting together of themed collections. Whitley Strieber comes across a touch terse in his interview (which has a postal or electronic feel) and it is clear that he views the publication of "Communion" as a career error. The issue is also jam-packed with columns and review pieces, some of which read better than others, all of which make for another great issue – the Lisa Tuttle story on its own would make this a first class purchase. The cover is by artist Vincent Chong.

I picked this up on the strength of Ellen Datlow comparing the author to a modern James, and was not disappointed. The author uses a subtle horror - the kind of sensation one might get from returning home and finding things had moved slightly - and tragedy/grief to convey the power in his stories.

no spoilers!

If you only buy the book for two stories in it, it's worth the price. These are Mr. Dark's Carnival and Dancing Men.

If you're looking for the traditional kind of ghost story, then you'll like Mr. Dark's Carnival the best of them all.
"Mr. Dark's Carnival." Set in Montana, it is told from the perspective of a local college professor who has visited every "carnival," kind of like a haunted house, over a period of years. In the town he lives in, there is a legendary one called "Mr. Dark's Carnival," one that is supposedly the most horrible and realistic of them all. Mr. Dark's Carnival is, however, by invitation only. This is the year he finally receives his invitation; he goes and well, I can't tell you or I'll ruin it.

The second story that is my favorite, is "The Dancing Men," about a dying man who summons his grandson to his deathbed. This fact alone is strange; he and his family have been estranged for some time. Anyway, the boy goes as he is told, and becomes a part of a bizarre ritual that dates back to the grandfather's days as a victim of the Holocaust. Again, I can't say more, because I don't want to ruin the surprise of it all.

As with every collection of ghost stories, some are much scarier than others and you will find your own favorites. But you will like this writer's work very much regardless of which story becomes your favorite.