|
The HUNTRESS Short
Stories
|
||
|
DLSIJ Press, 2004
Reviewed by Joy
Calderwood
Fans of THE
HUNTRESS can now get their fix with new stories from the same universe.
Seth Terrick, officially equipped with his new name and cover identity
of Baynard Stone, is firmly partnered with Mea Brin, Hunter and Huntress
together, and little Regan, who intends to be a hunter like her adoptive
parents. These four stories follow stages in their development as a
family, so I am reviewing them in chronological order.
A Stone’s Throw
What would Bay
Stone be willing to go through, to keep Mea as his partner? Quite a lot.
A series of vignettes shows their family learning to give and accept
support, including that of their android crew, while Bay undergoes an
ordeal he considers necessary. The emphasis is on love, not the
horrendous pain.
A Stone’s Throw
reads as though it were written just shortly after THE HUNTRESS, before
the author got her love of adjectives under control. Ignore the extra
adjectives and accompany Mea, Bay and Regan into the next stage of their
lives.
A Far Cry
Bay is in
withdrawal. He is only fighting one man to three, and hunters aren’t
allowed to kill unless necessary. Maybe two hunters against seventeen
slavers will give him a little more satisfaction.
Bay and Mea have
had sexy encounters in some unusual places, but – while grappling up a
wall? A Far Cry
is full of exciting action of both kinds, hunter and heated, while Regan
champs at her restraints wanting to get into the hunter action.
Heart Of Stone
Never the most
placid couple, Mea and Bay have found the darnest thing to fight about
this time. When Bay caved in to their relationship, he caved all the
way! Now how can Mea keep his enthusiasm from endangering their lives?
While Mea and Bay’s
fights are wrecking the furniture, Regan and Warren are providing comedy
on the side. Heart of Stone
is the funniest story of this quartet.
Leave No Stone Unturned
Regan finally gets
up the nerve to ask Bay how he became Seth Terrick, worst of the worst
among convicts. Seth/Bay’s memories don’t spare him: a jumped-up
tunnel-rat kid volunteering to kill the greatest rival of pack leader
Mag; the training that made him Mag’s most fearsome lieutenant; his
shocking entry into a wider world, the world above ground.
Leave No Stone Unturned
is the most powerful of these four stories, and in my opinion the best.
A lot of horror is compacted into these few pages, but framed within
Regan’s love so that Stone doesn’t have to make himself unfeeling again
in order to live with it. By the time she wrote this story, O’Leary’s
skills had reached the point where she says as much as possible as
concisely as possible, and moves the reader to the emotions she wants us
to feel.
In my opinion, the
talented Michelle O’Leary is essentially a novelist, not a short story
writer. Whenever I read her short stories, I want more: more
development, more background, more events, more room to grow. Just the
kinds of things she would give us if she set out to write a novel. These
Hunter short stories are meant for Hunter fans, since they assume that
we already know Mea, Bay, Regan, Warren, and Ema. They give us important
developments in their lives, leading up to the next Hunter novel.
Regan’s story HUNTER’S LEGACY will most likely have to wait a while,
since O’Leary just published LAST CHANCE, the first of a separate
science fiction romance trilogy.
The Huntress Short
Stories are sold separately at the website of DLSIJ Press:
http://www.dlsijpress.com/oleary/
February 2005
Review
All cover art used at Reviewer's Choice Reviews is copyrighted by the
respective publisher. All reviews and articles found at Reviewer's Choice
Reviews are the sole property of the contributor and are copyrighted by
the same. |
