There are two stories worth reading in this anthology of supernatural Civil War-themed work: those by Collins and Somtow. (The latter is a depressing tale of race hatred, but at least it's well written.) One or two others are vaguely OK. The majority of them are awful. They are not written well; they are not researched well; they suck. The worst is probably Moorcock's surrealist nonsense, but Ballard's boring George Todd story, Wagner's silly cannibalism/undead tale and McCaffrey's sentimental plantation claptrap -- not to mention a plethora of Sherman's Bummers meet Zombies splatter -- just leave me bored. I'd recommend avoiding this.

Being a Civil War buff and zombie lover, I couldn't ask for any better combination. It was one of those books that was literally hard to tear myself away from. It's been awhile since I read it, but from what I recall there wasn't a bad story in the book. Holds your interest from beginning to end. One of those few books that I can honestly say I have every intention of going back and reading again.

This collection of horror stories inspired by the War Between the States has found the triple point between surrealism, history, and macabre insanity. Many of the authors, all of whom are well-known in this as well as other genres, have found new ground to tread in this well-edited compilation of "Civil" War-inspired horror fiction. From the tragic unwelcome homecoming of a maimed soldier in "The Sunday Go-To-Meeting Jaw" to the grim folly of "Terrible Swift Saw", there is enough plausible reality to anchor the supernatural twists of "Foragers" and "Darker Angels". "The Master's Time" is a very fresh piece by two newer writers with a stunning ending. One could find her or himself whistling "Dixie" to ease the tension if reading this in solitude. Once these unsettling 25 short stories find their way into your mind, your dreams will no longer be the same...

Many of these stories push the envelope of Nasty, and this anthology is not recommended for those with weak stomachs. Some of them are absolutely gut-wrenching, like John Shirley's "You Hear What Buddy and Ray Did?" and Mike Lee's "High Heels from Hell", while others are just disappointing (Rex Miller's "Brainchild"). Very few are particularly distinguished, and I guess my favorite has to be Howard (The Turtles, Flo & Eddie) Kaylan's "The Energy Pals", which hilariously lampoons the Power Rangers/Ninja Turtles territory. If you're looking for a few good nasty thrills, okay, but if you're looking for a great read, perhaps you might want to look elsewhere.

Though not all the stories are as taboo-shattering as the cover hype implies, a good bit of them are still excellent. Danielle Willis shows us the decidedly unromantic and unglamourous life of a vampire and her lover; Lucy Taylor gives us deadly autoeroticism and shows us what lies on the other side; Don Webb turns torment into art and Steve Rasnic Tem twists the family ties. An incident in a junior high school locker room destines one teacher for revenge in a story from Edward E. Kramer. There's also great work from Rob Hardin, Mike Lee and Howard Kaylan. A collection with far more hits than misses.

Take heed, this is NOT a book to show your parents... Take eroticism and mix it with horror, and you've got something you just can't put down, but you wonder why the heck you're reading such material...

Arthurian fiction in general is steeped with awful fiction, and short story collections are a mixed bag. Let me simply say that I was left unimpressed - and often disgusted - by the stories in here. There are some good ones, but they are few and far between. (Do not be led astray by the pretty cover art! It is pretty, but that's almost all it has going for it)

We start with an icky poem by Jane Yolen; then a groanworthy Mercedes Lackey story "The Cup and the Cauldron" -- it stars girls and yes, has more Christian-pagan stuff if you're as sick of that as I am; an incoherent Andre Norton story "That Which Overfloweth"; Marion Zimmer Bradley's equally groanworthy feminist-Goddess-server "Chalice of Tears." We hit something far better in Diana L. Paxson's "Feast of the Fisher King," which is both well-written and entertaining, as well as being in play format; also Brad Strickland's enjoyable elf-fantasy-Arthurian story "Gift of Gilthiliad."

Then it's back into "groan" territory with Ilona Ouspenskaya's gypsy tale "Curse of the Romany," where you wonder what-the-heck-does-this-have-to-do-with-it? James S. Dorr's "Dagda" is pretty; Gene Wolfe's odd "Sailor who Sailed After the Sun" is another where you wonder what the relevance is; Lee Hoffman's indifferently-written western-fantasy "Water" takes a long time to get to the point, as does Alan Dean Foster's "What You See..." and Richard Gilliam's "Storyville, Tennessee" and Jeremiah Phipps' "Hell-Bent for Leather" (are you seeing a pattern of irrelevance here?)

Lisa Lepovetsky pens another icky poem; Orson Scott Card's "Atlantis" stretches indefinitely; Dean Wesley Smith's "Invisible Bars" is pretty amusing; Janny Wurts bores and annoys with "That Way Lies Camelot"; Kristine Katherine Rusch's "Hitchhiking across an Ancient Sea" is a pale, pale short story; Lawrence Watt-Evans's story has a good idea, but is poorly written; Lionel Fenn's "The Awful Truth in Arthur's Barrow" is just plain bizarre, as is Brian M. Thompson's "Reunion." Margo Skinner redeems the poetry angle with "Quest Now"; Neil Gaiman's "Chivalry" is enchanting; Bruce D. Arthurs is weird again in "Falling to the Edge of the End of the World", same with Rick Wilber's "Greggie's Cup."

As you can see, this mixed bag tends toward the dull, irrelevant, pretentious and just poorly written. Half the stories seem to have the Grail thrown in (if it's there at all) just as an afterthought. Except for Margo Skinner's poem, the poetry all stinks; only a few of the stories retain the beauty and prose that one espects to see in an Arthurian story. When I buy a book classified as Arthurian fiction, I WANT Arthurian fiction; I do not want stories about pregnant gypsies, fantasy westerns, or genies.

There are much better collections out there, however bright the bright spots in this are. Read "The Doom of Camelot" and the upcoming "Legends of the Pendragon" if you want good Arthurian short stories.

The Gaiman story in this collection is brilliant. There are other bright spots as well, particularly the contributions from Diana Paxson and Alan Dean Foster. Good, fun stuff.

Some good stories, some truly bad, but nothing really stands out. There's nothing really to say more than that, since it's an anthology--read the ones you like, skip the others. Some of the good ones--"White Lady's Grave" and the one about the Church and the dying businessman (can't remember title). The others were either okay or completely a waste of time, but having just read "The Earth Strikes Back", even the worst ones looked okay. I'm not sure if you'd want to spend your money on this--it's not that good, so why not borrow it from a library?

I don't read too many anthologies. Certainly, this one will only inspire a moderate amount of enthusiasm for me to go buy more.

It's published by White Wolf, which also is responsible for highly successful and intricately detailed RPGs such as Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse. (One of the weaker stories in the collection is by Steward von Allmen, who appears to be a key White Wolf founder.) I believe I picked this book up at GenCon; it's now out of print.

The anthology starts off very unpromisingly, with an embarrassing little number from beloved sci-fi/fantasy/horror fan Forrest J. Ackerman. This is the lowest point of the book, but luckily it rebounds from there. Ben Bova offers a story that has a perfect "Twilight Zone" twist, and Michael Moorcock tosses in an excursion to his Eternal Champion milieu in a tale that has a bit of an "English Patient" flavor to it. Ian McDonald in "The Time Garden" gives us an enchanting and lyrical exploration along the border of Faerie in a story that is reminiscent of the works of Robert Holdstock. (I believe, in fact, this may be why the basic Amazon review shown above claims that Holdstock is a contributor to the anthology, when in fact he is not.)

Jeremy Dyson's "City Deep" is another macabre tale with a dark cinematic flair such as would be found in one of the TV anthology shows. Two other stories are almost poetically elegant yet starkly simple: Charles de Lint's "Heartfires", about wandering Native American spirits losing their way in the present-day U.S., and Stephen Gallagher's "God's Bright Little Engine", with its beautiful and haunting ending. The story provided by Storm Constantine, "Blue Flame of a Candle", while not entirely successful, is nonetheless packed with intricate detail and manages to create a rich history with merely a few suggestions.

Other stories are much less powerful. The joint effort by Kathe Koja and Barry Malzberg is frankly unreadable, while that of Larry Bond and Chris Carlson is at best workmanlike and much more suited for a military-themed collection. Other stories are plain silly or sadly bland. The one by William F. Buckley (!) can only be considered an interesting experiment. Ian Watson's "The Amber Room" never comes together, and Christopher Fowler's "Tales of Britannica Castle" reads like a pointless pastiche of "Gormenghast".

While there is indeed good material to be found here, the lesser works really drag down the overall level of quality. A few of them should just have been jettisoned to save the rest.

Still, this is a suitable sampler for some authors who are rarely seen, and it definitely shows that some, such as Gallagher and McDonald, are worth following.

This book was did its job in telling the history of the World of darkness. Yet it seemed to me that most of this material was just a recap and mild expasion of what had aready been said in the othe WoD books. Look if you are new at WoD then you may get more kicks out of this book then I did.