Book Review - I, Hell by Ben Stevens

Judging from some of the other reviews for this book it was originally released as a single short story, but the version I've just read was more a collection of short stories, so I'll treat them separately.

The title short story is a decent short story. It's well paced and I enjoyed the style of it. The experiences of Hell were well done and the conversations with Hitler were amusing. To be honest while I was reading it I thought this was the first part of a longer work until I hit the end. The ending felt a bit cheap to me and while you could certainly argue that it demonstrates the basic selfishness of evil it diminishes all of the drama and the build up of what preceded it. Still it's a decent short story and well worth reading.

The other stories didn't stand out for me. They were all reasonably well written and had some entertainment value. However they were mostly short pieces that didn't quite hit the mark. I'm a big fan of very short fiction, but there is an art to making such short writing punchy and memorable and these felt more like longer works that hand't been fully developed.

The book's saving graces were the longer stories, in particular the first and last stories. They could have been more developed, but were still entertaining reads. Overall it's a bit of a mixed bag, but worth checking out for the title story alone.

Click on image to buy from Amazon

No one has ever escaped from Hell. But when one determined young man finds himself sentenced to eternal damnation, he hatches a daring plan...

From the author of 'BURIED ALIVE' and 'THE METAL MAN'.

'I have become a big fan of Ben Stevens. He writes extremely well...' Lloyd Tackitt, bestselling author of A DISTANT EDEN and EDEN'S WARRIORS.(Amazon US ***** review for THE WHISTLER.)

Click here to buy I, Hell from Amazon (and it's a decent read)