It's frustrating because this has one hell of a cliffhanger finish with the biggest betrayal so far.
The next volume isn't out until next month some time.
The storyline continues to intrigue and beguile. the artwork continues to spoil most other graphic novels for me. they feel so basic when you compare them to this.
Daniel Church is a new name in the horror scene and, with luck, it's going to be a big name. He certainly deserves it.
This book is a thrill ride of a horror novel. It starts with the local cop, Ellie, checking into the discovery of a frozen corpse on a hillside on the outskirts of her village.
The dead man is Tony Harper, a local drunk and troublemaker from a particularly nasty family of criminals, responsible for the majority of crime in the village.
What Ellie doesn't know is that this is just the first of many. As the winter storm moves in to cut the village off from civilisation, creatures are rising from the barrows beneath the hills to wreak havoc and pave the way for something else.
Church manages to keep the action moving at a cracking pace throughout, with minor pauses to allow the reader a welcome breath or two of relief, before the stakes are raised once more and the action begins again at an even more frenetic pace.
I could easily see this being adapted into one hell of a movie. It's got everything you need, a cut off location under siege, human villains who are as nasty as the monsters, genuinely scary creatures ripping the townsfolk to shreds, enough tension to build a dozen suspension bridges and enough action to keep the most jaded fan excited.
It's all written in an easy, unpretentious style. The lead characters are well drawn, even if some of the supporting cast come across as rough sketches. There were a couple of times when I wondered about the decisions being made, but it's human nature not to get everything right first time, and this book is about a high pressure situation. Mistakes will be made.
The way he manages to up the stakes even more, just when you think the threat is as extreme as it's going to get is something to be applauded.
This is high octane entertainment with a walloping side order of gruesome nastiness and sheer terror.
When it comes out in the shops, you need to buy it to experience it for yourself.
This one came out a decade ago, but, I didn't bother because it's sold in the children's section (not even the YA). I finally got around to buying it when The Troll War book came out this year (book 4 of this series) and I decided I might as well ch3eck them out.
I wish I'd bought it all those years back. This is every bit as strange, silly and funny as any of his books for grown ups. the only difference is that the lead character is a 15 year old girl.
This is set in the Kingdom of Hereford in the UnUnited Kingdoms of Great Britain in an alternate version of 2010.
Magic is going out of fashion with the rise of technology. A wizard can't cast even the smallest of spells without having to sign a mountain of paperwork (or face dire consequences).
Jennifer Strange, the narrator, is acting manager of one of the few wizarding emporiums left in the UUK. When all the precogs suddenly have the same vision, that the last dragon, who lives in its own allocated lands between Hereford and Brecon, is going to be slain on Sunday, around lunchtime, Jennifer's life is about to take a turn for the interesting.
As with all his other books, his worldbuilding is top notch. Even though this is supposedly aimed at younger readers, he hasn't slacked in the slightest on his plotting, or his biting social commentary. This is a really tightly plotted and well conceived storyline. You need to pay attention since a throwaway line early on could easily come back as a major plot detail. he slots the pieces of the story in brilliantly.
Who is playing who? Which of the characters lying to her is lying the most? And what do they have to gain? Who can Jennifer trust, if anyone? Why does she have to be the chosen one? She has nothing special about her. She's an foundling orphan, indentured to the wizarding business until her 18th birthday. She has no powers. just a sense of right and wrong. That's not enough in a world where the fate of magic itself might rest on the events of Sunday lunchtime.
It's laugh out loud funny throughout. The humour is surreal, punny, very clever in places, and deeply satirical of corporate greed.
The Chosen One plotline is nicely subverted and played differently than I've seen it play out before. I genuinely had no idea how he was going to pull the plot threads together in the final chapters, and I was deeply satisfied with the results (and this in a "Children's book").
I recommend you check out his website too. Jasper Fforde.com : Grand Central
It's easily the best author website I've experienced.
Since I read 1933 was a bad Year a few years back, Fante has been close to the top of my collect everything you can as you find them list. I must find a better name for that list, it's not the catchiest.
This is the last of his available novels, leaving me with a couple of short story collections to go. With this book I've read all of Fante's novels except for Bravo Burro (which is currently only available online in Italian for some reason)
He also wrote a screenplay for the film version of this book. At some point I will be tracking that down online.
This is easily the funniest of his books that I've read so far. His usual themes are all in place. the Italian parents who haven't moved into the twentieth century yet, the borderline abusive father, alcoholism and general dysfunctional family life.
The title refers to both his wife, who's heavily pregnant, and the floorboards of his kitchen, which are infested with termites. I do like a good multi-purpose punny title.
Our narrator - one John Fante - decides to save money on an exterminator and builder to replace the boards in his kitchen after they collapse under the weight of his pregnant wife, and calls on his father, a retired master builder in San Juan to do the work. After a couple of chapters featuring the most overdramatic mother in history, his father agrees and travels back to Los Angeles with him. Once there John finds himself increasingly ganged up on by his father and his wife.
John Fante's self insert in this book isn't quite as horrible as in previous of his books. The character of his father seems a lot more sympathetically drawn too, despite being something of a monster still.
The comedy is much broader and less cynical than the Bandini novels. His prose reads like free-flowing blank verse at times and is an absolute joy to read. there are sections where I stopped and reread paragraphs because they were so evocative. I still managed the book in a couple of hours. It is, after all, only 150 pages.
Like everything else I've read by Fante, it's brilliant, disarmingly honest, and a pleasure to read.
It must be good then...
There are some spoilers contained in this review.
It is very well written. There isn't really much of a story, but it more than holds the interest regardless. If you're writing a story with very little of note happening, you'd better make sure your prose sings off the page. And it does. The prose is easy to read, never boring and frequently funny. But... There are a few bum notes happening.
The story follows our first person narrator, Martha Friel as she tells us her life story from age 17ish to her breakup with her current husband Patrick, who's been in love with her since they were both teenagers.
Martha has been struggling since her late teens with mental illness and the book documents her experiences with this.
The reviews make it sound like this is a great exploration of life with mental health issues, but in my humble opinion (and most of my book group as it surprisingly transpired) on that level, this book is a big cop out.
The specific mental illness she suffers from is never named. When it's mentioned in the text it's referred to as ---- ----.
I thought I was being cynical when I suggested that the reason it's never named is because her symptoms don't actually match the patterns of any particular mental health issue. But during the meeting, it was brought to my attention that, at the back of the book, sandwiched between the list of quotes from other writers used in the text and the acknowledgements, there's a "Note on the Text" that states "The medical symptoms described in the novel are not consistent with a genuine mental illness. The portrayal of treatment, medication and doctors' advice is wholly fictional". In other words I was right.
As one of the book group said, that should be in big bold letters at the front of the book. That should be stated from the beginning. If you're going to pretend that suddenly being prescribed a pink pill when you're 40 is going to cure you of all the problems you've had for the last twenty years, let the reader know up front that this is fiction and that ain't gonna happen if you're experiencing any of the same sorts of symptoms as she is. It's possibly dangerous and the medical fraternity do not come out of this book very well in the slightest.
Then there's the alcoholic mother, who is immediately cured by being asked to stop drinking by her daughter. Is it realistic or responsible to suggest that a 30plus year drinking habit can end overnight in a book that purports to be a grand statement on the trials and tribulations of living with decreased mental health?
Some more general complaints about the book... She's described as being the life and soul of every party, the person people want to be around in a crowded room. However, we see little to no evidence of this in the book, and indeed, her behaviour in public is more than likely to chase everyone away.
More importantly, we're supposed to feel sorry for her. The way she treats people, in particular her husband Patrick, is supposed to be beyond her control. She is constantly horrible to Patrick. She's violent towards him, frequently throwing heavy objects at him. She emotionally abuses him. She gaslights him. She lies to him and manipulates him. However, it's not her fault and we should feel sorry for her because she's mentally unwell.
The biggest BUT of the book comes in at this point.
Firstly, imagine a book where the sexes are reversed. Would we be expected to feel sorry for the husband who attacks his wife, gaslights her, emotionally abuses her, manipulates her and lies continuously towards her? No. it would be a case of feel sorry for her, the victim, and the successful outcome to the book would be that she leaves him. He can't control himself, she's not safe with him.
Secondly, her behaviour towards him continues for several months after she's found her miracle cure and is apparently in control of herself. This suggests that she's actually just a horrible and shitty person. I so wanted the last meeting they had after the break up to go in completely the opposite direction to the one it took.
My sympathies were entirely with Patrick and not with her.
There's also the conceit that the book is the memoir she starts writing late on in the story. When a character read a line from the memoir and it was the opening line of the book, I'm surprised my groan wasn't heard in Antarctica. Such a trite and cliched cliché.
So, despite being a page-turner in the absence of a real plot, with some great use of humour and well portrayed minor characters, this isn't a book I would recommend. The cons are significant enough that I found myself annoyed when it all finished. I don't want to finish a book feeling pissed off at most of the characters in it. It's supposed to be moving, not irritating.
That'll teach me for reading a book whose title is just two emotions.
