The Dead Spot: Stories of Lost Girls, by Angela Sylvaine
The Book
Synopsis:
The Dead Spot: Stories of Lost Girls is the debut short story collection from the author of FROST BITE and CHOPPING SPREE.
The Dead Spot. A corner drenched in shadow. An earthquake’s epicenter. The part of a roller coaster ride where the car rounds the final curve and all force dissipates, leaving those trapped beneath the safety bar feeling sick and hollow.
The Dead Spot is a heart-wrenching collection of seventeen stories where lost girls and women live and die, where they laugh, cry, and disappear from view around that final curve.
My Review
The Dead Spot: Stories of Lost Girls is the debut horror short story collection of Angela Sylvaine, which will be published by Dark Matter INK. A compilation of powerful stories that all pivot around girls put in difficult situations, which push them towards their limit, written in a gorgeous prose.
It is difficult to qualify many of them due to how their length varies, from flash fiction territory to novelettes, but all equally intense, putting those girls in the spot where the society that should protect them can't help or even becomes part of that problem; a theme that runs in parallel with the current politic developments in some countries.
Supernatural things are involved in many of them, but we can see how at the end, it's only the agency of the characters their way to escape from that cycle they are immersed. I found especially interesting Antifreezer and Sweet Pea, one of the longest in the anthology, but whose ending almost stops my heart. Those with mixed endings stayed with me after finishing the collection.
If you are looking for a great palate cleanser, putting the focus on girls and horror, The Dead Spot: Stories of Lost Girls is an excellent collection, a proof of Sylvaine's talent as author.
The Author/s
Angela Sylvaine
Angela Sylvaine is a self-proclaimed cheerful goth who still believes in monsters. Her debut novel, FROST BITE, is out now, and her debut short story collection THE DEAD SPOT: STORIES OF LOST GIRLS will be available May 2024 from Dark Matter INK. Her short fiction and poetry have been appeared in over 50 magazines, anthologies, and podcasts, including Apex Magazine, Southwest Review, and The No Sleep Podcast.
She grew up in North Dakota and holds degrees in psychology, religion, and philosophy from the University of North Dakota. After marrying her high school sweetheart, they moved to Colorado, and now live on the front range of the Rockies with their three creepy cats.
Angela is a member of the Horror Writers Association, Denver Horror Collective, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, and Pikes Peak Writers.