Two Envelopes And A Phone > Recent Status Updates

Well, I took the plastic off this book as of now; I lose that sealed-in freshness and I have certainly let loose an odd-smelling paperback…but I get to look inside. Wow - all the stories are very short! That’s okay, just catches me a bit by surprise. Anyway, I shall sample a few tales after I get done with the dragons…

So I should be able to finish this tomorrow morning. It’s fairly entertaining as far as the Fantasy elements and the various surprises go, but I absolutely despise the “will they/won’t they?” ever-simmering romantic subplot going on with Violet and Xaden. I’m tired of this sort of dynamic, and the author is just shovelling it at us non-stop, to the point where I hate when Xaden shows up.

The Girl, The Gold Dragon, and Everything!?…

It’s gotten better - I like it more now. We have dragons…

I’m enjoying it…but it seems a lot like first entries in many other Fantasy series, so I’m unclear, so far, as to why it is such a runaway big-seller. I’m not the best person to judge, though, because this type of Fantasy book has become the type of novel I need to go to the least, precisely because they all seem very similar. But, as I say, this is an enjoyable book.

I might do Red House Mystery just ahead of this…but maybe not; I do want to see what I think of this high-impact Fantasy novel.

Two stories left - this collection has turned out to be fabulous. Superb stories.

Never really was inclined to read Dick Francis much - but the biographical details threw me for a loop, so now I’m curious. And I must finally get to Lionel Davidson.

I’m loving it - even if they aren’t his best stories (then again, I haven’t read them all yet!). The one with the circus lion was terrifying, even if it’s clear how much Fred Brown loved all cats, even huge cats.

Well, I’m happy, in a creeped-out way. This began as sort of a nightmarish version of As She Climbed Across The Table, and now it has left that behind, and we are in uncharted territory. Fun to get to this one so soon after Schow’s The Shaft, and even The Grief Hole. I have found another great Horror writer.

This should be an event - because up until now I have never managed to get to this author. Things change…

Vicious perfection, at the start.

First tale bodes well for the entire collection…

The Vengeance Man was terrific, and demands a “not too long after” Marlowe follow-up.

I'm on page 130, and the novel proper ends on page 169 - and then I get several short stories.

Loving it. Who knew there was an Incredible Shrinking Man from 1908 (final version, 1928). Cat, spider, dollhouse - shades of Richard Matheson! And…down to the sub-atomic…

Two stories left - by Lester Dent. and Erle Stanley Gardner. Overall, it has been a very entertaining line-up of stories.

I can’t tell you how excited I am to have another Maurice Renard novel lined up - he has been a true treat to find. I don’t think we can top The Blue Peril…but we’ll see. I didn’t know this was a “shrinking man” type of story; I just thought it was about a scientist maybe dealing with germs of some sort in a lab, them getting loose or whatever. But, no, apparently he shrinks to microbe size…