J. Lincoln Fenn

When obituary writer Dmitri Petrov lands a gig covering the reportedly haunted Aspinwall Mansion, he finds himself in the middle of a family mystery with maybe a few too many coincidences.

I went into Poe with limited expectations, having read mixed reviews of what some term a novel rife with “sophomoric humor.” Poe feels like a young adult novel in terms of voice, though not with regard to content. The blurb talks about gruesome murders, of which there are a couple scenes that yes, are a little disturbing. Is it horror? I wouldn’t say so, but the other book I’m reading right now is Joe Hill’s NOS4A2, which is. Poe is horror lite at best, sarcastic and more of a supernatural/paranormal novel than anything else.

This is a fun read that doesn’t take itself too seriously. There’s a pretty big cast (lots of minor characters to keep track of), of which Nachiel tripped me up the most (not only because I’m not a fan of any name that close to “nacho” but because I didn’t know where he came from). I think by that point I was in the midst of a serious case of “character soup.” The book goes back and forth through time (dream/wake/now/then), but the storyline flows with only minor hiccups.

Would I recommend it? Sure. Just don’t expect something it’s not (dark horror) and if you’ve read it and enjoyed it, Poe reminds me a lot of Matt Schiariti’s Ghosts of Demons Past. Another book full of sarcastic wit with an antihero lead character, Ghosts touches on a lot of the same themes.… (mer)

I was really enjoying reading this book until I got to the final 100 pages and the favours for “Scratch” started rolling in. The concept of the protagonist selling her soul to the Devil is a typical theme that I’ve read about quite a bit, but that didn’t detract from the story until the author made it clear that any and all of the favours being called in were of an extremely gruesome and violent nature. Maybe I’m just too attracted to the idea of Satan as a misunderstood anti-hero to accept the simple concept that every single “favour” is going to be extremely negative, but making it this simple gives away the author’s true feelings (and ultimate judgement) about the characters and her acceptance of typical Christian interpretations of the mythos surrounding the fallen angel, and ultimately ended up with me being equally grossed out by the atrocities carried out in the story and annoyed with the author for being so typical.… (mer)