Christmas Evil

by Mark L'estrange

It's Christmas Eve: a time of wonder, magic, anticipation... and terror.

A father who will go to any lengths to feed his hungry children. An unsuspecting woman who inherits a house with a deadly secret. A murderous widow who shares a train carriage with Jack the Ripper. Two burglars who bite off more than they can chew during a late-night raid.

These and many more bedtime stories come hideously to life in Mark L'Estrange's nineteen tales of terror, each set on the most festive night of the year. Will anyone survive until Christmas morning?

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Christmas

394 pages, Paperback

First published September 5, 2019

Reviews

[☠tsukino☠ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Il problema principale di questo libro, per me, è lo stile. La scrittura è proprio amatoriale; non mi fa impazzire ma c'è di peggio.
Ad eccezione di 3/4 racconti, i restanti sono parecchio prevedibili e ricalcano sempre lo stesso schema (sono tutti in stile Ai confini della realtà), con il risultato che, a lungo andare, diventano noiosetti.
Di contro, forse, avrebbero maggior senso come trasposizioni televisive, perchè nonostante tutto, sono sufficientemente carine.
Tre stelline perchè siamo sotto Natale e perchè la passione dell'autore è evidente.

[Final✘Girl✘Magick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I only rated Christmas Evil 3 stars bc the stories endings were predictable to me except for 2 stories. Now, to be fair I've been watching and reading scary stories/movies since I was allowed to watch TV and read books on my own starting with Scary Stories to Tell In The Dark and R.L. Stine. Or maybe its bc our minds just think a lot alike!

Other than that, the stories are not bad. I would still recommend this book to anyone to read wanting to get into the Festive spirit for Christmas! The stories are a good length and I loved the stories that came from a Villians point of view. Pick this one up and give it a chance. The author is creative with telling different fears based around Christmas!

[Nostalgiaplatz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tre stelline d'incoraggiamento, diciamo, perché la scrittura è davvero amatoriale. Le idee dietro certi racconti sono anche buone, però sono quasi tutti prevedibili nello svolgimento e nella conclusione e lo stile è, appunto, quello di un dilettante, con tutti i difetti di una scrittura "non professionale", troppo di slancio e senza nessun revisore ad aggiustarla, o a dare consigli competenti (poi magari è anche un problema di traduzione, ma più o meno ho notato gli stessi appunti anche nelle recensioni in inglese).
Leggendo un'intervista all'autore, mi è sembrato sinceramente appassionato, ma conscio dei propri limiti: il suo mestiere è un altro, e la scrittura è un sogno, una grande passione che lo rende felice. Questo misto di entusiasmo e umiltà me lo ha reso subito simpatico.

[R.A. Goli · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though very few stories were actually Christmas stories, (just having the story take place on Christmas Eve doesn’t make it a Christmas story), I still enjoyed this collection. They weren’t horrific or scary, but they were varied and interesting enough and kept me reading. I particularly enjoyed ‘The Cellar Door’, and ‘The Trial of Goody Weekes’.

[Yukki · Rating 4 out of 5]

Alla fine di tutto un buon lavoro, un buon prodotto.
Le storie non sono completamente scontate, non tutte almeno, e nonostante questa loro semplicità intrattengono molto ugualmente. Alcune di esse le ho trovate originali ed intriganti tali da voler approfondire la lettura in un volume dedicato a sé.
Il libro risulta molto scorrevole sopratutto per l'idea di aumentare la grandezza dei caratteri. Non mi era mai capitato prima di leggere un libro simile ed il risultato di quest'idea lo trovo geniale!
Unica e piccola pecca, ahimè, degli errori di battitura -evidenti e non sporadici- ed alcune ripetizioni che a tratti possono diventare snervanti.
Devo ammettere però che leggere questa raccolta proprio durante il periodo natalizio ha fatto la sua sporca figura.

[Tasmin Bradshaw · Rating 3 out of 5]

I mean sure it was alright. All the stories where pretty predictable. But not bad for a Christmas themed book.

[Laura · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretty disappointed with this on the whole. It wasn't awful but there were three key things which stopped me enjoying it as much as I could:

1. Too many exclamation marks! Writers should use these very rarely and it felt like every story had at least five. They were unnecessary and became very annoying to me

2. The stories followed a pattern of 'x goes somewhere, encounters weird people, weird people or x end up being a secret monster'. This wasn't every story but it was a huge chunk of them and it became very repetitive

3. Finally, one of the stories had a weird scene where some lesbians pretend to be straight to make a guy buy them expensive champagne, then mock him and make out in front of him. This added nothing to the story and just alienated me as a reader because it was presented as such a typical thing to happen and like, people don't do that?? The sexual content wasn't huge in this horror collection and certainly not compared to some others I've read, but sometimes it cropped up in weird ways (like a young boy looking up the skirt of a young girl, again for no reason) and it was always distracting when it did. I have nothing against sexual content but it has to add something and not just be a confusing aside

Overall, there are far worse horror collections out there but I still feel this needed a good editor to clean it up

[Valentina Maccherozzi · Rating 4 out of 5]

⭐ Ad accompagnarmi durante il periodo natalizio è stato questo libro che, come da titolo, non è altro se non una raccolta di racconti dell'orrore che si svolgono durante la vigilia di Natale, pur durante epoche o contesti diversi.
⭐ In questa raccolta è presente tutto ciò che un amante del genere horror può apprezzare: dal serial killer spietato alla casa infestata, dal vampiro assetato di sangue al lupo mannaro in cerca di vendetta, tutti i gusti possono essere soddisfatti.
⭐ Se devo trovare una crepa in ciò che l'autore ha scritto è che in tutti - ma proprio tutti - i racconti, il finale viene sempre interrotto sul più bello. In che senso? Leggiamo del vampiro che attacca la propria vittima, Jack lo Squartatore che trova una nuova vittima, il krampus... Ma non sappiamo cosa accade dopo, lasciando il lettore in una sorta di limbo e spezzando ciò che crea il botto finale, lasciandolo soddisfatto un pò a metà.
⭐ Ciò non toglie che la raccolta non mi sia piaciuta, anzi: racconti brevi si intervallano ad altri più lunghi, rendendo la mia fame di horror paranormale sazia durante queste festività.
⭐ Credo che tutti gli amanti dell'orrore debbano dare una possibilità a questa lettura, nonostante la "piccola pecca" evidenziata poco sopra che, tuttavia, rimane sempre e comunque un parere del tutto soggettivo.

[Amber Lee Kempkes · Rating 2 out of 5]

What could be a highly entertaining holiday horror collection is marred by multiple spelling mistakes- which are relatively easy enough to breeze past, albeit annoying. But the worst part of this book for me was the nearly!constant! needless! exclamation! points! For me, it took me out of the story so often just looking at those !!!!!! that it interrupted the flow of a really good story. Take those out, clean up the spelling, and this is a solid three star book for me. This author has great potential. I loved the variety of the stories, and they seemed well thought out and researched. I think this author will go on to grow and improve and I look forward to it.

[Alix Kampen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once again I did not read the synopsis so I did not know this was a collection of short stories. A lot of the time I am not a fan of shorts but these were pretty fun. I think the second story was my favoriteof them all. From murder, to domestic abuse, to vampires, to ghosts, to spider human shifters each story kept me guessing. Would recommend if you're looking for something creepy and dark stories all around Christmas time.

[Wesley B. Caldwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good selection of short stories

I enjoyed reading this collection of short stories and for the most part it was a 5 star read, but a couple of the stories made me drop it to a 4. If you enjoy short stories, and like them to be strange, spooky, and Christmas themed, then you will like this book and enjoy it as I did.🎅

[Pete · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not So Christmas Evil

Although all the stories took place on Christmas Eve, Krampus was the only one that had to do with Christmas. Every other story mentioned it was Christmas Eve but they could have taken place on any night of the year. Nothing Christmassy about these stories at all with the exception of Krampus.

[Christine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some very dark stories. Loved it

[Kayron Cunningham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great short stories

This book earned five stars from me as each story is different and also not too long, very good 😀

[Diane Mackereth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best short stories

I really enjoyed reading all of the Christmas Evil stories. They have a nice holiday touch! I know that you'll enjoy them too. Happy reading.

[Mark Heath · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nice xmas book , loved it

[Tina · Rating 4 out of 5]

😲

Pretty good collection of short horror stories. Some quite predictable but still really enjoyable 😊. Can't say there was any I didn't like.

[Cheyanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun stories, but could have benefited from a better editor. Quite a few misspellings and grammatical errors. Over all the stores were fun and I enjoyed the book.

[Ginger Pollard · Rating 4 out of 5]

ginger@thebeach

Not for the faint of heart!
A good book of Christmas horror stories. As I was reading I wondered if these short stories were written by the same author. They are very different, but at the end of the book I found, yes, they're by the same author. Anyone who loves a good horror story will enjoy this book.
It's not too scary, nor too tame. It's just the right amount of scary to stick with the reader and make you think. It's definitely memorable.
I would have gave this book five stars, but it needs some editing.
I enjoyed it, definitely different than a regular Christmas story.