Fic rec: XMFC

"Other Crabs Cannot Be Trusted" by groovyphilia | Charles/Erik | AU | Erik is a hermit crab and proud. He is also stalking a shore crab named Charles. In which everybody in XMFC is a crab. | 8.400 words

"I think I'm being haunted," Charles was saying. A bit ironic, Erik thought, considering he was a ghost crab.

"Er," Hank responded uncertainly. "Why would you say that?"

"It's rather silly, I suppose," Charles continued, waving his claws in distress. "But I think I'm being haunted by a shell."

... Oops.

LOL! Just... LOL!

Book #30

"Shadowfall (Godslayer Chronicles #1)" by James Clemens

♦ ♦

Dropping this book 4 chapters in. It's disgusting, literally bile inducing. In the 2nd chapter, a 13 year old girl is raped in a very graphic way. The main hero used to be a knight but for his crimes he was broken on the wheel and sold into slavery. The acolytes serving the 100 gods take care of and store their god's bodily fluids and smear them all over themselves - and I'm talking shit and menses blood and stuff like that. Just thinking of that makes me want to vomit. So when I started the 5th chapter, in which the main hero is whipped for something he obviously, very obviously didn't do till his flesh parts from his bones, I said to myself ENOUGH!

So why 2 stars? Because the story is interesting and would've been really good if the author curbed his voyeuristic obsession with perverse stuff.

If you want to read a dark fantasy about gods, read Tom Lloyd's "The Twilight Reign" - the series is not without flaws either but Lloyd's gods are much more interesting and he gets his heroes irrevocably broken while never crossing the line into being disgusting.