A Sliver of Darkness

Product Information

When Leila has to face up to her own imminent retirement from the liner, she can’t help asking questions, especially when a crew member is found dead in one of the swimming pools. Being new to Tudor's writing, I can already tell she excels at characterization and setting the scene, even in a short amount of time. so I will just say that they were comprised in equal measures of quirky, gory, zombie, flesh eating, cultish, horror, fantasy, futuristic, sci-fi, and even a dash of dystopian for good measure. At the beginning of each distinct, compulsive and well written story, Tudor helpfully provides an introduction which outlines how each came into being, and fans of the author may even recognise a character from one of her novels.

Story 1 | "End of the Liner" - A post-apocalyptic world where we follow a group of people stuck on a cruise ship for decades. Part mystery but with a sometimes horror themed twist, each offering brings us something slightly different. I also loved how amazingly vivid each story was, I could really picture what was happening and became so sucked in. J. Tudor, the author provides a very personal glimpse into her life, with the passing of her dad, and the impact that it had on her and her writing. They were good but I might have liked more of them if I wasn't already feeling unconnected as I knew I was heading into the fray of meeting new people, new situations, and new horrors.Tudor’s “A Sliver of Darkness” is an exciting short story collection that was fantastic from start to finish. Overall, if you like short stories with elements of horror which may give you the shivers then this collection should tick that box.

I already had a taste of Tudor’s short story writing when three were tacked on to an audio that I listened to a couple of years ago…one of them showed up in this collection (The Lion at the Gate) and I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed it the first time.A finished manuscript was scrapped because it didn’t work and rather than skip the publication year, C.

They are spooky, chilling, with elements of horror, the deranged, menacing and creepy, the bizarre, and on occasion, shot through with the darkest of humour. What I really liked it that each story featured an introduction from the author giving us insight into what inspired the tale. Tudor's novels are widely acclaimed for their dark, twisty suspense plots, but with A Sliver of Darkness, she pulls us even further into her dizzying imagination. As someone who has read all of Tudor’s published works, this is a great starting point for those that have not read her books before!This is the most profound and, at times, philosophical story of the collection while it retains its mysterious character as Leila will assume the duties of an amateur detective when a suspected murder takes place in the ship. Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine Books for not making me wait and for providing me with an ARC of this book for review. Since the book includes eleven stories and since they are short, I don’t think I’m up to the task of reviewing intelligently (do I ever? My favourite part was actually the ending as it was a bit of a twist and a cliffhanger rolled into one. There was definitely a deeper meaning behind it of greed and honesty which could have been expanded on.

BUT what I really did enjoy MOST was that ALL the stories also came with an introduction of their own-C. There is also a bit of humor in some of these stories (I'm Not Ted being a personal favorite) and I loved the 'expect the unexpected' twists at the end of each story. If you are a fan of Stephen King, Kelly Link, or the horror or thriller genres, there is definitely something here for you.There were a couple of other stories that leaned more to the horror side of things and those were not my favorite. One of my favourites was Gloria, featuring a woman who makes a living cleaning up the crimes of others. There are quite a few derelict blocks of flats where I live and I completely imagined sneaking around until I heard those strange noises, I would be out of there quicker than a Cheetah chasing a Gazelle.