I spent two months trying to finish this. None of the characters grabbed me, the Drake stuff went terrible places I didn't want to think about...and II spent two months trying to finish this. None of the characters grabbed me, the Drake stuff went terrible places I didn't want to think about...and I finally went on Wiki and read what happens in the rest of this trilogy and I refuse to accept the big thing the third book apparently throws into the whole Gone series. In my mind, I am pretending this sequel trilogy didn't happen. Gone was perfect. The end....more
I picked this up for research purposes and was quickly unsettled by it. There were several interesting visualisation exercises, and then it devolved iI picked this up for research purposes and was quickly unsettled by it. There were several interesting visualisation exercises, and then it devolved into bloodletting and group BDSM rituals. Not for me, thanks!...more
The first 200 pages of this book were excellent. There was strong characterisation and rich writing. II can't do it. I made it to page 363 out of 963.
The first 200 pages of this book were excellent. There was strong characterisation and rich writing. I wondered where it would all lead, how it would spin out for three books of such size.
As soon as it was revealed what was happening, it was just I Am Legend, The Stand, Omega Man, 28 Days Later, etc., with nothing new added to the mix to refresh an old tale. Nearly every character I had been led to feel involved in died so quickly that I had to re-read lines to be sure of what had happened. Then suddenly the story jumped seemingly 1,000 years into the future (if I'm understanding the journal dates correctly) and I had to get to know a whole new batch of characters, as if the others had never been relevant.
That's when it hit me that this is not a single 900-page book. I read a very played out 300-page book and had moved onto an unnecessary sequel, disguised as a new section of the same novel, without there having been any true feeling of resolution or purpose to the first story. I'm aware I haven't finished it. Maybe things tie together more later...but judging from other reviews on here from people who made it to the end, I don't think they do - not in the way I wanted, anyway.
Obviously this is just my opinion. However, if I'm going to read a book this long, about a killer virus, I'll re-read The Stand....more
An Intimate History of a Very Precise Elitist Minority of People from 'Acceptable' Locations in the World...with No Regard for the Remaining 98% of HuAn Intimate History of a Very Precise Elitist Minority of People from 'Acceptable' Locations in the World...with No Regard for the Remaining 98% of Humanity.
I've had this on the shelf for over 10 years and finally took it down to read. The stories got off to a fun start, but after enjoying the first two, tI've had this on the shelf for over 10 years and finally took it down to read. The stories got off to a fun start, but after enjoying the first two, the others I read didn't seem to go anywhere.
Also frustrating to me was that for at least the first 120 pages of stories, every writer was from the UK (apart from one Canadian). Also, someone tell me where all the female writers are - not in here!
Some thoughts on the stories I read:
The Things He Said by Michael Marshall Smith - darkly hilarious, great final line, drew itself out really nicely.
The Church on the Island by Simon Kurt Unsworth - I predicted the ending as soon as the old man started showing her around, but I didn't guess the pit of darkness - I liked how Lovecraftian it was in description and concept.
The Twilight Express by Christopher Fowler - it's okay. I liked the ending line, summing up the point. It was a good metaphor. I just found the story terribly sad from start to finish.
Peep by Ramsey Campbell - didn't entirely understand it, yet it was deeply unsettling on a human level and very sad.
From Around Here by Tim Pratt - interesting idea, although a bit eh to read. Sad. I did wonder if Oswald was like Osiris (underworld god, cut into pieces)...but it wasn't particularly exciting in execution.
Pumpkin Night by Gary McMahon - awful, sick and unnecessary. This was the point I nearly put down the book. This was apparently one of the anthologist's favourite horror stories of the year, too.
The Other Village by Simon Strantzas - vague and pointless.
13 O'clock - Mike O'Driscoll - creepy but then went nowhere, made little sense, with so much left unexplained.
I believe there's a Joe Hill one in there, too, that I need to go back and read before I give this to charity....more
I'm giving up on Straub. I got lured in by the film adaptation of Ghost Story, and then by how much I love The Talisman, co-written by Stephen King. BI'm giving up on Straub. I got lured in by the film adaptation of Ghost Story, and then by how much I love The Talisman, co-written by Stephen King. But I confess I found the actual novel of Ghost Story slow and difficult, I passionately hated Black House (the sequel to The Talisman) largely for the elements that were clearly Straub - Mr X was meandering and convoluted and seemed to go on for an eternity...and now this.
Other critical reviews say the first third is strong and engrossing, and then it falls apart when the magic happens. However, I found the first third difficult to get through. I only stuck with it because of the promise of evil wizards. When the magic finally took over, the switch was so sudden that I felt like I'd changed books. I assume the two stories turn out to be related in the end, but it just felt jarring.
The structure is needlessly complicated, as I've now come to expect from him. It's not that I couldn't follow it - it's that you're never allowed to just settle into the story. I like to escape into my books. This book seemed to go out of its way to keep me at arm's length from page one. On a similar note, the narrator never tells us his name (at least not for the 230 pages I read) and doesn't seem to be remotely important to the story. Why not just write it in third person and focus on Tom? Why go to the trouble of writing it from the perspective of someone who has zero background, zero friends, zero family, zero personality...and who isn't present for 95% of the events? And supposedly he's reporting to us a tale told to him by Tom - so, how can he tell us what's going on in Skeleton's house, or in his / his father's thoughts? Maybe this is somehow explained by the end of the book and I've not yet read it.
Other reviewers say they admire the book for its inventiveness and imagination. That's fair enough, but I needed characters to latch onto. When you find yourself choosing to read your long-term care insurance study text over a novel, you know something has gone very wrong.
Farewell, Straub. We'll meet again when I re-read The Talisman - but I'm afraid that unread copy of Koko is going to the charity shop....more
I have two main criticisms of this book. The first is the use of the second person present tense for a third of the story. I don't I quit at page 138.
I have two main criticisms of this book. The first is the use of the second person present tense for a third of the story. I don't feel it works. I actually experimented with this myself, years ago. I quickly saw that it is incredibly repetitive. The pronouns don't vary much. If you pick a character (let's call her Sarah) and write about her in third person, you can say Sarah, you can say she, or describe her, or refer to 'her'. If she's talking to her husband, you can say he embraced his wife - no need to say Sarah. In the second person, you can only ever say you and your - over, and over, and over, and over, and over again. It is so tedious to read.
The other two thirds are written in third person past tense. I have read other reviews that seem to explain why this stylistic choice was made. However, by page 138 this explanation did not feel forthcoming to me.
I also felt there was a lack of characterisation. For at least 138 pages we never see where any of them come from, never learn anything meaningful about their families, their friends, their passions, their fears, etc. They're all just stuck in bad situations and on the go and we are meant to care about them. But you can't care about someone like that if you don't know them at all.
I've read reviews saying it gets very emotional beyond the point I stopped (from what I've read, it sounds extremely grim and not my kind of story at all). However, I didn't feel invested enough, a full third of the way through the book. I can see that many people love this book, but I just couldn't do it....more
Feminism and self-respect have been bled dry - pun intended.
I found this book really disappointing and had to quit around page...250, maybe? The titleFeminism and self-respect have been bled dry - pun intended.
I found this book really disappointing and had to quit around page...250, maybe? The title is so misleading. I expected witches and I got Twilight. By the time the romance kicked in, it was all wine tasting and descriptions of food and fancy mansions.
More to the point: the vampire...I can't remember his name now and it's only been a week since I put this down. I'm just going to call him Edward. So, Edward breaks into her house and watches her sleep (where have we seen that before?). And in one scene, he pins her arms to her sides and holds her still. She tries every self-defence move she knows and she can't break free. He breathes down her neck and basically tells her to obey her. This might have been the same scene in which he says he's a predator and she's prey and if she doesn't stop, he'll have no choice but to eat her. And we're meant to find this attractive.
I just can't read this. I tried, but I'm quitting at page 151.
I adore The Silent Land and TWOC. I really liked The Tooth Fairy. A few others I was lesI just can't read this. I tried, but I'm quitting at page 151.
I adore The Silent Land and TWOC. I really liked The Tooth Fairy. A few others I was less wowed by, but they were decent. This was 150 pages of people talking about 'f*cking' and desiring each other's 'c*nt', whilst skipping thinly from empty detestable character to empty detestable character, with the most stilted dialogue.
I stuck with it for the promise of something supernatural. Maybe it happens later, but I'm not interested. I lasted long enough to find out who the instructor was. I had predicted it about 100 pages earlier.
The only thing I liked about it was the way he occasionally included a half-page explanation of how weather works, in a way that intimated it was extended metaphor for emotional states. Excellent. But that comprised about four pages of what I read, and the rest bothered me too much to read on....more
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