Bringing All The Bad: Two Dark Novels

Dark Collections #3

by Ann Christy

In Bringing All The Bad, two novels delve into the dark, where monsters disguise themselves as human. There, we discover what it really means to be special...and female.

Magic Baby in Room 108

After a mysterious phone call, Detective Melody Baker busts a highly organized child sex-trafficking ring. Though many children are rescued, there are more to find and time is of the essence. As authorities search, one rescued child spins a fantastical tale for the police. Is her story born of trauma-induced madness or does something more lie behind it. As Melody is soon to discover, there is more than one way to find justice and sometimes, a monster can be a detective’s best friend.

All of Them Dead or Hidden

In a single day, tens of millions of women inexplicably drop dead...and they continue to die. The world desperately searches for some pathogen to cure or weapon to eliminate, but there is none to find. All too quickly, women become the most endangered of creatures.

Four women follow three very different paths through the end of their world. For none of them is survival guaranteed. For none is life easy. As desperation shifts to a grinding determination, humanity must grapple with a terrible choice. When our existence depends on a few surviving women, can humanity afford to let them choose their own future?

599 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 26, 2020

About the author

Ann lives by the sea under the benevolent rule of her canine overlord and an incredibly foul-mouthed cat. A scientist and Navy officer by profession, the writing bug somehow got inside her during her travels. She's now stuck with it and can't stop writing.

She writes fully immersive works of science fiction and apocalyptic fiction. Ann is also a voracious reader, and adores a well-done audiobook. If she's not writing, then she's reading or listening.

Reviews

[Susan]

Wow!- These two books in one give a double barrel bang for your buck! Both of them deliver a very satisfying sort of retribution to the awful bottom feeders of the world. The two books are very different, the first deals with a supernatural type of being who delivers justice to the worst offenders of society. They have a very special superpower that delivers that special retribution. I can’t really describe it better without a spoiler, so let me just say that it is concluded with a very very satisfying ending. The bad guys get it in the end.
Book 2 has an entirely different plot and timeline. There are no supernatural powers with the heroes and heroines in this piece. There is one catastrophic event that changes the world. Suddenly, the resource that was taken for granted the whole world over, that was abused, diminished, and neglected, disappears in the blink of an eye. Suddenly, everyone realizes all at once, that they are the most precious thing in the world. Then that resource has to figure out a way to hide. This too has a bittersweet ending. It goes through several possibilities of how different societies will handle a situation. This one is hopefully not prescient but is an interesting take on what would happen if women suddenly became an endangered species. You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone comes to mind. Both books make it very easy to hate the bad guys and very easy to empathize with the good guys. While reading, it brought up emotions, made me laugh, cry, and get mad as heck, in the way only a very well written book can do. I know you will enjoy this book as much as I did!

[Jim]

First you have to realize that there are two books, two very different books, in this book. They aren't related but it is super important that you read the author's notes after each story, then read the final wrap up - they are an important part of the experience and then you will understand why these two completely different books had to be combined into one book.

Magic Baby in Room 108 might be the most memorable story I've ever read. You can't help but be drawn in to Melody and Baby's world, and you notice, very subtly, that things are not what they seem. Ann does an amazing job of channeling her inner Stephen King with the pacing and styling of this story, making you wonder where the story is going. And oh the places it goes. Whether you love it, or hate it, you will NEVER forget it - Baby and Melody will reach out from the pages and grab you in a way that that not many books can do, and the pages will just turn themselves as you fly through. (Side note - after writing a review for Amazon last night I couldn't get Baby off my mind and started rereading Magic Baby in Room 108. I'm enjoying it just as much or even more than the first read.)

All of Them Dead or Hidden was the second story. It didn't grab me like Baby did and maybe that's why I just wasn't able to get into it like I did Baby. It's a really great tale following four women and their journey after 95% of the world's women died simultaneously. Weird plotline, huh?

I believe I've read all of Ann Christy's works. This book, especially Baby in Room 108, is easily the best she has ever written.

[Debbie]

It took me a little while to finish this book. I had to take a break between the two novels. Both are emotionally intense, particularly the first one. Magic Baby in Room 108 is about the worst kind of horror, where all the monsters are humans. Child abuse of any kind is not a topic I choose for my fiction reading. Had this been written by another author, I would have passed it up. But I have read all of Ann Christy's work, and even her darkest stories are not without hope. That is true here as well. As with all of her horror stories, this is speculative fiction. It went in a direction I didn't expect at all. The characters she's created here are unique and very intriguing. They are designed to deliver justice in a fashion I've never encountered in a book before. I'm glad I didn't skip the story.

All of Them Dead or Hidden is the second novel, and my favorite. There's always a favorite, even when there's only two choices. I'm partial to stories about the end of civilization. There's never really an end to the human race, of course, but a radical change of one kind or another. Here the change kills most of the female half of our species. While the cause isn't identified, it at least seems fairly certain that this disaster wasn't a result of mankind's actions, which is a refreshing change from the usual dystopian fare. The male half of the race reacts, for the most part, by reducing the remaining women to no better than property - again. All in the name of protecting them, of course. The story follows four women in very different situations. Ultimately, it's about what they must do to regain their freedom.

I very much enjoyed both novels. They are dark, but in the end, there is hope.

[James Calhoon]

Excellent five star!

I really enjoyed reading this book, although I did get lost several times and wondered where we would wind up. I liked the book very much and recommend it to everyone.

[KHB]

Two for One

A fantastic book by one of my favorite authors. Two books in this collection, and they are indeed dark as advertised.

Both books were great, but the second and larger book I couldn't put down. It seemed to grow more sinister by the chapter.

A must read.