bookwyrm_kate's review
3.0
The stories that I loved, I LOVED (Some Desperado, Neighbors, Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell, Virgins [more because I know the characters and situations already, I imagine new Gabaldon readers might be confused], and Hell Hath No Fury), but the stories I hated, I HATED (I Know How to Pick 'Em, City Lazarus, and Lies My Mother Told Me). Those were just...icky.
Most of the other stories were "meh..." I enjoyed George R.R. Martins story adding to the history of Westeros, but it read as just that; history. I thought "The Girl in the Mirror," had potential, but borrowed heavily from Harry Potter, so much so that it seemed like fan-fiction.
I will look forward to reading "Bombshells," but as I'm not caught up on the Dresden Files yet, the intro alone smacked me in the face with a rotten-fish of a spoiler. Spoilers are only charming when alluded-to by River Song, so I would have appreciated a warning, although I realize that's a selfish, somewhat "spoiled" wish, considering the last book came out two years ago. Still...
Most of the other stories were "meh..." I enjoyed George R.R. Martins story adding to the history of Westeros, but it read as just that; history. I thought "The Girl in the Mirror," had potential, but borrowed heavily from Harry Potter, so much so that it seemed like fan-fiction.
I will look forward to reading "Bombshells," but as I'm not caught up on the Dresden Files yet, the intro alone smacked me in the face with a rotten-fish of a spoiler. Spoilers are only charming when alluded-to by River Song, so I would have appreciated a warning, although I realize that's a selfish, somewhat "spoiled" wish, considering the last book came out two years ago. Still...
thisotherbookaccount's review against another edition
3.0
The thing about anthologies is that it is impossible to hit jackpot with every story in the book. Likewise, in this anthology, which is a collection of 21 writers, there are as many hits as there are misses. There were veteran writers that disappointed and there were semi-professional writers that surprised. Either way, with the genres spreading far and wide for this anthology, expect more than a handful of stories to fall under the category of "not my cup of tea".
On the whole, it was an enjoyable read, even though there were a few duds along the way. The highlight of the anthology, of course, was the novella by George RR Martin called The Princess and the Queen, which tells the story of the Targaryen civil war in the A Song of Ice and Fire universe. It's a exciting look at a part of the universe's history that's been mentioned but not explored. As a fan of that universe, I'd say that that story was the most rewarding.
On the whole, it was an enjoyable read, even though there were a few duds along the way. The highlight of the anthology, of course, was the novella by George RR Martin called The Princess and the Queen, which tells the story of the Targaryen civil war in the A Song of Ice and Fire universe. It's a exciting look at a part of the universe's history that's been mentioned but not explored. As a fan of that universe, I'd say that that story was the most rewarding.
ladyoberholt's review against another edition
5.0
I thoroughly enjoyed this anthology. I wasn't sure what to expect, as anthologies aren't really in my wheelhouse of reading, but it introduced me to a variety of authors and was quite fun to read, although, admittedly, there was a story or two I found a bit disturbing . . . But that was all part of the adventure.
Btw: green vs blacks??? Foreshadowing for a certain book series/ HBO show??? We shall see!
Btw: green vs blacks??? Foreshadowing for a certain book series/ HBO show??? We shall see!
cher_n_books's review against another edition
2.0
2 stars - Meh. Just ok.
Major disappointment! Despite the big names involved, most of these stories were underwhelming, and almost all were forgettable.
The Dangerous Women anthology contains the following stories:
- “Some Desperado” by Joe Abercrombie - A Red Country story. 3.5 stars. Lots of action, sarcastically funny in parts. One of the few stories that fit the expectations I had for short stories about dangerous women.
- “My Heart is Either Broken” by Megan Abbott - 2 stars. More of a contemporary plot, but had awkward description phrases.
- “Nora’s Song” by Cecelia Holland - 1.5 stars - Yawn.
- “The Hands That Are Not There” by Melinda Snodgrass - 3 stars - Exceeded expectations. Reminiscent of something Hitchcock would have done.
- “Bombshells” by Jim Butcher - A Harry Dresden story - DNF. Drops a MAJOR spoiler in the author's intro with no warning, and the short story is wrapped about that spoiler as well. If you are not already well into the Harry Dresden series, don't even peek at this one.
- “Raisa Stepanova” by Carrie Vaughn - Didn't read it, and didn't realize that until I began writing this review. Must have accidentally skipped over it after DNF'ing Jim Butcher's story.
- “Wrestling Jesus” by Joe R. Lansdale - 4 stars - Includes a very memorable character and hilarious dialogue.
- “Neighbors” by Megan Lindholm - 3 stars - A lot is left unexplained. A sad story, but had very realistic dialogue. Interesting twist on dangerous, as the woman was dangerous to herself.
- “I Know How to Pick ’Em” by Lawrence Block - 2.5 stars - Sick and twisted.
- “Shadows For Silence in the Forests of Hell” by Brandon Sanderson - 4.5 stars - Creepy story about supernatural things in the woods with anger issues. Best story in the book!
- “A Queen in Exile” by Sharon Kay Penman - 2 stars - Not a bad story, but I am at a loss as to how to make the dangerous woman connection.
- “The Girl in the Mirror” by Lev Grossman - A Magicians story - 1.5 stars - While it takes place in the same world from A Magicians story, it is hard to believe it was written by the same author. Read like a middle grade story with gratuitous f**ks thrown in frequently, just to remind you it's for adults despite the juvenile writing and cheesy dialogue.
- “Second Arabesque, Very Slowly” by Nancy Kress - 1.5 stars - Dystopian world where women are a form of sex slaves and everyone is fighting to survive and eat, and then a few characters suddenly become obsessed with ballet. Yes, I thought that was strange as well.
- “City Lazarus” by Diana Rowland - 2 stars - Plot was interesting enough, but the dialogue was a bit cheesy.
- “Virgins” by Diana Gabaldon - An Outlander story - 3.5 stars - Would not be appreciated as much by those that are not already familiar with the characters from Outlander. If you do know and love those characters, this one was quite enjoyable.
- “Hell Hath No Fury” by Sherilynn Kenyon - 3.5 stars - Pleasant enough ghost story.
- “Pronouncing Doom” by S.M. Stirling - An Emberverse story - 1.5 stars - Not that interesting, and so forgettable that less than 2 weeks after reading it, I had to skim much of the story to even remember which one it was and what it was about.
- “Name the Beast” by Sam Sykes - 3 stars. One of the more unique stories - vaguely (very vaguely) reminded me of Avatar.
- “Caretakers” by Pat Cadigan - 2 stars. Ambiguous ending, extremely unrealistic nursing home/ALF setting.
- “Lies My Mother Told Me” by Caroline Spector - A Wild Cards story - DNF - Zombies + cheesy dialogue = I just can't.
- “The Princess and the Queen” by George R.R. Martin - A Song of Ice and Fire story - 2 stars. After what felt like forever in reading time, skimmed along and went to the end to see how it wrapped up. Not what one would call a page turner.
--------------------------------------------
Favorite Quote: When all the trees have been cut down and all the animals have been hunted to extinction, when all the waters are polluted and the air is unsafe to breathe, only then will you discover you cannot eat money. ~ “Hell Hath No Fury” by Sherilynn Kenyon
First Sentence: Genre fiction has always been divided over the question of just how dangerous women are.
Major disappointment! Despite the big names involved, most of these stories were underwhelming, and almost all were forgettable.
The Dangerous Women anthology contains the following stories:
- “Some Desperado” by Joe Abercrombie - A Red Country story. 3.5 stars. Lots of action, sarcastically funny in parts. One of the few stories that fit the expectations I had for short stories about dangerous women.
- “My Heart is Either Broken” by Megan Abbott - 2 stars. More of a contemporary plot, but had awkward description phrases.
- “Nora’s Song” by Cecelia Holland - 1.5 stars - Yawn.
- “The Hands That Are Not There” by Melinda Snodgrass - 3 stars - Exceeded expectations. Reminiscent of something Hitchcock would have done.
- “Bombshells” by Jim Butcher - A Harry Dresden story - DNF. Drops a MAJOR spoiler in the author's intro with no warning, and the short story is wrapped about that spoiler as well. If you are not already well into the Harry Dresden series, don't even peek at this one.
- “Raisa Stepanova” by Carrie Vaughn - Didn't read it, and didn't realize that until I began writing this review. Must have accidentally skipped over it after DNF'ing Jim Butcher's story.
- “Wrestling Jesus” by Joe R. Lansdale - 4 stars - Includes a very memorable character and hilarious dialogue.
- “Neighbors” by Megan Lindholm - 3 stars - A lot is left unexplained. A sad story, but had very realistic dialogue. Interesting twist on dangerous, as the woman was dangerous to herself.
- “I Know How to Pick ’Em” by Lawrence Block - 2.5 stars - Sick and twisted.
- “Shadows For Silence in the Forests of Hell” by Brandon Sanderson - 4.5 stars - Creepy story about supernatural things in the woods with anger issues. Best story in the book!
- “A Queen in Exile” by Sharon Kay Penman - 2 stars - Not a bad story, but I am at a loss as to how to make the dangerous woman connection.
- “The Girl in the Mirror” by Lev Grossman - A Magicians story - 1.5 stars - While it takes place in the same world from A Magicians story, it is hard to believe it was written by the same author. Read like a middle grade story with gratuitous f**ks thrown in frequently, just to remind you it's for adults despite the juvenile writing and cheesy dialogue.
- “Second Arabesque, Very Slowly” by Nancy Kress - 1.5 stars - Dystopian world where women are a form of sex slaves and everyone is fighting to survive and eat, and then a few characters suddenly become obsessed with ballet. Yes, I thought that was strange as well.
- “City Lazarus” by Diana Rowland - 2 stars - Plot was interesting enough, but the dialogue was a bit cheesy.
- “Virgins” by Diana Gabaldon - An Outlander story - 3.5 stars - Would not be appreciated as much by those that are not already familiar with the characters from Outlander. If you do know and love those characters, this one was quite enjoyable.
- “Hell Hath No Fury” by Sherilynn Kenyon - 3.5 stars - Pleasant enough ghost story.
- “Pronouncing Doom” by S.M. Stirling - An Emberverse story - 1.5 stars - Not that interesting, and so forgettable that less than 2 weeks after reading it, I had to skim much of the story to even remember which one it was and what it was about.
- “Name the Beast” by Sam Sykes - 3 stars. One of the more unique stories - vaguely (very vaguely) reminded me of Avatar.
- “Caretakers” by Pat Cadigan - 2 stars. Ambiguous ending, extremely unrealistic nursing home/ALF setting.
- “Lies My Mother Told Me” by Caroline Spector - A Wild Cards story - DNF - Zombies + cheesy dialogue = I just can't.
- “The Princess and the Queen” by George R.R. Martin - A Song of Ice and Fire story - 2 stars. After what felt like forever in reading time, skimmed along and went to the end to see how it wrapped up. Not what one would call a page turner.
--------------------------------------------
Favorite Quote: When all the trees have been cut down and all the animals have been hunted to extinction, when all the waters are polluted and the air is unsafe to breathe, only then will you discover you cannot eat money. ~ “Hell Hath No Fury” by Sherilynn Kenyon
First Sentence: Genre fiction has always been divided over the question of just how dangerous women are.
alliebookworm's review against another edition
2.0
First, DO NOT READ Sirens if you are not far into Dresden Files (minimum of Ghost Story), or else the intro to the Jim Butcher story will have a massive spoiler and make you want to throw this 800-page book across your dining room (not that I’m speaking from experience). Of the 20-ish stories, I liked a total of one from start to finish (Brandon Sanderson’s), and the rest were boring, pointless, or unnecessarily violent/demeaning/bizarre towards women. I picked up this book for stories of strong women, but most of these authors created worlds where women are the useless castaway of society, good for nothing but sex and making babies - so that a single strong woman could rise through it. Woof. That’s a lot to read over and over for 800 pages. Not all of the stories were bad, but the other ones I liked ended with me going “wait, what?” Also, if you want a tale of an underestimated stripper who wins the love of a sexist man to betray him for her own ends (told from the POV of the sexist man so that you really GET him, you know?), good news - you have not one, but two such stories in this book! Save yourself some time (and muscle strength from lifting this) and read something else instead.
corgi66's review
3.0
Admittedly, only read the GRRM story so far, which is a novella about the Dance of Dragons civil war that takes place about 100 years before the Ice and Fire series
jwels's review
4.0
This took me a while to get through. While I like the stories I much rather read a novel rather than short stories but I've found that by reading this anthology's like this I discover other writers I like and then go on to enjoy their novels. This anthology does this and allowed me to cross genre's as well. Of course I really like the stories done by my favorite authors like Diana Gabaldon, Brandon Sanderson and George RR Martin but now I have other authors like Cecelia Holland and Caroline Spector to check out.
zoe_marlett's review
challenging
dark
slow-paced
2.0
I would personally recommend not reading this. There’s a lot of weird, disturbing things and very few authors understood the assignment, as many of the stories were about men, only mentioning the so called ‘dangerous woman’ a few times. TRIGGER WARNING FOR NECROPHILLIA in ‘I know how to pick ‘em’ or whatever it’s called. I’ve blocked it from my memory and I wanted to tear out that story and burn it. It was horrible. Also, women written by certain men are some of the most unrealistic and annoying characters. Some guys write women like they’ve never had a good conversation with one and it shows. There were a few good stories, including Brandon Sanderson’s, Lev Grossmans, and whoever wrote the first story in the booo. There were a couple good ones, but overall, just no. Not worth the time and wrist pain from holding this giant book. Not it, for me personally.
theredqueen444's review
4.0
I only got a chance to read Virgins before it was due back at the library. Good backstory.