Thank you to NetGalley for granting this ARC, super good and fast read. The story was intruiging and the characters had an interesting back story.

I read & enjoyed both A Sheep Among Wolves & The Land of Milk and Honey. They were both kinda slow starters but the final acts made up for that.
I sadly had to skip Fine Print. I read for enjoyment and this felt more like work so I tapped out after having to look up the definition of something for a 5th time. This felt like cashing in on things learned in a word a day calendar, but I also completely understand that this would fit with some clans and is just not my thing.

*Digital review copy provided by NetGalley & the publisher.

WALK AMONG US is the vampire collection I never knew I needed. All three authors are new to me and delivered strong chilling tales.

Until this book, my experience with the role-playing game Vampire: the Masquerade began and ended with the short-lived 1990s-era TV show Kindred: the Embraced, which I still adore with the fire of ten thousand suns but which I knew all along probably had little to do with the source material. So I actually took a look at the online wiki for the game before reading this book, and I'm glad I did, because all three stories within basically assume you're already familiar with all the relevant Vampire: the Masquerade background lore. (Though to be fair, none of the stories is intensely lore-intensive, in the sense that you'll be completely lost without any preexisting background knowledge.)

There are three stories here: the first follows a young human whose life is upended when she begins to encounter the Kindred; the second follows a newly-embraced Kindred as he struggles to navigate his new existence; and the third follows a longtime Kindred as she finds herself caught in certain inescapable webs of her existence. Of the three I thought the first was the strongest, both because the narrator's ignorance of the Kindred made the store more easily followable to a reader who'd never played the game before, and because there was a twist at the end that I genuinely didn't see coming. (Something I always appreciate!)

Overall, if you're a fan of the RPG, or if you're just in the mood for some decent vampire fiction, this is a decent afternoon read.

As a player of the table top rpg these tales are inspired by… I LOVE IT! The world building in each novella was well done and I invested in every character. Even if you don’t play Vampire the Masquerade, this compilation is a nice twist on vampire lore I’d recommend to any fantasy/horror fan!

Walk Among Us is a collection of three novellas set in the world of Vampire: The Masquerade. For those of you unfamiliar with Vampire: The Masquerade, it's a gothic tabletop RPG that rose to popularity in the 1990s. Set in the "World of Darkness", players play vampires, complete with the struggle to maintain some humanity as well as navigating treacherous political machinations of both vampire and human alike. True to the vampires of that world, these stories are dark and broody. The vampires within these tales have diverse backgrounds and ideologies.

"A Sheep Among Wolves" is the first foray into the world of White Wolf. This story by Genevieve Gornichec was the weakest of the bunch for me. In it, a college student dealing with depression and loneliness finds herself realizing a whole other world has been right in front of her. I struggled with this story the most. The pacing was incredibly slow and I really had to push myself to get through it. The main character felt very insipid and reserved. Any supporting characters went the reverse direction and were absurdly stereotypical. While I certainly appreciated the overall mental health theme, this one just felt like something I'd read before.

The second story, Cassandra Khaw's "Fine Print", certainly elevates the collection. Bringing a modern-day touch, the main character here is someone that you love to see get what he deserves. Khaw brings this detestable character to life in hi-def and lets us take a seat to watch his undoing. Arrogant and overbearing, this rather tedious specimen of manhood thinks that he's getting the better deal when in all actuality he's getting played by vampires way older and smarter than he is. This one truly shows that vampires are inexhaustible masters of manipulative and cunning.

"The Land of Milk and Honey" by Caitlin Starling brings up the rear in this collection. This unique story combines ethics and vampirism with this setting of sustenance and sustainable farming. Out of all the stories, I enjoyed this one the most. The strange quandary of needing blood to survive but to do so without killing is one that has been touched on before in vampire fiction but never quite in this way. It brings up some interesting parallels to our own struggles. This story has a bit of everything, some romance, a little treachery, and a lot of manipulation.

For a collection that only holds three stories, it took a while to get through this one. I enjoyed the variety of themes presented by each story. Vampire fiction has been around for a long time so getting something that feels fresh is a unique experience in itself.

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Omar

Walk Among Us, was a very fast paced and intriguing anthology of three stories set in the World of Darkness of Vampire the Masquerade. In this world, as its name mentions it, vampires or Kindred as they call themselves, live in the shadows of our world or among us without the humans knowing.

Age has power among the Kindred and knowing how to eat is the first lesson every kindred must learn. In this world, the vampires are divided between the Camarilla, who believe in the old ways and structure of powers such as Princes and royals, and the Anarchs, whom as their name say, believe the old members of their clan shouldn’t hold all the power and want to use modern technology. But one rule that they both follow is to uphold the Masquerade, which is to make humans believe that vampires do not exist.

The short stories of this anthology show the world of the kindred in different ways, learning about their existence and becoming a servant, becoming kindred themselves, and the schemes that exist among the vampires to gain power over others.

A SHEEP AMONG WOLVES, tells the story of a college student that has trouble adjusting to her new life and is suffering from a mental illness. But as she joins a group of lonely students she makes a friend, meets a strange man that she wants to please, and feels that a gorgeous woman wants to harm her. But beware who you trust and the order you follow.

In FINE PRINT, a man wants to be embraced, to become a kindred, and believes he is smarter than the kindred he is going to join. I really liked this one, it was my favorite story for the main reason of how much the main character missed because of his hubris, he believed he was smarter than the vampire that embraced him, and most of all he didn’t believe the warning he received from them. It was so fun when he truly believed he could see the sun again after the embrace.

Lastly in THE LAND OF MILK AND HONEY, a kindred wants to continue their experiment with a farm to ethically harvest blood from humans while helping them, but others want a piece of the cake and will do anything to get it.

These stories paint different pictures of the world of the kindred and their machinations, but most of all it shows the reader how similar they are to their human counterparts, but deadly and vicious with the power they hold. If you are a fan of the Vampire the Masquerade RPG or their stories, then I recommend you Walk Among Us. In this anthology, the authors write stories set in the World of Darkness where once the sun goes down and night reigns, creatures come out to play and hunt.

I requested this book because I loved The Witch's Heart by Genevieve Gornichec. I was completely unaware of the universe of Masquerade until my husband saw me reading it. Luckily, after a quick Google session, I felt prepared. I liked Gornichec's story, and I liked Cassandra Khaw's story even more, and I LOVED Caitlin Starling's story. They were all solid, and I will definitely seek out each author's other work.

Thank you to Harper Voyager and Netgalley for the review copy!

This is really impressive.

I read A LOT of tabletop tie-in fiction back in the day, and though it got me through high school and middle school, it's largely a blur. The World Of Darkness books were particularly unmemorable. For a company that appeared to be fully staffed by frustrated dark fantasy writers, the fiction that came out of White Wolf's RPG settings was overwhelmingly disappointing.

In these three novellas, the authors take the World Of Darkness as seriously as a fan could want for as long as they possibly can. They're well-realized, excellently paced, and adult in a way that the WOD anthologies of old never were. And if each eventually collapses under vampire cliches or goofiness, what can you do? A certain amount of silliness is just inherent in the setting.

At scale, the politics of Vampire: The Masquerade have never made a lot of sense. The fact that these authors were able to craft engaging stories that seem to take place in a larger, connected world is an achievement on its own.

Gorgeously dark. Each novella os completely different while maintaining the same gory, bump-in-the-night vibe I was looking for. This is an excellent read and I can't wait to handsell it!

Walk Among Us is a collection of three dark tales about deadly vampires. The writers pull you in from the beginning and keep you on the edge of your seat.

A Sheep Among Wolves 1/5

I didn’t care for this story at all. In fact, it felt like I was reading a badly written YA novella. I simply disliked all the characters, and it all felt too forced.

Fine Print 5/5

This was my favorite out of all three. It is an excellent story about making deals with the wrong people. I loved how dark and gruesome this story was. Cassandra Shaw did an amazing job bringing the World of Darkness into this collection.

The Land of Milk and Honey ⅘

Caitlin Starling’s entry in this book is also very solid. It’s a very unique story, and I enjoyed the double meanings surrounding the ethical issues in it.

A big thanks to Harper Voyager and Netgalley for the advanced copy

Great stories. Slow burn at first to build things up, but once they get started the stories are awesome. Would love to read more by these authors in the world of darkness setting.

As someone who did not play the game, I don't think I was the intended audience for this title, and that's okay. I thought it would be easier as a fan of vampires to be dropped into this world, but had a difficult time getting into the story, unfortunately. I didn't finish the book.

Book Review for Walk Among Us by Cassandra Khaw, Genevieve Gornichec, Caitlin Starling
Full review for this title can be found at: @fyebooks on Instagram!

Walk Among Us
by Cassandra Khaw, Genevieve Gornichec, Caitlin Starling
Pub Date: 04 May 2021

Vampires have been written as sexy, sparkles, and just monsters who crave blood. This book shows them in a new view.

Here we are given a collection of stories about one set of vampires and how they treat each other, not so much on how they treat humans. A totally unexpected view of these creatures. We learn to be happy with the choices we are given, to be careful about what we wish for, and to think long and hard about our choices..

This group of vampires are cruel and have a total disregard for the others in the clan., betrayal is the norm and the unlucky vampire that steps away from the normal activity or beliefs will be dealt with in a twisted and cruel way..

Very enjoyable to read and a different way to view this type of book. I do recommend reading this book.

#WalkAmongUs