Jared

I don't even know what to say. I hate manga fans so much. I hate that someone turned this into a bullshit comic and that's all how idiots will get this story. I am constantly filled with rage.

I wanted to enjoy this a lot more than I did. Maybe it was just too long, but the last 100 pages were a slog to get through and I felt more like I was powering through it so I could move on to the next book instead of wanting to finish this. A lot of the stories felt really edgy and I was just pushing through the interstitials so I could get to the next one.

Story Ranking:

1. Obsolete by Mr. Whittier

2. Crippled by Agent Tattletale

3. Swan Song by The Earl of Slander

4. Exodus by Director Denial

5. Guts by Saint Gut-Free

6. Dissertation by The Missing Link

7. Ritual by The Matchmaker

8. Post-Production by Mrs. Clark

9. Evil Spirits by Miss Sneezy

10. Ambition by The Duke of Vandals

11. Foot Work by Mother Nature

12. Hotpotting by The Baroness Frostbite

13. The Nightmare Box by Mrs. Clark

14. Dog Years by Mr. Whittier

15. Punch Drunk by Reverend Godless

16. Product Placement by Chef Assassin

17. Slumming by Lady Baglady

18. Something’s Gotta Give by The Coutness Foresight

19. Cassandra by Mrs. Clark

20. Civil Twilight by Sister Vigilante

21. Poster Child by Mrs. Clark

22. Green Room by Miss America

23. Speaking Bitterness by Comrade Snarky

Usually the word "comedy" scares me when it's something written before Buster Keaton invented jokes in 1921. The Canterbury Tales is a slog to get through, The Divine Comedy is neither funny nor divine, and I was expecting this to be another slog with zero funny jokes.

So imagine my surprise when I was laughing at the words I was reading. I haven't laughed this hard at a book since I was a middle schooler reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid. This was hilarious. I was so shocked by how stupid everything was. They speak in uppity language, yet they're talking about deeply stupid topics.

I really want to see this performed live. I bet this would be an absolute hoot with a packed audience.

Times change and ultimately the worst people you know are going to thrive from it.

I really liked the difference between Yasha and Petya, both extremely irritating and purposeless men, yet Petya has a reason to keep going and Yasha's already given up. Petya seems afraid of the love he feels for Anya, while Yasha's love for Dunyasha is unreal and unrequited. He sees her as a workplace fling and disregards the love because he sees himself as above her, whereas Petya's love for Anya is genuine, he just believes that he's too far gone in a loveless world.

Varya's the goat. She's so easily ragebaited and Petya knows exactly how to push her buttons, I almost wanted to see the two of them fall in love. But ragebaiter x ragebaitee is not a common ship dynamic, especially in early 1900s Russian theatre.

I had to read this for a class. My professor absolutely adores Chekhov and I can see why. We had to read The Lady with the Dog earlier, and that was a truly beautiful short story. It made me cry by the end of it. That's probably the best short story I had to read for this class. Either that or Hills Like White Elephants, which also made me cry.

The Cherry Orchard didn't make me cry, but it's a comedy so that's expected. It didn't make me laugh either, but I'm sure these jokes would work a lot better if I saw them performed in a theatrical setting. I absolutely loved the characters, though. Especially Firs, I bet he would have had me hooting and hollering if I saw this live. That's a funny character. And his death is really funny too, I should really seek out a production of this play, because ending it with such a stupid death scene is comedy gold.

This was rad as hell. I LOVE that Jekyll wasn't the main character until the last chapter, it made everything so much more intense. I bet this would have been incredible to read as a surprise and not see the big reveal coming.

Literature is so awesome. This would be perfect to teach my students if they could get used to the Victorian language and random references to random stuff they wouldn't understand.

I am so endlessly impressed with how this was written. There's only six chapters and each one is from a different character's perspective. We see the same event play out five different times, and each time feels just as thrilling as when we first learned about it.

The only thing keeping this book from being perfect was the second chapter, the only chapter to not go over the inciting incident and also the only chapter that bored me to almost DNFing. But I'm endlessly glad that I powered through it and finished the rest of the novel in two days. This was seriously unbelievable.

It was written by a housewife and ex-teacher in her spare time. That's so inspirational to me, as I'm trying to become a teacher. If someone's debut novel can be this expertly written and near perfect, and it was produced in their spare time, then I can create something great too, even if it takes a decade or more.

The changing perspective was something I haven't seen outside of Weapons. I absolutely adore the idea of going over the same story multiple times, and I think the novel I'm going to write is going to use this format. It makes every single moment so tense.

Kristopher Triana constantly proves himself to be one of the best authors working in the horror space, and it's because he really understands how to write something that isn't remotely horror. A lot of times it seems like he desperately wants to get out of the extreme horror space, because all of his best work is just more violent crime dramas.

Shepherd of the Black Sheep works really well because of how much time we spend with Tom. The novel takes a lot of inspiration from 90s crime thrillers but puts us in the shoes of a victim instead of a cop. Tom falling down the rabbit hole feels so real because Triana cares about the characters he writes.

I don't have much to say. This was an incredibly gripping novel. I highly recommend this.

Triana repeatedly shows himself to truly care about his characters. Even in rather by the books ghost schlock like this, he proves that he wants these people to feel real. I like how the ghost who killed himself was kinda a dick. I like that his suicide was portrayed as something that had a drastic negative effect on the people he loved. I hate art that portrays people who kill themselves as innocent.

I really hated the ending of this one. Having the ghost write "I forgive you" instead of "I'm sorry" to Phoebe was really insulting. Phoebe was a lesbian who rejected him, which was the catalyst for his suicide. That's not her fault. She didn't do anything wrong. He shouldn't "forgive" her for anything, he should apologize for killing himself.

All in all, this was a fine novella. Sometimes it's nice to have a short little 90 page book to read when you're bored.

There have only been two books that have ever made me cry (audiobooks don't count). This is one of them.

I adored how most of the story doesn't involve the incident we are all expecting. It reminds me of The Dirties in that way. Despite most of what's happening being rather sweet, we know something deeply tragic and horrible is coming up. There's an endless underlying sense of dread that makes a lot of these sweet moments feel wrong.

And that ending. I feel so lucky to have my family. That's the real magic.

There have only been two books that have ever made me cry (audiobooks don't count). This is one of them.

I adored how most of the story doesn't involve the incident we are all expecting. It reminds me of The Dirties in that way. Despite most of what's happening being rather sweet, we know something deeply tragic and horrible is coming up. There's an endless underlying sense of dread that makes a lot of these sweet moments feel wrong.

And that ending. I feel so lucky to have my family. That's the real magic.

I put this book on pause for like a month only to find out i only had a chapter left. SUPER underwhelming ending.

There have only been two books that have ever made me cry (audiobooks don't count). This is one of them.

I adored how most of the story doesn't involve the incident we are all expecting. It reminds me of The Dirties in that way. Despite most of what's happening being rather sweet, we know something deeply tragic and horrible is coming up. There's an endless underlying sense of dread that makes a lot of these sweet moments feel wrong.

And that ending. I feel so lucky to have my family. That's the real magic.

I'm writing a dystopian novel and this inspired me to keep going. I really did not like the ending.