These stories are so well written and full of imaginative twists and turns. Thoroughly enjoyable though I think this is more of a one and done book. I don't see myself revisiting or really giving much thought about it in the future.
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I loved Priest's Troll and The Family Plot. A very talented author who writes scary and macabre just right. Sure enough, in short form she doesn't disappoint either. One great story after another. Great collection, Huge collection. Very sort of genre's favorite themes and then some. Two novellas, one novelette. All lengths, something for everyone. Great for dipping in and out of or binging out right. Recommended.

Holy Terror is a great collection of short stories and novellas by Cherie Priest. There's fantastic tales of horror, fantasy, steampunk, and some that transcend genre. I think my favorite in this collection is "Catastrophe Box", it's just so dang good. Every story in this book is a gem. Highly recommended!

What I very much enjoyed about this collection of short stories and two novellas were the small introductions by the author before each piece. I find those things tiring, usually, but Ms. Priest has a very special knack for framing her fiction in a manner that really helps the reader understand both the meat of the story and the potentially ragged edges that could be found therein (i.e., in one short story we are introduced to The Heavy, a character and situation that could have been spun out into a full length novel and a person that I can imagine building a series around. Ms. Priest explains why she was attracted to, and ultimately grew distant from, him in her brief forward and I found it very enlightening as both a reader and an aspiring writer). Anyhoo, as in any collection some of these work better than others (nun assassin) and some are a bit vague and less-than-satisfying (a kind of wendigo-ish creature, a pizza place, and a Civil War POW camp) but a recommend for sure.

In Holy Terror: Stories by Cherie Priest, the author embraces her horror roots within her first short fiction collection, which includes a mixture of short stories, novellas and a novelette. Here you’ll find unnerving and haunting tales of eldritch beings, yokai, and zombies.

I do have to admit, some of the stories didn’t grab me as much and some of their endings felt unsatisfyingly abrupt. However, there were three stories in particular that really stood out to me.

“Bad Sushi” - A sushi chef serves a mystery meat that has customers flocking to come eat it. However, he believes his manager is holding a sinister secret, and he’s determined to uncover it.

“Catastrophe Box” - A man’s psychic wife steals an enigmatic box and warns him to never open it. However, as his wife grows sicker and sicker, he becomes increasingly curious about its contents.

“Wishbone” - A grotesque monster made up of the bodies of dead soldiers plagues a prisoner-of-war camp. (Needless to say, there’s some wonderfully gnarly body horror in this one.)

Overall, Holy Terror is sizable and eclectic collection with notes of historical and religious horror, which Priest nails really well.

I just finished Cherie Priest’s collection Holy Terror, this is a superb and varied collection. Ranging from steampunk (including Clementine, a Clockwork Century short novel) to horror to fantasy to stories that defy categorization. Ms. Priest always tells a good story, with characters you care about. The newest story “Talking in Circles” is a favorite of mine, as good as anything she has written. Highly recommended.

Holy Terror : Stories By Cherie Priest- A cross-section of stories, some old, some recent, with an introduction by Kevin Hearne. Lots of horror mixed with some steampunk, which contain their own horror. Stories vary from Lovecraftian (Bad Sushi) to Horrific dread (The Catastrophe Box). My favorites were the two Steampunk Tales Clementine and Reluctance. I've read her dark Steampunk novels Boneshaker and Dreadnought and enjoyed them. I confess, I'm not much of a horror fan, so I can't digress into which story fits into which niche except for the obvious. The writing is always top notch and the stories so different from each other, you will be entertained.

A strong collection, for the most part. Priest has a deft hand at short horror fiction, but perhaps not longer works; I'd read her breakout novel <i>Boneshaker</i> in order to provide context for the novella "Clementine" included in this collection (both of which take place in her Clockwork Century universe), and found it weaker than most of the stories here, which are able to take advantage of a strong central idea but not wear out their welcome. It could just be that I'm uncharitable to the Clockwork Century setting, since I didn't like "Clementine" very much either -- which, turns out, I did not need to read <i>Boneshaker</i> to understand, <i>nota bene</i> -- while "The Wreck of the Mary Byrd," the longest or second-longest story here aside from "Clementine" was quite enjoyable.

"Holy Terror Stories" by Cherie Priest is a collection of short fiction which includes two novellas, one newly penned novelette and an assortment of dark tales. Each story, as introduced by Priest, explains her melding of ideas. My favorite, "The Wreck of the Mary Byrd", was inspired by a footnote regarding a riverboat travelling along the Tennessee River.

"The Mary Byrd was a ship of misfits" in the year 1870. The principal characters narrate their story. The gambler, once a hard working man, would stare at the river or play cards aboard the vessel, a man used to playing big-stakes games. Laura, a former slave, came North after the Civil War, found the cold weather inhospitable, and now helped run the kitchen on the Mary Byrd. With a revolver under her shirt, a little red-haired Irish nun seemed smart, spunky, and full of questions but at the ready to rumble. The ship captain was a man of many aliases. Why? It happened in India. He was pounced upon by a beast. "Survival was a wonder better left a continent or two away." A little hunger...a boat trapped in a raging storm...observe the almost full moon.

Paris during World War II. Stray bricks had fallen from a wall. "I caught a glimpse of him...pleading...venez m'aider...it was a little French dragon...I shipped him back home...named him Pierre. He was small, quiet, and four-legged plus a pair of wings...just like one of us...hurt by the Nazis. I couldn't leave him with his broken wing." Pierre was "The Immigrant" in the sparsely populated Appalachian foothills. Storytellers told legends, "sightings" of a rational, educated creature, clearly not a person.

It was "The Catastrophe Box". An Englishwoman who died one hundred years ago, left explicit instructions for a wooden box, bound with weathered silk strips sealed with wax. The box must only be opened in times of national crisis and in the presence of twenty-four bishops. "Why did [Sonia] clutch [the box] in such a fierce, dreadful manner...as if she could neither bear to look nor look away?" For safety, she concealed the box in the attic in a locked and bolted trunk.

Captain Croggon Beauregard Hainey was moving contraband cargo and passengers on "a borrowed, nameless dirigible...his true ship...a rightly pilfered and customized ship, the one he'd stolen fair and square eight years before was nowhere to be seen." The "Free Crow" had been stolen by red-headed thief, Felton Brink who renamed the dirigible "Clementine". Why was it barely flying, barely maintaining a good cruising altitude? Hainey was determined to recapture his beloved ship. Enter Pinkerton newbie, Maria Isabella Boyd. Her assignment- make sure the Clementine's cargo reaches its destination.

The ghost of Mother Jones gives a pep talk in "Mother Jones and the Nasty Eclipse". "There's always an eclipse...a moment when it goes all dark...and you think maybe the sun will never come back again...They called me a foreigner...stay home and knit...close my mouth...no one would speak for all the girls...I shouted them from the highest peaks...but no one heard me until I came back to earth...I thought if everybody knew, then someone somewhere would have to do something...I stood at a podium...I did not stay home and bake cookies...".

Cherie Priest's "Holy Terror" contains a wide array of apocalyptic, steampunk, and zombie tales as well as stories of alienation and madness. Not having read Priest's writing before, I did not know what to expect. What a delightful surprise! Highly recommended!

Thank you Subterranean Press and Net Galley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

While I prefer reading novels, as they give the author enough space to run with an idea or explore characters, sometimes I read short stories, too. In this collection Priest proves, that you don't need 300+ pages to tell a compelling story. Good stuff from a true master. And the notes are fun to read, as they let you get into the head of the author.