Enter Softly - by Tyler Jones

On the eve of the release of Tyler Jones’ first novel, Almost Ruth, Tyler added three novellas as a stand-alone book, comprising of the three novellas that are added to the extended versions of his previous two novellas - The dark side of the room, and Criterium - as well as the novella included in Almost Ruth.

Now, I haven’t read Almost Ruth yet, that’s actually my plan today, but the two stories “Along the shadow” and “Enter softly” are novellas that share common ties with the novellas they appear alongside – In Along the shadow, we follow a detective investigating a homicide in which the perpetrator of the crime is the supernatural being that is the base of The dark side of the room. Likewise, "Enter softly" explores the world surrounding Criterium, bringing in characters from that book and also showing a side of the story previously unseen, that of a nurse on the emergency ward where victims of Criterium’s antagonist (a bike) are admitted to hospital. I can’t speak about the common tie from “Wake up”, but am fairly confident I’ll get that tie by the end of today.

Ok, so that’s the intro over, how did the book fair?

Tyler’s playing his A-game here, there’s an unashamed appreciation from my part for Tyler’s prose, his voice is eminently readable, his flow merciless, the language lyrical, his love of character perfect. Of the three novellas, Enter softly made the most impact for me, the deterioration of the protagonist Lisa Morton was sublime, Tyler’s timing, his layering, all of it was just spot on. I was fully committed to the storyline, I wanted to see how low we could go and Tyler illustrated the house perfectly, and the inclusion of Henry Thayer was wonderful, I loved the character from Criterium so was thrilled to see a return and a little more background building from him. I believe this won’t be the last we see of him, Tyler has left us some unanswered questions here that we will need answering. Dammit.

I’m not going to tell you about the stories because honestly, that’s not what is on sale here. You are buying time with Tyler’s voice, and it is money well spent. There’s a bleeding honesty in Jones’ prose, it comes across as heartfelt, as if Tyler has lived in the shoes of all of his characters, there’s nothing stereotypical or 2D about any of the characters or situations in his books, each personality comes with its own baggage, emotional turmoil, and humanity.

Tyler knows his characters, and every one of them has a heart that can be broken, and Tyler shows us that process. It hurts, but every second you spend in his world is escapism of the purest form.

I can say without any doubt that Tyler is a “must-buy” Author from me. Can’t wait to get going on Almost Ruth.

5 out of 5 ⭐ ‘s and my thanks for releasing these stories for those of us that already had the novels these stories appeared in, in their extended editions.

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You can buy Enter Softly by clicking on the Amazon store appropriate to you.

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