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A review by tbr_the_unconquered
Dangerous Women 3 by Gardner Dozois, George R.R. Martin
3.0
So here is my take on the last book in the trilogy :
Some Desperado by Joe Abercrombie
Rating : 5/5
In Summary : A woman on the run arrives at a ghost town in the West. She is bloody, battered and tired. On her trail are three bounty hunters who have all the time and resources in the World. But the woman – Shy is no pushover and there are a few desperate cards up her sleeve. I loved this story and in my definition, this is how a dangerous woman story should be written. Bloody and quick its gets to the meat of things and characters don’t cut corners. The writing is also taut and swift which suits the mood of the story very well. I put this story right in the league of tales by GRRM, Brandon Sanderson and Jim Butcher in this collection.
City Lazarusby Diana Rowland
Rating : 4/5
In Summary : What if the dangerous woman in the tale does not come out of the woodwork until the very end ? A post-apocalyptic New Orleans makes for a good setting of a cops v/s mafia whodunit. A corrupt and shady cop Danny finds love in the person of Delia who is a stripper and the story takes off from there. This story is a mix of hard and soft elements and Diana Rowland captures the noir-ish tones deftly. Personally, about 80% into the tale I had a kind of hunch about the outcome of the story which turned out to be just right. In that way, it is slightly predictable.
Hell Hath No Fury by Sherrilyn Kenyon
Rating : 2/5
In Summary : A group of teenagers go meddle in a place where they had no business in the first place. The place reeks of ancient evil and then….all hell breaks loose. There, you see ? This has been the plot outline of many a cheesy movie and this lack of originality kills the story. The writing style is quite good and so is the dialog but like always cliché kills the tale.
The Hands That Are Not There by Melinda Snodgrass
Rating : 4/5
In Summary : Find a stranger in a bar and 9 times out of 10 they will tell you fantastic stories over drinks. This story starts off a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away but it is no space opera ! The plot line is of treachery and high profile espionage which does not really care if it stamps a few innocent lives under its feet. This again was another twist in the tale format but unlike Diana Rowland’s tale you come off this one with a faint sense of paranoia. I am still wondering if that guy who I met in that last bar was real or a figment of my imagination ! Sheesh ! These stories will someday be the end of me…
Caretakers by Pat Cadigan
Rating : 2/5
In Summary : Two sisters, an old mother with dementia, an assisted living home which is not all what it looks like. Somewhere along this way, this tale had a spark but it is written in a very soporific fashion. Using two paragraphs where two sentences would suffice is what I think is called an overkill. This story suffers from an overload of this medical condition.
Bombshells by Jim Butcher
Rating : 4/5
In Summary : Three smoking hot women go on the hunt for a vampire, who happens to be the boyfriend of one of them. On their way to this hunk, they meet up with countless other monstrosities and battle their way to a rather interesting conclusion. This story occurs in the universe of Harry Dresden but he is absent from the tale. I wasn’t a taker for the first book in Dresden’s universe but this one was very well written. It was a pleasant surprise too for in his first story, Butcher’s characters came across as chauvinists while here the tale does a full tilt and has a woman drive the entire plot onward. One of the really good stories in the collection.
The overall reading experience : It is a strictly average collection. While some of the stories ( GRRM, Brandon Sanderson, Sharon Kay Penman, Joe Abercrombie, Jim Butcher) are real dynamite, the bad ones outweigh them heavily. To me splitting this book into three volumes looks to be a dubious way of boosting sales. If you ever chance across the three volume version of this book, avoid the second volume like the plague. The third seems to be the only one worth its salt. I would not recommend this one unless you get a choice to pick and read the stories.
Some Desperado by Joe Abercrombie
Rating : 5/5
In Summary : A woman on the run arrives at a ghost town in the West. She is bloody, battered and tired. On her trail are three bounty hunters who have all the time and resources in the World. But the woman – Shy is no pushover and there are a few desperate cards up her sleeve. I loved this story and in my definition, this is how a dangerous woman story should be written. Bloody and quick its gets to the meat of things and characters don’t cut corners. The writing is also taut and swift which suits the mood of the story very well. I put this story right in the league of tales by GRRM, Brandon Sanderson and Jim Butcher in this collection.
City Lazarusby Diana Rowland
Rating : 4/5
In Summary : What if the dangerous woman in the tale does not come out of the woodwork until the very end ? A post-apocalyptic New Orleans makes for a good setting of a cops v/s mafia whodunit. A corrupt and shady cop Danny finds love in the person of Delia who is a stripper and the story takes off from there. This story is a mix of hard and soft elements and Diana Rowland captures the noir-ish tones deftly. Personally, about 80% into the tale I had a kind of hunch about the outcome of the story which turned out to be just right. In that way, it is slightly predictable.
Hell Hath No Fury by Sherrilyn Kenyon
Rating : 2/5
In Summary : A group of teenagers go meddle in a place where they had no business in the first place. The place reeks of ancient evil and then….all hell breaks loose. There, you see ? This has been the plot outline of many a cheesy movie and this lack of originality kills the story. The writing style is quite good and so is the dialog but like always cliché kills the tale.
The Hands That Are Not There by Melinda Snodgrass
Rating : 4/5
In Summary : Find a stranger in a bar and 9 times out of 10 they will tell you fantastic stories over drinks. This story starts off a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away but it is no space opera ! The plot line is of treachery and high profile espionage which does not really care if it stamps a few innocent lives under its feet. This again was another twist in the tale format but unlike Diana Rowland’s tale you come off this one with a faint sense of paranoia. I am still wondering if that guy who I met in that last bar was real or a figment of my imagination ! Sheesh ! These stories will someday be the end of me…
Caretakers by Pat Cadigan
Rating : 2/5
In Summary : Two sisters, an old mother with dementia, an assisted living home which is not all what it looks like. Somewhere along this way, this tale had a spark but it is written in a very soporific fashion. Using two paragraphs where two sentences would suffice is what I think is called an overkill. This story suffers from an overload of this medical condition.
Bombshells by Jim Butcher
Rating : 4/5
In Summary : Three smoking hot women go on the hunt for a vampire, who happens to be the boyfriend of one of them. On their way to this hunk, they meet up with countless other monstrosities and battle their way to a rather interesting conclusion. This story occurs in the universe of Harry Dresden but he is absent from the tale. I wasn’t a taker for the first book in Dresden’s universe but this one was very well written. It was a pleasant surprise too for in his first story, Butcher’s characters came across as chauvinists while here the tale does a full tilt and has a woman drive the entire plot onward. One of the really good stories in the collection.
The overall reading experience : It is a strictly average collection. While some of the stories ( GRRM, Brandon Sanderson, Sharon Kay Penman, Joe Abercrombie, Jim Butcher) are real dynamite, the bad ones outweigh them heavily. To me splitting this book into three volumes looks to be a dubious way of boosting sales. If you ever chance across the three volume version of this book, avoid the second volume like the plague. The third seems to be the only one worth its salt. I would not recommend this one unless you get a choice to pick and read the stories.