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Visions in the Fog: A Review of Terror at Deventhier Bay

Terror at Deventhier Bay by Eloise Molano book cover. Image on cover shows an old wooden ship sailing on a calm sea at night. The full moon is peeking out behind the clouds behind them. Title: Terror at Deventhier Bay

Author: Eloise Molano

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: July 24, 2021

Genres: Horror, Paranormal, Historical

Length: 26 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 3 Stars

Blurb:

In a remote region of the north, in a huge bay was the town of Deventhier, the characteristic of this place was precisely the origin of the formation of a thick summer fog that was somewhat mysterious that was found in these partly cold waters that condition the Deventhier weather.
And it is precisely in the bay of this town where its locals talked about old stories of shipwrecks, inclement winter, terrifying fog, accidents of fishing boats and many stories of the dead and ghosts.
In one of these stories, a local named Manfred recounted the events that happened to an acquaintance named Albert on his trip on the ship named Zarpador, commanded by Captain Horace and with several well-known sailors among others, was Sigmur, Jhon and Hendrik.
On one of their fishing trips they had a fatal accident with a small boat caused by intense fog and heavy rains that did not give the sailors vision.
Due to the weather they could not rescue anyone from the small boat but in the following hours some strange phenomena and appearances began to happen on the boat, which drove its occupants to madness and increased the risk around the constant fog and cold. and the rain that lashed them.
Join me as I follow this story full of suspense, terror and dramatic testimonies from the people who suffered all these events.

Review:

Small towns are the perfect place for shocking news to spread.

The horror genre encompasses many different themes and styles. This isn’t something that so much as glances in the direction of anything gory or gross. Instead, it relies on secondhand information and the outer limits of the human imagination to made its audience shudder. That just so happens to be one of my favourite types of horror, and I’m pleased every time I find another author who writes this sort of stuff. Some of my favourite scenes were the ones that tried as many different ways as they could to scare me using these tools and preciousF few others.

This short story had a huge cast of characters that I struggled to keep track of. As much as I liked getting to know the characters, it would have been easier to remember who was who if the cast was smaller given how few pages the author had to work with when introducing everyone and explaining how they were connected to the haunting. Having fewer characters would have also left more space for the scary parts of the storyline, too, which I thought passed by too quickly given how much of the blurb was devoted to them.

With that being said, I did enjoy the conversational tone of this tale. It had been passed around to so many members of the community by the time the main character shared it that it had that wonderfully tattered feeling that sometimes happens when a story is passed through so many different points of view. That is to say, it came out in dribs and drabs instead of being as fresh and sharp as it might have been if those moments were described to the readers from the first person perspective. This was an excellent choice given the subject matter, and it made me curious to see what Ms. Molano might write next.

Terror at Deventhier Bay should be read by anyone who is looking for something spooky on a rainy or foggy night.

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Fixing Everything: A Review of Solaria

Title: Solaria Solaria by Thomas Volz 

Author: Thomas Volz

Publisher: Self-Published

Publication Date: June 7, 2020

Genres: Science Fiction

Length: 42 pages

Source: I received a free copy from the author.

Rating: 4 Stars

Blurb:

After encouraging his savant daughter to build a theoretical time machine, Eduardo Solmar scrambles to complete the project after Elishia mysteriously vanishes. His tampering with time reveals more about his future and the dangers of ripping the fabric of the space-time continuum.

Review:

Content Warning: Murder and grief.

If you’ve ever wished you could change the course of events of one single day, this might be right up your alley.

The character development was handled nicely, especially considering the fact that this was a short story and the author had limited time to show how memorable his characters were. I’m always thrilled to find authors who can pull that off with this form of writing. It isn’t easy, but it’s so rewarding when it does happen. Eduardo and Elishia both had unexpected layers to their personalities that were slowly revealed throughout their journey to build and use a time machine. I enjoyed getting to know them and would be thrilled to see a sequel if one is ever written.

While this was the sort of short story that works best if the twists in it are revealed quickly, it would have been helpful to have a little more world building along the way. I could easily picture Eduardo and his daughter Elishia because of how much effort was put into describing their physical appearances as well as their personalities. If only I could say the same thing about the setting! There was space here to dive into that topic, and I would have gone with a full five-star rating if the author had done so. Everything else about this tale was exciting and interesting.

With that being said, the ending was fantastic. It caught me off-guard at first, but I soon put all of the pieces together. I actually enjoyed feeling that mild sense of confusion while it lasted because of how nicely foreshadowed it ended up being and how well it suited the arc of the plot once I thought about it for a few moments. This was the sort of conclusion that the science fiction genre was meant for, and I couldn’t have been more pleased with it.

Solaria made me yearn for warm, summer days and for seeing if science fiction’s theories about time travel will someday turn out to be anything like what actual time travel might be like.

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Love and Regret: A Review of The Curse of La Llorona

Film post for The Curse of La Llorona. Image on cover show La Llorona holding the hands of the main character's two children in a candlelit room Content warning: deaths of children. I will be discussing this in my review. 

The Curse of La Llorona is an American 2019 supernatural horror film set in 1973 about a mother who tries to save her children from a malevolent spirit who is trying to keep them for herself.

La Llorona, or The Weeping Woman, is a famous spirit in Mexican and Latin American folklore.

She was a spurned wife who got revenge on her philandering husband by drowning their two young sons. After she died, she was refused entry to heaven because of this act.

I will make no comment about the rest of her story or any similarities or differences between it and this film. Feel free to read more about the legend of La Llorona ahead of time or start watching this with no additional knowledge of her tale at all. The plot works nicely either way.

The Curse of la Llorona is also part of The Conjuring universe, but it is a standalone tale in that series.

Characters

Linda Cardellini as Anna Tate-Garcia

 

Anna was a young widow who was raising two children as a single parent. A social worker by trade, she was well-versed in normal child development and how children react to frightening experiences.

Roman Christou as Chris Garcia

Roman Christou as Chris Garcia

 

Chris was Anna’s imaginative and impressionable son. He loved pretending to chase away bad guys.

 

Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen as Samantha Garcia

Jaynee-Lynne Kinchen as Samantha Garcia

 

Samantha was Anna’s independent daughter. She loved dolls.

Patricia Velásquez as Patricia Alvarez

Patricia Velásquez as Patricia Alvarez

Patricia was the mother of two of the children Anna had on her caseload. When Patricia was accused of abusing her children, Anna attempted to figure out what had really happened.

 

Raymond Cruz as Rafael Olvera

Raymond Cruz as Rafael Olvera

 

Rafael, a former member of the clergy, was the person Anna turned to for help when all of her other attempts to figure out what really happened to Patricia’s children and why her own children were in danger had failed.

 

Marisol Ramirez as La Llorona

Marisol Ramirez as La Llorona

La Llorona was the spirit who had killed her own children in a fit of rage.

Her identifying features are obscured for spoiler reasons.

Sean Patrick Thomas as Detective Cooper

Sean Patrick Thomas as Detective Cooper

 

Detective Cooper was a police officer who sometimes worked on cases with Anna. He had also struck up a friendship with her and her children over the years.

 

Tony Amendola as Father Perez

Tony Amendola as Father Perez

 

Father Perez was a local priest who had experience with La Llorona.

My Review

I had mixed feelings about this film.

The foreshadowing was strong and easy to spot. If not for the grim subject matter, this is something I’d play for young film buffs who wanted to learn how to pick out clues about future plot twists early on in a storyline. There were plenty of examples of this scattered throughout the early scenes.

Obviously, La Llorona’s story must involve the deaths of children given the legend that inspired this film. The backstory of why La Llorona began killing other people’s children after she died was shared with the audience clearly. I’m being a little opaque on the topic for spoiler reasons, but know that much of it was implied instead of outright shown. Honestly, murdered children is a grim enough topic that I’m glad the filmmakers stopped where they did.

I wasn’t a big fan of the way the plot ignored previous character development and rules that had been set up earlier on about how this haunting worked.  For example, one of the minor characters developed a grudge against someone else in the storyline. This conflict built up for a large part of the storytelling process only to be suddenly abandoned for reasons that were never explained. It lead to plot holes that I found unhelpful.

There was also  contradictory information about what the living could and couldn’t do when interacting with La Llorona. Sometimes she was written as a spirit so consumed by rage and regret that every shred of rational thought had been torn out of her centuries ago. In other scenes, she behaved in ways that directly contradicted that character development. Either interpretation of her could have worked, but it was confusing for me as a viewer to never know which Llorona we were going to get.

With that being said, this was a wonderfully scary and atmospheric tale. There was never any doubt in my mind that La Llorona was a malevolent spirit. Her intentions were straightforward and easy to understand even if her cognitive abilities were not. This was refreshing, especially in a genre that sometimes veers too far in the direction of romanticizing ghosts.

It would have been nice to have stronger character development in general. No, I wasn’t expecting the characters to spend the first half hour talking about their hobbies or dreams. This was a heavily plot-based story, and I respect that. But knowing about who the characters were as individuals would have made the storyline more memorable.

If you really love ghost stories and can overlook a few plot holes, I would recommend The Curse of La Llorona.

The Curse of La Llorona is available on Crave and Apple TV.

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