Review: What Happened to Annabell? A Monday Night Anthology

Ten talented writers contribute a creative storm of stories in response to a single question in the macabre and compelling collection, What Happened to Annabell? With a fascinating hook for these tales – an original writing prompt that is both straightforward and inherently intriguing – it is easy to be pulled into this entertaining and expertly curated collection.

After seeing a headstone from more than a century ago, bearing a female name that lacked a death date, a curious writing prompt was composed, imagining the fate of such a woman. The variety of clever and dark takes on the concept from each writer/poet gives the collection an unpredictable and dynamic energy. From shadow selves and horrible beasts to casual culinary reincarnations and the bureaucracy of heaven, these writers tumble into afterlife premises and discussions of mortality with grace, creativity, and wit.

Some stories place Annabell in smaller roles, as mysteriously long-lived sages, such as Great-grandma Bell in “The Box,” while other writers put her in the forefront, the driving character behind a rebellious life’s memoir. The slyly penned piece of black humor that kicks off the collection is an excellent starting point, eliciting feelings of guilt, commiseration, Schadenfreude, and sinister glee. Like telling a gruesome ghost story to unsuspecting campers, there is a grim pleasure in the tale of a crotchety old hag who refuses to stay beneath the dirt.

The second yarn, an unlikely love story between Annabell and Hattie, is gripping in an entirely different way – emotional, vengeful, empowering, and righteous. The straightforward nature of “The Sewing Box,” addressing the mysterious headstone directly, is one of the stand-outs, with a strong thematic message for women who have endured abuse. Alternating between heavy to light, depressing to downright dreamy, the specificity of the prompt, paired with its boundless potential, makes for quite the creative outpouring.

Despite having so many different voices represented, with stories that range from the surreal and supernatural to the serious and somber, there is a consistent level of quality, concision, and originality that is hard to believe for a group of writers. The fact that these writers largely came from the same writing group is remarkable, and a testament to the skill of that particular pod of pens, especially Kristina Horner, Sunny Everson, Shay Lynam, and Amy Piedalu. Unexpectedly, the binding premise makes the whole experience smooth and consistently aligned, even though the collection is peppered with abstract and post-modern pieces to whimsically narrative slices of flash fiction.

Through a technical lens, some stories are more polished than others, though there was obviously a thorough proofreader for the entire collection. There are a few weaker pieces near the end, which seemed less neatly edited and a bit more rambling, but every story has certainly earned its place. Overall, this third Monday Night Anthology proves this unique series to be continually compelling, offering far more than an intellectual exercise, but an exhibition of confident writers navigating disparate genres into a complete narrative work.