Forrest’s Reviews > Ossuary of Dreams: Twenty-Five Tales of German Horror and Weird Fiction > Status Update

I can't tell if this story is hitting it's stride or not. Time will tell.

As I was listening to the skipping of an old scratched record (Jean-luc Ponty's "Cosmic Messenger" if you must know), I realized that the wincing I get from the choppiness of a skipping record is what I often encounter in Grain's prose. Either he's trying to cram too much into each sentence or there's something about the translation that makes it irksome. Splitting one sentence into several is a possible solution.

. . . a rumbling like from a squadron of unleashed poltergeists in the entablature.

This phrase has so many problems, I can't even begin to enumerate them. Well, maybe I can, but I really don't want to. Suffice it to say that I have more questions than answers about what is happening here.

An interesting start to the longest work in the collection, "The Path of Saint Mephis". I'm hoping this holds up as well as (most of) the other long works herein.

"Holding Out at Castle Von Lohe" is a mixed bag. It's like watching a marathon runner who stumbles every couple of miles, even falling down once or twice. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love it, either. I'm firmly in the middle on this one.