My notables:
Specimen 313 - Jeff Strand
And Still You Wonder... - Gary A. Braunbeck
though both for the core idea more than overall execution. ( )

the average was actually 4/5, but from 19 stories no less than 8 were 5/5 for me (the Maberry, McIlven, J. Anderson, McCrumb, Kenyon, Strand, Green and Due - the Due even better than 5/5), just 2 were 2/5 (Moody and Cain) and one 1/5 (Braunbeck, wtf was that?!), the rest 3s and 4s.
So, according to my taste, an excellent, captivating, very diverse selection with a large variety of monsters in quite different meanings of the word. Really enjoyed it, so the overall rating as a whole is 5/5. ( )

Margar ágætar sögur frá öðru sjónarhorni en maður en vanur. Þær eru hins vegar misgóðar og það dró úr heildarmyndinni. ( )

I received an ARC of this book from the goodreads first reads program.

I was very excited to receive this book. I have been reading more short story collections this past year and I like the variety that they provide. This was probably my favorite collection I have read lately. All of the stories were good, some were great. Even the stories I didn't like as much were still interesting.

My favorite stories in the book were The Awkward Age, Big Man, Siren Song, Specimen 313 and Wicked Be.
The Awkward Age, the first story in the book, was amazing. I wanted the story to keep on going, so I could here more of Mason's story. I loved Mason's voice in the story.
Big Man was another great story. I liked the way it kept switching points of view, from Glen to the rest of the world. Glen's story was very sad.
Siren Song I liked the 3 sisters in the story. I also liked the Alaskan setting, although that didn't really figure in the story. Pauline was a strong woman, doing what she needed to do to survive.
Specimen 313 sentient plants, What an awesome idea for the story. The description of how they felt when they were uprooted, everything about the story made me want to be nicer to plants.
Wicked Be Melissa and Caleb's love story was so bittersweet.
What all of my favorite stories had in common was a strong point of view that made me really feel for the "monster." I felt I really understood the monster's point of view, and cared about them.

My least favorite stories in the book were Succumb, Rattler and the Mothman, And Still You Wonder Why Our First Impulse Is To Kill You and Jesus and Satan Go Jogging in the Desert. On the whole, these stories seemed the least successful at representing the monster's point of view. I did not care for, or feel any sympathy for the monsters. The stories were also the least interesting to me.

Overall, I loved this book. I enjoyed reading it. As a whole, the collection is great. Even my least favorite stories were pretty good. ( )

I believe Christopher Golden used the term “sympathy for the devil” in the introduction to The Monster’s Corner to describe the theme -to be honest I may have skimmed over that intro to get to the stories. I know that should have prompted me for what was to come, but “The Awkward Age” by David Liss was what set my expectations. In retrospect it doomed the rest of the tales within. Liss was brilliant; he gave me the distinct taste of that point of no return, the feeling you get at the top of a roller coaster, or as your lean in for that first kiss, or maybe it was more like watching someone throw the first punch in a fight... Read the rest of my review ( )