The Poison Eaters and Other Stories by Holly Black

Summary:

In her debut collection, New York Times best-selling author Holly Black returns to the world of Tithe in two darkly exquisite new tales. Then Black takes readers on a tour of a faerie market and introduces a girl poisonous to the touch and another who challenges the devil to a competitive eating match.

Anna’s Thoughts:

This review is based on an ARC (which I received from LibraryThing’s Early Reviewer Program), which is also, sadly missing two stories that will be in the final book.

If there is one thing that I could say about Holly Black it would be this: The lady is good. I haven’t read many things by her, but everything that I have read continues to impress me. The Poison Eaters is no exception. The ability to tell an entire story in less than 15 pages is something that very few people can accomplish, and yet Holly makes it look like a cake walk. The only comparison that I can think of to sum up all of the stories inside of The Poison Eaters is that of the Brothers Grimm. Every story has a classic twist to it that leaves you completely in awe when you realize that never did you ever expect that to happen.

Since this is a collection of short stories though, what I did was rate each story individually and then averaged the ratings together for the final rating.

The Coldest Girl In Coldtown

It’s no secret that I am getting horribly tired of vampires, however this story introduces us to the idea of a world (in the near future) where vampires are commonplace in the world. We know they’re there, and they are not the good kind. The only thing that I disliked was the ending which to me felt a little blah.

A Reversal of Fortune

This by far is my favourite story out of the entire collection, it’s witty, wise, and the main character is a tricky little thing. LOVED the work-in reference to Devil Went Down to Georgia, although I couldn’t get the jump rope reference, anyone who might know what it is, should tell me :)

The Night Market

This story was very cute, but slightly sad. It’s nice to see a story where siblings fight for each other. And yet again the main character was strong and fought for what she wanted. There was a nice twist there at the end that I honestly didn’t expect at all.

The Dog King

This, this, this, is from what I’ve seen a lot of peoples favourites so far, and very well deserved, it’s a good story with a really good twist that you don’t expect fully but have some clue to. I wish there had been more information about the boy and his family, but it is a short story and not a novel for a reason.

Virgin

I loved love loved this one, I really truly did, and the lack of 5 stars is merely because of .. close to end ending.. hmm – I think when you read it you’ll know what I mean. This taught me a few things I didn’t know about unicorns and their lore/myths, and gives an amazing story with yet again, a beyond amazing twist!

In Vodka Veritas

In Vodka Veritas was cute, kind of like Revenge of the Nerds cute, where as the nerds get the upper hand for once! I liked it, the characters and descriptions of the class kind of remind me of the Italian class I took in 11th grade (which may I mention, I hated as well). However I was really interested in what people thought when they ‘woke up’ and found someone kissing them.. especially towards the end when the boys’ lips would have been getting kind of tired (I would imagine).

Coat of Stars

This was a very beautiful and sort of classic type story that shows the nature of the Faeries that I like. The sort of greedy, picky ones who have sleeves all full of tricky tricks. I really loved it and how easily the main character accepted what had happened and how hard he tried to get back what he had lost, it was really beautiful and very sweet.

Paper Cuts Scissors

Paper Cuts Scissors would probably have to be my least favourite out of all of the stories included in the book. For me it was sweet how everything happened, why the MC went after what he went after but the ending just completely shocked and sort of appalled me as well. I wasn’t happy with the way it ended, I kind of wanted to punch something.

Going Ironside

This one kind of left me going ‘ehhh’ at the end, good story, very vivid descriptions but there’s no real purpose to it, it kind of seems like they needed another story for filler and just kind of through this one together, and tossed it in the book. You will probably appreciate this one more if you’ve read the Modern Faerie books, if not and you don’t have knowledge of faeries in general, you might be a tad lost.

The Poison Eaters

By far this would have to be tied for my favourite with A Reversal of Fortune. I loved Reversal because of it’s funny, tricky, quirky story, but this one is my favourite for it’s sweetness and it’s pure ability to be an instant classic. It starts off a bit odd, but once you get into the story it’s completely heartbreaking and captivating all at the same time. I could defiantly see this being retold to children 20-30 years from now and beyond.