Coping with Death and Destruction Review

Title: Coping with Death and Destruction
Author: Arrison Kirby
Series: Not Applicable
Publisher: El Deth Inc
Publication Date: 20 March 3027
Source: Author
Format: Paperback
Pages: 36
Rating: 3 Stars (An average of all the stories combined)
Reading Timeline: 15 June 2017 - 18 June 2017










Goodreads Synopsis:

This is a collection of twelve, high concept, multi-part short stories reflecting on and inspired by the death and transformation of the year 2016. It serves as an elegy for that period of time, submerging into its dark themes of lass, extracting what irreverence and hopefulness it can and reflecting it through a prism of an eternal universe.

Sorted astrologically, the stories sometimes span generations, depicting conflict based around themes such as apocalypse, dreams, again, dying, ghosts, the afterlife, animals, nature, global politics and pop culture. Location also varies taking the reader through several America states to North Korea, Africa, the Philippines and beyond - often peppered with heavy doses of Southern Gothic sensibility. Here you can read about religion based on science fiction and fantasy, a 1960's lounge singer marginalized by the Beatles, or a mixture of drugs that allows the user to summon the dead.

Several of the tales blend fact into fiction, nodding to the cultural giants whose deaths loomed over the year 2016: David Bowie, Leonard Cohen, Prince, Carrie Fisher and others. These are detailed and developed stories, intended to instill within the reader a sense of timelessness and a comfort in the notion of infinity.

Book Review:
Pre-reading Thoughts:

I was sent this book a couple weeks ago and have finally found time to pick it up. I believe that the concept of this book is a really interesting one and I want to see how well the concept is executed. With the unique concept comes numerous amounts of possibilities that I hope are explored through the twelve short stories. I am also intrigued to see how developed these stories are and to which event they relate to.

Thank you so much to Arrison for this opportunity! I am grateful for a copy of the books! Just a quick note; I have received this book at no costs of my own in exchange for an honest review. With that ebbing said, please note that in no way has receiving this book affected may opinions. All thoughts are my own.

Writing Thoughts:

The writing in this book is really good. Just enough description for you to see the world unfolding and a good enough pace for it to see like it is not dragging. I enjoyed this aspect of the book way more than anything else.

Plot Thoughts: In this case of this book, I will list what I thought of the different stories

Myth, 2.5 Stars
This story focuses on the feud between those who like Batman and those who like Star Wars. In the dystopian world present, there is no technology and adults refer back to old method of story telling. The story started off well and focused but seemed to loose that focus after a couple of pages. One moment we are in a classroom-like environment and the next we find ourselves in the midst of a family separating because the husband likes Batman and the wife likes Star Wars.

Earthlings, 3 Stars
This story was focused on how certain people deal with death and honestly, it was a bit disturbing towards the end and slightly uncomfortable. But it was also a lot more focused and made way more sense than the previous story

Oblivion, 2.5 Stars
This was another story that I didn't really understand. It started off pleasant and then sort of when a little haywire where everyone sort of just died at the end... I'm not too sure what to make of it.

Butterflies, 3 Stars
What started off as peaceful snd interesting turned out to be a bit off. A young to be married couple Vader a huge amount of butterflies for their wedding. However, incorporated in the masses of butterflies is one deadly type that's poisonous to digest. And I think you can see where that story foes. It was interesting but odd...

Final Thoughts:

Overall, I ended up DNFing this book. Not because it was bad. I thought that this book was odd but interesting at best. Half the time, I was unsure of what to make of the stories. Whatever I was expecting, it certainly was not this. But I just kinda sat on my bed, picked up this book and realized that it wasn't for me. It didn't appeal to me and I hoped at some point it would but it just didn't. I am, however, grateful to have received this book from the author in exchange for an honest review. I really liked his writing style would definitely like to see more of it in future novels.

Yours in Reading,

Melleny

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