[Review] - Blood Relations
by Kristopher Triana
Blood Relations will be released May 5th, 2020, from Grindhouse Press.
Before we get to Blood Relations, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. This elephant is called Full Brutal, Triana's splatterpunk award-winning novel. This book is only a year old and I feel comfortable saying it is already extreme horror canon. Even if you're a jaded horror fiend, you will find yourself shocked throughout this book. I mean that in the best way and I cannot praise this book enough. This is not an ad. I just love this book.
Blood Relations is an upcoming short story collection from Grindhouse Press and Kris really shows some of his range here. In these 160 pages, Triana goes from dystopian ("Dog Years") to seriously-messed-up-extreme ("Womb"). There are ten stories in here and I enjoyed each and every one of them, which is a rarity for me. Most short story collections have at least one or two clunky stories. Not this one.
Although I do vouch for the overall quality of this collection, in my mind there were two obvious standouts: "My Name is Chad" and "We all Scream."
"My Name is Chad" is a found-footage style stun-bomb of a story (stun bomb? I better wrap this up. I'm starting to make up words).
"We All Scream" is both the final and longest story in the collection, clocking in at 25 pages. This is relevant because I believe it is also the one I read the fastest. It's a Faustian story involving the ice cream man. That's all you get.
Early prediction: this collection shows up on at least one awards ballot next year.
Grade: B
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Review by Jason Cavallaro
jcavallaro42@gmail.com
Twitter: @pinheadspawn
I received a copy of this book from Grindhouse Press for review consideration.