Good stories, slightly repetitive
593415
The author details life in a moderately-sized city fire/EMS department. To any seasoned fire/EMS professional, the book may seem to spend far too much time explaining the basics of EMS over and over. The stories are exciting and certainly entertaining. I wouldn't expect it to be any great learning experience for someone in the field, but if you are a newbie or want to learn more about the fire/EMS service, it is a great read!
2033423
I typically enjoy reading short stories, and this is a pretty good,
if somewhat uneven collection.  The goal of some of them (particularly
the frame story) seems to be little more than to shock.  And while
this is accomplished relatively well,  there is something more to
a number of the stories.

One does have to admire Palahniuk's craft.  The structure of most
stories and the narration is masterful.  The first story stands out
in this regard.  After all these are just words on paper, and not that
many words at that.  And yet, the story is as disquieting as anything
I have seen on television or film.

While none of the other stories achieve this intensity, they are all
disturbing in their own way.  And that is probably the main shortcoming
of the book - one does ask whether Palahniuk really used his prodigious talents
only to show that he can disgust us in 25 different ways?
4538632
The only problem I have with this is that it IS short stories, which are not my favorite.  The stories are pretty good, if you do like that kind of thing.
3448215
I did like this series, but when reading all ten books at once, the stories in the middle start to drag a little bit. It begins to feel a little bit repetitive, but then picks up again towards the end.
4262648
Excellent book. A bit repetitive at times.
3146469
Its a good read, won't be to everyones sort of read, a bit repetitive when reading the next book.
1579761
It's interesting to me that the compilation of these two stories got higher ratings than the individual stories.  I enjoyed both tales though they were not without their shortcomings.  The positive: I enjoyed the author's writing style. He does know how to create suspense and I felt his descriptions at times (ex., during the blizzard) really placed me in the scene.  That being said, I felt at times there were subplots in Dismember that went on too long (the mall scene) or didn't need to be included at all (the attack scene in the mother's house).  Remove or at least pare down those scenes and there would be ample space to give us more critical information. For example, what was Mr. Boots motivation in taking Davey and what happened to Davey over those twenty years?  And, in Freeze, what is the origin or at least some explanation for the ice monsters?  For me, these monsters are so out of the ordinary that some explanation of their existence is a requirement.  But my biggest complaint, with both stories, are the abrupt endings. I'm guessing the author prefers to leave the endings open to the reader's interpretation but with Freeze in particular the ending is so abrupt it almost seems like the story went unfinished.  Or maybe the idea is to leave these stories open to enable sequels.  If so I'd like to know that I'm reading the beginning of a series before I commit my time to the first book.

Again, I enjoyed the suspense and if some readers feel I'm being too critical it's because I do see a lot of positives and I'd like to see even better stories down the road.  I'm not sure, though, I can commit to reading more from this author if the stories all end the same way.
4599807
Good content; a little too repetitive and some of the anecdotes dragged on, but it was a quick and interesting read.
278168
I've read these stories several times. And it was worth rereading.
868405
I'll try and review each story in short.

1. Faerie Ire by Erin Tettensor. A cute story rich in humor and with some very witty writing. Some may consider it childish, but that was author's intention. Entertaining. ****

2. The Woman Who Drew Dragons by Rosemary Jones. A very nice idea, but a bit drawn out. Could have been shorter. ***

3. The Hunting Game by Eric Scott De Bie. One of two stories I was looking forward to. De Bie shows all of his storytelling talent in this story, but I got the feeling he wanted to tell too much in 30 pages. Had the substance for a whole novel, really. Imaginative, but hasted. ***

4. The Road Home by Harley Stroh. A very good short story, with all the elements a short story should have. Very interesting characters. ****

5. How Burlmarr Saved the Unseen Protector by Kameron Franklin. The second one I was looking forward for. I just loved "Maiden of Pain". The story features one of Realms' iconic dragons. Again, we have an interesting idea and good writing, but very hasted realization. Could have used additional 20 pages. ***

6. A Tall Tale by J.L. Collins. Nave and pretty boring. Probably the worst of the lot. *

7. The Book Dragon by Jim Pitrat. Concise and vivid. Interesting characters, although not so dragon-oriented as the rest of the stories. ****

8. Freedom's Promise by Ed Gentry. The crown story of the book. Magical, philosophical, tragic. Simply great. *****

9. Possessions by James P. Davis. Another great story. Bloody and mystical, with one totally unpredictable twist. *****

10. Queen of the Mountain by Jaleigh Johnson. A story of human determination. As some other stories in the book, could have used a couple more pages to flesh it out. ***

11. The Strength of the Jester, by Murray J.D. Leeder. Nothing special, although it has a nice, philosophical note to it. The only story directly dealing with the Rage. Too much combat, though. ***

All in all, this is a selection of average short stories, with two shining exceptions, and very few bad stories. I will give it four stars, although I must warn you that you will actually get only 240 pages of stories. The rest are excerpts from other books, used only to pump up the page count. They really could have included another story or two. A classic WotC robbery.
4607912
I did really love a few of the stories in this anthology. The concept of it was fun: what can people do in hotels that they wouldn't do at home, surrounded by the markers of daily life? I haven't had a whole lot of sex in hotels, and this was a fun way to live vicariously.

I liked Tightly Tucked by Alison Tyler for its audacity. Memphis by Gwen Masters almost made me want to have an affair with someone who's taken, just for how well it captured the frisson of taboo in that situation. Talking Dirty by Shanna Germain was a sweet story, and I thought Reunion by Lisabet Sarai was a sexy story while still being emotionally charged. Hump Day by Rachel Kramer Bussel herself was fun; I usually like her writing, and this was no exception.

All that said, I think Greta Cristina had a point when she recently said that the flood of available erotica books means that there is less consistent quality in the stories published. I think it's a good thing that you can walk into big book stores and buy sexy stories easily as pie, but this book has a couple examples of stories that weren't as fleshed out or well-written. The St. George Hotel, 1980 was a little rushed and implausible, Heart Shaped Holes read to me like a caricature of an erotic story, and a few more were just kind of bland.

Overall, though, this book is worth buying and reading for the excellent stories that are in it, and I'm sure other people will have different favorites. The good thing about an anthology is you can always just skim or skip the stories you don't like.
4752176
Though not a totally stellar collection, there are some stories that I consider real clunkers in this, it is a nice collection by an author not widely known to many people.
  The stories aren't sheer entertainment here, they are entertaining, generally, but of a higher caliber, thought-provoking and displaying a wide-breadth of subject matter and technique. As I mentioned, they can be somewhat cynical, sometimes whimsical,and always satirical.
  Tenn's afterwords to each story provide some interesting insights, and in a couple cases give good reason anyone would display some cynicism
  Overall it was good enough that I shall be trying to get the second volume. The good stories repaid the effort put into reading them and more than made up for the stories I personally did not like.
3993391
Good stories.  Poor transfer.  Some a little dated.
3597626
Some really good stories mixed in with passable stories. Nothing particularly awful, which is good enough with me. But it did use the Supernatural iin ways that change the structure of the story. Which is good, that means it isn't a noir story with demon gangsters or vampire Femme fatales, essentially supernatural elements wrapped over Noir tropes. Instead we get Jealous boyfriends biting off more than they can chew with apocalyptic consequences. Addicts helping old ladies stop a sorcerer from achieving immortality. Friction develops between a couple isolated in the northwest woods.

I subscribe to James Ellroy's idea of noir; Losers and burnouts, murderers and creeps. But on the other end, there's the normal people in tough situations. This anthology reaches both ends of that spectrum. There is one Private Eye story, but that's interesting enough that i enjoyed. It was one of the more lighter toned stories.
This is a good Anthology, quality writing, quality stories. Can't go wrong with reading Datlow.
1414683
I thought the stories were generally well-written. The collection could have been larger. Some stories dragged on and left me confused on the plots. Overall, for someone like me who reads a lot of science fiction, they were satisfactory.
2122034
These books are a good read at a great price. You'll fall in love with the Moretti minions, laugh out loud and cry. Each couple goes through both heartache and medical dramas before their HEA. The stories were good but each story was just to similar in context to the others. To give this set more stars the stories needed to be more original instead of basically the same story with different characters and different medical crises. Baseline good just not fully developed individual stories.
2353172
For the most part, it was good. The stories were intriguing and a couple resonated with me (still do). Some of the others were a tad too avant-garde for my taste.