As a longtime fan of Timothy Hickson through his youtube channel, I went and bought his first fiction book the moment I found out about it and it was pretty much exactly as I expected from an author I love so much who I also know is a first time writer. As with any collection of short stories, it is a mixed bag but the highs are very high and the lows aren't too low.
My favourite is easily 'The Funeralists; or Hate in Five Parts'. This was a fascinating story based on such an original concept that having had my eyes opened to, I desperately want to find more like it. I always love a story told in parts across vast expanses of time and this couldn't expand across more time. In such a short space of time, it expertly drew me in to feeling all the feelings our main character does through the massive up and downs of her journey watching humanity. This story stuck so hard in my head that I will never stop thinking about it. It just hits so different.
A story I have more complex feelings for was 'A Worm Beneath the Skin' [spoiler due to description of self-harm]

As someone who has suffered from mental health issues and self-harm myself, I was unfortunately rather disappointed my this one. Of course, everybody's experience is different so I wouldn't want to suggest that this is not an accurate depiction of these issues but it really didn't speak much to me despite being a fairly similar problem to my own. The metaphors were half lost on me and I just didn't buy into it all that much. I can only hope that others found more enjoyment from this one ad it doesn't do much that interesting other than to try and tackle this difficult topic.

If you want your heart broken in less than 20 tense pages, 'Two Robots at the End of the World' is the perfect start to this book for you. I really didn't expect to open on such a high to make me feel so much for just two lovable little robots so quickly.
For balance, I'll say that I didn't care much for the poetry in this book and while that may be partially a personal preference, I really tried hard to enjoy them anyway and it just didn't work for me at all. Maybe I need more skill at analysing poetry because I could barely even understand it, unfortunately.
As I write this review, I keep remembering more and more about this book that I actually really enjoyed. There is just so much to it, I couldn't possibly fit it all in a reasonably sized review. So many of the stories are amazing and weird and wild and varied and I find it inspiring to see such originality to many of them. I can't recommend this book enough.