Punishment by Hope by Erik Hofstatter

 


Nim is a master swimmer floating on waves of wet hope. His penance is to swim and carry, but his heart is held onboard a grieving ship in the aquamarine prison of her eyes.

She is his sentence and he is hers. Will a mysterious humanoid jellyfish reunite the star-crossed lovers?

This book contains graphic sex and violence, and is not suitable for readers under the age of 18.

Praise:

“Punishment by Hope is a wildly poetic and surreal odyssey through sexual obsession, murder and retribution, set in a bioluminescent Dantesque world of fiery and aquatic horrors.”—Barbie Wilde, Author (The Venus Complex, Voices of the Damned) and Actress (Hellbound: Hellraiser II)

“A dreamlike seascape of desperate wishes, and a nightmarish vision of love’s life and death, this is a powerful, haunting tale.”—Tim Lebbon, Author of Eden

“Punishment by Hope is a vivid and erotic fantasy mystery. Hofstatter weaves a memorable spell.”—James Bennett, Author of Chasing Embers

“Punishment by Hope ebbs and flows in its oceanic imagery, giving you a taste of something you might want before churning in gore or the grotesque and then withdrawing back into its own uncanny depths like some kind of foamy blood tide. And like the vast ocean, the tale it spins is at once visceral, lustrous and literally unfathomable.”—Michael Arnzen, 4 x Bram Stoker Award-winning Horror Author

“Punishment by Hope is an erotic, splattery fever dream of a story. It gets to the core of what makes the very best horror. Underlying both is the sense that the universe isn’t orderly or benign, but rather chaotic and malicious.”—Tim Waggoner, Bram Stoker Award-winning Author of Winter Box

“A dreamlike seascape of desperate wishes, and a nightmarish vision of love’s life and death.”—Tim Lebbon


This is unlike anything I have read before, the first surreal genre story I have read. At first I wasn't sure what to make of it but the imagery is so rich it carried me along. This feels more like a poem than prose. 

Set in a mythical world full of magic we have a dark love story between two lovers who aren't always what they seem.  Nim is a master swimmer and hopelessly in love with Esiteri who is trapped on a ship far out in the ocean. Nim is tormented with her captivity but there is no way to free her without hurting her, but he still lives on hope that one day they will be together again.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Stone Road by G.R.Matthews

Image
I was introduced to this book as part of Fantasy Faction's Book Club where we all get together and discuss our favourite books. This time the administrator chose a title that had been self published. Out now via Amazon Now I'm going to let you in on a little secret, that yes of course there are a lot of really bad self published books out there, but there are also some really good ones. Since buying a kindle I've bought numerous self published titles for as little as 49p and have enjoyed most of them. Recently I read The Lady of the Helm by T.O.Munro and that was really very good. I'm going off track a bit here but if you love fantasy fiction and want to read really amazing self published fiction then head over to Mark Lawrence's site where he hosts the annual SPFBO - The Self Published Fantasy Blog-Off in which top bloggers read through the top 273 self published fantasy  novels to determine an overall winner. So back to  the Stone Road by G.R.Matthews.
Read more

Reluctant Immortals by Gwendolyn Kiste

Image
For fans of Mexican Gothic, from three-time Bram Stoker Award–winning author Gwendolyn Kiste comes a novel inspired by the untold stories of forgotten women in classic literature--from Lucy Westenra, a victim of Stoker’s Dracula, and Bertha Mason, from Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre--as they band together to combat the toxic men bent on destroying their lives, set against the backdrop of the Summer of Love, Haight-Ashbury, 1967. Reluctant Immortals  is a historical horror novel that looks at two men of classic literature, Dracula and Mr. Rochester, and the two women who survived them, Bertha and Lucy, who are now undead immortals residing in Los Angeles in 1967 when Dracula and Rochester make a shocking return in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. Combining elements of historical and gothic fiction with a modern perspective, in a tale of love and betrayal and coercion,  Reluctant Immortals  is the lyrical and harrowing journey of two women from classic literature as they brave
Read more

The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cornwell

Image
This epic tale is a fictional memoir of Uhtred, son of Uhtred who's destiny was forged in battle between the pagan Viking warriors and the pious Christian Anglo-Saxons in 9th century Britain. "My name is Uhtred. I am the son of Uhtred, who was the son of Uhtred and his father was also called Uhtred. My father’s clerk, a priest called Beocca, spelt it Utred. I do not know if that was how my father would have written it, for he could neither read nor write, but I can do both and sometimes I take the old parchments from their wooden chest and I see the name spelled Uhtred or Utred or Ughtred or Ootred, and I look at the deeds which say that Uhtred, son of Uhtred, is the lawful and sole owner of the lands that are carefully marked by stones and by dykes, by oaks and by ash, by marsh and by sea, and I dream of those lands, wave-beaten and wild beneath the wind driven sky. I dream, and know that one day I will take back the land from those who stole it from me." (Taken from
Read more