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Book Review: The Girl With the Lollipop Eyes by Lucy Leitner

The Girl With The Lollipop Eyes, by Lucy Leitner

Blood Bound Publishing, 2023

ISBN: 9781940250618

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

Buy:  Amazon.com

 

 

The back cover advertises this as a “detective adventure in slacker noir.”  I’m not sure what that means, but this type of book works well when read in an overstuffed recliner with a six-pack of wobbly-pops.  It‘s not the story alone that drives this, it’s mainly the characters and overall style.  No further doubt: Leitner has a unique writing style all her own and deserves more recognition.

 

This isn’t a horror novel, it’s a detective novel, in the style of the old Spillane ones.  But it’s written in Leitner’s offbeat, humorous way, and that makes it a lot more entertaining than anything Mickey wrote in the Mike Hammer series.  The book is carried start to finish by wannabe PI Thor Cole, his miscreant sidekicks, and the writing.

 

This is old-fashioned detective fiction, with plenty of pounding the pavement, talking to people for leads, and the occasional fight.  On the surface, there’s not much there.  That’s where Leitner’s skill comes in: she turns a simple plot into an addicting rush of a read.

 

You can’t help but love Thor Cole and his attempts to be a brilliant detective. He lives in a seedy Pittsburgh apartment, and things just never seem to go right.  He gets in trouble with his roommate Brittanie for using household appliances as weapons in fights and not replacing them (this guy should advertise for the George Foreman Grill).  He manages to bash himself in the head with a bicycle in a misguided attempt to prevent bike theft.  Somehow, most of his “detective” work has him winding up at bars and drinking too much.  He’s a perfect folk hero for the neighborhood, and his antics, and constant snarky way of looking at things, are what makes him such an engrossing character.

 

The sleuthing part of the book is simple enough. Cole and company are investigating a hit and run in their trashy neighborhood, and it’s a highly entertaining ride as they smash and crash their way through the case: subtlety is not in their vocabulary.  The case does evolve into a larger plot concerning the whole neighborhood and sleazy developers, but this is really all about the tone and style, and it’s perfect for the characters and neighborhood.  That’s what makes Cole great: he’s the kind of dude that ordinary, blue-collar people will love.  The story itself may not be new, but the writing certainly is, and keeps readers engaged right to the end.

 

Leitner also does a great job bringing Pittsburgh to life: she clearly knows Pennsylvania and its quirks.  You have to be a local to know about beer stores, swill brands like Iron City and Straub, the unofficial Steelers fight song (not a good choice), etc.

 

Bottom line: it’s a don’t miss.  Leitner has already shown a singular voice with her dystopian satires: add “multi-faceted” to the list with this “slacker noir” tale.  Hopefully, Cole will return, and isn’t put out to pasture: who needs a stylish Sonny Crockett for a detective when you have a banged-up, alcohol-chugging Thor Cole? Cole would have whipped him in a fight anyhow.  Highly recommended.

 

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson

Book Review: Eynhallow by Tim McGregor

cover art for Eynhallow by TIm McGregor

Eynhallow by Tim McGregor

Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2024

Available: Hardcover, Paperback, Kindle edition

Buy: Bookshop.org  |  Amazon.com

 

 

Tim McGregor’s writing evokes the ghosts of 19th century English writers who captured the mystery of human beings and the wild forces of nature that remain untamed around us and in us. His latest book, Eynhallow, is an irresistible mix of science fiction and horror, with a twist of Gothic terror and a dash of old legends.

 

This story about an unusual, hardy woman opens in 1797 in the nearly deserted Orkney Islands, where four families are struggling to survive. Agnes, a devoted mother, has always acted out of necessity, the only reason she married and stays with her abusive husband. She now cooks and delivers meals to their new, wealthy neighbor, for a price. Her days revolve around family life, and occasionally helping to bring a neighbor’s child into the world. It is a monotonous existence, but Agnes has a curious and active mind that is constantly evaluating and analyzing everything and everyone around her. She also has many questions she feels she must answer about herself, what she wants, and whether she can have what she most desires.

 

As she pursues these answers, Tim McGregor’s atmospheric descriptions of the weather, vegetation, houses, characters, and even the church and food take on a life of their own, putting the reader into a state of growing uneasiness about Agnes’s safety and security. Slowly but surely, we discover that she has a role to play in another story, a famous one about a monster created from dead human body parts, who is now alive. McGregor brings the two stories together in surprising ways, reminding us of what we already know about Victor Frankenstein and his Creature, and filling in new details about the challenges of dealing with the monster’s demands and the unforeseen consequences of what Frankenstein dreamed would be the greatest scientific achievement of all time.

 

In the end, Eynhallow, meaning holy island, is far from it. It is a place of violence, pain, torture, and death. Just as Mary Shelley made her audience consider the boundaries between God and man, the spiritual and the scientific, and life and death, so too does Tim McGregor, but with an important difference. McGregor’s audience has had a much greater chance to explore these boundaries and observe their crossing. It is in that context, one of greater understanding, that we can truly see an earlier horror story becoming a contemporary one… and a permanent nightmare.

 

 

Reviewed by Nova Hadley

Graphic Novel Review: Lot 13 by Steve Niles, art by Glenn Fabry

Lot 13 - Niles, Steve

Lot 13 by Steve Niles, art by Glenn Fabry

Dark Horse, 2023

ISBN: 9781506734484

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

Buy: Bookshop.orgAmazon.com

 

 

The story opens in 1670, in Fairfax, Virginia. The bodies of the Wyatt family are on trial. The father, Robert, stands accused of murdering his family before committing suicide. The court ultimately finds him guilty of mortal sin and cast their bodies into unhallowed ground for eternity.

 

Time switches abruptly to the modern day. A married couple are finally ready to move into their dream home. Their three children aren’t as ready as their parents to leave their friends and apartment, but they will get used to the idea in time. The family load up into the moving van, and head to their new home in Fairfax. Unfortunately, when they arrive, the house isn’t ready to be occupied, and the cozy family has to find other accommodations. After an accident on the road, they come across an apartment building, where they are welcomed by an elderly man. When they start seeing things, the secrets of the mysterious building emerge, and they find themselves fighting for their lives.

 

The story is okay, but not great. It is good if you just need some gore. Some things don’t line up or even get addressed. For instance, when the family hits what appears to be a child in the middle of the road with the moving van, gore is all over the front of it and the road in one panel, and in the next it is gone. There is no viscera on the hood, no body parts littering the road. There is also no discussion over what just happened, just the son pointing at a random building nearby advertising apartments to rent for a night to a year. The family just appears to forget what they just saw. The incident is never spoken of afterward. Weird things happen in the building, and some of it is treated in a similar manner. It makes me wonder if the family often has mass hallucinations to make them just gloss over such things.

 

It took me a minute to remember the name Glenn Fabry. I admit I am really bad with names. As soon as it hit me, I knew the art was going to be intense. His covers for Preacher are incredible, and his art in general is fantastic. Fabry goes above and beyond with the amount of gore in this one. Highly recommended, more for the art that the story

 

Reviewed by Lizzy Walker