Wine and Rank Poison

[David A. Riley]

Has anyone read this collection yet?

I was going to review it, but...

[dem bones]

but ... what exactly? If you think it's worth reviewing, it's worth reviewing.

[David A. Riley]

It should be reviewed. There's enough attention been lavished on it, and it comes from a good small press, with a truly excellent cover. It's just that the writing does not excite or interest me. It reads almost as if it was styled upon some East European or Russian stories that had been indifferently translated into English. This may have been the author's intention (apart from the "indifferently", I suppose), as the stories seem to be based in the Ukraine. And one piece, I'll swear to God, had probably been copied and pasted from the internet. It's a description of the apartment the protagonist's rented in some unpronouncable city.

"He had pre-booked an apartment on the internet for a week which was cheaper than a hotel. Theo had rented the one bedroom apartment for seven nights at £24 for a night which he paid without much regret as he thought it cheap enough to get laid, and perhaps get his wife back. It was two minutes from Deribasovskaya. The apartment was a bed-sit really. From the site description he could see that it had a bedroom/living room, kitchen and bathroom. PC/1024 kbps high-speed Internet, cable TV, a well equipped kitchen, which he wouldn't use much, and a queen-size bed."