The Clock in My Mother's House - Annalisa Crawford - ★★★★.¼

AUTHOR: Annalisa Crawford

GENRE: Anthology.

RATING: 4.2 Stars.

In a Nutshell: Wow! I can't believe it's just the first half of February and I already have one more strong contender for ‘Best Anthology of the Year 2023’! An amazing collection without a doubt.

The ten stories in this indie anthology have no theme in common. The genres too are somewhat distinct: speculative fiction, paranormal, mental health, general fiction,… What can be pointed out as common to each tale is the presence of a strong narrator. Every story has a protagonist that will grab your attention.

Many of the stories herein have been finalists or winners of varied short story awards. After reading this book, I can clearly see why.

As always, I rated the stories individually. Of the ten stories, a whopping six stories were at 4.5 or 5 stars. The rest were between 3 to 4 stars. So not a single bad story; you get either good or outstanding. Most of the ones that I rated on the lower side also were attention-grabbing to me; they only fell short in terms of their endings. The sole exception (and the only story that got a three-star from me) was a tale called ‘Black Dog.’ I liked the writing, but I think I was too obtuse to understand it. 😄

These were my top favourites with 5 stars each:

🌹 The Clock in My Mother's House Runs Backwards: Reminded me of the Benjamin Button short story, but this is even darker.

🌹 One Minute Silence: Astounding writing. I was speechless at the end.

🌹 Adventures in My Own Back Garden: Began a bit slowly and I was wondering where it was going. Until the layers started coming off one by one. I was left with a big happy teary grin at the end.

Honorary mentions with 4.5 stars:

🌷 The Woman in the Van: I liked how it didn’t give any explanations. Something was going to happen, someone already knew it and came to help. That’s it. No hows or whys.

🌷 A Thousand Pieces of You: A portrayal of mental health struggles with the narrative device of a mirror. Excellently written in second person.

🌷 The Fear of Ghosts: Knew where it was going, but still was captivated by it. The protagonist being blind was an interesting touch as it heightened the spooks.

A must-read entertainer. Definitely recommended to short story lovers. (And if you don’t like short stories, you ought to try at least the ones I mentioned above.)

4.2 stars, based on the average of my rating for each story.

This rating should make me click on the 4 star mark wherever I have to hit the star button. But I will make an exception to my own mathematical rule and hit the five star mark this once, because I relished the writing in almost every story, I LOVED the imagination of the author, and this is an indie work so it deserves every bit of support. I wish I could change its cover to a more attention-grabbing one!

My thanks to author Annalisa Crawford and BookSirens for the DRC of “The Clock in My Mother's House”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.