I was kindly given a free ARC of this book by the author, Sangamithra Nataraj with the option to write an honest review. 

Sunflowers Under The Moon and Other Stories is a collection of eclectic short fiction from various genres.

It takes a look at the mystical in the mundane, acting as a study of human nature, and highlights the joys of everyday life?

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This was an interesting read as there was a real mix of stories in different genres.  There wasn’t really a theme though as the blurb states it was a study of human nature in a way.  I think this worked well for the collection.

I found the stories easy to read and I was compelled to read on with most, however, it was let down a little by spelling and editing issues right from the first page.  Personally,  I am a stickler when it comes to errors in published books as they do tend to spoil my enjoyment.

Each story was only a few pages long which I prefer and was a mix of POVs.  Unusually, some of the stories where written as if narrated by the character to the reader.  This gave a sense of the character retelling the story, which normally I’m not a fan of but actually it worked really well with the types of stories and I was pleasantly surprised.

There was some awkwardness in the prose in places where it was unclear who was being referenced, especially in parts were names were not used and instead pronouns were.  This made it a little stilted in places and meant I needed to re-read paragraphs just to be clear.

Characters were not fleshed out much and description was given more to set the scene than to pull you deeply into what was going on however, I got a flavour for each of the characters within and that was enough.

I have some definite favourites among the collection including:

• Of Cats and Fish
• Blood of the Convenant
• The Bone Tree
• Sea Spray On The Rocks

I should note there was no trigger warnings included at the beginning of the book (at least, not in the ebook copy I received) and topics such as suicide were in some of the stories.

Overall, I enjoyed the book and many of the stories within – another edit pass would definitely have been useful and a possible trigger warning too. 

My Rating:

⭐⭐⭐1/2

Genre: Collection of short stories (kindle)

Length: 87 pages

Availability: Buy it on Amazon

About the Author:

Sangamithra Nataraj is a fantasy author and poet. She did her Master’s in English Literature in Madras Christian College, and is currently working as an English teacher in Chennai.

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Happy writing

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