Poe's Children
The New Horror: An Anthology
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Narrated by:
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various
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By:
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Peter Straub
About this listen
From the incomparable master of horror and suspense comes an electrifying collection of contemporary literary horror, with stories from twenty-five writers representing today’s most talented voices in the genre.
Horror writing is usually associated with formulaic gore, but New Wave horror writers have more in common with the wildly inventive, evocative spookiness of Edgar Allan Poe than with the sometimes-predictable hallmarks of their peers. Showcasing this cutting-edge talent, Poe’s Children now brings the best of the genre’s stories to a wider audience. Featuring tales from such writers as Neil Gaiman and Jonathan Carroll, Poe’s Children is Peter Straub’ s tribute to the imaginative power of storytelling. Each previously published story has been selected by Straub to represent what he thinks is the most interesting development in our literature during the last two decades.
Selections range from the early Stephen King psychological thriller “The Ballad of the Flexible Bullet,” in which an editor confronts an author’s belief that his typewriter is inhabited by supernatural creatures, to “The Man on the Ceiling,” Melanie and Steve Rasnic Tem’s award-winning surreal tale of night terrors, woven with daylight fears that haunt a family. Other selections include National Book Award finalist Dan Chaon’s “The Bees”; Peter Straub’s “Little Red’s Tango,” the legend of a music aficionado whose past is as mysterious as the ghostly visitors to his Manhattan apartment; Elizabeth Hand’s visionary and shocking “Cleopatra Brimstone”; Thomas Ligotti’s brilliant, mind-stretching “Notes on the Writing of Horror: A Story”; and “Body,” Brian Evenson’s disturbing twist on correctional facilities.
Crossing boundaries and packed with imaginative chills, Poe’s Children bears all the telltale signs of fearless, addictive fiction.
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Critic reviews
A Washington Post Best Book of the Year
“Revelatory. . . . A remarkably consistent, frequently unsettling book.” —The Washington Post
“Straub is uniquely qualified to hold forth on what makes a good horror story. . . . [He] collects the best scary short stories out there.” —Time
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Story
Marvelous creations, including a short story set in the world of The Matrix and others set in the worlds of gothic fiction and children's fiction, can be found in this extraordinary collection, which showcases Gaiman's storytelling brilliance as well as his entertaining (and dark) sense of humor.
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Perhaps a different format?
- By Karen on 11-03-10
By: Neil Gaiman
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The Invisible Circus
- By: Jennifer Egan
- Narrated by: Madeleine Lambert
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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In Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Egan's highly acclaimed first novel, set in 1978, the political drama and familial tensions of the 1960s form a backdrop for the world of Phoebe O'Connor, age eighteen. Phoebe is obsessed with the memory and death of her sister Faith, a beautiful idealistic hippie who died in Italy in 1970. In order to find out the truth about Faith's life and death, Phoebe retraces her steps from San Francisco across Europe, a quest which yields both complex and disturbing revelations about family, love, and Faith's lost generation.
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Too bad zero was not a choice...
- By IVAL on 04-28-13
By: Jennifer Egan
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The Bad Place
- By: Dean Koontz
- Narrated by: Carol Cowan, Michael Hanson
- Length: 15 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Frank Pollard awakens in an alley, knowing nothing but his name - and that he is in great danger. Having taken refuge in a motel, he wakes again only to find his hands covered in blood. As far as he knows, he's no killer. But whose blood is this, and how did it get there?
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THE BEST KOONTZ
- By Root VanDorn on 10-20-10
By: Dean Koontz
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Arcadia
- By: Lauren Groff
- Narrated by: Andrew Garman
- Length: 11 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Lauren Groff’s acclaimed debut novel The Monsters of Templeton was short-listed for the Orange Prize. Her second novel, Arcadia opens in the late 1960s with a group of young idealists forming a commune in western New York State. Into this group is born Bit, who grows into a quiet, distant man. Over the course of 50 years, Bit witnesses the utopia crumble and the world change in unimaginable ways.
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Luscious prose, intimate and realistic
- By Kathleen on 03-22-12
By: Lauren Groff
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The Stolen Child
- By: Keith Donohue
- Narrated by: Andy Paris, Jeff Woodman
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Seven-year-old Henry Day is kidnapped and renamed "Aniday" by changelings, ageless beings who inhabit the woods near his home. The changelings also leave behind one of their own, who flawlessly impersonates Henry except for one noteworthy detail: the new Henry is a prodigiously talented pianist.
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Not Anything Close to the Hype
- By Jon on 06-20-06
By: Keith Donohue
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Fruit of the Drunken Tree
- A Novel
- By: Ingrid Rojas Contreras
- Narrated by: Marisol Ramirez, Almarie Guerra, Ingrid Rojas Contreras
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Seven-year-old Chula and her older sister, Cassandra, enjoy carefree lives thanks to their gated community in Bogotá, but the threat of kidnappings, car bombs, and assassinations hover just outside the neighborhood walls, where the godlike drug lord Pablo Escobar continues to elude authorities and capture the attention of the nation. When their mother hires Petrona, a live-in-maid from the city's guerrilla-occupied slum, Chula makes it her mission to understand Petrona's mysterious ways.
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Maybe better to read this book than listen???
- By Amazon Customer on 12-12-18
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Trigger Warning
- Short Fictions and Disturbances
- By: Neil Gaiman
- Narrated by: Neil Gaiman
- Length: 11 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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In this new anthology, Neil Gaiman pierces the veil of reality to reveal the enigmatic, shadowy world that lies beneath. Trigger Warning includes previously published pieces of short fiction--stories, verse, and a very special Doctor Who story that was written for the fiftieth anniversary of the beloved series in 2013--as well as "Black Dog", a new tale that revisits the world of American Gods, exclusive to this collection.
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It Triggered Me to Stay Up Late and Listen
- By Jan on 02-10-15
By: Neil Gaiman
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Mr. Fox
- A Novel
- By: Helen Oyeyemi
- Narrated by: Carol Boyd
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Fairy-tale romances end with a wedding and the fairy tales don't get complicated. In this book, celebrated writer Mr. Fox can't stop himself from killing off the heroines of his novels, and neither can his wife, Daphne. It's not until Mary, his muse, comes to life and transforms him from author into subject that his story begins to unfold differently....
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A Great Novel, just Poor for Audio
- By James A. Dittes on 08-13-16
By: Helen Oyeyemi
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Priestdaddy
- A Memoir
- By: Patricia Lockwood
- Narrated by: Patricia Lockwood
- Length: 10 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Father Greg Lockwood is unlike any Catholic priest you have ever met - a man who lounges in boxer shorts, who loves action movies, and whose constant jamming on the guitar reverberates "like a whole band dying in a plane crash in 1972". His daughter is an irreverent poet who long ago left the church's country. When an unexpected crisis leads her and her husband to move back into her parents' rectory, their two worlds collide.
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Terrible narration--read, don't listen
- By Penelope on 08-06-17
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Haunted Nights
- A Horror Writers Association Anthology
- By: Ellen Datlow - editor, Garth Nix, Kelley Armstrong, and others
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman, Erin Spencer, James Patrick Cronin, and others
- Length: 11 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Here are 16 chilling, never-before-published tales that explore every aspect of our darkest holiday, Halloween, coedited by Ellen Datlow, one of the most successful and respected genre editors, and Lisa Morton, a leading authority on Halloween. Included are stories about scheming jack-o'-lanterns, vengeful ghosts, otherworldly changelings, disturbingly realistic haunted attractions, masks that cover terrifying faces, murderous urban legends, parties gone bad, cult Halloween movies, and trick-or-treating in the future.
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Slow burn stories
- By Alex Sumner on 03-05-22
By: Ellen Datlow - editor, and others
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Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules (Unabridged Selections)
- By: Edited by David Sedaris
- Narrated by: David Sedaris, Mary-Louise Parker, Cherry Jones
- Length: 2 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules is a collection of short stories, some classic, others impending, selected and introduced by David Sedaris.
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Great stories but only 5 of 17 are included
- By Terri Kirk on 07-13-12
What listeners say about Poe's Children
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- aneta
- 04-23-14
Not what I expected :-(
What would have made Poe's Children better?
The stories were just plain boring.Not one stands out in my memory,should I name one?I can't!
Has Poe's Children turned you off from other books in this genre?
No,I love horror stories,both as a novel and in short form.These were just not able to keep me interested.
How did the narrator detract from the book?
The narrator was alright.
What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?
Disappointmentand and boredom must cover it pretty Well.
Any additional comments?
Anthologies are usually a hit or miss situation,but sometimes you can find some real gems hidden inbetween. This; I really had high hopes for,since I'm a big fan of Peter Straub. But this maybe just shows, that even though I enjoy his writing,I do not necessarily enjoy the same books as him.
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Overall
- Lindsay
- 09-26-21
This was a struggle.
I got the audiobook because I was having a hard time reading the ebook. I was bored and was hoping that listening would be easier. And while that was true, it was still a struggle. Additionally, the audiobook is not the entire anthology. There were quite a few stories that were included in the ebook that were not part of the audio experience.
I understand that we were going for a more literary form of horror here, but some of these stories were so long and boring that the horror just got lost. And while I will admit that there were a few enjoyable stories, there were more "misses" than hits and I wouldn't recommend this to anyone.
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- Kevin Young
- 11-29-16
Hit and Miss
While all stories were competently performed and a few were genuinely stellar and engaging tales, there are definite duds in the collection. The stories tend toward the overly-cerebral, and a fan of deep genre fiction would likely find a more satisfying collection elsewhere.
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Overall
- Barbara
- 12-08-08
So not worth it
This one isn't worth 1 credit, forget 2. I wouldn't even call the stories Poe's stepchildren, no relation to Poe's quality of writing at all. Mark this one a miss...
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3 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Jennifer
- 06-02-09
terrible
with boring, muddled stories full of vague abstract ideas that spark neither the readers interests nor imagination, this book was a complete wast of time. dry, dull and "new age kitschy" themes and story lines left this horror buff annoyed and frustrated. give this a miss!
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5 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Shilo Davis
- 11-09-08
Only thing interesting was the title.
I had a feeling I was in trouble when the introduction was a contrast to the cover art. There were two interesting short stories but I was expecting a creepy Poe like vibe, and was greatly let down. Overall the only reason I kept listening to it was because it cost me two credits. It is not worth it.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Shaundra
- 01-30-12
Waste of credit: I should have read reviews first
What would have made Poe's Children better?
Less pretense and ego. The title of the book should have given me pause. Any collection of contemporary authors willing to contribute to a collection that compares them to a master of their genre are probably laboring under a misguided since of their own self worth. The tone of the book is that of literary snobbery without the merit of good stories to backup it up.
What was most disappointing about Peter Straub’s story?
Another thing that should be pointed, out is that this is not a collection of horror stories. The stories are often abstract and bizarre at best. I bought it in the horror section and that's what I wanted.
How could the performance have been better?
I don't think the narrator(s) is to blame for my disliking this story. The narrator(s) only job is to convey the content for the author. While a good reader is important, they have to work with what they've got. Most of the stories in this collection lack cohesion and are infuriatingly cryptic for no reason I can gleam.
You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?
Finding something redeeming about collection will take more time than I've got today...
Any additional comments?
I see other readers share my disappointment. I will pay closer attention to the reviews during future purchases.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Rona M. Hill
- 07-21-14
STOP! READ REVIEWS 1ST!!!
What would have made Poe's Children better?
Stories that made sense and were actually scary instead of just tedious and weird
Has Poe's Children turned you off from other books in this genre?
NO
Would you be willing to try another one of Various’s performances?
YES
If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Poe's Children?
Every story after the 1st. I felt like it was bait and switch
Any additional comments?
I will be returning this book. I tried several times to get into it. Skipped ahead and listened to several stories over a period a several weeks. I'm sorry to it was more of the same boring, weird stories that made absolutely no sense. If I could choose a (-) star to rate this I would
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3 people found this helpful
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Overall
- M. Rocheleau
- 04-07-09
Couldn't Get Through It
Of all the stories I heard, the first one was the best. I didn't think it was great but it was decent and mildly unsettling. I listened to two more afterwards and both seemed endless and went nowhere. It was one of the rare times I desperately wished to be able to flip ahead and see how many more pages there were left to go. They weren't horror stories so much as bizarrely conceived expositions on the horror that is a part of us all and can take many forms and blah blah blah.. I hated it, but I also didn't finish it. Maybe some works of genius were hiding towards the end.
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2 people found this helpful