{"id":7317,"date":"2020-03-04T19:19:29","date_gmt":"2020-03-04T23:19:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/?p=7317"},"modified":"2020-03-04T19:19:29","modified_gmt":"2020-03-04T23:19:29","slug":"book-review-deaths-dreams-by-darryl-dawson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/book-review-deaths-dreams-by-darryl-dawson\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: Death’s Dreams by Darryl Dawson"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Death’s Dreams <\/em>by Darryl Dawson<\/p>\n

Darryl Dawson Books, 2019<\/p>\n

ISBN: 978-1-7331921-4-9<\/p>\n

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition<\/p>\n

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Death’s Dreams<\/em> is the wildest, most original collection of short stories to come barreling down the pike in a long, long time.\u00a0 If you’re looking for stories that are seriously OUT THERE, with a decent touch of blood splashed around the pages, this book is the place to be.\u00a0 Why this wasn’t nominated for a Stoker award is beyond me, as it is certainly good enough to justify a nomination.<\/p>\n

The collection is loosely held together by the idea that ol’ Death, the Grim Reaper himself, is losing it.\u00a0 All the horrors he’s seen over the years while riding his figurative pale horse have started to get to him, so he finds a shrink to talk to and unload all his stories on.\u00a0 Those stories make up the basis of this collection.\u00a0 Make no mistake, what he’s seen in these stories would be enough to put any rational person in a padded room.\u00a0 \u00a0“New Identity” is a hellish look at what happens when one bad person makes a mistake and winds up the prisoner of a person who is a lot worse.\u00a0 It’s a common plot device, but this story is truly terrifying.\u00a0 “Night Train” may be the most original one, as it contains an actual phantom (or not?) train running in the storm drains beneath the city, that promises possible escape to those who need it.\u00a0 Simply open the door to one of the train cars, and step into another dimension.\u00a0 “There Really Are No Accidents” is a viciously ironic story concerning one woman’s attempt to take a brutal revenge on her scummer of a husband, and what befalls her.\u00a0 This one also showcases author Dawson’s twisted sense of humor. The end of the story might well make you laugh, despite its nastiness.\u00a0 Written with only dialogue, “The Claim” concerns a camera that causes the death of everyone it takes a picture of.\u00a0 The author’s choice of format for this story makes it stand out from the others, as it can be a tough format to work with, but Dawson does it with ease.\u00a0 “The Champion of Suffering” is a fantastic revenge story, as the evil killer starts the story already executed through lethal injection, and in Hell.\u00a0 The protagonist has to decide if he is willing to sacrifice and condemn himself to Hell, just to go after the killer and inflict more punishment.\u00a0 Is the death penalty enough?\u00a0 How much is vengeance\u00a0 worth to him?\u00a0 This is an outstanding story that also raises some good questions about the nature of retribution.<\/p>\n

The overall quality of all the stories is extremely high; there isn’t a bad one in the collection.\u00a0 Some are better than others, but they all do a good job showcasing the author’s fertile imagination and skill.\u00a0 The only drawback is the lack of dialogue between Death and the psychiatrist.\u00a0 The first chapter was an excellent setup between the two of them, but that thread never really got explored to its potential, as they barely show up for the rest of the book.\u00a0 If the interaction between Death and the doctor had been fleshed out more, this could have been an outstanding novel, instead of an outstanding collection of short stories.\u00a0 Despite that minor quibble, Death’s Dreams<\/em> is a book not to be missed.\u00a0 Keep an eye out for this author in the future. Highly recommended.<\/p>\n

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Contains: violence, gore, profanity, sex<\/p>\n

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Reviewed by Murray Samuelson<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Death’s Dreams by Darryl Dawson Darryl Dawson Books, 2019 ISBN: 978-1-7331921-4-9 Available: Paperback, Kindle edition   Death’s Dreams is the wildest, most original collection of short stories to come barreling down the pike in a long, long time.\u00a0 If you’re looking for stories that are seriously OUT THERE, with a decent touch of blood splashed<\/p>\n

Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[4328,1356,4329,83,1526,495],"class_list":["post-7317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-darryl-dawson","tag-death","tag-deaths-dreams","tag-horror-fiction","tag-short-stories","tag-short-story-collections"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7317"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7317\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7321,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7317\/revisions\/7321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}