2 out of 4 stars
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The Goblin Child and Other Stories is a collection of short stories by Michael Forester ranging in length from one page to much longer. The eclectic nature of the stories places them in the "other fiction" category and none of the stories are interlinked and can thus be read out of sequence.
A young girl who will protect nature with her life and thinks that she has found love finds herself the prey of a deviant. A poet who has found love and lost it in an age where such love is forbidden cannot reclaim it. A queen who is convinced that the child she gave birth to has been replaced by a goblin. A brother who is blind to his abusive twin's hold over him. A man who claims to be Santa Clause has deep and dark secrets. The wonder of birth seen through the eyes of the traumatised baby. The real reason for the Tooth Fairy. The sleazy world of sexual predators. All these plus other thought provoking themes are covered in the stories.
The book as a whole is very difficult to critique as the stories are all written in different tenses, using different viewpoints and with different character vocal inflections. This makes some of the stories written from a very young person's view somewhat complicated to grasp. I felt a little deflated after reading the book as I didn't understand all of the stories or perhaps not the story itself but what the writer was trying to convey. I then found other online reviews also saying that some of the stories were tricky to identify with so I felt a little less ignorant. There are a few instances of grammar errors but nothing to detract from the overall impression of good editing.
I loved the pictures preceding the stories but unfortunately not all of the pictures came through clearly on the kindle. The writer definitely has a way with words, and the stories that I did understand were meaningful and covered many facets of the human heart and mind. Some very disturbing imagery emerged and in many circumstances the writer was able to take a deep subject and leave it to the reader to fill in the blanks, as with Angel's Place. In other places he sums up an event that changes a life and lets you see the sad future that awaits, as in Jumbled Egg with Prawn. The story that possibly made me smirk the most was Sometimes They Don't Come Back, which is a clever explanation of what the Tooth Fairy really is and how the visits are not as easy as just collecting the tooth.
I rate this book 2 out of 4 stars as although there was inherently nothing wrong with it, I would not recommend it as engaging reading. I tend to recommend books based on whether or not I would read them time and again, but this book would definitely not fall into that category and is not one whose stories or characters will remain with me.
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The Goblin Child
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