From: bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com

Hi fellow denizens of SF.written,

Spelunking Through Hell by Seanan McGuire
Suptitled: A Vistor's Guide To The Underworld
An InCryptid Novel

Well this slim paperback volume contains the title
story plus a prequel. Thomas Price made a bargain
with the "Crossroads" a malevolent spirit that apparently
enjoys human pain. He did it not for personal enrichment
but to save the life of a girl. When she dies he will be
freed from the curse of being confined to his home.
Alice Price is that grown-up girl married to Thomas
but one morning the Crossroads demands full payment and
removes Thomas to a dead bottle world. Alice spends
the next 50 years or so searching in the Underworld for
Thomas. We get to see what that entails and some of
the obstacles she must face.

The second story "Sweep up the Wood" an InCryptid novella
covers the earlier part of the Alice-Thomas relationship.
Both Thomas Price and Johnathan Healy, Alice's father are
fugitives from the Covenant of St.George an organization
dedicated to the extirpation of any non-humans on Earth.
Some of those non-human are the frikkens and the Aeslin
Mice who are harmless. Others are larger and look like
people and do nothing to hurt people but Alice Healy's
mother's engagement ring is made of the silver bullet
taken from the body of the first werewolf she killed.
In this novella we get to see what sort of a person
Alice Healy is and more about her and Thomas.

`I enjoyed both stories a very great deal but then
Seanan McGuire is one of my favorite authors.
Copyright is from 2023 and the book was published
by Urban Fantasy a part of DAW Books, Inc. at
$17.00 USA.

bliss

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