Category Archives: book reviews

Retail Theory, the downs, and why she hates everything…

Posted on April 4, 2025 by Mark Hayes

Retail is a strange place. I am aware I speak as a man who is less than fond of shopping, and who has never worked in a shop, but I have long been aware for those who do, retail is a strange place. Just how strange… Well that’s where Maggie Weber’s book comes in. Continue reading →

Posted in book reviews, books, humour, indie writers, indiewriter, reads | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Dear Edgar 28~ The Murders in the Rue Morgue

Posted on April 3, 2025 by Mark Hayes

At some point in your life you will have learned of this story, you will most likely not recollect when and how you learn of it, but you know of the story. ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue’ is one of those stories that is part of the zeitgeist of humanity. It is a story so intrinsic to our collective culture, so ingrain within us, so referenced and repeated, that it exists beyond itself. Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, Poe, reads, retro book reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Dear Edgar 27: The Man of the Crowd

Posted on March 31, 2025 by Mark Hayes

 It was well said of a certain German book that “er lasst sich nicht lesen” –it does not permit itself to be read. There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. Men die nightly in their … Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, Dear Edgar, Lovecraft, Poe, reads, retro book reviews, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Miscast in petticoats

Posted on March 28, 2025 by Mark Hayes

Lucifer Mandrake, Arcanist to the court of St James, by appointment of Queen Victoria Saxe-Coburg, is not having his best day. Someone has been resurrecting dead peers of the realm. The House of Lords is now inhabited by the undead. Sooner or later, someone is bound to notice. Well probably. Is this just a plot to derail The Witchcraft Bill? Or is it something more insidious, such as a plan to remove Victoria as head of state and replace her with the King of Hanover? Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, books, indie, indie novels, indie writers, novels, rites, sci-fi, steampunk, supernatural, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Cocktails in the Cosmos

Posted on March 3, 2025 by Mark Hayes

I am to blame, at least in a small way, for something delightful. This has been known to happen before… Occasionally I think people just need someone to blame and I am convenient as I have an occasionally loud personality, … Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, books, fiction, indie, indie novels, sci-fi, writing | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A semblance of Truth

Posted on December 9, 2024 by Mark Hayes

I am a bit of a fan boy when it comes to the work of Nimue and the esoteric creation Hopeless Maine (and Nimue’s writing in general). So when I was given the chance to read a early copy of Semblance of Truth I jumped at the chance. Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, books, indie novels, indie writers, sci-fi, steampunk | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Fascinating Folklore, Taurus and the book pile

Posted on November 22, 2024 by Mark Hayes

fascinating insight as that may be to the beside cabinet of a bibliophile, on to some reviews, starting, as a delightful Flemish research witch has me on a folklore kick at the moment with with Fascinating Folklore… A book that answers a question much on the lips of the zeitgeist these days. Did anything good ever come out of Twitter..? Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, books, rites | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Terrifying Joy from the Forests of Flanders

Posted on November 20, 2024 by Mark Hayes

Terrifying joys, and glimpses into Europe’s our collective cultural past. For while these are all Flemish tales, they are tales that are echoed throughout Europe. Which is only natural, as travels tell tales of their homelands and those tales get retold and made anew. A such this book is tales of the kind told around the camp fire, on the edge of the woods, with twilight all around. Told to frighten, and to warn. The woods are dark, the wise do not wander there.

But who wants to be wise… Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, books, druidry, Europe, pagan, reads, rites, supernatural | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Dear Edgar #22 The Fall of the House of Usher

Posted on October 27, 2024 by Mark Hayes

The themes of three earlier stories in particular are each echoed in this story, those being Morella, Berenice and Ligeia. Which is not to say that Edgar was obsessed with putting female characters into soporific states that seem death like, decaying, and wasting away, but it is a theme that comes up time and time again in the early tales. What is odd is that these themes were so prevalent before the wasting disease that would take his wife from him not many years later was diagnosed. Equally the male characters in all these stories react to these tragedies with obsession and madness that echoes how the death of Victoria was to plunge him into a deep alcohol fuelled depression and began his own downward spiral to an early grave.

Occasionally life imitates art in dreadful ways. Continue reading →

Posted in book reviews, Dear Edgar, Goth, horror, opinion, Poe, reads | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Redux: Beguiling darkness: Tethered

Posted on October 15, 2024 by Mark Hayes

This is a fabulous ride of a novel, through a dark gritty fantasy landscape, with strong characters, betrayals, surprises, shocks, a whole world of imagination to explore and wonder at. There will I am sure be more to come, and I was delighted to go back to it and see how much what had been a good book when I read the early draft four year ago has been revise and polished into something so much more than it was. Continue reading →

Posted in amreading, book reviews, books, fiction, reads, steampunk, supernatural, writing | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment