Shades of Noir, Book Two, is a collection of short stories set in the universe of Archon Gaming's role-playing game Noir. This makes the stories in Shades of Noir "gaming fiction", or (as it is more commonly called) "bad fiction". However, this is not entirely accurate in the case of Shades of Noir, Book Two. Of the ten stories included in the anthology, two are actually pretty good: "A Man of Two Minds" by Tim Toner, and "A Bird for Becky" by Max Allan Collins (the fourth and fifth stories, respectively). These are not *great* stories, but when compared to the rest of Shades of Noir, Book 2, they veritably shine. I will not embarass the authors of the other short stories by naming them.

I will, however, question the wisdom of placing these stories in the center of the book. The conventional wisdom in editing a short story anthology is that the collection should start strong (to grab the reader's interest) and end strong (to leave a positive impression in the reader's mind). Lisa Manns chose instead to place the only two readable stories in the center of the book. If I had not been reading the book for a review, I would have stopped after reading first two stories. I also question the editor's ability *as* an editor: the book is rife with typographical errors and misspelled words, sometimes as many as three per page.

Role-playing games have a reputation for being poorly edited, and gaming fiction has an even more deserved reputation for being just plain bad. Shades of Noir, Book Two more than lives up to both reputations.

Style: 3 (Average)
Substance: 1 (I Wasted My Money)