Bad Ass Faeries 2: Just Plain Bad
ed. by Danielle Ackley-McPhail, L. Jagi Lamplighter,
Lee Hillman, and Jeff Lyman

Review by Alyce Wilson

The new collection Bad Ass Faeries 2: Just Plain Bad is dedicated to "overturning preconceptions everywhere," and it provides a much darker view of its subject matter than the previous volume. In fact, it could just as well have been subtitled "Grim Faerie Tales."

The book is broken up into four sections: "Rebel Fae," "Rogue Fae," "Shadow Fae" and "Enforcer Fae."

In the first section, we find stories about faeries who are outsiders in some way, such as a black ops force made up of faeries going after a particularly nasty Unseelie (bad) faerie, in "Party Crashers." Another story, "Moonshine," deals with faeries who operate a black market business, with a goal of world domination. Of this first section, the best is L. Jagi Lamplighter's, "Of Plunder and Souls," where a mother accidentally discovers a dreadful secret and must choose whether to trust a faerie who claims to be on her side or to strive to simply save herself. Lamplighter's story might have been a better lead-off for the collection, since the others in the first section are so relentlessly dark.

In "Rogue Fae," a half-faerie solves a gruesome crime in Elaine Corvidae's "A Clear-Cut Case," while D.C. Wilson's "Bad Clown" capitalizes on childhood fears with a nightmarish version of a deranged faerie. With a somewhat wry twist, a half-faerie teams up with a werewolf to steal a magical item in Skyla Dawn Cameron's "Whiskey Sour." And the Lorne Dixon story "Zwischenzug" marks the welcome return of a member of a Mob family and his faerie sidekick as they undercover the truth behind a gangland murder scheme.

In the section "Shadow Fae," we finally get some humor, such as C.J. Henderson's "Do You Believe?" In it, a raconteur tells a tall tale in a local bar about his experiences with faeries. But could he perhaps be telling the truth? In the "Guardian Bell" Danielle Ackley-McPhail's half-faerie biker returns, once again running full-tilt into danger. "REPOstiltskin" is a clever story by James Daniel Ross, loosely based on the Rumplestiltskin story, but with a twist, as a young guy is repossessed by a magical being and follows the being around town as he repossesses other souls, all the while trying to find a way to free himself.

Bad-Ass Faeries 2: Just Plain Bad is a good collection of stories, but unlike the first collection, which represented a diversity of tones, most of these stories are decidedly dark. Yet, if the purpose of this book was to change preconceptions, it succeeds. After reading this book, you will no longer picture faeries simply as delicate creatures with diaphanous wings.

Rating: *** (Good)