Birds have always held a fascination to writers of the weird and the uncanny. It might be the uneasy relationship shared between humans and our prevalent feathered friends, it may be that we simply understand that these creatures are likely to be the evolutionary ancestors of dinosaurs. Some of the earliest examples of classic horror stories are based around birds - I'm thinking specifically of ETA Hoffmann's owl-like haunter of children, The Sandman, how The Birds by Daphne du Maurier made the familiar sight of our feathered friends unsettling, or Edgar Allan Poe's supernatural narrative poem The Raven - so there seems to be a rich vein of unheimlich to be mined here.

Datlow's anthologies are never less than entertaining and Black Feathers adds to her array of rightly-celebrated titles. There are sixteen entries (one being a poem), all of the highest quality, although I should also add that - as with all anthologies - some stories worked better for me than others. For example, one of the tales - M John Harrison's Isobel Avens Returns to Stepney in the Spring - happens to be one of my favourite short stories of all time, and has been since I first encountered it in the mid 90s. The second reprint - The Obscure Bird - originally appeared in Black Static in 2011, and I had remembered how its seemingly straightforward prose bore all the unsettling hallmarks of Nicholas Royle at his best.

As far as I'm aware, all the other stories are original to this book. There's a brilliant contribution from Joyce Carol Oates, heartbreaking and disturbing in equal measure. In Alison Littlewood's The Orphan Bird, Arnold, an ornithological painter, reflects on childhood traumas caused by bullying and we get to see a startling insight into his disturbed world now. Blyth's Secret by Mike O'Driscoll is an absolute cracker of a story, in which the narrator, Wil Blevins, ekes out a lonely existence in an isolated Welsh forest, close to where a young boy has gone missing. There's a deep thread of discomfort running through this one, and the subtext is subtle and devastating, exactly the right side of ambiguous. Blevins' jackdaw friend, Blyth, adds an element of psychology that brings to mind Norman Bates and his taxidermy obsession.

The Crow Palace by Priya Sharma tells the story of Julie and her twin sister Pippa, who fled the family home years before, following the apparent suicide of their mother. Pippa has cerebral palsy and Julie has to face the selfishness of her past, which is also entwined with mythology and a glorious slice of avian folk horror. This is a great way to end the book, finishing on a real high, with such a pitch dark tone, embodying the theme of the collection perfectly.

Black Feathers is a wonderful anthology, filled with stories from the best writers working today. Whilst I didn't find every single story to be as engaging as the rest, there's no denying the quality of the writing, and so this is a book that is easy to recommend. I'm sure even the most discerning reader of dark fiction will find much to love.

16 bird stories and I'm actually thinking this was a really good anthology collection with only a couple of duds... I started to read this book a previous time, but changed to another book, and another book, etc. So, the first three stories. Well, poem and two stories did I reread.

First, we have O Terrible Bird by SANDRA KASTURI. A poem. I'm not a big fan of poems. So 2-stars because it's not badly written just not my cup of coffee.

Next story is The Obscure Bird by NICHOLAS ROYLE. Really creepy, just as creepy as the first time I read it. 4-stars

The last story I reread is The Mathematical Inevitability of Corvids by SEANAN MCGUIRE and I've forgotten how sad and brutal it was. 4-stars

Something About Birds by PAUL TREMBLAY. This story was pretty odd and I just felt that compared to the other stories I've read so far was it weaker. 3-stars

Great Blue Heron by JOYCE CAROL OATES. This story felt like an odd duck among the other stories. Good but I didn't see how it would fit in with the other stories. Until the end...wow 4-stars

The Season of the Raptors by RICHARD BOWES felt a bit rambling. Not bad, not among the best so far. Still interesting to read 3-stars

The Orphan Bird by ALISON LITTLEWOOD! I loved the twist in this story when you realize why this story belongs in this book... 4-stars

The Murmurations of Vienna Von Drome by JEFFREY FORD is not bad, I just think it lacks any good twists and has no wow factor. However, it's an interesting story and I can see it fleshed out into a movie or novel. 3-stars

Blyth's Secret by MIKE O’DRISCOLL. The first story that didn't capture my interest. When it's a horror anthology is it, of course, unavoidable that there is a lot of weirdos. However, I felt that the main character in this story just didn't work for me. Especially since a lot of people in this anthology are weird. Then, I want them to be at least memorable. 2-stars

The Fortune of Sparrows by USMAN T. MALIK. Frankly, this story didn't make much sense...or it was me that just didn't enjoy it so much. 2-stars

Pigeon from Hell by STEPHEN GRAHAM JONES, for some reason the ending made me think of Pet Sematary... Because sometimes dead is better... 3-stars

Secret of Flight by A.C. WISE...great to finally have a good story after some not as good ones...4-stars

Isobel Avens Returns to Stepney in the Spring by M. JOHN HARRISON. Sigh, and ladies and gentlemen, the first 1-star story. This story was flat out boring as hell.

A Little Bird Told Me by PAT CADIGAN. Meh. It feels like the best stories were at the beginning of the book. Or it's me that has started to get tired of bird stories

The Acid Test by LIVIA LLEWELLYN. Acid trip. 1-star

AND THE FINAL STORY IS: The Crow Palace by PRIYA SHARMA the very last story and the very best. Creepy and engrossing. LOVED IT. 5-stars

So, that's it. Not a bad collection and there are some authors here I'm going to check up what they have written.

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

I can well remember the terror as a youngster when watching Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, even now as an adult when you can see a lot of the ‘effects’ and superimpositions it’s still a chilling concept. So on that basis this is a good theme for a (mainly) horror anthology. I enjoyed some stories more than others obviously but that’s par for the short story collection course. It’s a nice change to have a collection of stories that I can dip in and out of instead of being tied to one long novel as I usually am.

I liked the stories, but didn't finish the entire book. There are just so many creepy stories you can read before it gets to be too much.

Black Feathers is a collection of fantastic stories, creepy, dark and unsettling tale that feature birds in some form of another.

I’ve often found birds to be unsettling and disquieting. The Birds, both Du Maurier’s story and the film make my flesh crawl.

I loved every story in this collection. My favourites were The Obscure Birds by Nicholas Royle, The Mathematical Inevitability of Corvids by Seanan McGuire, Great Blue Heron by Joyce Carol Oates and Pigeon from Hell by Stephen Graham Jones.

Among these stories The Mathematical Inevitability of Corvids by Seanan McGuire and Great Blue Heron by Joyce Carol Oates stand head and shoulders above the others.

This is hugely enjoyable collection of stories.

Again, Datlow hits it, and it FLIES right out of the park! Great anthology.

O Terrible Bird by Sandra Kasturi
A poem.

*** The Obscure Bird by Nicholas Royle (reprint)
Very much a horror-genre story, but it effectively creeped me out, so - thumbs up! A wife is progressively disturbed by her husband's increasingly odd behavior. It started with just late nights on the computer, but a strange obsession.. and perhaps something more... seems to be developing.

**** The Mathematical Inevitability of Corvids by Seanan McGuire
It's really, really hard to write from the perspective of a mentally ill person convincingly, and in the past, I've criticized many works for failing in the endeavor. McGuire, here, pulled it off very well, I thought. Her teenage narrator obsessively counts birds, and marks her days by them. With a cruel stepfather and a weak mother; the only person she truly loves is her younger brother. But one day, the birds point to tragedy; and on this occasion, by random chance or not, the omen is correct.

**** Something About Birds - Paul Tremblay
Well-crafted horror tale, with metafictional elements. An aspiring journalist and horror fan arranges an interview with a cult author mainly known for one creepy tale. He thinks the resulting publication will cement his reputation in the horror writing community. Of course, he accepts the author's invitation to have a followup meeting at a private dinner party. But then things start to get weird.

**** Great Blue Heron by Joyce Carol Oates
Oates is a literary author - but she has a delightful willingness not to pull back where other "mainstream" authors would fear to tread. Mostly, this is an insightful, heartwrenching exploration of grief, and the awfulness of having to deal with nasty humdrum realities after a loss. But there's a bit more going on here than just a widow having to manage importunate advances at a bad time...

*** The Season of the Raptors by Richard Bowes
Very autobiographical-feeling: any New Yorker will recognize several elements of this piece. Mixes (not so idyllic) memories of childhood with a present-day fascination with birds of prey.

**** The Orphan Bird by Alison Littlewood
Quite disturbing. The author plays with the reader's sympathies and perspective in unexpected and effective ways. A portrait of an isolated man who grew from a bullied child to a loner artist - an ornithological illustrator - grows into a horrific tale.

***** The Murmurations of Vienna Von Drome by Jeffrey Ford
Oh, this is just lovely.
I suppose that technically, this story is a paranormal police procedural: an investigator is on the hunt for a serial killer. Not usually my favorite genre. I also haven't particularly loved other works I've read by Ford. But this is just wonderful: the lush, dreamlike feel of this fantasy city, with corruption lurking in all its corners; the juxtaposition of carnal violence and sublime magic. Should be an award winner.

**** Blyth’s Secret by Mike O’Driscoll
This one feels almost like a response to Littlewood's "Orphan Bird." It starts with a very similar scenario (a mentally unstable loner obsessed with birds, disappearing children), and uses the same reader-uncertainty about the guilt or innocence of its characters. I found the way things play out here to be more believable - but perhaps a little less disturbing, because of that.

**** The Fortune of Sparrows by Usman T. Malik
Beautiful told, but enormously sad. The setting is a Pakistani girls' orphanage, where young women stay until they are married off - sooner, or later. You have to suspect the situation depicted here is more fact than fiction, and this makes the tragedy that lurks around the edges of the story yet more horrible.

**** Pigeon from Hell by Stephen Graham Jones
A couple of teenage girls trade babysitting jobs. When a moment of girlish inattention results in a child disappearing from his bath, bad goes to worse - and worst - really quickly. And one of the girls is literally haunted by a not-undeserved guilt.

**** The Secret of Flight by A.C. Wise
After the mysterious disappearance of a leading lady onstage, a theater director is haunted by a ghost - but not the one he'd prefer to be visited by.

**** Isobel Avens Returns to Stepney in the Spring by M. John Harrison (reprint)
Beautifully written. The specifics of this story are a bit science-fictional, but the parallels work for any situation where one is dealing with someone with an obsession with plastic surgery, or a dissatisfaction with their body that crosses the line into dysmorphia.
The story outline the torn and shredded remnants of a relationship. My one issue with it was that the shifts in time were not always immediately clear, and ending in the time frame the author chose made the piece feel a bit unfinished, to me.

*** A Little Bird Told Me by Pat Cadigan
Some people have figured out a way to cheat death. Those in charge of assuring that natural laws are followed don't look kindly upon this sort of thing. Violators can be condemned to eternal punishment - as a civil servant assigned to police the sort of violations they themselves might have committed. Although the story references Harry Potter a couple of times, it brought 'Beetlejuice' to mind, for me.

** The Acid Test by Livia Llewellyn
OK, yes, the protagonist is on acid, but that just seemed like an excuse for some unnecessarily purple prose. And I am usually a fan of melodramatic writing.
College chick discovers that the alluring 'grad student' she's had her eye on is more of a dangeous bad boy than she'd guessed - although she's having a hard time figuring out what's real and what's just part of her hallucinations.

***** The Crow Palace by Priya Sharma
After her father's death, a woman reluctantly returns to the family home where her disabled sister and her father's longtime companion wait for her. She has never wanted to be tied down to anything; but the secrets she unearths after these many years may be more binding than the ties of love and affection that she has coldly thrown off. Really good; my (possibly unintended) sympathies for the narrator made it that much more disturbing.

There is something about birds that is otherworldly and creepy. Black Feathers: Dark Avian Tales, is an anthology that picks up on our fascination with and subtle dread of birds. This is the second anthology edited by Ellen Datlow that I’ve had the pleasure to read, and it was thoroughly satisfying.

The sixteen stories in this anthology come from different writers with varied backgrounds and writing styles. Each of the stories then, stands out. While I always enjoy anthologies more than novels, Black Feathers was special because except for a couple of stories, I enjoyed them all. Even the ones that I didn’t like as much, had their merit -it is just a matter of personal taste that made them not for me.

The anthology begins with a very visceral poem, O Terrible Bird, by Sandra Kasturi, whih is dark and dangerous and just a little bit sad. It is a great opener! The Obscure Bird by Nicholas Royle, has a tinge of The Metamorphosis in its slow unraveling of a relationship under strain.Seanan McGuire’s The Mathematical Inevitability of Corvids is one of my favourites in this anthology. This hard to decsribe tale featuring a girl with an obsessive compulsive need to count corvids really shook me!

I thoroughly enjoyed Paul Tremblay’s A Head Full of Ghosts so I was really happy to see that a short story of his is part of this collection. In Something About Birds, he crafts a truly chilling narrative about a man interviewing his favourite author about his most famous story, who gets invited to a mysterious gathering hosted by that author. Great Blue Heron by the brilliant Joyce Carol Oates about a widow mourning for her husband, even as her dreams and more are taken over by a great blue heron, is a thoroughly satisfying read.

The Season of the Raptors by Richard Bowes is one of the stories that I didn’t really “get”. It seemed to end too abruptly, and I am not quite sure what actually happened. The Orphan Bird with it’s disturbing and unexpected twists is a great piece by Alison Littlewood. Another favourite of mine is The Murmurations of Vienna Von Drome, a mysetry about a cop investigating some serial-killings. It has some great edge of the seat moments and a satisfying ending. Blyth’s Secret another mystery about missing children, is chilling, creepy and a favourite.

Usman T. Malik’s The Fortune of Sparrows is a sorrowful tale filled with a dread that women from the Indian sub-continent can more than recognize. It is, for me, the most beautiful tale in this anthology. I really enjoyed the last story by Stephen Graham jones that I read (Lonegan’s Luck, part of the anthology Nightmares: A New Decade of Modern Horror) and was delighted with his Pigeon from Hell which is a deliciously dark, brilliant and twisted tale. The Secret of Flight by A.C.Wise is another favourite. Told through exrepts from scripts for a play, letters and newspaper clippings, it is a sad and memorable tale.

Isobel Avens Returns to Stepney in the Spring by M. John Harisson is a bizzare story about a woman who wants to fly. Unfortunately, I didn’t care much for it. A Little Bird Told Me by Pat Cadigan was interesting, with a witty MC, and while I enjoyed it, I felt it would have done better as a longer piece. The Acid Test is a has a very stream of consciousness vibe to it and reads like prose poetry, but unfortunately this made it difficult for me to focus and I didn’t enjoy it much. The closing story, The Crow Palace by Priya Sharma, is another favourite. It is brilliant and original!

Black Feathers succeeds in infusing the commonplace with creepiness. You’ll never look at birds the same way again.

FTC disclaimer: I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for this honest review.

This was fun! Seriously, what an interesting read and so well written. They all were!

I was engaged from start to end :)

I can't pick a favorite, they were all wonderful.

With stories by: Joyce Carol Oates, Seanan McGuire, Pat Cadigan, Richard Bowes, Paul Tremblay, A. C. Wise, Usman T. Malik, Jeffrey Ford, Sandra Kasturi, Mike O'Driscoll, Priya Sharma, Alison Littlewood, M. John Harrison, Nicholas Royle, Livia Llewellyn, and Stephen Graham Jones.

I would totally recommend.

Black Feathers edited by Ellen Datlow

I know two people who are terrified of birds. One can’t explain it, just, “birds freak me out.” Another says, “they’re dinosaurs just waiting to peck my eyes out.” Birds have a wealth of symbolism attached to them: piety, spirits, freedom, joy, sorrow, danger. They are a perfect theme for a horror anthology.
It's hard for me to resist buying a copy of any anthology edited by Ellen Datlow. With rare exceptions, her mastery of collecting tales that showcase some of the best authors in the field is highlighted by the way the stories fit together as a whole. Black Feathers is one book I've bought in hardcover because I don't want to wear out the paperback with re-reads.
Here are a few of my favorites.
The one that gave me chills for days was "The Orphan Bird" by Alison Littlewood. I've grown tired of serial killers, but Littlewood didn't reveal the subject until I was already hooked. I'm glad I kept reading. Yes, there's a killer, but the story is so much more than that. All the hints, all the breadcrumbs to the trail that kept me up at night were laid so perfectly that I didn't see it until the end. Bravo.
Joyce Carol Oates has always been a hit-or-miss author for me, but I loved "The Great Heron." A newly-widowed woman is mired in grief and depression. She tries to hold on to her old life, reliving walks by the lake with her husband as if he is with her, and dreams of flying with the great blue herons she fears. Her vile brother-in-law hounds her to sell the house, looking to cash in on her misery. Her friends urge her to move on. The birds become a powerful symbol of anger, grief, freedom, and self-determination.
I also enjoyed "The Murmurations of Vienna Von Drome" by Jeffrey Ford, mostly because I'm a sucker for horror stories that harken back to the past. There's something terribly wrong with the mad scientist's daughter, who hasn't spoken a word since her mother died. Now that her father is gone, she has no one but a devoted servant and a pet starling that follows her everywhere. This story also features mysterious deaths, a dogged constable obsessed with Vienna. However, the story didn't go where I expected and that made all the difference.
All of the tales create a dark and wondrous mood ranging from creepy to skin-crawling horror. Some stuck with me, some not so much, but fiction is subjective so others can find their favorites within.

I received a copy from the publisher via Netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.
I have not seen Alfred Hitchcock's movie, but do find other horror/ suspense movies with birds unnerving and unsettling. Short stories are a refreshing alternative to a full-blown novel, and each author has his/her personal style. The good thing about this book being a short story collection meant I was able to dip in and out of it. It was well-written and haunting.

The editor has given 14 original tales and 2 that are reprints. This is a book of dark fantasy and horror stories. It is more psychological and subtle in its horror. Awful things do happen in this book. It is not for the "faint of heart." Being a bird lover and parrot owner, when I saw this title edited by one of my favorite editors I had to read it. The stories focus on birds as part of the darkness of human nature. The stories sneak up on you as you read them, the reader will discover the "horror." Too often, we forget that there are dark sides to a bird as well as the light sides. Enjoy the book, I did!

I usually love to review anthologies story by story, but in this collection I unfortunately didn't have much to say about many of the stories. I loved Seanan McGuire's, Jeffrey Ford's, Usman T. Malik's, Pat Cadigan, Priya Sharma but that's about all - the rest were a little too similar in feel or tone that it made the anthology hard to read through and keep the stories separate in my mind, which then made it a little confusing. I love Datlow's editing work in general so I look forward to her next collection, and wish I could have written a longer review full of praise.

An absolutely stunning anthology that is filled to the brim with avian goodness. Black Feathers is powerful, dark, and enthralling. This book left me reeling for weeks afterwards! A must read for all speculative fiction fans.

Like any themed anthology, this is a mixed bag; but the quality is high. There are particularly unsettling stories from Paul Tremblay and Nicholas Royle, and these are worth the price of admission on their own.

As always with anthologies, there are some good stories, some mediocre, and some just plain bad. While I am glad I didn't encounter any glaringly awful story, the ones that were decent were not great. I did like the theme of this anthology: birds can be very creepy creatures in the hands of talented authors.