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Member Reviews

4 stars

Mr Ballen is always fun, entertaining, informative, and enjoyable for the whole family!
This is going to make a great addition to my library.

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MrBallen's latest graphic novel takes us around the world, focusing on an array of stories that are equally as interesting as they are terrifying. The art styling for this graphic novel suits the stories well, only showing so much to let your imagination take over and craft up the horrors that lay within. This is a quick read, but one that I had a great time sitting through.

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I mean what can I say about this that I didn't say about the first Mr. Ballen book. I mean this is perfect for anyone who loves true crime or paranormal stories. Mr. Ballen is an amazing story teller and everything he does is amazing! I love his books and podcast and his channel. Anyway this man tells stories is going to be great. Even of you have no idea who Mr. Ballen is or know about the Strange Dark and Mysterious you'll still love this.

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Most of the stories available to read via this ARC were chilling, and I felt Andrea Mutti's painterly style made an excellent pairing. The Bell, in particular, stuck with me in the best way. I also appreciated Allen providing "further reading" at the end so that I may dive deeper into some of these subjects. I look forward to reading the remainder of the stories when the book releases. I will be releasing a more comprehensive review when I am able to read the complete volume.

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I have been listening to Mr Ballen for years now and I look forward to every single video he puts out every week. The artwork in these graphic novels are amazing and definitely worse, collecting them if you're a fan of his. Now I will always prefer to listen to him because that is the whole reason why I became such a fan of his but the books are really good to. You get a little bit more of a visual of the storylining, which makes it great. And I will definitely be buying this to add this to my collection.

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MrBallen Presents: Where Nightmares Live feels like an odd fit for the comic format. While the name might resonate with horror novel enthusiasts, here the storytelling feels mismatched. I could be wrong though as I have never heard of this author.

The collection of shorts, touching on themes like a girl caught between worlds, werewolves, and haunted ships, lacks originality and scares. The reliance on narration over dialogue significantly diminishes the characters, lending a fairy tale-like quality rather than a true comic experience. The artwork is adequate, occasionally strong, but ultimately unremarkable.

This one didn't click for me, earning a 2 out of 5. Perhaps dedicated horror fans will find more to appreciate.

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I have been a longtime fan of Mr Ballen's storytelling, and I'm so happy I got the opportunity to read this before the pub date! I read it all in one sitting and refused to put it down for even a moment until I was finished reading it!.

Where Nightmares Live is a graphic novel based on real-life events. Each chapter is a tale from unsolved mysteries and chilling firsthand accounts that go beyond science and into the stuff of nightmares: unknown creatures, unexplained deaths, reincarnation... I love a good supernatural-mystery horror story, but what sets this collection of stories apart from fiction is its foundation: each story is real and happened to actual people.

Whether you're a longtime fan of Mr Ballen or new to his brand of "strange, dark, and mysterious," this book delivers. Where Nightmares Live doesn’t just tell scary stories, it reminds you that strange, unexplainable things can happen to just about anyone.

I also enjoyed the art style! The artist did an incredible job! The combination of the artist's illustrations and the story had me so immersed in the story that I didn't even notice time passing. Definitely an instant buy for me!

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I received an ARC through NetGalley for an honest review.

I don't know if I have become to desensitised through being on the internet and reading horror, but this really didn't do anything for me.

The stories are based on real life events, often from the reports of the people experiencing the strange and disturbing events, which allows for a whole lot of skepticism on my part. I think the fact that these are 'true' stories made it much more difficult to suspend my disbelief. This isn't helped by the comic book avatar of Mr Ballen appearing at the beginning of each story and the tone and deliry of the prose, which comes across more like the voice over for video footage than a graphic novel script.

The art is rather nice and expressive pen and ink style, but, as with the reporter tone of the script, it's quite clinical and boring in its presentation.

Ultimately, I feel like the leaning too hard into the 'it's a true story, believe me bro' of it all made it far less interesting and effective. The stories, at least as they were presented, were not enough to be effective for me.

Do I have answers to all these unexplained events? Absolutely not, but humans, animals, nature, and science do a lot of unthinkable and weird stuff.

If you can go into this with a Joe Rogan, 'whoa, that's crazy' attitude, you might enjoy this.

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I'm a fan of the MrBallen. I was super excited to get my hands on a copy of this graphic novel ahead of its release. MrBallne Presents: Where Nightmares Live didn't disappoint. I read it from cover to cover immediately.

The illustration were great. I absolutely love how they added a small picture of MrBallen on some of the pages. As I read the stories I could hear his voice in my head. I've watched and listened to everyone of his stories. I think MrBallen is a great storyteller. I am so happy my daughter introduced us to his YouTube and podcast.

Thank you NetGallery, Clarkson Potter/Ten Speed Press and MrBallen for the ARC.

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Do you know where nightmares live? In the real world. Mr. Ballen relays real-life accounts in this anthology horror graphic novel from around the world. Sometimes I forget how bizarre and scary just plain real life can be. We never really know what is out there until it stares us straight in the face. I cannot wait until the entire book is available so I can read more of these real-life tales of horror!

#ThxNetGalley #MrBallen #MrBallenPresentsWhereNightmaresLive

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As always, I loved every story in this collection! I read it in one sitting because I literally couldn’t put it down. My favorite story was the bell, so spooky!!!

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