Cav's Place

This is a collection of short stories with fantasy elements that generally take place during the current invasion of Ukraine. The one exception, in terms of setting, is the first one, which is still presented from the point of view of a Ukrainian, but takes place in an alternate, dystopian reality, where Russia seems to pretty much rule the world. And that’s also one of the better ones in the book, and it makes a good point as well. And the same can be said about the third, though it probably overdoes the effect of state propaganda on Russians, at least at this point. On the other hand, I’m not quite sure what to say about the fifth, since it’s basically Doctor Who fan fiction and those familiar with that universe would be much better placed to comment, but it does look like quite a lot of effort was put into it… Though somebody “managed” to lose count of its chapters…
All but one of the rest are little bits of imagination that don’t aim too high, but at least the fourth and the seventh are good enough overall, at least for such short stories. The sixth is less so, and I wouldn’t even consider it as having a fantasy element, plus that “managing” to misspell National Geographic made me raise an eyebrow, but I wouldn’t necessarily call it bad either. I will do so when it comes to the second and the eighth, however, and while that eighth one is just a little thing that might not have really been meant to make much sense anyway, the second one seems to have aimed higher but failed, dragging on for a while without saying much, being written in a style that I’m not fond of, and having fantasy aspects that hardly make any sense whatsoever.

Rating: 3/5