I was recently contacted with a request to review Dark Melodies an anthology of (ahem)
darkly lyrical short stories by the critically praised William Mekile – and because
I happen to be a huge fan of anthologies and short fiction in general, I jumped
at the opportunity. Seemingly only a few
short hours later, I had a PDF copy of the book in my inbox.
First of all, and unlike many anthologies, the collection of
stories in Dark Melodies is cohesive –
meaning that while they are clearly separate entities, they all have a similar
mood and feel – clearly a lot of thought went into keeping the content coherent
and purposeful. And the purpose, it
seemed, was to transport the reader to a darker, more introspective and
bewitching realm.
Dark Melodies consists
of eight stories, of which six are previously unpublished. My undisputed favorite had to be The Persistence of Memory – and there
are several reasons for this. Perhaps
the biggest reason is that I could see myself as Betty, making the same
decisions she did – and ending up in the same place. Even knowing ahead of time what would happen
to me (which she didn’t) I would have been unable to stop myself from going
down the same road – just in case I was wrong and could be reunited with the
one person I’d built my life around.
While The Persistence
of Memory was my favorite story in the Dark
Melodies anthology, all of the stories were very strong and captured my
attention – each in their own way.
While I know that anthologies aren’t for everyone, if you
are a fan of the style – and of dark fiction that isn’t full of slashers and
vampires, but chills you in a more subtle, supernatural manner – Dark Melodies will certainly be an
entertaining, escapist journey for you.
You can read it a story at a time, or (because it is under 200 pages)
you can devour it in one sitting. 4 out
of 5 stars.
