
Murder Ballads and Other Horrific Tales
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Narrated by:
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James Meunier
About this listen
A terrifying collection of horror and crime noir from the author of Southern Gods and A Lush and Seething Hell.
Featuring 10 tales, two never before in print, Murder Ballads and Other Horrific Tales is an exciting glimpse into the dark territories of the human heart.
These are coming-of-age stories. Stories of love and loss, grief, and revenge. Survival and redemption. From old gods to malevolent artificial intelligences, vampires to zombies to ghosts, Jacobs exposes our fears and worst imaginings.
Contains the sequel to Southern Gods.
©2020 John Hornor Jacobs (P)2020 JournalstoneListeners also enjoyed...
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cursed stories not retold tales
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Charles Thomas Tester hustles to put food on the table, keep the roof over his father's head, from Harlem to Flushing Meadows to Red Hook. He knows what magic a suit can cast, the invisibility a guitar case can provide, and the curse written on his black skin that attracts the eye of wealthy white folks and their trained cops. But when he delivers an occult page to a reclusive sorceress in the heart of Queens, Tom opens a door to a deeper realm of magic.
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“I’ll take Cthulhu over you devils any day”
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Attempting to escape his abusive father and generations of cyclical poverty, young Jonah Hargrove joins the mysterious River - a teenage girl carrying thousands of dollars in stolen meth - and embarks on a Southern Gothic odyssey through the East Texas river bottoms. They are pursued by local drug kingpin, John Curtis, and his murderous enforcer, Dakota Cade, with whom River was romantically involved. But Cade and Curtis have their own enemies, as their relationship with the cartel controlling their meth supply begins to sour.
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Decent book
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late 20s, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born - a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam - and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation.
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Beautifully written, but painful.
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The Imago Sequence
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- Unabridged
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Overall
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Story
The title story of this collection - a devilishly ironic riff on H. P. Lovecraft's "Pickman's Model" - was nominated for a World Fantasy Award, while "Probiscus" was nominated for an International Horror Guild award and reprinted in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror 19. In addition to his previously published work, this collection contains an original story.
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Agonizingly Dull and Meaningless
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Critic reviews
"Jacobs demonstrates masterful control of his eclectic themes and frequently propels them into unexpected and pleasingly original territory...Offers plenty to keep genre fans hooked." (Publishers Weekly)
What listeners say about Murder Ballads and Other Horrific Tales
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Performance
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- ian
- 02-07-23
Good, one story has dog fighting
Good collection of stories, some more grounded in reality. Old Dogs has a pretty brutal depiction of dog fighting, so be aware if that is a trigger.
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- vurnt22
- 04-12-21
Subtle Tales Of Extraordinary Circumstances
Incredibly satisfying both in content & execution . James Horner Jacobs claims not to be a short story natural in the intro to this collection - don’t be fooled Jacobs finds new directions in well travelled genre conventions like the Coming Of Age, Ghost, and Vampire story. James Meunier’s narration is curiously perfect- his native British expository narrative accent works because his American, southern character accents work incredibly incredibly well. Highly recommended.
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- Julie Swan
- 06-06-22
Couldn't vibe with the writing at all
After listening to 'Exquisite Corpse' by Poppy Z Brite twice in a row (something I've *never* done before) I figured this would be an excellent palate cleanser. Still horror, but more digestible short stories.
First story was about Vikings and some kinda legend? I don't know. I couldn't follow along at all. I loved the narrator's voice, though.
Maybe the first story just isn't for me, I thought, and skipped to the next one. It was slightly more interesting, granted, but still nearly impossible to follow along with. I couldn't get a visual picture in my head to go along with the story.
Returned. Still loved the narrator's voice and accent, but the writing and I just didn't vibe.
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- Josh
- 05-16-23
Very Few Stories Kept My Interest
This was a struggle to get through. 3 or 4 of the stories were decent enough to keep my attention, but none of them were great. Despite having a good narrator, this book was such a drag. I can't place what hurt it. Maybe it was the basic descriptions of things, the lifeless characters, or the fact that nothing stood out in these stories. If this book was a free listen, I would have stopped listening half way through it, but because I wasted an audible credit, I made it to the last story before I finally decided to stop wasting my time.
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