(I received this book for free as part of Goodreads First Reads giveaways).
(This review may contain spoilers).
Science fiction is probably one of my favourite genres of books. I found this collection of short stories to be really intriguing, though I did notice there seemed to be an underlying connection with all of them.
An interesting thing I noted was the fact that the main characters in the stories weren’t actually named. It was an intriguing way of doing things, but it did make it a bit hard to differentiate between the different characters. There were a couple of stories I felt could have been connected to each other, such as the one about the child and its mother… and the one about the mother and her son.
Some of the short stories were quite disturbing. There were elements of horror in a few of them, but some of those scenes were a bit more difficult to follow.
I would have liked a bit more background to some of these short stories. There was lot of potential for the world/s to be expanded upon and I was disappointed that I couldn’t learn more about the surroundings the characters were in.
A couple of the short stories were really quite confusing, such as Lost and Found. I was left entirely uncertain about what was going on there. Mimir’s Well carried a lot of intrigue, while Life Line was another one I would have liked a bit more background on.
Empty was particularly creepy to read about, though I think one of the mental images I got from reading it wasn’t quite what I was expecting. Live and Virtually Returning was an interesting concept, even if I wasn’t sure exactly what had happened by the end.
I thought Bethel was quite emotional… not just because of Bethel herself, but also how bad the justice system so clearly was. I think it showed really well how humanity’s reliance on the artificial can turn justice to… well, the opposite.
It was interesting to read The Child and to see how someone questioning the system was seen as wrong and abnormal. It was easy to feel the depression and sameness many of the characters were facing.
These stories were intriguing and well-written. In the future, I’d definitely read more books by this author.
Ink of Blood 