The finale to the ‘Shadowspawn’ saga sees Adrian and Ellen fight Adrienne and the manipulated Harvey to stop Adrienne’s deadly plan for humanity. Can Adrienne’s relentless and seemingly unstoppable pattern of conduct be foiled? Will Ellen actually do anything other than have opprobrium for Adrienne? Can Adrian ameliorate his children’s genetic heritage? Will there be accountability for Harvey’s consciously and purposeful (as well as stupid and ignorant) coercion to the dark side? Will the war against the Shadowspawn and the ugly things they do ever end? Will the human slaves of the Shadowspan ever break their unhealthy interaction patterns? Some if not all of these questions will be answered. This was very good even if it is removed from stone cold reality. There could be more in this verse; hopefully Stirling won’t adamantly refuse to write any more ‘Shadowspawn’ novels like he did with his ‘Draka’ verse.

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This 2003 ‘horror’ centres on the Gowan brothers who made films like ‘Revenge of the Maniac 2’ and ‘Terror Dolls of Castle Pain’, now they’re doing a crass reality show. Various hypersensitive, increasingly hostile, viperish, feckless, unstable idiots are kept in isolation and subjected to antagonising provocation. Naturally no-one acts in a reasonable manner or takes ownership for not intervening. But you don’t care about the shouty, obnoxious victims full of bitterness. This was badly written, unscary and punitive to the reader.

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