The Eyeball Collector (Tales from the Sinister City 3) - F. E. Higgins

Higgins fills her book with deliciously nasty bits (Mandible paints using blood leeched from a servant), riddles and a Dickensian atmosphere that’s both stark and delightful.  Some familiar faces appear, but this story works beautifully on its own.

Readers with a taste for lurid prose, macabre twists, riddles, exotic poisons, high-society caricatures, murderous schemes and scenes of stomach-churning degeneracy will find some or all of these in every chapter, and though the author trots in multiple characters and references from previous episodes, this one stands sturdily on its own.

Higgins has a marvelous flair for the macabre, and her deft pacing escalates to a satisfying crescendo of shivers…  Readers who appreciate the grotesqueries of Cirque du Freaks – but packaged with fine writing and a well-conceived plot – will want to add this to their collection.