Please Do Not Taunt the Octopus by Mira Grant
My rating: 5/5 cats
i had no idea that mira grant had written ANOTHER newsflesh novella until i got my copy of Chimera in the mail and i saw this one listed on the “also by” page. i ran to my computer and bought it IMMEDIATELY and as soon as i finished Chimera, i read this even though a better person would have hoarded it instead of burning through all the available mira grant and finding themselves completely bankrupt of mira grant words to read.
but i’m not complaining. much.
generally speaking, you can read these newsflesh standalones in any order you please. however, in this case, you would be doing yourself a disservice to read this one without having read The Day the Dead Came to Show and Tell first.
this is a story about dr. shannon abbey and ALSO a beloved character from Blackout who i’d always wanted more time with, and as i was reading this View Spoiler » i got SO EXCITED to see them pop up and then as the story continued to unfold i had a moment of total readerheartgasm (if you are reading this, skip, this is also not a real word) when i realized how this story connected not only to Blackout, but also to The Day the Dead Came to Show and Tell. i read Blackout so long ago that i don’t remember how much of this character’s backstory was revealed there, so maybe this wasn’t a surprise to other readers, but when i was reading The Day the Dead Came to Show and Tell, i didn’t realize that that character was the same as the Blackout-character i so loved, and when all the connections were revealed in this story i was over the freaking moon with joy and delight and screaming. not literally. literally i squeaked instead of screaming, because it’s rude to wake people who live in your apartment up with screaming. unless there is actual peril. then you should totally scream.
outstanding stuff here.
i hope she never ever stops writing these stories, and if she has more stuff like this in her—where she collapses stories into other stories in the most exquisite ways, well i might just scream after all. sleepers beware.
i’m sorry if this “review” makes no sense to you. because that means you have not read enough mira grant. get on that immediately.
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