I had just finished reading "Storm Dancer (Dark Epic Fantasy)" when I noticed that this collection of short stories was available for purchase. For the small price, I knew that this would yield a high return on investment for my entertainment dollar. Though saddened to learn that Dude and Mierda (the romantic couple from "Storm Dancer") wouldn't appear in these pages, I kept hope alive that I would meet some brand new characters that would bring me to tears. Disappointment was not on the menu; this book delivered with the efficiency of an industrial ipecac and laxative blend.WARNING: DETAILED SPOILERS AHEADKin:The story begins with Leha (some old bag) anguishing over a natural disaster that topples a mountain range (let that sink in for a moment) and smashes every every village and town as far as the eye can see, including her own. Despite her awareness of widespread disaster, she decides it'd be a good idea to walk for seven days to the next destroyed town (or wait - later she says it was only five days... perfect example of the terrible continuity one comes to expect from this author), ostensibly to find some food to bring back to her destroyed village. Despite how terrible an idea this is, Leha and her child-slave Jehanzeb make the trek, during which we learn that Leha has three daughters, only two of which she acknowledges. In the context of the widespread destruction, I immediately had a notion of how this story would end, and came up with two possible scenarios: A) the disowned daughter would take Leha in, and Leha would regret what a terrible parent she'd been, or B) the disowned daughter would be dead and Leha would lament and regret what a terrible parent she'd been. Turns out, A was the correct choice. Leha arrives at the town to find that neither of her beloved daughters will allow her to stay in their homes. Clearly, they are the product of bad parenting. In their defense, Leha sucks as a character, and I wouldn't have let her stay with me either. The only likeable character in this narrative is the disowned daughter, Komal, who was kicked from the family roost for getting knocked up by a drifter - my kind of girl. Leha abandons her religious beliefs and decides to stay with the unrepentant fornicator.Greywalker:In the landscape of modern fantasy fiction, it should come as no surprise that there are zombies in this book. This is a zombie story, sort of.Turgan is diagnosed with terminal liver cancer, and goes to the local shaman where he learns that he can make amends with his former wife (who he used to beat and eventually walked out on) by voluntarily turning himself into a zombie. Using a blood doping technique that would make Lance Armstrong sit up and take notice, the shaman turns Turgan into a better, stronger, faster zombie. His estranged wife, Laina, is living in foreign-occupied Ain-Elnour where she, like the Vichy French, provides housing, food, and sexual comfort to the occupying army. She takes her husband in after thirty years of separation because she is loyal and stupid. Some of the army's officers are staying in her home, and true to zombie form, he eats one of them. Then he eats his wife because that's what the shaman wanted him to do all along.The Water of Truth:There was a farmer named Yarkoud. E-I-E-I-O.And on that farm he had a spring. E-I-E-I-O.One day Yarkoud decides to take an introductory class in economics. Embarrassed by their agricultural heritage and their work clothes, Yarkoud convinces his family to cash in on the truth-giving powers of the spring on their property. Using his deep understanding of international commerce, Yarkoud quickly turns his family's paddock into the Las Vegas of the Bronze Age, complete with luxury hotels, showgirls, a travel agency, vacation packages, souvenir shops, prostitution, and organized crime (if you think I'm joking, read it - I couldn't possibly make this up). Once the laws of supply and demand set in, Yarkoud is forced by economic conditions to drill a new well, diluting the truth-giving power of the spring by one thousand percent. Customers leave dissatisfied, and the empire he made crumbles into financial and physical ruin. Unswayed by his venture's failure, Yarkoud convinces his family to grow grapes and toil in the fields while he stays comfortable indoors working on a new marketing strategy.Each Stone, A Life:I will admit that, when I read the name Kirral, I felt a little tingle in my nethers. The Queen's Consort from "Storm Dancer" reprises his role in this short tale of bizarre psychological torment. While Kirral's constant, over-the-top viciousness wears thin in the novel, here his unique ability to make everyone suffer finally shines.Leta, unwilling member of Kirral's harem (there's a trend), is faced with the death of her countrymen who were captured during their attempt to rescue her. Kirral gives her an option: do nothing (and all the prisoners die) or gamble with their lives while playing a new board game she's never seen before. Leta decides to play Kirral's game, and she's given as much time as she needs to master it - but if she takes too long, the prisoners may collapse from dehydration, in which case they'll be executed. Leta uses her superior skills as a mathematician to determine a winning strategy, and announces that she is prepared to play for the prisoners' lives.I'm not going to tell you how this one ends, because it surprised me. Although the writing itself is the same "vanilla + soiled kitty litter" flavor you expect from Rayne Hall, she gives us a glimpse into the mind of Kirral that shows his sadism can be clever. Golf clap.The Colour of Dishonour:Remember earlier when I wrote that Dude wasn't going to make an appearance in this book? I lied, sort of. This story is told from the perspective of Karamak, a Tribune in the Queen's army, who is locked in a heated race with Dude for the Generalship. Although Dude himself never appears, he is mentioned often enough that you can almost hear him smashing and raping offstage as besieged fortresses implode before his awesomeness. After nine months of siege-laying fails to topple the fortress town of Ain Narnat, Karamak, who desperately wants to snatch the Generalship away from Dude (but lacks Dude's innate awesomeness) resorts to treachery. At the monthly parley, Karmak lies to the city's envoy and promises a rape-free takeover if they open their gates. Convinced of Karmak's sincerity, the gates are opened and there is wholesale rape and slaughter as every living thing within the walls is raped and slaughtered, and the vast quantities of blood are used to literally "paint the town red". If this abuse of metaphor weren't enough, the author then takes one of literature's most enduring and poignant metaphors from Macbeth and chucks it right in the pan. In response to his treachery, Karamak begins hemorrhaging blood, stigmata-style, from imaginary wounds on his palms and shows them to the visiting general, bleating about the "blood on my hands". The general then appoints Dude to take over Karamak's duties. Dude, like gravity, cannot be overcome, even by treachery. This story was painfully bad. I think my eyeballs are bleeding. Go to the hardware store and ask for some paint that matches the colour of dishonour, and they will hand you a shiny can of "stupid". How the author decided on this as the book's title piece defies human understanding.A Horse for a Hero:The story opens with a Pegasus named "Pagos" in a horse stall. I didn't need to read any further to know that I'd hate it. I decided this book review was over when I read, "Pagos pranced with pleasure" on the first page.Overall, this book was every bit as horrible as I expected it to be. Judge this book by its cover: it sucks! It is ripe with the unmistakable stench of Rayne Hall's malodorous sentence writing (see Pagos, the pleasure prancing Pegasus). Every other book I read from this day forward will be fantastic by comparison, so that is a strong plus for this book.Go look under your sofa cushions, under your car seat, or in your child's piggy bank and figure out a way to drum up the 99 cents required to bring this book into your life. I did. Amazon Verified Purchase. Booyah. I am forever changed as a result.