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The University of Corporeal and Ethereal Studies
At the University of Corporeal & Ethereal Studies meddling with unknown powers can be dangerous work. Courses in arts and sciences experiment with supernatural forces to solve the mysteries of the universe, but when school projects go awry, the students may discover more than they would like to about the madness of the cosmic 'Beyond'.
Eight interwoven stories follow students whose school work, social lives and inner demons crash together, leading to fantastic and horrible experiences, supernatural powers, and a fuller understanding of the dark depths of their world.
Classes include subjects such as time travel, alchemy, oneironautics, psychedelic transformation, rogue automatons, cosmic ghosts, reality-warping crystals, and more.
Inspired by many authors of science fiction, fantasy and horror, including H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, J.K. Rowling, Neil Gaiman, William Gibson, Kurt Vonnegut and Isaac Asimov.
Eight interwoven stories follow students whose school work, social lives and inner demons crash together, leading to fantastic and horrible experiences, supernatural powers, and a fuller understanding of the dark depths of their world.
Classes include subjects such as time travel, alchemy, oneironautics, psychedelic transformation, rogue automatons, cosmic ghosts, reality-warping crystals, and more.
Inspired by many authors of science fiction, fantasy and horror, including H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, J.K. Rowling, Neil Gaiman, William Gibson, Kurt Vonnegut and Isaac Asimov.
726 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 12, 2017
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26 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 13, 2017
I received this eBook via Story Cartel for review.
First impression: I wasn't sure if I could bring myself to finish the book. The description I read on Story Cartel sounded like the perfect tale. It's not that the stories are bad, they're just far more "gruesomely detailed" than I was expecting. I found I had to read something different for a bit and come back to this."
Second to end impression: The world building, the minute details are both good and bad. Good, for it pulls you in, paints a picture, describes the feel of taste, texture, colors and sound. The bad? Precisely for the same reason it's good. Because of the detailed descriptions, the stories are more viscerally disturbing. A disconcerting read. I needed to read something lighthearted in-between most of the stories.
It took me quite a while to finish this book. I both liked and hated these tales, and was disturbed and taken outside of my comfort zone and was made to think and so on and so on. I'm still not really sure how I "feel" about this book, my feelings are running in and endless loop!
I loved the use of several somewhat obscure words, and there are very few typo errors, no more so than books I've read from the supposed "professional" publishing houses, so good job in that department. Perhaps another run through editing to tighten it up (on my Nook Classic this was at 612 pages).
Lovecraftian, sci-fi, horror, often dark and heavy, steampunk, mad science, friendship, the world in danger, dystopian, university life (with a twist). The ordeal of changing into something otherworldly. The feeling of hopelessness, being all alone in despair and then finally belonging. The struggle between politics, science, religious beliefs, addiction, fanaticism, mysticism, love, hate, anger, family, societal class system, and the greedy conflict between the rich and the working class. Whew! A whirlwind of emotions!
Would "I" read this again? Probably not. It's like the horrific movie - I made it through once, but it was so far outside my zone of comfort that I wouldn't be able to watch again. However, although it doesn't end with a "cliffhanger" as such (some might consider it a cliffhanger), it does leave the story open for continuation. And that - I would probably read! Ugh, see what I mean by the endless loop of feelings? Which leaves me wondering how do I rate this? 4 stars for how disturbing, thought provokingly grueling and odd. 3 stars for how much I liked the tale. Leaving me with 3.5 stars. Others who lean towards horror/sci-fi as their genre of choice will probably really enjoy this book.
First impression: I wasn't sure if I could bring myself to finish the book. The description I read on Story Cartel sounded like the perfect tale. It's not that the stories are bad, they're just far more "gruesomely detailed" than I was expecting. I found I had to read something different for a bit and come back to this."
Second to end impression: The world building, the minute details are both good and bad. Good, for it pulls you in, paints a picture, describes the feel of taste, texture, colors and sound. The bad? Precisely for the same reason it's good. Because of the detailed descriptions, the stories are more viscerally disturbing. A disconcerting read. I needed to read something lighthearted in-between most of the stories.
It took me quite a while to finish this book. I both liked and hated these tales, and was disturbed and taken outside of my comfort zone and was made to think and so on and so on. I'm still not really sure how I "feel" about this book, my feelings are running in and endless loop!
I loved the use of several somewhat obscure words, and there are very few typo errors, no more so than books I've read from the supposed "professional" publishing houses, so good job in that department. Perhaps another run through editing to tighten it up (on my Nook Classic this was at 612 pages).
Lovecraftian, sci-fi, horror, often dark and heavy, steampunk, mad science, friendship, the world in danger, dystopian, university life (with a twist). The ordeal of changing into something otherworldly. The feeling of hopelessness, being all alone in despair and then finally belonging. The struggle between politics, science, religious beliefs, addiction, fanaticism, mysticism, love, hate, anger, family, societal class system, and the greedy conflict between the rich and the working class. Whew! A whirlwind of emotions!
Would "I" read this again? Probably not. It's like the horrific movie - I made it through once, but it was so far outside my zone of comfort that I wouldn't be able to watch again. However, although it doesn't end with a "cliffhanger" as such (some might consider it a cliffhanger), it does leave the story open for continuation. And that - I would probably read! Ugh, see what I mean by the endless loop of feelings? Which leaves me wondering how do I rate this? 4 stars for how disturbing, thought provokingly grueling and odd. 3 stars for how much I liked the tale. Leaving me with 3.5 stars. Others who lean towards horror/sci-fi as their genre of choice will probably really enjoy this book.
March 23, 2017
I received The University of Corporeal & Ethereal Studies anthology as a review copy from the author. The gifting did not determine the review/rating, which reflects my honest opinion. The blurb is written for the overall Students of Madness series, and does nothing to do clarify the plots of each novella within the anthology. In the first tale, Red Hand, we follow a young thief who is not a student, but apprentices as a maintenance person for the University of Corporeal and Ethereal Studies. Chase, our anti-hero, has a way with machines. Remaining stories range from horrifyingly riveting (imagine watching a head-on train wreck) to odd-strange. While I enjoy fantasy, this anthology leans heavily toward horror-- not a preferred read for me. Even while I cringed at some stories, I felt compelled to continue reading. The author did his job, and I'll admit to being unsettled I couldn't look away.
March 3, 2017
The University of Corporeal and Ethereal Studies deals with all types of science, both natural and supernatural, physical and unseen. Through eight interwoven yet standalone stories I was able to experience many different aspects of what one might study at the University of Corporeal and Ethereal Studies, the different types of people involved in the college and the very interesting town that is shaped around the college. With any collection of stories, there were some stories that I liked better than others. Each story followed a different subject in the science fiction and fantasy genres; my personal preferences were for time travel and lucid dreaming, so there is probably at least one story in here for everyone. From each of the stories I had a wonderful sense of characterization and there was a diverse cast as well. In many of the stories I enjoyed that there was a dark element, a warning that these branches of science are both amazing and dangerous. My only complaint was that some of the stories felt very heavy, some warranting a long break before I picked up the book again and that the eight separate stories made for quite a long read ending at over 600 pages.
This book was received for free in return for an honest review.
This book was received for free in return for an honest review.
March 2, 2017
I will start by saying that this is the first book I've read that was written by Wolfgang Edwards and OMG OMG OMG it was amazing!!!
When I was asked to read this book, I looked at the description on Amazon and almost said "I don't know if I want to read this or not ". I haven't really read a lot of steampunk stories and wasn't sure if they would be too my liking or not. Well - guess what -- surprise surprise!!!
The first book in the collection is entitled THE RIGHT HAND. It is a story about a young girl who is working for the university and how she comes across an invention that she helps finish and brings to life. Now, I don't write spoilers -- but OMG, it was nothing like I thought it would be like at all. Put it this way --- once I started reading this story, I could not stop until I finished.
I'm not gonna write a mini review for each of the other stories -- but they are the same in regards to not being able to stop reading them!!!
The stories tie into each other - in one way or another, and making the beginnings of one fantastic story.
When I was asked to read this book, I looked at the description on Amazon and almost said "I don't know if I want to read this or not ". I haven't really read a lot of steampunk stories and wasn't sure if they would be too my liking or not. Well - guess what -- surprise surprise!!!
The first book in the collection is entitled THE RIGHT HAND. It is a story about a young girl who is working for the university and how she comes across an invention that she helps finish and brings to life. Now, I don't write spoilers -- but OMG, it was nothing like I thought it would be like at all. Put it this way --- once I started reading this story, I could not stop until I finished.
I'm not gonna write a mini review for each of the other stories -- but they are the same in regards to not being able to stop reading them!!!
The stories tie into each other - in one way or another, and making the beginnings of one fantastic story.
March 7, 2017
I very much enjoyed reading this book it hooked me from page one, a girl who works at the university, finds out about a project which was secretly done and she goes to search of it in the dungeons. She is trying to finish it and hopes to sell it so there will be food on the table.
I won't tell much more, don't want to spoil to much, it is 8 stories total and so so worth your time . there is many in there, psychedelic, alchemy, oneironautics, time traveling etc!!
Great book in my humble opinion.
I won't tell much more, don't want to spoil to much, it is 8 stories total and so so worth your time . there is many in there, psychedelic, alchemy, oneironautics, time traveling etc!!
Great book in my humble opinion.
February 25, 2017
Well written and thought out. The story line for various individuals at the institution of the book tile. Each is gifted in one form or another thru great personal trails and come together to both unwitting unleash and then to try and stop a great evil on the world. Some readers may find it slow reading as it is written in an almost dickens style but it melds and moves well with the culture and people it potrays. Waiting for the next volume
March 7, 2017
The University is a unique book that reminds me of Edgar Allan Poe, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Lovecraft, and recently Astor/Weiss. I loved the way there's eight separate stories that all actually loop back into and around one another. I think the automaton that went murderous whilst allegedly making Chase's life "easier" was my favorite although they were all really good. You really question whether meddling in nature is a wise idea or if it'll come back to bite you in ways unexpected
Merged review:
The University is a unique book that reminds me of Edgar Allan Poe, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Lovecraft, and recently Astor/Weiss. I loved the way there's eight separate stories that all actually loop back into and around one another. I think the automaton that went murderous whilst allegedly making Chase's life "easier" was my favorite although they were all really good. You really question whether meddling in nature is a wise idea or if it'll come back to bite you in ways unexpected
Merged review:
The University is a unique book that reminds me of Edgar Allan Poe, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Lovecraft, and recently Astor/Weiss. I loved the way there's eight separate stories that all actually loop back into and around one another. I think the automaton that went murderous whilst allegedly making Chase's life "easier" was my favorite although they were all really good. You really question whether meddling in nature is a wise idea or if it'll come back to bite you in ways unexpected
January 17, 2018
The University of Corporeal and Ethereal Studies is an imaginative yet strange and uncomfortable read.
The writing is competent, if perhaps drawn out, and explores themes which push the author into describing the fantastical – and there are many such trips – using the setting of an academic institution which is specifically in business to research and commercialise H.G. Wells-style fabric of reality stuff. This provides the ideal launch pad for many unusual stories from the same source, or at least from offices and research departments next door to each other on the same campus. Teaching, research and spin-out companies are all described in a fantasy context, but breaking the boundaries (and glass ceilings) of research is where the central action comes from.
The campus itself is set in a poverty-stricken, Victorian gutter-influenced, maker and steampunk city where the rich and the poor divide is thrown into sharp relief. It’s the sort of place where street urchins need their engineering skills to survive, exploitation is rife, so you wouldn’t want to be without work in this environment. The rich on their rocket sleds think they’re a species apart from the poor, the poor divide themselves absolutely from the painted savages in the wilds and the academics in their towering edifice act superior to all of them. It’s hard to be sympathetic to any part of a population which disfigures itself like this. Resentment, starvation, abandonment, lack of compassion and permanent injury have all been normalised in this imagery, so it’s hard to feel good about the book.
The characters are of course there to open up each themed idea, so could be puppets for all they matter, used to destruction, illustrating an idea, then it matters little if they are thrown away. In H.G. Wells’ the Time Machine, do we remember the name of the scientist? No, but we do remember the idea and what happens. The writer tries to engage the audience with each protagonist in turn, hoping readers will care about what happens to them, but from my reading of this it didn’t connect. The sense of macabre, almost semi-horror, that these mini plays descended into affected me in the way that I mentally stepped back, putting in some emotional distance so I wouldn’t be drawn into their queasy experiences. I wanted to see where the story was going and understand the characters but was reluctant to be part of it, to fuss around them.
In the sense of nature versus nurture, a desensitised society produces desensitised people (“society’s to blame!”) and that landscape of blunted emotions becomes tangible. In my case, the story desensitised me to the plight of the characters because it made me feel uncomfortable. What I had expected to take from this book was a sort of inspirational buoyancy, a feeling that there’s so much more behind the scenes of reality and what fun it would be to discover it. That got lost rather in all the social deprivation and hardship. Although I’m sure this is all very worthy and has historical precedence (Dickens hoped we’d change society if our attention was drawn to it), at this stage of history we have already understood that lesson and we need something a little more uplifting. That opinion can be disregarded in full if you think steampunk has to be Victorian and depravation goes with the territory. I disagree in this case as it wasn’t a light veneer. Fantasy is supposed to help us escape from drudgery, not wallow in even more of it. Good writing but... this is an institution in need of change.
The writing is competent, if perhaps drawn out, and explores themes which push the author into describing the fantastical – and there are many such trips – using the setting of an academic institution which is specifically in business to research and commercialise H.G. Wells-style fabric of reality stuff. This provides the ideal launch pad for many unusual stories from the same source, or at least from offices and research departments next door to each other on the same campus. Teaching, research and spin-out companies are all described in a fantasy context, but breaking the boundaries (and glass ceilings) of research is where the central action comes from.
The campus itself is set in a poverty-stricken, Victorian gutter-influenced, maker and steampunk city where the rich and the poor divide is thrown into sharp relief. It’s the sort of place where street urchins need their engineering skills to survive, exploitation is rife, so you wouldn’t want to be without work in this environment. The rich on their rocket sleds think they’re a species apart from the poor, the poor divide themselves absolutely from the painted savages in the wilds and the academics in their towering edifice act superior to all of them. It’s hard to be sympathetic to any part of a population which disfigures itself like this. Resentment, starvation, abandonment, lack of compassion and permanent injury have all been normalised in this imagery, so it’s hard to feel good about the book.
The characters are of course there to open up each themed idea, so could be puppets for all they matter, used to destruction, illustrating an idea, then it matters little if they are thrown away. In H.G. Wells’ the Time Machine, do we remember the name of the scientist? No, but we do remember the idea and what happens. The writer tries to engage the audience with each protagonist in turn, hoping readers will care about what happens to them, but from my reading of this it didn’t connect. The sense of macabre, almost semi-horror, that these mini plays descended into affected me in the way that I mentally stepped back, putting in some emotional distance so I wouldn’t be drawn into their queasy experiences. I wanted to see where the story was going and understand the characters but was reluctant to be part of it, to fuss around them.
In the sense of nature versus nurture, a desensitised society produces desensitised people (“society’s to blame!”) and that landscape of blunted emotions becomes tangible. In my case, the story desensitised me to the plight of the characters because it made me feel uncomfortable. What I had expected to take from this book was a sort of inspirational buoyancy, a feeling that there’s so much more behind the scenes of reality and what fun it would be to discover it. That got lost rather in all the social deprivation and hardship. Although I’m sure this is all very worthy and has historical precedence (Dickens hoped we’d change society if our attention was drawn to it), at this stage of history we have already understood that lesson and we need something a little more uplifting. That opinion can be disregarded in full if you think steampunk has to be Victorian and depravation goes with the territory. I disagree in this case as it wasn’t a light veneer. Fantasy is supposed to help us escape from drudgery, not wallow in even more of it. Good writing but... this is an institution in need of change.
December 23, 2020
READ THIS! This book is a veritable feast. The incredible imagination of the author is comparable to Roald Dahl – indeed it had many echoes of “Tales of the Unexpected”. Based around a university like no other, the main elements are steampunk, mild horror and fantasy. The book follows several different people who are in some way attached to the university, and there are overlaps between the stories, though each one is uniquely different and each a satisfying tale on their own. The imagination of the author is astonishing, penmanship is smooth, the descriptions effortlessly evocative. Worldbuilding is solid, so you can really lose yourself in this very quirky university.
May 18, 2019
Hard to describe. It consists of a set of long stories, each about a single main character
and they all take place in the same city and university. The last involves the whole group and ends on a bit of a cliff hanger.
The stories are a little long and too much description of clothes and such, similar to Victorian novels. I got pretty involved in the stories even though this is not my usual kind of book.
and they all take place in the same city and university. The last involves the whole group and ends on a bit of a cliff hanger.
The stories are a little long and too much description of clothes and such, similar to Victorian novels. I got pretty involved in the stories even though this is not my usual kind of book.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews