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  • All the Children on the Porch: A Short Horror Story

  • By: Dona Fox
  • Narrated by: Sarah L. Colton
  • Length: 48 mins
  • 3.8 out of 5 stars (6 ratings)

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All the Children on the Porch: A Short Horror Story

By: Dona Fox
Narrated by: Sarah L. Colton
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Summary

Jenny was born on October 31st. She’s never gone trick-or-treating or celebrated her birthday beyond an initial taste of frosting that always puts her into a deep, drugged slumber - a sleep that protects her from family secrets and the horrible reality that dark holiday could reveal. What will happen when she finds her father’s journal and determines to stay awake on Halloween? Will she survive when the dreadful truth comes out?

©2018 Dona Fox (P)2018 Dona Fox
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What listeners say about All the Children on the Porch: A Short Horror Story

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    4 out of 5 stars
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Not sure about this one...

Jenny was born on Halloween, but although she has celebrated her birthday she has never celebrated the holiday itself. She is always treated to a wonderful cake, that her father allows her to eat all to herself, and drifts off to sleep before the festivities around her begin.

One day before her birthday Jenny creeps into her fathers room and sneaks a look at his journal, and suddenly a light is shone on a particularly dark moment of the town's history, one where her family - and especially her mother - takes centre stage.

All The Children On The Porch is one of a collection of tales available by the author, each presented as a separate short story rather than in a collection. This puts a great deal of pressure on individual quality, as there’s no chance of a story that doesn’t hit home being offset by one that does, which makes me wonder if releasing stories this way is a good idea.

I mention this because All The Children On The Porch did not hit home for me, in spite of it being a well written tale, and I cannot quite put my finger on why this was the case. Perhaps there were too many things I thought of as inconsistencies (that were perhaps nothing of the sort) or perhaps the ending wasn’t as fulfilling as I wanted it to be (and this is one of those stories where it’s more about the destination than the journey).

If you read this far in my little review then this title must be of interest to you, then my advice would be to give this story a go and see what you think. In many ways it is an undeniably well written story, the performance (by Sarah L. Colton) is extremely good, and the atmosphere is well drawn between her efforts and the authors. My dissatisfaction may be entirely unwarranted, and as there was no other story to listen to I cannot tell if the author just isn’t for me, or if this is just an anomaly in her writing (or if I’m just being too harsh).

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

My review

What a great little story. It’s nothing like I’ve ever seen before, if you like scary and psychological thrillers then this short story is for you.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Warning: Do not read with the lights off!

Dona pulls yet another terrifying story out of the bag... thoroughly enjoyed it and only struggle to give it 5 stars due to it being so short.
Very well narrated by Sarah, who portrays the characters superbly well and fits the story perfectly.
This is an honest opinion of a free review copy.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

A Twisted Horror

This tale is told by our young innocent narrator Jenny who we find out lives only with her Father.
Jenny was born on October 31st, Halloween but as she has got older she realises she has never got to go trick or treating like all the other children. In fact she always gets a birthday cake but all she can ever remember is tasting it and nothing else of the night and her Father shrugs off all questions. As she stumbles upon her Fathers diary she horrifyingly realises the truth and why she has been protected from been a child on the porch trick or treating around neighbours houses. Suddenly the notorious scary neighbours horrific scam is revealed and the reason her Mother was jailed disturbingly comes to light.
I really enjoyed this short story and would have loved it to have been a longer book. The story pulled me right in and the twist finished it perfectly. I will certainly be looking to listen to more of Dona's work.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Keeps you guessing

I enjoyed this short horror story. The plot is done in such a way as to keep you guessing right up until the end. The narrator did a fantastic job with the reading.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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🙁 this story hadSo much potential but sadly in the

Sadly want to implement commonsense into the storyline it makes no sense. A little boy goes trick-or-treating at the scariest house in the neighborhood where an old lady takes in borders and the rumor is she buries them in the backyard again after trick-or-treating in the house with drugged and dead people with bowls of candy in the lab they go and witnessed her burying someone and run home but never tell the parents. She even videotaped the excursion. Now that was 1970, let’s fast forward to 2001 when the little boy is grown and married with a five-year-old daughter his wife is a nurse who goes and works at the boarding house with the older lady who is now very old. She finally gets caught collecting checks for dead people and dead people in her backyard, but she blames it all on the man’s wife which makes no sense because what they dug up the bones in the backyard they would know Debbie the nurse would’ve been a child when these murders took place or at least not an employee of the old lady. This book made no sense in it makes even less sense when Debbie the nurse gets sentenced to life in prison and the old lady goes free. The story has so much potential it’s a shame it couldn’t fulfill that. The narrator was good the first half of the story was really good and the second half as long as you’re not equipped with lots of common sense you may like this book. I did not.

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