Number 100 - West of Rome - John Fante

 

Book 100 for the year!!

Last time I managed that would have been when I was a kid and most of what I read was about half the length of this.

I needed something good for book 100 - but also short because I wanted to actually finish it this year. So a John Fante book was a natural choice.

This is two novellas - more of a novella and a short story really - My Dog Stupid (which clocks in at 138 pages) and The Orgy (which clocks in at 40).

My Dog Stupid - a cantakerous old git adopts a stray dog and loses his kids, in ways at least tangentially related to said adoption of the eponymous canine. 

This is an interesting one because I really don't believe any publishing house would touch this with a bargepole if it was written by a contemporary writer.  The narrator,. Henry Molise, is a homophobic and more than slightly racist character.  Although he's called out on it more than once, he's unrepentant and has no redemption arc.

However, there is a technical name for people who conflate the opinions of a character in a book with the real life opinions of the author.  That technical phrase is IDIOT.

If the only characters we're allowed to read about are perfect people with no foibles or flaws, then literature will suffer massively as a result. 

Despite his faults, Henry Molise is a funny character. The world is an ugly place through his eyes, a place filled with cynicism and devoid of nearly all hope. He knows he loves the dog far more than he believes he loves his children. The gradual shrinking of his family unit gives scope for a glimpse at the real feelings of the man behind the harshness.It's not necessarily a pleasant sight, but is always entertaining. 

Some would try to excuse this story as a product of the time it was written.  I say no excuse is needed when the writing is this sharp and incisive and it's so damned good.  You can't possibly agree with him on most things and that seems to me to be very much the whole point of the character.

The Orgy - this is a short story about a boy who finds out too much about his father's weekend activities.  The title is a clue and slight spoiler. I was wondering if the title was a metaphor for a lot of the story, and in some ways it certainly is.  

The narrator's father is a builder who is gifted a gold mine by an ex employee (It's a lot more believable the way it's written in the story). He starts going there every weekend with his friend and workmate. The workmate is hated by his wife because of his atheism.  The narrator agrees vehemently with his mother. One weekend, the boy is forced to go along with them.

The ending of this story is quietly devastating and genuinely moving. 

All in all this was a great way to finish off this year in books.

Number 99 - Johnny Got His Gun - Dalton Trumbo

 This is a classic of pre-WWII literature that I've managed to somehow not read until now, despite having had this copy on my shelves for a good couple of years.

I wasn't sure what to expect from it. I know of the film, but haven't seen any more of the film than we see in the video for THAT Metallica song. KNowing its reputation as a classic and once banned anti-war novel, I was worried it could be a little too polemical for my tastes.

I needn't have worried.

Having read the book, I really need to see the film, just out of morbid curiosity about how to transfer this to the screen. It's written in the very close third person and follows Joe Bonham as he falls in and out of consciousness after sustaining horrific injuries on the front line in the first world war.  

As the pages fly past, the extent of his injuries becomes clear.  There's nothing left of him other than the absolute necessity to keep him alive.  He has no limbs, he's deaf and his face is also missing. This obviously leaves him as alone and as close to death as possible without actually dying - and totally unable to communicate with the world.

It's as close as a third person narrative can come to true stream of consciousness writing. He drifts in and out of fever dreams and reminiscences.  He tries to make sense of the world/ward around him based on the only senses he had left.

I started the year with a novel about a boy trapped inside his head (Patience - Toby Litt) and I've almost ended it with one too.  It's difficult to say which of the two is better as they are so different in their approach. This one is certainly the most devastating. In Patience, the narrator can celebrate his personal victories.  Joe doesn't have that option. He does have small victories, but the ending is

Slight spoiler - This was surpringly seasonal at the end, I accidentally chose the perfect time of year to coincide with the events.  In fact, this book could be seen as a perfect metaphor for 2020. Obviously, not intentional on the part of Mr Trumbo. but it's there nonetheless.

I raced through this in a couple of days.  The prose is spot on, colloquial enough to accurately depict the character, hallucinegenic in places and truly emotional.  I let out more than a few tears while reading this one.

Available in all good bookshops, I highly recommend this one to anyone.

Number 98 - Santa's Twin - Dean Koontz

 

A very quick festive read. That's the positives out of the way.

Dean Koontz is not a poet. This is written in bloody awful rhyming verses that don't scan.  I'd be more forgiving of the book if it didn't make such self aggrandizing claims in the blurb on the inside of the dust jacket.

"At the request of his fans, bestselling novellist Dean Koontz has created a contemporary masterpiece that is destined to take its place alongside "The Night Before Christmas" and A Christmas Carol as a perenniel yuletide favourite"

Someone somewhere thought this was worthy to be mentioned in the same sentence as A Christmas Carol?

The storyline is pants, but it's a Christmas story about Santa primarily written for kids, so that's to be expected. However, even writing for kids, write your verse so it scans, make some effort to make it fun. This is too wordy for younger children and too childish for older. It falls firmly between two stools.

The illustrations are very good.  I had quite a lot of fun playing "Where's the snowman" after I finished the book.  There's a snowman hidden in every picture somewhere, even in the picture on the front cover - see if you can spot it.

I wish the story/poem was that much fun.

  

Numbers 96 & 97 - Walking dead volumes 27&28

 The most unexpected redemption arc of any character since Merle came good in season 3 and the single most emotional death in the comic series to date both feature in this pair of volumes.  Alongside a war with the whisperers and the biggest zombie horde yet. 

Action packed and emotional are the best words I can think of to describe these.  I was so glad I had vol 28 on hand when I finished vol 27 at lunchtime.  I con't imagine how I would have felt if I'd been collecting the original comics and I got to that point and knew I had a month before they would even start to resolve that cliffhanger.

I know it's winding rapidly towards the final volume and the standard has never slacked in the whole collection so far.  brilliant stuff.  I hope to finish it all this year.

Number 95 - Skitter - Ezekiel Boone

 Those people who pay attention to my ramblings may remember I reviewed a book with a very similar cover to this a few months ago. That book was The Hatching, and this is of course the promised sequel.

It's a great feat of marketing on the part of Mr Boone.  I would never have taken the chance at reading a 1000 page novel about killer spiders by an unknown author.  However, splitting that down into what I now find is a trilogy means that people like me picked up the first one on the off chance and found ourselves compelled to buy the second, and from the way this one finished, the third book will soon also make its way to my groaning bookshelves.

These are not great works of literature.  There's no bon mots or hidden deeper  meaning tp these books - although this one serves as unintentional metaphor for people's behavior in the pandemic. They are very smoothly written though.  It might not be stylish, but damn is it fun to read.

 It picks up about a week after the first one ended.  As it says on the cover, the first wave of spiders is dead.  They've left behind lots and lots of egg sacs.  Some of them traditional externally visible egg sacs attached to walls etc, but a lot more inside the bite and sting victims left alive from the first book. 

These spiders are the reason that mankind is scared of spiders to this day.  Their last appearance on the planet, before recorded human history, was enough to leave a psychic scar on evolution. They're back now and making a similar impact.

Once again the pace is frenetic, bouncing around from location to location, building up the tension in carefully calculated bursts. We don't have quite as much shreddie action in this book as there was in the first. He's building up information about the spiders and how they operate. We know all hell is about to break out and the majority of the book is building up to that... There are some new spiders in town and they have more horrific tricks up their webbing than just skeletonising their victims in under a minute.

There are a few genuinely horrible (in a good way) chapters where the true threat levels shine through. A scene in a hotel sub-basement is a particular highlight and genuinely made me shudder. Elsewhere it's gloriously trashy nonsense. Again, in a good way. All the characters are brilliant and good looking, mostly rich and powerful, and the dialogue can be hilariously over the top.  However this does match the ever escalating state of emergency so it's easily forgivable.  

The scene where the first female POTUS takes her chief of staff aside for a quick half hour roll on the sack for some stress relief possibly stretches things a tad too far but the rest of the book stays within acceptable limits.

Don't expect a satisfying ending to the story this volume.  In typical part two of the trilogy style, this finishes on a cliffhanger, when all the hell does break loose as we've been promised for the past 300 pages. Book three should be a humdinger.

For a book with more plot than action sequences it truly does read enormously quickly and easily. This is assisted by the very short chapters and jumping from one side of the world to the other.  

The characters are broadly drawn and just about on the right side of believable.There is still one set of characters who haven't really impacted on the central storyline.  The last time we saw them they'd worked something out and phoned someone in the security forces, but we still don't know the detail. Hopefully, we'll find out how they tie in in book three. Which I will definitely be buying.

I could see this being a very successful series of films or tv show if anyone optioned it.  Enormous cast, exotic locations, flesh eating spiders, it's got everything.

Number 94 - Another Avatar - SP Somtow

 

SP Somtow is always a reliable source for an enjoyable cheat read.  And an enjoyable full length novel as well - obviously - but this one is a cheat.  A really good fun short read, picked partly just to get the numbers up for the year.

This one is very squarely in the YA category of Somtow's output. That doesn't reduce the enjoyment, it just increases the speed of the read.

It follows the story of Kris (Krit), a young orphan boy living in a catholic orphanage on the edge of the the slums of Bangkok. One morning he wakes to find the God Ganesha stealing bananas from the orphanage kitchen.  After that, things get weird.

It turns out that Kris is not all he appears to be. The plot becomes very cosmic very quickly with all the gods of all major religions thrown into the mix. In a serious adult novel, maybe this would feel a bit silly, but given that this is a very short YA novella, it's perfectly fine, and Somtow's sheer energy of storytelling pulls you through with a minimum of questioning. 

Like Miriam, (see my October reviews) this is also part one of a longer work, although this one has a much better cut off point and feels like the end of part one rather than just stopping dead mid story. Also like Miriam, it offers a very different view on comparitive religions in a very easily digestible form. 

Between this and the Stone Buddha's Tears (see my September reviews), I feel I have a fairly accurate picture of the city of Bangkok. Despite the fantastical elements, these stories are rooted in a very well drawn world. These two books have given me far more insight into the culture of this city than The God Child gave me into Ghanaian culture, and they've entertained me far more.

This is available online from all the usual sources. Go out and buy it.  Somtow's renewed writing career deserves to be huge.

Number 93 - The Grieving Stones - Gary McMahon

 My second cheat read by Gary McMahon this year.

There's a melancholic feel that infests McMahon's prose, and this book is no exception. 

A therapy group take a weekend retreat to an old house deep in the Lake District, an English version of the Cabin in the Woods trope - but with Gary McMahon at the helm, you know you're not in for any cliched old nonsense.

The stones of the title are a set of standing stones near the house. There are rumours and legends that surround the stones, and the appropriately nicknamed Grief House. 

Our protagonist Alice, much like the central character in Shirley Jackson's classic Haunting of Hill House, feels a deep connection to the forces that surround the house. 

To say much more about the story would be a spoiler.  However I will say that the Backward Girl is one of the most genuinely creepy images I've read in a horror novel in several years. Also this book contains one of the best nightmare sequences I've read outside of an Adam Nevill book.

Alice is a believable and sympathic central character.  When I say believable, I mean that it's easy to believe she exists and that her actions are credible in the circumstances, rather than that we believe what she's telling us. We see the entire story through her eyes and we know she's not the most reliable narrator ever from about the halfway point.  There are hints that everything happening may well be just in her imagination, which makes the ending possibly more chilling than if the sisters and the Backward girl were really there - which they could be. There are hints in that direction too.

The supporting cast are well drawn with not a single weak characterisation. The atmosphere builds beautifully and there are a few well placed shocks and sneaky reveals. 

McMahon is one of the more stylish writers lurking beneath the surface of the modern British horror genre.  He deserves to be much more widely read. Get out there and buy his books.

I think I will schedule the Concrete Grove trilogy for a well overdue read for the new year.

Number 92 - London's Overthrow - China Mieville

 

I'm not sure what, if anything to say about this book.

China Mieville is a very good writer of a weird science fiction almost steampunk sensibility.  His first book - King Rat - was so well written, that while I was reading it, he managed to convince me there was merit in drum and bass (pone of my least favourite genres of music but damn the way he wrote about it made itr sound good) 

His New Crobuzon novels are amazingly good.Embassytown was a drag for the first half but then picked up the ball and ran with it for a brilliant second half. 

This is a different beast altogether.  It's a political polemic  -and I must say I'm very firmly on the side of his politics. He knows his stuff and expresses it a lot better than I could so I'm not sure I'm qualified to dissect this book.

He paints a grim and depressing look at London in 2011, one year into Con-dem rule.

This is a warning from history.  A lot of what he predicts in this long essay has come to pass.  It's a well argued and anger inducing read. My only real criticism of this would be the grainy quality of a lot of the photos.  I kind of get what they were aiming at, but quite a few of them just come across as bad photos rather than the intended effect.

I found it online for a price befitting the slimness of the volume.  

Numbers 90&91 - The walking dead volumes 25 & 26

 The saga continues.  I want to finish it all by the end of the year, so two at a time in between books now.

The whisperer storyline is one of the best since the series started. volume 24 ended with the biggest shock and emotional blow so far.  Volume 25 picked up from that with an emotional aftermath and massive trouble for Rick.  The story hasn't been predictable in the slightest and Volume 26 finished with an event I would never have guessed at in a thousand years.

Vol 25 also had a special free issue 1 of one of Kirkman's other comics - Outcast - which seems like a pretty good take on the demonic possession story.  As marketing schemes go, I can't say it's ineffective as I will be seeking that out in the near future.

Only 6 volumes to go... Who is Eugene talking to on the radio?  When the tv spin off ran a similar storyline, it didn't go to any good places.

I'm aware that I now have some massive spoilers for the tv series, but I don't mind.  they've done a good job of keeping the two formats distinct yet similar enough I'm sure there'll be surprises for me on the way.

Number 89 - The God Child - Nana Oforiata Ayim

 

This month's book group book. When I read the plot description I did say to myself "I hope that's better than it sounds".

Unfortunately, when I finished the book, I found myself saying "Is that it?" at the close of the final chapter.

Ms Ayim is many things, she has a list of jobs a mile long in the about the author section.  However, a competent writer is not anything that should be added to the list anytime soon.

 This book is dull and plodding.  There are flashes of good writing at random intervals but, for the most part, this is dull. Dull and meandering, filled with unsympathetic characters, and almost wholly lacking in memorable incident.

Maya is a young Ghanaian girl living in Germany. Apparently her family is minor royalty currently deposed in their home nation. Her mother thinks they should still be treated as full royalty and spends her entire section of the book pulling the old "Don't you know who I am" over all and sundry, whilst maxxing out her husband's credit card. Her cousin Kojo comes to live with them as a brother.  I have no idea how old he was supposed to be when he was introduced, but he certainly isn't a convincing portrayal of a child character of any age. 

Daddy gets fed up of Mummy's profligate spending, divorces her (I assume - it wasn't entirely clear, but they were definitely separated) and the two children end up in separate boarding schools in England. Then Maya is back in Germany for a chapter where nothing much happens.  Then she's back in England at university and she decides to go back to the homeland where her mother is living it up again on an undisclosed source of income and Kojo is now a minor politician who drinks too much and drives too fast. Apparently they have some type of impact on the world around them.

It might be just the fact that I have no sympathy at all for riches to rags charaters who continue to behave as if they're rich.  We're expected to sympathise if they can't pay their creditors.  I feel more sorry for the creditor who was ripped off for their goods/services by a character who knew they didn't have the wherewithal to pay for it. I couldn't bring myself to give a damn about anyone in this story.

I should have known what was coming early on when there was an entire chapter devoted to Maya having her hair done. That was about as exciting as this story got.  The sole exception is one chapter late on, set at an art show, that actually managed to get a point across about western views on African culture. Other than that, there was nothing of note in the entire book.

Spoiler

When the narrator loses two close relatives over two chapters, I would normally expect to be shocked and upset for him/her. When that happened here I just thought oh. This book had perecisely zero emotional impact. 

Ms Ayim manages to portray the viewpoint of a young child who doesn't really know what's going on a bit too successfully.  Sadly, this continues into Maya's adulthood and the reader is asked to do a lot of work to pull out what's actually going on. For that to work, unfortunately, the reader needs to care.

The prose manages a certain rhythm for most of the book.  That works against it because theres so little variation in tone.  The narration doen't feel any more mature when Maya is grown up compared to the early chapters when she's still a young child. There are some glaring examples of bad writing in there as well.

A sentence that reads "I took off my pyjamas, showered, got on the number 7 bus to Russell Square..." cannot be excused.  She got on the bus straight from the shower? Where was she keeping her change purse? 

This sort of thing runs through the whole book.  There are big leaps in the narrative from paragraph to paragraph, or even mid-sentence like that example. Although this does mean the book is mercifully shorter, it doesn't add to the readability. 

This could have been a fascinating insight into another culture, but the writing completely lets it down.

If you still want to read it, it's available online or in most bookstores.

Number 88 - Project Clio - Stephen Baxter

 A quick cheat read from my growing selection of novellas from PS Publishing. I only know Stephen Baxter's name from his collaberations with Terry Pratchett (which I shamefully haven't read, or indeed bought, yet). Still if Pratchett was willing to team up with him for three books, he must have something going for him.

And on the strength of this he probably does.  This is a fun little romp through a very fictionalised late 60's where the John Steed and Emma Peel Avengers series was based on a real agency who were using it to hide in plain sight. 

A mysterious company, known as the company, is producing advanced technology and, through a magazone known as Magazine, is making the nation's children produce strange toys from kits known as kits whilst they listen to endless guitar solos broadcast from the Company's own pirate radio station known as... the station.

There's a lot of ground covered in this book in a very short number of pages.  We have assassins attempting to kill ex-soldiers to stop them killing an ex-nazi scientist who  holds vital information about the company. We have a pair of agents trying to take down the evil version of Radio Caroline.  We have a good cop trying to reconnect with her stepson who is under The Company's control. Oh, and a potential alien invasion from within, setting the groundwork for invaders from beyond the Solar system to swoop in and destroy humanity.

The characters are as developed as you can get in such a short book.  The prose is witty and to the point. It's not laugh out loud funny but I did have either a broad smile or an ironic grin on my face for most of the time I was reading this.

 It's still available from PS Publishing. If short and witty take-downs of 60's tv sci fi are your thing, go ahead and buy it.  You won't regret it.

Number 87 - Wrestliana - Toby Litt

 

Toby Litt is a bit of a literary chameleon. He never seems to write in the same genre twice. he also seems to be equally adept whether he's writing a science fiction epic Journey into Space, or chick-lit, or hard boiled crime. You're never quite sure what you're going to get from a Litt novel. His most recent two (Notes from a Young gentleman and Patience - both reviewed on this blog) were particularly experimental.

This one is very straightforward in prose style as it's a biography of his great great great Grandad - William Litt, a celebrated wrestler in Cumbria in the early 1800's and a slightly less celebrated writer and poet.

This being non-fiction, it doesn't fit into the A-Z he's been building with his other books.

In addition to telling us about his great etc grandfather, he tells us a lot about himself, his own family, and his process of learning about his ancestor - the effect this had on him as a person.

He explores the meaning of masculinity then and now, the importance of being a man and the meaning of fatherhood.

He starts by telling us about his own father, and how it was his father's wish for him to write this book.  One of my favorite lines in the book appears here when he describes his father as having reached the age where "standing up from a chair is a paragraph, not a sentence". That's quietly heartbreakng as well as incredibly evocative of the fragility of age.

William Litt won over 200 belts in Cumberland & Westmoreland wrestling and wrote one of the first sports manuals - a treatise on the sport of wrestling.  He was very likely a smuggler in his younger days, but after his success in the wrestling ring, he eventually fell foul of a local lord and emigrated to Canada where he died aged 62.

In the course of his research, Toby Litt faces up to his own insecurities. How does he compare as a man to his ancestor, even to his own father?  How do his talents as a father compare? And what does fatherhood mean?

Non-fiction is not normally my genre to read in - book 87 this year and this is the first pure non-fiction so far. But this was fascinating throughout, disarmingly honest and genuinely moving in places.  All the moreso for being true.

The Lowther family get mentioned frequently as playing pivotal roles in William's life.  This is particularly interesting to me because my own Great Grandfather was a lowther, quite possibly from Cumbria... I will admit that's not something to keep many people outside of my immediate family engrossed in the book, but it certainly helped me.

I thoroughly enjoyed this. Toby's ancestor is a genuine character, and Toby himself comes across as a genuinely nice guy, somewhat in envy of old William's earlier exploits. It's clear that this book was a labour of love and that comes shining through the page.  What could have been the equivalent of someone gettng the photo album out is turned into an engrossing history of a remarkable man. Through the power of prose, Toby has wrestled his ancestor onto the page, and quite definitvely won this round.

This is available through Galley Beggar Press

Number 86 - The Little Gift - Stephen Volk

 

Stephen Volk is another writer primarily known for television.  He's probably best known for the BBC fake reality show Ghostwatch that caused a bit of a stir when it first came out. He also wrote the film Gothic, the tv series Midwinter of the Spririt and Afterlife (starring Andrew Lincoln of Walking Dead fame)

So he has a very classy screenwriting career.   despite having a few of his books I'd never quite got round to reading them.  I needed a cheat read while I wait for the next few volumes of the Walking Dead  so this seemed like as good a time as any. 

I'm glad to say his prose writing is as classy as his screen work. This is one of the most thought provoking things I've read this year. I'm not even sure what genre it belongs in - and that's a good thing.

The story begins with our narrator's wife finding the little gift the cat has brought in for the family. The narrator is asked to put the bird out of it's misery and dispose of it. The very beginning is told in present tense. As he's walking to the bins to dispose of the latest gift, his mind drifts back to a day that started when the cat brought them a dead vole, and the events that followed.

The story now switches to past tense and we hear the tale of his past infidelity and what came after. To say more would be very spoilerific. 

The relationships in this book are beautifully drawn - easily the equal to any whirlwhind romance I've read in a Rupert Thomson or a Jonathan Carroll novel - and coming from me that is high praise indeed. Despite not liking the narrator for his actions, you know where he's coming from and can understand him. I was genuinely moved and shocked by some of the events that transpired.  

The metaphors inherent to the story never overpower the storytelling and the ending is well nigh perfect. I finished this late last night and it's been on my mind all day. This is a dark meditation on love and the turns life can take.

Even by PS Publishing's normal high standards, this is a well put together book.  The cover art and internal illustrations are excellent. They perfectly match the darkness at the centre of the story.

I have a few more of Mr Volk's works on my shelves.  They have all been moved much higher up the TBR pile.

There are still copies of this available through the PS website.  https://www.pspublishing.co.uk/ 

Buy it there while you can.  Jeff Bezos doesn't need any more of your money.

Number 85 - Luther The Calling - Neil Cross

 

Neil Cross is known primarily these days for his tv writing.  He wrote two episodes of Doctor Who for Peter Capaldi's doctor (and very good they were too), he was a lead writer on the spy show Spooks, he wrote a recent serial called Hard Sun and of course, he wrote the whole of the show Luther.

He's also an excellent novelist. His book Holloway Falls was one of my highlights last year. This of course, is a novel based on his show Luther.  I'm not sure the star of the show is the most unbiased source they could find for a cover quote, but that's what the marketers went for.

It serves as a prequel to the tv show, with an early case in his career that paved the way for the unpredictable character the viewers know and love.

A young couple have been murdered in their home, both of them cut open and mutilated. The woman was 9 months pregnant. The baby is missing. Luther is assigned the case to find the murderer and to try to recover the baby if it's still alive. Are there links between this and some cold case kidnappings from many years previously? He also has to help an old man being victimised by local heavies and try to save his precarious marriage.

This is fast moving, brilliantly paced, violent and shocking throughout. Subtlety is not a strong point in this book.  It's  written in a no-nonsense, very immediate and tension inducing present tense.

The opening line, "John Luther, a big man with a big walk, crosses the hospital car park, glistening with the rain." sets the tone perfectly for what's to come. Tough guys doing what they do best.  Having said that, he does have his sensitive side and we keep full sympathy with  him throughout.  His build up of rage is understandable. When Luther bends the rules it's because someone deserves it.

This man is not a good policeman.  He can solve a crime.  He's great at that part of the job, but he's distinctly lacking in the following the right channels part of the job.  As such he's the classic renegade cop.  Pretty much all that's missing in this is the "you've got 24 hours or you're off the case" speech from his boss. Without leaving spoilers I hope, there's actually a neat reversal of that oh so familiar trope in the middle of this book.

There are twists and turns galore. It's not entirely unpredictable - I did see one of the biggest reveals in the story about 150 pages before it happpened - but it's never boring, it's never tedious and it keeps you turning the page. Also, I do have a talent for spotting plot twists before they happen.

 The villain is spectacularly evil. One of the main weaknesses of the book is the partial explanation given for this... I'd say more, but spoilers. This book also breaks the rule of making the villain the hero of his own story.  The most interesting villains don't think they're bad people. They think they're good people forced into doing bad things.  The bad guy here knows he's in the wrong and doing it for entirely selfish reasons.  As such, he's definitely scary, but not particularly credible.

Having made that criticism, it must be said that the tension in the closing chapters is almost unbearable. Knowing he doesn't care about anything other than himself does raise the stakes immensely.

I've raced through this one in a couple of days.  It might not be the strongest of Neil Cross's books, but it's still damned good and well worth getting hold of, especially if you're a fan of the tv show.

7.5/10

Content warning - there is some cruelty to animals and children. this is not for the faint hearted.

Numbers 84 & 82 - The walking Dead Vol 24 Life and Death, Dogs think Every day is Christmas - Ray Bradbury

 

This seemed quite slow compared to the pacing of other volumes.  However it packs the biggest emotional impacts so far.  having said that, this is laying down an awful lot of plot threads.  The new societies are not running entirely as smoothely as Rick would like. Maggie has been provoked into an action Rick will certainly not approve of.  Dwight isn't taking to leadership and there's potential trouble brewing with the saviours again.

The whisperers are a fine bunch of new villains and their leader, Alpha. is a creepy creation. Negan was violent, but you could almost see why he was doing what he was doing. You could guess his next course of action.  Out would come Lucille and someone would be hurt.  

Alpha is just... woah... unpredictable would be mild.

One of the final pages of this volume made me shout "No!" loud enough to scare the cat. This is possibly the biggest shock ending of any volume so far. The ending is drawng closer and it's been a wild ride, which looks set to get wilder.

This is a whimsical little poem by Bradbury, charmingly illustrated.  A nioe little compaanion piece to Cat for Comforter which is similar to this, but an illustrated poem about cats.

Both are necessary for Bradbury completists, or for people who like charming little poems with sweet illustrations.  Not much else to say about it.

Number 83 - Mordew by Alex Pheby

 

You have to hand it to the fellows at Galley Beggar Press, these black paperback editions are rather handsome and distinctive.  The postcard in the picture shows the artwork on the hardback edition they sell and is a thing of beauty in itself.

GBP are a small press who release only 4 books a year normally.  Unlike a lot of small presses, they don't charge through the nose for the books, even the signed  limited editions (which the black paperback copies all are).

Any company only printing 4 books a year, you have to assume is applying strict quality control on the writing contained therein.  So far, I can only agree with the editor's fgood taste in the few of their books I've received so far.

Alex Pheby is a new name to me, but has been published through GBP before.  This is the first book of a new trilogy, set appropriately enough in the city of Mordew.

As you might guess from the picture on the postcard, it's a fantasy novel. Mordew is an unusual place.  The mud in the slums is living mud which births strange creatures at random, known as flukes. This is because of the corpse of God which is buried deep beneath the surface after it was murdered many many years ago.

Our hero is Nathan Treeves, a womb-born boy who has a spark inside him. This is a source of incredible power. The first we learn of this is when he can create his own flukes in the living mud rather than randomly fishing for them like all the other peasant children.  Unknown to him, forces are gathering that want to use his power and he soon finds himself an unwilling pawn in battles he struggles to understand.  He encounters new friendships, betrayal and double-crosses.

A lot of the individual ingredients in this are admittedly cliches of the genre - young boy with magical powers - check.  Family secrets - check. Magical spellbooks - check. Evil overlord - check. Or is the overlord evil or just misunderstood? - check.

However, the execution of the storytelling is really very good indeed. The prose is never less than a pleasure to read.  Before this book I never thought that a narration could feel so whimsical, almost twee in places, but have such a dark heart at the centre of it all. Nathan is a magical Oliver Twist, passed from pillar to post, conned and cheated and betrayed by the people he should trust.  Despite the familiarity of the concepts and the plot details in the story, I was constantly wrong-footed - and the ending of the novel itself left me begginig for more, which is always a very good sign.

 I'm not sure that the glossary at the end of the book is strictly necessary - the length of it cries a little of pretentiousness, but there are some really nice hints about future developments which make me want to get the next book in the trilogy even sooner.   

This is one of the more memorable books I've read this year and scores an easy 8/10.

I should have another GBP book on the way very soon and I can't wait.  They have a buddy scheme, where for less than the price of  a p[late of fish and chips a month, they send you every one of their books as they're released.  And that's a really good deal.  You can find them here.

 https://www.galleybeggar.co.uk/ 

Alternatively, you can just buy the individual books as they come out.

Number 81 - Wyrd and Other Derelictions - Adam Nevill

 

The last book of my October horror marathon, and what better way to finish than the new collection by Adam Nevill?

I count three of Adam's novels in my top 5 scariest things ever written.  His short story Mother's Milk in his first collection - Some will not Sleep - guaranteed for me that the title of the collection was true.  It was a particularly vivid fever dream transplanted to the page.

This collection is an odd beast. Derelictions is a term that Adam uses for aftermaths. In this collection there are no characters, no living protagonists, no people, just the bodies left behind after a series of happenings.

The only other time I've seen anything like this is Ray Bradbury's story There Will Come Soft Rains from the  Martian Chronicles. That is my favourite Ray Bradbury story, and IMHO one of the best short stories ever written.

These aren't quite as successful as that (sorry Adam) but on the plus side - not as good as maybe the best short story I've ever read is in no way an insult. These are still more successful and more scary than a couple of the full length works I've read this (last) month.

These are mood pieces, and very creepy mood pieces at that. The reader is left to work out what caused the death and destruction we see dispassionately described in these tales. 

In each story we're taken on a journey over a detailed landscape (or shipscape) where violence has occured. In some cases it's still happening in the peripheral distance. That rather lovely creature on the front cover makes an appearance in one of the stories too.  

I think Low Tide was my favourite of the stories, but it's a close run thing as there are no real stand outs - for the best possible reason. The imagery throughout is nightmarish. the prose cold and precise as it describes the devastation left behind. The stories become larger in scale as you move through the book.  

We start with the description of an empty ship in Hippocampus. Next we see the result of a mass suicide/ritual slaughter for reasons unknown in Wyrd.  Turning the Tide features a seaside campsite where something has come from the sea and taken the unfortunate campers nearby. Enlivened takes us through a large manor house where something still lurks. Monument tells why it's a mistake to disturb the ancient monument you don't know is buried at the end of your garden - you and all your naeighbours are going to regret it. Low Tide features an uprising of assorted sea creatures, starting at a caravan park and moving on the nearby town.  In the final story - Hold the World in My Arms for Three Day and All Will Be Changed - it feels as though this is only a fraction of a planetwide phenomenon. 

All these are told in forensic detail. Occasionally we're given glimpses of the things that are committing these acts. In at least one story the acts are still in progress even though it's too late for the humans involved. The sense of dread never leaves the pages for a moment.

This is definitely a successful experiment for Mr Nevill and, while there isn't as much variation as in his other collections, it's still generates a fair few shudders on the way.

It's available through www.Adamnevill.com as a limited edition hardback, or through amazon in paperback and ebook format.

Number 80 - The Walking Dead vol 23 - Whispers into Screams

The saga continues

These really are excellent cheat reads. 

After 23 volumes I'm running out of things to say about them. 

This is slow paced compared to some issues, but this is setting up what would appear to be major plotlines.  I couldn't help but notice while I was looking for the next volumes online that one three or four down the line is called The Whisperer War, which suggests this group is here for the foreseeable.

There were sections of this that filled me with a righteous anger with the behaviour of some of the characters - always a good sign that you're still emotionally attached to these people.

Carl seems to have turned into a bit of an idiot as he's grown up, but the petty jealousy towards him from people who should know better (Gregory - I'm looking at you) is frustrating for the right reasons. 

I'm only 9 volumes off the end now... and I don't know where the story goes from here, but it's been a great journey so far, and I can't see the writers letting us down in the final section of the story

Number 79 - The Crone - Bill Garnett

 

Yet another 80s horror with a tacky cover. I have no idea where or when this crawled onto my shelves.

I've never heard of Bill Garnett and Google doesn't give many clues... although this edition is currently on Amazon for a bargain £95. 

In my review of the Jack Ketchum I finished recently, I talked about how you need to give the reader characters that they care about before you start killing them off. This book breaks that rule completely. 

The central character, Peter Stone, is an entirely selfish and self-obsessed man. He lucked into a rich marriage when he got a tycoon's daughter pregnant and managed to start his own business with her family's money. He sleeps around and has no interest in his wife further than not losing his grasp on her cash.

The most sympathetic character in the book is actually the crone of the title. Magda lives in a dank attic room in a boarding house, in desperate hope that her daughter, Peter's new secretary, will call. Her daughter is too busy having an affair with her new manager. For the first hundred pages we hear a lot about Magda's background on the violent streets of post WWII Europe, including the less than romantic night that led to her fleeing to England with a new life inside her.

When the affair ends and the daughter takes drastic action that backfires badly, Magda draws on her knowledge of the occult to set in motion a ghastly revenge.

Despite breaking the rules about making us care for the characters, this is actually a damned good book.  It's no masterpiece, certainly, but I was hooked. Bill Garnett, if that is his real name, knows how to pull the reader into the story. Chapters are told from the viewpoints of random people who intersect with Peter's and Magda's lives. These characters never reappear, but their contributions give nice alternate viewpoints on the events.

The final two chapters were a touch underwhelming, as what looked like a possibly redemptive arc for Stone turned out not to be, but it was satisfyingly nasty. The monster that Magda creates is genuinely creepy and you wonder if it's possible to stop it, ot if you really want it to stop.

This looks like it should be a guilty pleasure but I refuse to feel guilty about this one.  It's well written with interesting if not likeable central characters, and a vicious streak a mile wide.

Number 78 - The Walking Dead Volume 22 - A New Beginning

 

The war with Negan is over, the war with the dead never ends...

A new beginning is a very apt name for this volume. We are four years ahead of where we last left our heroes.  A civilisation of sorts is rising from the ashes.  Eugene is building windmills, they have fresh bread for the first time in years. Rick has to contend with the idea of Carl leaving Alexandria to live in Hilltop.

A new threat is on the horizon though. A new band of survivors have found their way to the relative safety of these settlements.  Are they to be trusted?  

Further afield, who or what are the whispering dead? This is a new development that has me more intrigued than anything the comics have thrown at me so far.  

I love the fact that everyone is going round on horses now.  Clearly petrol has run out, eliminating what has to be the biggest plot hole in the tv show (at least as far as I've reached).

Rick seems to have let leadership go to his head. He's not as mobile as he once was, since the events at the end of the all out war.  The people worship him almost as a new god. While he claims to not like the attention, his response to a guard who made a mistake was extreme and very un-Rick-like.  

All in all, an excellent volume with nice new characters and a really gripping new storyline.

Number 77 - The Girl Next Door - Jack Ketchum

 

This book has a reputation. Having read it now, that reputation is well deserved.

This is one of the most brutal and disturbing books I've read.  This is a literary equivalent to Funny Games  (the Haneke movie, if you haven't seen it, you need to) in that he makes you the reader complicit in the cruelty you're reading about.

What makes it all the worse is that it's so well written you can't put it down, can't look away from the car crash brutality playing out on the page. 

It takes its time setting things up. It's chapter 25 before the really nasty stuff kicks in.  The previous 24 chapters set up the characters intimately.  We know these people, the first person narrator, David, talking as his 30 something self, describing his meeting and burgeoning friendship with Meg, the eoponymous girl next door, and Meg herself. These are hugely likeable characters even if David is ocasionally as selfish and spiteful as pre-teen boys are wont to be. He's done some bad things with the gang he hangs around with, but he's basically a good kid.

If you have a likeable character, the worst thing you can do to them in a narrative is do them incredible harm, right?

Nope. You can also make your nice pleasant lead chracter an accomplice to the evil at work. With the personable and likeable first person narration, we're watching everything and not doing anything about it either.  This is where Ketchum is Funny-Gamesing us. One of the main points of tension in this book is wondering when or if young David is going to crack. We understand his passivity but we're screaming at him to do something for gods sake before it's too late.

The story is very similar in a lot of ways to Mendal Johnson's equally notorious  Let's go Play at the Adams. I wonder if they were based on the same real life crime. A group of children on the cusp of their teens torture a local girl for their own pleasure.  In this case, also for the pleasure of the girl's guardian, her aunt Ruth with whom she's been sent to live afetr her parents died in a car crash.

This is vastly superior to Mendal Johnson's book though.  It's a long time since I read that book but I remember that it felt gratuitous for the most part. Nothing in this book does.  Ketchum uses the first person narrative to avoid giving every last detail of what's happening.  Things happen to Meg while he's not there that we learn of second hand.  He tells enough that we know what's happened, but without gloating over the detail. There's even one chapter where the narrator refuses entirely to describe what he's seen - for which I was eternally grateful.

The prose is direct and concise.  Chapter 24 is only one sentence long, but that one sentence is possibly the most chilling in the book, because it foreshadows all the bad things to come - in only 7 words.

I feel more sorry for Meg than I do for any fictional character I've read about. She's introduced so well and her personality so well drawn that when things turn nasty, we feel it.  And that's what horror is supposed to do. 

I hate when a writer gives a cast of characters that we'd be happy to see killed off and then just kills them one by one, it can be fun, but it's never scary.  For horror to work, you build a sympathetic cast and it's the people you like that you do the bad things to.  It's far more effective.

That's exactly what Ketchum has done here. This is the reason why this book has the reputation it has.   Not only did he exact horrendous damage on the nicest character in the book, he implicates us the readers in the torture by telling it first person through the eyes of a character that we can't help but like.

A strong stomach is a definite before reading this. But if you have the intestinal fortitude, this is a classic horror novel.  I'm glad I read it, and I will probably read it again at some point, but not for a long time.

This edition also contained two random short stories by Ketchum, which were good, but I was too shellshocked by the novel to really appreciate them.  It also contains an interview with Ketchum and the makers of the film version of the book ... I didn't know there was a film and I have no idea how you could possibly film it. I really don't know if I want to see it.

This book is available from all good booksellers.

Number 76 - Dr Who: Forever Autumn - Mark Morris

 

Continuing with the Halloween theme for October's horror reads marathon...

This one slightly slips on the straight horror front, but is definitely themed on Halloween, and Mark Morris has been writing horror novels for over 20 years so he has a good pedigree and therefore fits regardless.

They're my rules and I make them up as I go along and don't care what anyone else thinks.

This is of course a Doctor Who novel, therefore aimed at younger readers - so we shouldn't expect Booker prize material here. this should be fast paced, entertaining, and easily readable.

It scores on all those points and adds in a fairly creepy vibe with some scenes that would be genuinely scary on tv.

I wish this had been made as a two part episode back when 10 was travelling with Martha. It would have been a high point of the entire series. But the book is all that exists for this story so it will have to suffice.

The Doctor and Martha land in modern day (2008 ish) America in a small town called Blackwood. Ostensibly this is because of a tree in the centre of the town which is made of a black wood, but I suspect was Mark Morris punning on the name of Algernon Blackwood to pretty good effect.

This tree is actually the home to an ancient alien race who, from their descriptions in the book, resemble terrifying versions of Jack Skellington. They've just awoken a few days before Halloween and have amoral plans afoot. These aliens aren't evil.  They just don't even realise what they're doing to the townsfolk isn't nice.  They don't care.

The scene is set for a confrontation with our favourite time travelling hero. But what can he do against these creatures with their ability to turn everyday objects against us and who are practically invulnerable to any normal weapons - including the sonic screwdriver? The final showdown would have been one of the greatest scenes in Doctor Who if it had been televised. 

Reading this book it made me realise quite how far standards have dropped the last two years. 

The prose is as you'd expect for a youth oriented book, with no particular flourishes.  Having said that, Mark Morris keeps the story moving at a cracking pace and manages to generate some genuine tension - especially in the final scene at the Halloween fayre.  

One of the big tests of this type of book is whether you can picture the familiar characters in the story.  Not only could I see them in this book, I could read most of the Doctor's dialogue in David Tennant's voice (his Doctor voice rather than his natural scottish brogue). From a Doctor Who fan as obsessive as Mark Morris, this shouldn't be a surprise, but it's still impressive.

It was a genuinely enjoyable read, possibly one of the best Doctor Who novels I've read - although the last one I read was a couiple of decades ago, so my memory is a tad fuzzy.

If you're a fan of the tv show, you'll enjoy this. Go out and buy a copy.  What more is there to say?

Number 75 - The walking Dead Vol 21 - All Out War part 2

 

As the title suggests, this is the second part of the all out war with Negan.

All bets are off over who lives and dies in this volume.  Each of these volumes covers 6 issues of the original comic.  Negan appeared 4 volumes ago which means he was the lead threat in the comics for two years. 

Since he joined, the pace hasn't let up at all.  This was the biggest issue with season 7 of the tv show - instead of what happened here where Rick only pretyended to be broken, in the tv show he cracked for real.  They then had to spend half the season for him to decide that living under Negan's tyranny wasn't worth it.

 This led to a marked slowing down of pace.  It wasn't as bad second time I watched it, but it was still an issue.

This volume marks the end of me having any idea where the story goes next. I've caught up to my tv viewing.  I have season 9, but I'm watching the spin off show because I know there's a crossover and feel I need to catch up.

All the usual comments about quality of writing et al apply to this volume as much as the others.

Number 74- The Cabin at the End of the World - Paul Tremblay

 

Paul Tremblay has been making a bit of a name for himself over the last few years. He's one of the new rising stars of the horror genre, complete with the obligatory cover quote from the King.

Is he any good though?

On the strength of this, I'm very happy to say yes he most certainly is.

This is the best book so far in my  October horror novel binge.  There's certainly no guilt involved in enjoying this one.

It starts relatively normally.  Wen, a seven old Chinese girl is playing outside the holiday cabin where she's staying with her adoptive parents, Eric and Andrew. She's catching grasshoppers to keep in a jar and study them.  While she's doing this a stranger approaches who introduces himself as Leonard.

The conversation with the Leonard takes a turn for the vaguely threatening when he tells her that nothing that is about to happen is her fault.  Very soon after this, his three associates appear, each wielding an unusual home made weapon.

Wen runs indoors to fetch her two dads and a siege situation develops.  But things take a turn for the apocalyptic when the invaders announce their reason for being there.

The story is told in a tension inducing present tense, lending a sense of immediacy to the increasingly paranoid atmosphere. Tremblay shows a great control over mood and pacing.  The opening chapter is a masterclass in how to turn a situation from normal and nice, to a bit weird, to a distinct sense of threat, without ever making any overt statement of danger.

He manages to keep this mood of strangeness right the way through the book.  Are the strangers insane or genuinely on the mission they state? If their mission is genuine, who would want to live in a world with a god/higher power quite so capricious?

This is one of the least predictable books I've read all year. It's very rare when I get down to the final chapter that I still have no clue which way the story will turn, but this book had me guessing all the way.

In summary, this is a really well written, claustrophobic home invasion thriller with a nasty bite and a thought provoking narrative.  It's shocking and gory by turns and also very moving.  Pretty much every emotion you want to feel when reading a good horror novel is dredged out of you most efficiently by this book.

If his other books measure up to this, I have a new name in my favourite writers list.

easy 8.5/10  possibly higher

Number 73 - The Walking Dead Volume 20 - All Out War part 1

 

The saga continues apace

And what a pace...

Intense is not quite a strong enough word to describe this volume.  

The cover and title probably do a pretty good job of describing the plot of this volume.

The war with Negan has begun for real. A lot of story beats are familiar from the tv show, but still a few surprises. With the diversions from the tv characters alive and who's alive here, it really is difficult to guess who will survive the war.  

The writing is top notch.  King Ezekiel is so much funnier in this than he is on tv.  His exchenge with Michonne in the first few pages gave a genuine laugh out loud moment, despite the build up of tension that was happening.

Negan is a supreme villain. He has some of the greatest lines in the books.  A few of them I wish had made it to tv.  

With a cliffhanger ending like this volume has, I'm so glad I've got volume 21 on standby for when I finish my next full length novel.

Shame these finish on volume 32 - I only have 12 more of these great cheat reads to go - and only 1 more until I know nothing about what happens next, even at a wild guess...

Number 72 - The Unquiet Dead - Margaret Bingley

 

The second book in my October horror marathon.

Margaret Bingley is an entirely new name to me although she apparently published a dozen or so books back in the 80s.

I think I found this in the charity book section in my local Tesco.  With a cover like that I was hardly going to leave this one behind.  I can't help it, it's a weakness I have for 80s horror novels with tacky covers.

Sometimes, just sometimes, the inside is worth the time and effort needed to read a full novel.

The question is, was this one worth it?

I'm honestly not sure. Objectively I know this is a badly written novel.  There are grammar slips bad enough to drag me out of it time and time again. 

It's overblown and melodramatic. The characterisations are strictly cookie cutter.  There are plot holes big enough to drive a busload of devil children through - chief of which is why, if he'd had the childhood described, did one of the characters not have a body covered in scars - a point which the chief character would certainly have noticed. 

The prose, when it is grammatical is plain to the point of bland, and occasionally just plain bad. There isn't a believable conversation at any point in the entire book.

But...

I had fun with this book.  The story is overblown, but intriguing enough.  It does take a few unexpected turns and there's a vein of viciousness at the heart of it that actually captures what horror is supposed to do. The ending was actually pretty nightmarish in concept.

The story -

In the village of Lower Ditton, a pretty young mother is mysteriously killed and the police have no clues as to the identity of the murderer.  She's the third mysterious death in as many months. 

Her sister Amy moves in to help her widow look after the children. She starts to become suspicious that her nieces, along with the rest of the gang they hang around with have more to do with the outbreak of violence in the village than anyone would have predicted.  Can they possibly be guilty of all these horrendous crimes?  And why?  And how does Carlo, the impossibly handsome shop owner she falls in love with, tie into the whole affair?

It probably helps that devil children are a favourite cliched trope of mine. This has a nice take on the old theme that, whilst not original, feels quite fresh. I also like the fact that the characters take most of the book to believe in what's happening around them. Unlike the last novel I read where they accepted every silly plot turn on face value, our heroes in this book take a much more believable route of 'No that can't be true... you must be joking.... oh he's dead now as well... Oh bugger, it's all true...'

It's rare that I want to like a book less than I did, but I can't help it.  Godammit, for all the bad writing I actually enjoyed reading this.I will almost certainly buy more of her books if I see them, and hate myself for doing so. 

I can't give it a score out of 10 - it has a shifting score somewhere betweenn 4 and 7 depending on enjoyment or quality...

Number 71 - Keeper of the Children - William H. Hallahan

 

This being October, I'm sticking with horror to the end of the month - starting with this slim volume with the tasteful cover. Yet another of my 80s pulp horror novels that I have no idea where or when I bought it.  I just know it was in one of my cupboards gathering dust and I'd not read it yet.

When will I learn?

Sadly, this book does not quite live up to that cover.  

It opens well enough. Susan Benson's daughter, Jenna, fails to return home from school. By the time her husband Eddie gets home from working abroad a few days later, she's found out that Jenna has moved in with a local cult and is begging on the streets for them.

 It's up to Eddie and the parents of the other children taken by the mysterious cult leader to  try to get their children back.

This is easier said than done since Kheim, the cult leader, has mysterious powers which he uses to kill the parents off one by one, until only Eddie and Susan are left.

There's a lot of potential in a story like that.  It's a shame this book doesn't deliver on it.

The main problem is that it's too fast paced.  It jumps from scene to apparently unrelated scene with wild abandon.  It's like reading a particularly jump-cutty Michael Bay film without the explosions. I kept thinking I'd skipped a page and going back to check. Some of these jumps miss out vastly important detail - for example, when Eddie and two of the shreddies witness the first murder from a distance (where a scarecrow beats a man to death with an iron bar) and then they enter the house where it happened and phone the police, we are not advised why the three of them weren't locked up and what they told the police had happened.... 

In the one sequence where it does settle down and concentrate on something for more than a handful of pages, it's actually quite good.  Unfortunately, having 20-30 good pages isn't enough to save a novel.

There are major flaws in the plotting too.  Eddie is offered his dream job on a film in Africa.  He goes to the meeting where he's offered this job before he goes to see someone about his missing(ish) daughter. When he turns the job down, tells them he needs a few  more weeeks to try to get his daughter back, the book actually has the exec offering him the job say "Before you hang up, you bastard, tell me something. Is that kid of yours worth it?" I can't remember a less believable line in any book I've read.

The supporting cast do very little supporting.  His wife virtually disappears from the story after the first chapter, just popping in for a half a page here and there. Eddie's son actually does disappear, he only makes one more appearance after chapter one, for about five lines. 

We never learn what exactly is happening to Jenna. From all appearances she's entirely safe in Kheim's care, well fed and watered and not mistreated. She's seen from a distance a few times and pops up in the last chapter for a few pages.  There's never any real tension, no race against time for her to be rescued. There's also no satisfactory explanation as to why the authorities allow Kheim to keep all the children with him when the parents complain that they've run away and they want them back.

We never particularly learn enough about the shreddies to care about them before they're offed. They all die offscreen as well which feels wrong. 

The only onscreen violence involves cats.  One particularly bad jump cut very close to the end gives a five page description of a rat hunt before reaching the point and returning to the actual story. The author also clearly has never watched cats killing rats/mice.  He describes one cat as picking up a dead rat in its mouth and another in one of it's paws and running off.  When did cats gain the oppsable thumb required for that?

The characters seem very accepting of the most ludicrous stretches of reality. Eddie just accepts the (very silly in places) supernatural elements with barely a WTF.  His acceptance so quickly (and his wife's on one of her rare forays back into the narrative) does not assist this particular reader with my own suspension of disbelief.

Apparently Hallahan won a couple of awards for his writing, and one of his books was described by the New York Times as one of the scariest books ever written. I have to assume that this book was a misfire if that is the case. I'll need some heavy duty persuasion before I pick up another book by this writer though. 

This is available on kindle should you wish to experience the deathless prose for yourself. Physical copies appear to be hard to come by online.

Number 70 - Miriam: Memoirs of a Goddess 1: Annunciation - SP Somtow

 

I was honoured to be sent a sneak preview of this new book by SP Somtow.

As my regular readers know, I am a big fan of his work and have been since reading Vampire Junction in my mid teens.

This is a book he started over twenty years ago but couldn't find a publisher for. To be completely honest, I can understand why an American publishing house wouldn't touch it. That's nothing to do with the quality of the writing though, more the subject matter.   

The subject matter is quite obvious from the cover artwork. In this book, Somtow does to the Christian mythology what he did to Greek myths in the Shattered Horse.  I can imagine a large chunk of bible belt America wanting to burn this book for what they would describe as blasphemy.

Note the distinction there - "WHAT THEY WOULD DESCRIBE AS"

Taking an alternate viewpoint on the beginnings of Christianity is always going to annoy some people.  As a Catholic I feel that I am supposed to be outraged by this book.

But I'm not.  

It's not an offensive book in the slightest. It's an alternate history to the established lore, dealing with the life of Mary, mother of Jesus. I hesitate to say fantasy novel since so far there have been no unambiguously supernatural events. Everything has been in the realms of the possible despite the talk of Gods and the wild religious ritual which occurs.

Somtow has used Mary or alternate versions of her before. In his Riverrun Trilogy, the mother of the central character is called Mary and just happens to be the mother Goddess in quite literal terms. Here, he's going to the source of the myth, joining the story of the ever-virgin (although even the Bible tells us Jesus had brothers and sisters) Mother of Christ with the other deities common at the time.  Remember that the Romans were in charge at the time of Christ and they, along with the Greeks had their own religions which were contemporaneous with Mary's upbringing. 

At least one element - Miriam's age at the time of the birth - seems wrong to western ears, but was probably entirely normal 2020 years ago. The rather less than virgin birth could be a sticking point for some easily offended religious types. This is the family of Christ as actual people and not just religious cyphers.

This is part one of a much larger novel.  It opens with a 40 something Miriam being visited by P/Saul who wants to use her for his new religion. There is a meeting with the disciples where P/Saul tries to sell them his new vision with rather limited success. We also have flashbacks to her early life and the events that happen close to her betrothal to Joseph and the birth of her first son. It finishes at a fairly random point, but this is, as previously mentioned, only part one.

If it was written by some hack, you could argue that the more potentially controversial elements of the story are there for effect and to garner publicity, but that's not true here.  Somtow has a powerful story to tell and these are necessary elements. 

I can't wait for part 2 as this has well and truly piqued my interest and I really want to know what happens next.

Number 69 - The Walking Dead Vol 19 - March to War

 

The title and the cover aren't quite as much of a giveaway to the storyline as they may seem.

This is one of the most intense volumes yet.  The stakes are higher than they've ever been. Negan is a real badass, making the Governor look a bit wet in comparison.

It was nice to see one of King Ezekiel's character moments in the tv show came from the comics, although it was with Michonne in the comics and not Carol. It would be kind of creepy if he'd had that scene with Carol since she died early on in this version of the story.

I genuinely didn't know who was still going to be alive at the end of this volume.  I raced through it with bated breath for the action sequences near the end. 

These really are brilliantly done, even if the artwork is sometimes a little bit off.  As zombie apocs go, I think this has taken the crown.

Number 68 - The Piano Tuner - Daniel Mason

 

This month's book group read.  I knew nothing about the author before I picked this up on Amazon.

It's an attractive looking book, a perfectly pleasant picture on the front, nice quality paper, and it's just the right size for my coat pocket.

I have a few more compliments for it, but not many.

The opening line was appalling.  the rest of the prologue/chapter 1 not much better.  With an opening as weak as that, it was going to need something special to recover.

The story concerns a Piano Tuner who is commissioned by the army to travel to a remote corner of Burma to tune the piano that was sent out to Anthony Carroll, a somewhat eccentric Dr General in the army, to help him civilise the natives.

Edgar, the eponymous tuner of erard pianos, is a rather dull character. His wife is slightly less charismatic.  She only exists in the story so that Edgar can feel guilty later on when he is predictably attracted to a native girl in Burma. 

There are segments of the book that work very well.  At times the prose is truly a thing of beauty, evoking place and time with what feels like scalpel precision.

Unfortunately, much of the prose is merely workmanlike, and some of it is pretty bad. There are frequest tense shifts, the strory shifting from past to present tense for a couple of pages and then back again for no particular reason.  He also uses quote marks for 60% of the the dialogue in the book, but for the other 40% he Cormac MacCarthy's it - abandoning quotes and other punctuation - but without MacCarthy's skill at still making the dialogue easy to follow.

The precision of the descriptive passages is spoilt by things like stating that the scenery is passing to quickly for him to see - whilst riding in a horse drawn carriage. How fast exactly is that hose traveling? When I'm in a car doing 70, I can still watch the scenery go past.  Similarly, at one point he is galloping along on a pony, his fancy woman is sitting on the back of the horse in front, behind the driver(?) of the horse as it gallops along at high speed - except she is apparently riding sidesaddle and holding a parasol in one hand - WHILE ON THE BACK OF A GALLOPING HORSE.  

In the section where she is demonstrating this trick riding ability, we hear twice within three sentences how Edgar is excited by the "thrill of the speed" using the exact same words three sentences apart in the same paragraph. That's bad writing. Despite the book being set in the latter half of the 19th century, there are some remarkably 21st century attitudes on display.

The storyline meanders slower than the river he travels down for half the book. There are pages and pages of info-dump about the different tribes of Burma, about the history of the Erard Piano, detailed descriptions of how to tune a piano, etc. The second half of the story is slightly faster paced. After the build up of how amazing the Doctor is, Anthony Carroll was actually a fairly engaging character and certainly the saving grace of the story.  

However, Mason chooses to obfuscate and avoid telling us a lot of what Carroll is doing, trying to foster in the reader a sense of mystery and eventually ambiguity about the revelations at the end of the book. However, it reads more like he didn't know which side to come down on so he left bits out.  

I wanted to like this book a lot more than I did.  However, the lack of a strong storyline, the clumsy attempts at artful writing that come off as pretentious tosh, and the dullness of the central character are not redeemed by the occasional flashes of good writing.

A lowly 5.5/10.  If  you like your historical fiction to be pretentious, go for it.  You can buy this from most online booksellers.

Number 67 - Fight Club 2 - Chuck Palahniuk/Cameron Stewart

 

How would you like your sequel done sir?  I think I'll have it surreal, metaphysical with a side order of what the fucking fuck is going on, please.

I've read some weird stuff, much of it by Chuck Palahniuk.  I've read some metaphysical stuff where the author has inserted himself as a character - Paul Auster and Stephen King spring immediately to mind. 

This has to take the biscuit for sheer bizzarreness. The first book is hardly "normal" but this is in a different league. 

It starts with a brief recap of the final couple of chapters of the original novel 

We then jump about 10 years, the nameless narrator from the novel is now called Sebastian and is amarried to his girlfriend, Marla, from the first book.  They have a 10 year old son - who is nameless.

Sebastian thinks he has Tyler under control through strict medication. However Marla has been swapping out his medication for sugar pills because she's bored of the surburban life and is cheating on him with Tyler. 

By the end of chapter one, the house has been blown up and the boy apparently kidnapped. To get him back, Sebastian must rejoin Project Mayhem to try to track him down.

After that, things get weird. 

A few chapters into the book, Marla contacts an author with a weird name who's composing a story at a "Write Club". These characters develop a more and more prominent role as the story continues.  To say more would be spoilerific in the extreme. Suffice to say, this is on a par with Paul Auster's Travels in the Scriptorium for meta writing, maybe even more meta.

The artwork is impressive throughout. The cover art from the original issues of the comic is stunning. The writing is funny, fast paced and exciting, even if there are many places that make me say WTF.

 I still think the film is better than the first book, and I really liked the first book, and I have to say I think the first book is better than this one. Mainly because it was easier to work out what was happening.

 It's still well worth reading.  If you like Palahniuk, you'll enjoy it as much as I did.