Stories by Carrie Vaughn (my favourite), Megan Lindholm, Lawrence Block, Joe R. Lansdale, Megan Abbott, Cecelia Holland, and a novella by George R. R. Martin set in his Song of Ice and Fire world.

Releasing at the Bookcrossing Meetup Group Monthly Meetup (Vancouver). Come and join us. Free books; great conversation.

Tuesday, October 14, 2014 at 7:00 PM

Heartwood Community Cafe, 317 East Broadway (at Kingsway, near Main), Vancouver, BC

This was originally one third of a book of the same title, now broken up & published as three. It is difficult to categorise other than as short stories because the range of genres is so great. The longest piece is George RR Martin's The Princess and the Queen which is a novella that could serve as a prologue to "A Game of Thrones". It unfortunately is written as a history of the time, the narrator occasionally self refers as 'scribe', and it reads like history with the people rarely appearing as anything other than reactive figures. The piece does not inspire me to read Game of Thrones, especially since I know that all the dragons, riders and politicians would not be referred to in that work.
The other stories are very different: Lawrence Block gives us a startling first person tale of a man who apparently allows himself to be picked up in a bar, with unpleasant consequences, Megan Chisholm gives us a sanity/dementia - life/death story with a somewhat disturbing ending, and Megan Abbott has a story of a missing child and the questioning the parents undergo when the child cannot be found.
They are all well written by authors who understand their craft, there are twists in the tails of the tales, and the voices are all distinct from each other.
I would have marked it higher if I had liked the GRR Martin novella.

We can't leave books here so they are available only as long as we are there - until approximately 8:30pm. Join us for coffee and a chat, we welcome newcomers. We're easy to spot as there is always a pile of books moving about our table and there are always more than the ones announced as being released. Feel free to ask for the book that attracted you and you don't _have_ to stay.