Phil Brucato

Super disappointing. The book doubles down on the stereotypes used in oWoD rather than trying to move past them. The breeds are not fleshed out well, the formatting is not used consistently, and nothing seems to be playtested, well, at all. There is a single box that says how its not balanced and that's okay (no its not), but not only is this horribly unbalanced, a ton of the options in here are either broken or just not fun or playable.

The authors are apparently obsessed with fucking and show more shitting because every page mentions one and/or the other. The text is obsessed with sex in a way that is not sensuous or complex or anything - its very flat and juvenile on top of being repetitive.

The characterization and story samples are also terribly lazy and cliched, and typically hinge on gratuitous, needless rape.

Huge letdown. show less

Easily the single best-written supplement to the Mage system, GTTT makes the Technocracy a playable, sympathetic alternative to the regular system. Even when used for creating antagonists, this books help to make them as three dimensional and complex as possible.

I finished "Ravens in the Library" today. It took me a while to find a common thread to the collection. There are stories of fantasy, of time travel, of urban settings, of rustic settings, of magic and mundanity, of loss and of love. The artwork was equally varied, but each image well suited the story it went with.

While the subject matter tends to be very different from one to another, as a whole it is clear to me that this is a collection of fables. Rather than a moral, each story show more (including the introduction) contains a warning of one kind or another. Some are cautionary tales, while others show the value of hope.

I’ll admit that a couple of the stories may have been darker than I prefer, but there is not one poorly written story in the collection. Whether heartening or haunting each was evocative and worth reading once, some I will read again and again. show less

While there were a few stories that just didn't speak to me, this anthology (on the whole) is quite good. As usual, the de Lint and Gaiman stories were my favorite of the bunch, but other standout authors/stories (IMO) were Terry Windling, Shira Lipkin, Angel Leigh McCoy, SatyrPhil Brucato, Alexandra Elizabeth Honigsberg and Laurel K Hamilton. It definitely makes me want to pick up a Sooj Tucker CD and hear the vocals to go with some of her lyrics.

2010 Reread--Even more excellent than I show more remembered. Recommended (if you can find it). show less