The Captivating Flames of Madness – Book Review
Thank you to author Jeff Parsons for providing me with a copy of The Captivating Flames of Madness in exchange for this honest review.
It’s always good to have a short story collection sitting around. It’s the perfect way to fill the gap between longer books or to have something to read when you’re short on time. You get to enjoy a full story in under an hour instead of committing to a long novel.
That’s the hope anyway. There’s been an odd trend in these collections recently to not write actual stories that include a beginning, middle, and end. The shorts are more like first chapters to books that will never be finished. I’m not a fan.
However, The Captivating Flame of Madness does not fall into this trap. Each of these horror tales are complete with a satisfying conclusion so that you don’t have to be left on 22 cliffhangers. Thank you Jeff Parsons!
A quick disclaimer about my rating policy for short story books. In order for one of these to get a perfect 5/5 score every single story in the collection must be a 5/5. Clearly, this is very difficult. I’d make an exception if one or two of the stories really blow me out of the water but overall I typically only give 4/5 as a high for most of these books.
The collected works in The Captivating Flames of Madness cover every scary topic you could imagine from witches, zombies, ghosts, demons, and all sorts of supernatural or man made horrors. 4 of these stories stood out to me as my favorites.
Nothing Personal is about a con artist who gets more than he bargained for. It starts with one villain but ends up with another. He thinks he’s manipulating his way to eternal life but eternal doesn’t guarantee pleasant.
At Any Cost is all about what a life is worth. How much money would you spend to stay alive? How big of a sacrifice would you be willing to make in order to avoid dying a long, painful, cancer riddled death?
The Bracelet deals with similar themes of sacrifice but this time for love. A man makes a love potion to win over the woman who doesn’t love him back. As anyone could guess this is not so straightforward. A lot of the stories in The Captivating Flame of Madness come with the theme of “be careful what you wish for.”
Give ‘Em Hell, Mr. Carter is my personal favorite of the bunch. It’s a ghost story that doesn’t focus on ghosts. A supernatural investigator develops a device that can not only detect otherworldly beings but can summon them as well. The other members of the community accuse him of being a charlatan, but he has proof.
There are many other stories so if those 4 don’t capture your attention something else may. Those are just my personal favorites based on what I already like. There isn’t a story in the bunch that’s bad, so you’re likely to find something to enjoy.
If you like horror stories that focus on the human side of supernatural events this book will be for you. Let me know which ones are your favorites!
4/5 flames 🔥🔥🔥🔥
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