Evil is a Matter of Perspective: An Anthology of Antagonists Hardcover – Illustrated, 24 May 2017

i love grim dark, the short format is giving lots of worldbuilding and interresting ideas

Don’t be put off by the ludicrously pretentious foreword by Mr Bakker ( who can glory in having a part doctorate in philosophy and astounding us with his insights) as his only other contribution is the last story in the book (equally as bad as his foreword).In between two horrible bookends I found stories that were at least good , with many being very good. It gives me an insight into the worlds that these characters live in and at 4 authors to read more of (Messrs Ward and Tchaikovsky already have my undivided attention).That, and the fact I know to stay well away from Mr Bakkers works, is a win win for me.

I am not a wimp, but after about the 4th short story it was getting depressing so I gave up and deleted. I think that someone who reads this would need to be a bit more ruthless than me.

My rating 4.5I really liked all story in this compilation Grimdark Magazine. Although some of the stories I liked less than others, in the entire magazine there are still many of them that are great. Mostly fantasy readers will find stories for themselves because there is something for everyone. I sincerely enjoyed a lot of stories from which good novels might have emerged, if they were not written yet. In stories, there are characters that you can easily hate or love, but antagonism and rivalry among characters are well described. In some stories, I literally hated the characters who at all costs want to achieve their goals, but in their perception of the world, this is the right way. One thing is certain that all the stories in the magazine will not leave you inferior because it will drag you into the fantasy world and that is the most important thing. All in all, I was delighted to read this short story collection. I believe every fantasy fan will love this collection.

This collection of nineteen stories is a bold, comprehensive and worthwhile introduction to "grimdark" fantasy fiction. It contains several masterful tales that warrant the price of admission alone, and serves as a fabulous starting point for readers seeking to know more about the sub-genre.It also requires a degree of tolerance and perseverance. Possibly due to the manner of its creation, as a Kickstarter funded project led by a man clearly in love with his subject, it is without a doubt the most uneven anthology I've read.After a fusty foreword which combines a spectacular misreading of The Lord of the Rings with some amateur moral psychology and the brave promise that grimdark brings realism, maturity and nuance to the world of fantasy, we are then subjected to a handful of stories which seem to be doing their utmost to prove the opposite. Thus we discover that we have been invited to join a game of literary Russian roulette. At the commencement of each chapter we have no absolutely no idea whether we are about to experience a work of originality and brilliance, or be subjected to a stinker. The good news is that the great and the good significantly outnumber the stinkers. The bad news is that the stinkers are really bloody bad, and for some profoundly eccentric reason, most of them come early.Essentially, this anthology includes three categories of story. To my mind the best are the genre bending oddities which range from Victorian Gothic horror via historical fiction through to warring insect people. These are mostly thought-provoking, often poetic and always interesting. Of particular note are "A Royal Gift", "Old Blood" and "Exceeding Bitter".More numerous are the tales of criminal and magical ne’er-do-wells. I found these very reminiscent of Robert Asprin’s classic Thieves’ World anthologies of the ‘70s and ‘80s. That's no bad thing. While the similarity may have reinforced my opinion that grimdark isn’t anything new, what that means for us is very written stories that usually contain at least one twist or novelty that lifts them above the ordinary. I thought the best of these was "The Tattered Prince."The final block of stories were the ones I found problematic. Stories which read like bad Warhammer/Dragon-Age fan fiction, assembled from a bargain bucket of tv-tropes and Marilyn Mason-esque symbolism. These routinely tried (and failed) to make themselves interesting by offering unexamined glimpses of domestic violence, rape and child abuse. Examining these topics in a fantasy context can be done with power, compassion and finesse, as George Martin and others have shown, but when they are handled with the sensibilities of titillated, sadistic teenager, you get a car crash.But if you forgive those missteps, or better still skip past them, this is mainly a cracking read. It’s always hard to know how to rank anthologies, and rarely do I feel that it's sensible to simply take an average score of the short stories included. What I look for in this kind of work is a couple that I know will stick in my mind long after reading. Evil is a Matter of Perspective contains at least a handful of those - which is an excellent result.There’s plenty of gold in this collection, you’re just going to have to sift a little to uncover it.Thanks to the publisher for the ARC

Boring, unimaginative content.