Tag Archives: Early Reviewers

Then She Died by Michael Geczi

Emotional and psychological episodes are nothing new for Will Post. He’s got a lifetime of experience. More than anyone would want or believe. But he doesn’t have any experience dealing with his recent killing of three people, and that’s his newest challenge, along with haunting hallucinations and delusions. His solution: hit the road, get out of Chicago, and hide and figure things out in the Berkshire Mountains in Western Massachusetts.

For a year, it works out well. He lives as a recluse, stays out of sight, and develops a new routine. Then he meets Val. They fall in love, move in together, and share a near-perfect life for several years … until she gets sick. And then passes away.

The episodes return, and Post inexplicitly decides to return to Chicago. Perhaps he can learn how to forgive himself and even heal. Chicago is no panacea, however. Chicago PD Detective Tanner Osborn is looking into the three killings, now ignored cold cases, determined to learn more.

Post faces other issues, as well, some dating back to his heartbreaking childhood, new ones tied to his return to Chicago, and others signaling a significant and intensifying psychological break.

And then there’s the voice in his head providing specific – and often conflicting – instructions.

Then She Died is a fast-moving and deeply penetrating look at the highs and lows surrounding life, love, death … and the always-important truism that actions – conscious and unconscious – have consequences.

Every single aspect of this story must be taken with a grain of salt. You’re already going to know that because right from the start there will be a constant nagging in your head. “This just doesn’t seem right? Is it?”

Is it? In the end you still won’t know, what with all the red herrings and loose ends that remain. Or will you?

This isn’t a case of too many characters, though sometimes it felt like it when a name popped back up and I couldn’t remember how they fit in. They were just under utilized and most of them could have been developed at least a little bit more. But taking that too far would have given away the whole thing! The “is this even real” vagueness is a must.

Looking for logic here isn’t going to serve you well. There isn’t any. But it was a fun ride!

3/5

Haunted Houses Creak: A Horror Collection by M. H. Altis

“I once read a F. Scott Fitzgerald (F. Scott Fitzgerald? what he’d do to you?) short story collection that gave a bit of context and descriptions for all the stories within, and I liked it. Not necessarily the stories themselves, but the idea. So, here were [sic] are — shouts out Scotty F regardless.

“Be warned: some of these stories may be truly scary, and some are definitely on the goofier side. Be prepared to laugh, cry, roll your eyes, and shiver.” ~ M. H. Altis

Let’s get this out of the way. I found this book difficult to read. I know some of the words weren’t those intended. For instance, I don’t know what a “spurring boy of only five years old” would be. I even looked it up, to see if there was a definition of “spurring” that I wasn’t familiar with. I didn’t find one. There are some instances of the exact same wording used in a different part of a story to describe a condition or event. Some of the sentence structure was confusing – odd sentence structure or colloquialism. There are some places where it’s quite obvious some editing was done for a sentence and the unwanted remnants remained. A lot of what I found seemed to be simple word processing errors that a spellcheck wouldn’t catch.

5 AM Publishing needs a proofreader and an editor.

This is a book of short stories, so character development needs to be done quickly. The introduction of the group of friends in “Phantoms of Eternity: Haunted House” was interesting. Ages weren’t mentioned, or if they were I missed it. Initially they sounded like a bunch of high school kids, but then Sophia is described as having a visible scar from breast augmentation surgery. Oh! Must be early twenties? College kids? Nope. There’s mention of a new girl who was popular at her old high school. This made me go back and re-read Sophia’s description. Yup, high school girl with a boob job. Is that a thing now? Perhaps!

The boys all have a thing for the girls. No surprise there! What was a surprise was one couple, seconds after barely escaping one of the monsters in the house, moving in for a close, romantic moment while they’re still lying on the floor.

I could relate to “The Weeds.” I loved spending my summers in lakes, rivers and creeks but never any body of water that had vegetation in it! This one was definitely creepy!

“The Dog in the Woods” was an interesting story and more fleshed out, but it was also predicable. The ending wasn’t a surprise, though it was sad.

I had high expectations for “The Music Box.” The set up was great. But weird things happened with the telling of this one, too, not the least of which was using a rock to prevent a back door from closing as you couldn’t get back in – it locked automatically. But I couldn’t help wondering why they couldn’t just walk around the building to the front door, which was wide open. The visitors note a lot of inconsistencies in the condition of the place, which should be totally derelict, but is not. That’s never really explained. Also, it had really nothing to do with a music box, other than the fact it was there.

My favorite story was “The Shack.” Very creative use of an empty building and a surprise ending on this one!

All in all, I think the author did achieve the goal of making readers “laugh, cry, roll your eyes and shiver.”

3/5