Technically excellent but I didn't care for the stories
354736
From a technical point of view, this Battlestar Galactica is superb. The acting, production, special effects, etc. are all very good. And if you liked the original 1978 show, I would guess that you'll love this. However, I absolutely hated the stories. I don't care for soap operas where you are left hanging every episode, didn't care for the "complex" manic-depressive character development where characters consistently bounce from superheroes to supervillains, and I mostly didn't care for the voodoo dogma masquerading as science fiction. The idea that the earth was seeded with hi-tech people from far-away galaxies, the realization of shallow, bizarre prophecies, the inexplicable presence of human machines, etc. did little to stimulate my imagination. So while I can certainly understand how others might enjoy many aspects of this show, I simply couldn't make it through the entire series.
3041746
These short stories weren't my cup of tea. They are well-writ in a literary way, but the plotting in most of of it is vague and chaotic.

I mildly enjoyed The Ferryman, which was cleanly written, if shorter than the other stories. An Honest Day's work was thoughtful, but not especially interesting. Eyelids of the Dawn felt more like poetry than a narrative. The Golden Shroud was fine, although told in a hazy dreamlike state. I couldn't get into anything else in this collection.

In fact, most of the writing here was more poetic than anything else: I really had to concentrate on what could possibly be going on, and re-read things to make sense of them. I realize some people very much enjoy this kind of exercise. I'm just not one of them. I prefer clear plots, and characters I can care about, for my entertainment. I spend enough time figuring out what the meaning of life is on my own, thank you.

I wanted to give this book three stars for the author's fine use of language and imagery, but in my mind three stars goes to a book I can at least say I liked on some level. I honestly didn't like anything enough here to recommend it.
3323131
I remembered the front and back matter and the story of how he projected the technology from the first dial up computer access.  I just didn't care much for the story itself.
3796170
As I'm addicted to the whole series, I didn't like the way the stories skipped around in the beginning. It took a while for everything to settle down so I could get involved in what I was reading.
4308619
To me, a very interesting concept for a novel, or actually, an obvious opportunity for a series of novels.

But... I just didn't like the story.  I'm not talking about the premise of the novel, or the characters, or the background story, those I enjoyed.  What I didn't like, and found boring, was the story that the artifact told.  Instead of looking forward to the next "mind meld" interlude, I began to see them as a part of the story I had to slog through.

So much promise.  So much history to draw from.
494255
The Mythean world presented in these books is a very interesting and engaging place. The stories bridging our everyday reality and the reality formed from our belief systems, myths, and theologies are plausible if one accepts the premise that all belief systems are real but hidden from mundanity like the wizarding world of Harry Potter. The characters are well developed and easy to relate to. I was very very disappointed when I came upon the first explicit sexual descriptions. What until then had been a wonderful fairy tale turned pornographic and obscene. Yes, I was disappointed. Yes, I skipped over the prurient portions that seemed to go on for way too many pages. Yes, it was enough to drop a five star story to a two or three star barely worth my money story... in fact, I figure somewhere between 10% and 25% of the pages I would not have paid for if I had know what was written there.
2800341
I wasn't thrilled with the stories but the extra material between them was interesting.  I like Jo Beverley a lot.  I'm not sure why these didn't appeal more.
1300980
This is a surprisingly excellent book. Great stories, great writing, engaging and sweet. In contrast, the '5-minute snuggle stories' book looks like a hodgepodge of ill-conceived, badly executed stories.
1906246
Technically very good.  Nor meant for pleasure reading.
29917
For some reason, this anthology is very praised for its stories, so I'm surprised that I was disappointed. Most of them felt like they were written quickly, making them almost boring. There were two or three that I really enjoyed (Peter Cawdron's "The End" was fabulous), but other than that, it was a mediocre collection of stories.
4744414
I wish every story in this collection were equally as beautiful, equally as astounding. The first two I didn't like at all, and after the third I was ready to close the covers. But then there was "1967," the story of Lila Mae Muncy's first real date, the story called out in the Kirkus review above. Lila Mae and her cousin reappear in "1968," a paean to summer nights, awakening and the failure of adolescent understanding. "1970" is a simple story, the step-by-step record of profound and inexpressible male grief. "1976," the story of a precipitous, adulterous  car ride, cleanly removed my heart from my chest for the duration of its pages. I laughed so hard during "1979," and thought I'd certainly found one of the best collections I'd ever read.

Sadly, the last three stories are less successful. The digressions of "1981" render a sweet idea (a man watches his own funeral) nearly impossible to read. The Aspergerian main character of "1983," a rattler hunter with an inability to understand that his one joke is not at all funny, was disturbing and good, but too long. And the final story, "1986," is a hard one. A long conversation between a confused man in a junk store and a sad woman with a difficult daughter closes the book on a difficult note.

So five stories are brilliant, and the others left me cold. Still, I have to rate the book highly, because the stories that work... they work so beautifully.
1251453
This is one set of stories I could not get interested in. I do not know why but it just wasn`t very interesting for me.
2040304
I am frustrated, because I was blown away by Gunnhild yehaug's storytelling, Kari Dickson's translation and Heather Wild's reading, but the way the audiobook was formatted left much to be desired.

I can't easily tease out the difference in storytelling and translation here, but in particular appreciated the matter-of-fact narration style in all the stories, which I suspect is if not linguistically then culturally appropriate. It didn't pressure you into having an emotional reaction to a story but when you did have one it felt more genuine. I found the stories of "Knots" rich with symbolism, self-aware and painfully real. So many stories were full of people behaving exactly as I've seen myself and my friends behave, even though almost no character was at their best during the story. I was not initially sure I enjoyed these stories and I'm still not sure that's the word I'd use. However almost all of them made me uncomfortable. I kept asking myself "Why would she do that?" "Why does he want this?" "How can they be so unhappy?". Questions I found easy to ask about fictional characters but not often about the circumstances of my own life. That is why I am impressed by yehaug's work, and am going to check out any other English translations available.

On the downside, and this is stated better elsewhere, the weakest point was the audiobook formatting, which had no chapter titles and no pauses in between each chapter. This might have been less irritating in a novel, but when every story story packs a punch, I really needed a chance to breathe between them. I ended up pausing the book between most chapters to just sit and think, which was made difficult by the non-existent pauses.

In summary, I was strongly affected by these stories but found the audiobook formatting and to some extent the audiobook style interfering with my engagement with them.
22770
The preface was very promising.  Mr. Thomas' prose felt like Conan Doyle's, and the explanation for why these stories had just come to light more than plausible.  And then I began reading the stories.

Mr. Thomas has done his homework, and these stories read like a lecture.  Like many authors who attempt Sherlock Holmes' pastiches, Mr. Thomas has decided to insert the fictional Holmes and Watson into historic events and have them interact with men and women who walked the planet during the Victorian era.  But I, for one, don't read a Sherlock Holmes story to get a history lesson.  I read them for the interplay between the main characters and the surprise twists Conan Doyle could provide.

I read the first four short stories hoping to be delighted.  Instead, I was fidgeting.  I may read more of them, but I may not.  There are so many books and so little time.

But don't take me as the last word.  I've read glowing reviews of Sherlock Holmes pastiches that I judged abysmal and never purchased upon reading the "look inside" provided by Amazon.  While I am convinced the author asked his mother to write these reviews (and his aunts and uncles), maybe I'm just cranky and hard to please.

But if you purchase this book and don't like it, don't say you weren't warned.
336194
I am fascinated by ancient Japan and loved the Tales of the Otori series so was very excited when these books came out. However, this was a disappointment and I won't continue with the series.  Not because of the reasons pointed out by other reviewers. I thought it was well written, moved fluidly through the story and was engaging throughout. One interesting aspect is that my allegiance to characters kept shifting, I was never sure who I should root for; characters are heroic and then not, villains are evil and then not. Some may find this frustrating but people are not one dimensional and the only part of the story that draws me to the other books is to see how the characters evolve.

What I did have a problem with is the content, the type of book and story this is. Tales of the Otori is about warlords and stories in ancient Japan with a touch of the magical and fantasy that imbues Japanese culture. In Tales, legends about the almost super human skills of Ninja-like characters are a reality but mostly the story is grounded in the real world - an imagined reality based on history but still believable. In this new series, Hearn has almost completely abandoned the historical and anything that could be considered real. From the start we have magic, sorcerer's, fantasy and most of it not particularly pleasant, rather quite violent and definitely of the dark side.

If you like this type of story then there is nothing negative I can say about it, except that it is short and without resolution as it is clearly intended to be quickly followed by book 2 in the series (I imagine they are all like this or else why put them out so close to each other?). If pure fantasy fiction is not your thing but do like reading about ancient Japan, then try Cloud of Sparrow and the Autumn Bridge by Takashi Matsuoka. Or the wonderful series of detective novels by Laura Joh Rowland.
3267192
I enjoyed the stories a lot, until the author explained how he took liberties with timeline, people, etc.

I thought it was great non-fiction, but it turned out to be better than average fiction.  I suspect the true events of the actual people are a much more powerful story.
3504428
I did enjoy the stories, however , I didn'T like the fact that I continued to have to remember new names continuously.