A Sliver of Darkness by C. J. Tudor

Join a group of survivors who wash up on a deserted island only to make a horrifying discovery.

Meet a cold-hearted killer who befriends a strange young girl at a motorway service station.

Travel along eerie country lanes in a world gone dark, enter a block of flats with the most monstrous of occupants and accompany a ruthless estate agent on a house sale that goes apocalyptically wrong.

These eleven twisted tales of the macabre from the bestselling author of The Chalk Man and The Burning Girls are your perfect companions as the nights draw in…

If you’re brave enough.

---

A Sliver of Darkness is a collection of short stories from an author who is widely considered to be Britain’s answer to Stephen King. I’m not sure why I’ve not read Tudor’s work before, but having enjoyed this collection, I will definitely be purchasing her novels – this is exactly my brand of weird and macabre.

The tales in this collection are wonderfully varied.  Some are merely sinister while others stray into more post-apocalyptic scenarios and out-and-out horror.  As with any collection, there were some tales that I enjoyed more than others, but none that I didn’t enjoy to some degree, and I can honestly say that there isn’t a bad one in the collection.  This is far from an original thought, but I’ve always felt that shorter fiction is harder to write – and to write well – given that there’s less time to establish a scenario or develop a character.  The reader has to be able to pick up what they need to know in a very short time, and it’s something that Tudor does brilliantly here. 

I’ve really struggled to pick out my favourite stories, but I’ve settled on The Block and Runaway Blues.  Ask me again tomorrow, and the answer might change.  The Block sees a group of teenagers get more than they bargained for when they enter a derelict apartment building.  I loved the premise of this tale and the way in which Tudor so brilliantly captures the teenage angst of its protagonists and the way in which stupid acts are sometimes undertaken in order to “save face”.  Tudor successfully captures the individual voices of these characters, fleshing each one out in a brilliant example of show, don’t tell.  And like all the tales in this collection, it comes with a wonderful little twist at the end to finish it off.

Runaway Blues is quite a different tale, transporting the reader to 1970s America where a young couple becomes caught up in the life of a musician.  It is, as Tudor states, her most King-like story, and would make a good introduction for those coming to her work because of the comparisons to Stephen King.  I absolutely loved this story, which is dark and unexpected in its development. It has less of a supernatural vibe than some of the other tales in the collection, and yet is no less creepy or disturbing for it.  It’s a story that toys with the reader, playing with their sympathies as it builds up to a horrifying conclusion. I adored it!

For me, this collection worked brilliantly as an introduction to Tudor’s work, and I can’t wait to pick up some of her longer fiction – I think I’m in for a treat as I love her style of writing and the scope of the collection has left me wanting more.  One element that I really liked about A Sliver of Darkness is that each tale is introduced by the author.  In these introductions, she shares where her ideas came from and what inspired each one.  I loved this insight into Tudor’s own writing processes, and particularly the way in which inspiration may strike at any time.  I felt that each tale was enhanced by knowing the background to it. 

I recommend A Sliver of Darkness to anyone who enjoys creepy tales of horror, the macabre, post-apocalyptic scenarios, and any combination of the above.