Number 9 - The Fall - Alan Baxter

 I never liked mushrooms much before I read this book.  Now I know I'll never eat another one again if I can help it.

This is the follow up to The Gulp, which I reviewed last year. Once again we have five interlinked novellas set in a small town on the Australian coast. Known locally as The Gulp, Gulpepper is no ordinary town.  It's been possibly deliberately excluded from most maps of Australia. It has a habit of swallowing people, both literally and metaphorically.

This book opens with Gulpepper Curios.  Like the opening story of the Gulp, this also features an unlucky outsider who makes the mistake of staying the night and rapidly finds himself in deep trouble. In this case it's a man on a motorcycle trek across the country who falls under the influence of the town. He finds a lot more than he bargained for when he looks for hidden treasures in the town's curio shop.  This is by turns funny, gruesome, scary and the ending is diabolically good. I laughed and shuddered simultaneously. It's a great intro for the uninitiated into the world of the Gulp.

Next we visit Cathedral Stacks. A fishing boat is attacked and the crew are stranded on a large rock formation a few kilometers from the "safety" of Gulpepper harbour. What they find underneath the rocks is worse than whatever forced them to abandon ship. A brilliant frying pan into fire story with engaging characters and some beautifully realised horrors deep in the caves. The visual imagery here will stick with you.

The third story is That Damned Woman - a local farmer tries to cover up after his wife dies accidentally and horribly while they're arguing. This sort of thing never goes well in horror fiction and this is no exception. Again this switches effortlessly from jet black comedy to truly scary happenings in the turn of a sentence. 

Story 4 - Excursion Troop - a group of venture scouts from a nearby town wander too close to the Gulp whilst on an orienteering exercise. After eating some of the local delicacies they foraged, the horror starts and a chase commences. This is an exciting and horrible (in a good way) story. We feel every ounce of panic that the ever reducing cast of characters is feeling. The ending of this one leads directly into the final story

The Fall - the title story in the collection is suitably apocalyptic on a scale not yet seen in the Gulp stories.  It pulls together plotlines and characters from all 9 of the prior stories from both collections. The Lovecraftian hints from the earlier tales come to fruition here like a hideous spawning fungus. The stakes are raised exponentially and the survival of more than the Gulp could be in question.

This is easily as good as the first book in the series. If you've not read the Gulp, a few references in the final story might go over your head, but it covers the essential details to allow you to follow the plot so it's should still be effective as a standalone. 

Alan Baxter is a name that has become a benchmark for quality. I've yet to read one of his stories that I've not loved unreservedly. He is a major talent. His books are effortlessly readable, and damned scary. 

The fall is released in April  I was lucky enough and privileged enough to get an advance reading copy.

It can be preordered on Alan Baxter's website if you don't want to pay mr bezos any more money than you think he deserves

Alan Baxter - Warrior Scribe - Horror, dark fantasy, and weird fiction from multi-award-winning author, Alan Baxter. (alanbaxteronline.com)

Number 12 - Something is Killing The Children Vol 2 - Tynion et al

 

When the first thing you do after finishing a book is jump onto the interwebz to order the next volume, safe to say that it's done its work and done it well.

That's exactly what I did when I reached the last page of this.  it was a case of "You can't leave it there! I need to know what happens AND I NEED IT NOW!"  

Sadly it's going to be a few days until it arrives.

Subtlety isn't the strong point of this series.  The title kind of gives away the main thread of the story. Small town America and something in the woods is, well, killing the local children.

The something is a very nasty set of monsters.  Enter Erica Slaughter to kick some monster ass. In the last volume she was a bit of a cypher, arriving from nowhere to save the day.

In this volume we learn more about her past and the organisation (the House of Slaughter) that sent her on her mission. Similar to Buffy and the Council of Watchers if they were a lot more unpleasant to work for. 

there's very little originality in the story, but its all packaged so well and breezes past at such a hectic pace that you really don't care.  It was only last night that I twigged about the similarity to Buffy, hours after finishing it. that's a good sign.  if you read it and you're making the links while you're reading, then you can suggest it's derivative.  This certainly doesn't feel it.

The artwork is pretty good. the panel layout could be clearer as to when you're reading across a double page and when it's single pages, but it's not enough of an issue that it spoiled my enjoyment.

It's exciting, scary and damned good fun, and finishes with a massive cliffhanger. Highly recommended.

Number 11 - American Vampire - Scott Snyder/Stephen King

 

Scott Snyder came to my attention last year when I read his Wytches graphic novel - which was possibly my favourite graphic novel of the year. 

This one was apparently his first original comic he produced after working on various Marvel and DC established properties.

Wytches was a very original take on the concept of witchcraft and magic.  This is, on the surface, an original take on the vampire story.

It creates its own vampire lore and the protagonist vamps have a new set of powers compared to what we're used to. They certainly look a lot different to the standard aristocratic gentlemen or the more recent moody emo look. It's stated specifically that this is an attempt to get away from the recent trend for moody teen vampires in love and make them scary again.

That's what Stephen King says in his intro and I have no reason to disbelieve him.  

I'm not 100% sure it's as original as it thinks it is.  Mutant ugly vamps - 30 days of Night/Buffy, daywalking vamps - Twilight, SP Somtow's Timmy Valentine books/Lucius Shepherd's the Golden/ Blade. The look of the vampires in full attack mode is new, but the extra powers have been done before in various guises.  This doesn't make it bad in any way.  It feels fresh as you read it.  it's only after finishing it and let it simmer that any similarities came to mind- and that's a sign of good writing.

Each issue of the comic that makes up this volume is split into two parts - a story set in Hollywood in the roaring twenties (scripted by Snyder) and a set of flashback stories charting the origins of Skinner Sweet, the first vampire created on American soil, written by Stephen King.

It's a bit of an egotistical concept that America makes better vampires than Europe, (there's something very MAGA-hatty about it) but it's played well enough that I can forgive it and go with the flow of the story.  

The artwork perfectly suits the story being told.  It's vivid and gruesome and contains some really great flash pages. 

The Hollywood story follows a newly created vamp, Pearl Jones, as Skinner enlists her into the ranks of the undead to help him get revenge on the European vampires who accidentally gave him undeath forty years earlier and tried to bury him under a lake. The flashback tale fleshes out the 1920s story neatly. 

Both stories are equally well written, Snyder here showing us he's as good as the King of horror at least in comic book format.  They blend together seamlessly, and if it wasn't for the credit page at the beginning of each issue, you wouldn't know there were two writers involved, let alone who wrote which part.

Maybe in a few volumes we might find out why the American vampires are so different. There's only one way to find out and I'm happy to part with more of my hard earned cash to do it. This is exciting and entertaining, and just bloody good.

Number 10 - Queen of bad Dreams - Lore, Perez, Kelly, Mclean, Andworld

 Yes, I've missed number 9 - I'm still reading that.  For various reasons, I can only read that at home so I took this to work and read it on my lunch break.

It's an interesting concept.  In this world, since an event some years previously, anyone with psychic powers can release "figments" from their dreams and imaginations out into the real world.

It's up to the Inspector Judges to track the figments that escape down when they either destroy it, reinsert it into the dreamer or allow it to roam free in society as its own living creature.

Our hero Daher stumbles on a conspiracy when the son of a prominent politician loses a powerful and potentially dangerous figment.

It's nicely written, very inclusive - Daher is a black lesbian and her lover and her daughter are the two narrators of the comic book. Some people will take that as a bad thing, but those people are idiots and bigots.

It's nicely twisty and turny with a few big surprises along the way. There is plenty of strong social commentary, a police state where even your dreams are monitored... etc. The artwork is sharp and clear although I found a couple of the characters hard to distinguish between. 

The worldbuilding is surprisingly good on reflection. Considering the brevity of it (5 issues of a comic bound into one edition)  the world feels natural and complete. The stranger concepts are introduced seamlessly.

All in all a nice little cheat read to go with my chicken curry.

Number 8 - The Eyes of the Carp - T.M. Wright

Another very weird book.  And again, completely intentional on the part of the writer.

T.M. Wright has a very distinctive style. He wrote fractured narratives more skillfully than nearly any other writer I can think of.

This book is no exception.  

Kevin, the narrator doesn't stick to the subject at hand for long.  He jumps back and forward in time.  The diary style date headings cease making sense very rapidly, and once they're replaced by increasing and decreasing levels of pi it just becomes surreal.

Surreal is probably the single best word to describe this book.  Kevin is not the world's most reliable narrator.  The fractured nature of the storytelling gives us a picture of how broken his mind is.

The story follows Kevin and his wife after they move into a strange house in the middle of nowhere.  Weirdness ensues, but seems to be more from the narrator than the surroundings.

Once again with a TM Wright book, I have to say that I only had a vague idea what was going on, although the ending was probably 75% clear. However I loved the journey to get to whatever that destination was.  It was creepy and strange and disturbing in a way I find it difficult to pin down. 

We are seeing the world through Kevin's eyes and it's not a nice place.  Kevin is not a nice man. There are several instances of way too much information. It's a good literary impression of what living with a serious mental illness might feel like.

It's very short and an easy, if confuzzling, read. 

I got lucky and found a cheap-ish copy on Ebay which I snatched up.  This tends to sell for silly prices online.  If I'd paid the regular price for this I might have been less pleased with it. But since I found it for reasonable second hand rates, especially considering it's a signed limited edition (number 19 of 750) I can't complain.

Number 7 - Nemesis - Millar & McNiven

 

Mark Millar has one hell of a CV in the comics world.  He's written for all the major superheroes in Marvel and DC. He wrote the Old Man Logan series for Wolverine that was turned into the most interesting Marvel film to date  He also wrote the Kickass comics and Kingsman.

Slightly less well known is this one - mainly because it hasn't been filmed yet. 

Gratuitously violent, and necessarily so, this type of story works best taken to excess like this. 

Nemesis is the world's greatest supervillain. Born to ultra-rich parents, he uses his wealth to gather the best gadgets and career criminals to help his rampages. In the first pages alone his death toll is probably in the thousands. And he's never been caught. Supervillainy doesn't come much mor supervillainy.

Pitted against him is super cop Blake Morrow. He's never failed to take down a perp and now nemesis has set his sights on Washington DC, the city under his protection.

The scene is set for a gloriously OTT ultra-violent confrontation.

There's no subtlety of characterisation.   There's no deep hidden meanings.  This is good old fashioned action storytelling. 

McNiven's art is perfectly suited to the story, sleek and gory with no detail missed.

There's not much more to say about it.  It's a great fun read, funny and shocking in equal amounts. As good fun ways to kill a spare hour go, this is pretty hard to beat.

Number 6 - The Unconsoled - Kazuo Ishiguro

 

And the winner of most boring book cover of 1996 goes to...

This isn't a book I knew existed before I found this in the charity section of my local Tesco. It's Ishiguro's fourth novel and it's a doorstop of a book.

Despite the cover being boring, it's also weirdly appropriate for the book despite the book not being boring. It's such a strange choice of picture but has a feel to it that matches the tone of the book. 

Our first person narrator- Ryder, an internationally renowned pianist- arrives in an unnamed city to give a performance at a gala concert in three day's time. He has a hectic schedule ahead of him, according to one of the organisers who greets him. The concert is apparently the last hope the city has to pull itself out of an unnamed crisis and only Ryder can save them. If only he could remember what the schedule is, or could avoid his personal life and extraordinary talent for procrastination getting in the way.

This is one of the strangest things I've read for several years - and if you're reading this, you can look back and see I read some pretty strange books. 

Ishiguro manages to give the book the feel of an ever shifting dream. Locations are malleable.  Trying to make a mental map of this city is nigh on impossible as long car journeys into the surrounding countryside apparently finish in the centre of the city in a location he visited earlier. His stream of consciousness frequently dips into the lives of the surrounding characters and we're given details he has no way of ever knowing. Despite his unfamiliarity with the town, we are introduced to some of the most important people in his life living there and waiting for him to come home.

A phrase I've heard used to describe this book is Kafka-esque, and I have to agree.  This is a book you take on faith. don't go picking plot holes, they're clearly intentional, put there to increase the sense of unreality and confusion. We know that Clint Eastwood and Yul Brynner did not star in 2001 A Space Odyssey and can assume Ishiguro knows it too.

This is weirdness on an epic yet intimate scale. It's funny and sad and dark and silly and serious. Allegiances between characters are important yet irrelevant. Will Brodsky reunite with the love of his life? Will Ryder ever find time to practice his recital piece? 

if you're the type of person who thinks Stephen King goes on a bit, this probably isn't the book for you. Characters speak in three page long monologues with no paragraph breaks. Much of the book feels like a character in a game getting stuck on the side quests, and then side quests from the side quests and never quite returning to the main thrust of the original journey.

I had no idea what to expect when I started reading this, and I got exactly what I expected.

I loved it. It's a book to savour.  I'm sure I will reread this one at some point.

Number 5 - Gideon Falls Vol 6- The End - Lemire et al

 

The black barn is back, the laughing man and his hideous hordes are closing in on our heroes. 

The artwork and fantastic layouts continue to blow my mind.  There's even a section in this one where everything turns upside down and we have to turn the book over to read it.  

You could argue that it's gimmicky but I thought it was a lovely touch. 

With multiverses, time travel, monsters from the deep, cockroach infested zombies, this has been a rollicking good read.  There's no mystery as to why this won so many awards the years it was published in comic form.

This copy ends with the written script of everything that came before.

If you like your fiction wibbly wobbly timey wimey (to borrow from Matt Smith's doctor) with high concept monsters and genius layouts, this is the series for you.

Number 4 - The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole - Sue Townsend

I first read this book in 1985 when I myself was nearly the same age as the titular hero. This has 70p written in pencil on the top of the first page inside, so it's easily possible that this is the very same copy that I read all those years ago.

I remember finding it very funny first time I read it, but I don't recall it being embarrassing laughing uncontrollably in public funny. 

That's the difference between reading this as a teenager, and reading this as an adult. This time round, I was sitting reading it on my lunch at work and several times dissolving in hysterical fits of giggles.

I have a less complicated relationship with the character this time too.  In 1985 I was skinny with dark hair and glasses - and liked to read a lot.  Especially after the tv show came out, the favoured insult from those so inclined was "Adrian Mole" in much the same way that kids matching that description now get called Harry Potter. That may have taken the shine off the books for me somewhat and may explain why I have still to read the other 4 Adrian books.

Top of the list of reasons why this was so much funnier this time is that I understand what the adults are talking about. Whilst I don't think I was quite as naïve as Adrian, I didn't get a lot of the little asides. The references to the books he's reading with some vastly wrong fact about the author - eg, reading a book "by some woman called Evelyn Waugh" or the biography of Kinsley Martin where he says it's strange that it doesn't mention that he wrote Lucky Jim.

Townsend captures the uncertainty of teenage life with total accuracy. You just know you wouldn't want Adrian anywhere near you, let alone in your close circle of friends.  He's irritating, self-absorbed, and obsessed with sex. He spreads chaos around him whether he means to or not (example Mr Braithwaite's letter). However we can't help but sympathise with him. Even though probably three quarters of his pain is imaginary, and most of the rest is self inflicted, we're privy to some of his most private thoughts and we can understand where he's coming from. And we know he does care about some things. 

I have a couple more of the rest of the series to track down - I want to get similar editions to this one if possible-  but I will be continuing the series sooner rather than later.

For quick easy, screamingly funny reads, this is a very difficult book to beat.

Number 3 - Wraith - Joe Hill & Charles Paul Wilson III

 

Now this was a lot of fun.  A graphic novel prequel to one of Joe Hill's prose novels.  There's a clue on the cover which one - that car number plate will ring a bell to most Joe Hill readers.

This tells the story of the creation of Christmasland and follows up with the misadventures of an unlucky group of people forced to visit.

A prison bus crashes and the three prisoners and two wardens are collected by Charlie Manx and taken to his kingdom.  One of the prisoners has links to Manx, knows he can help people to disappear, but doesn't know quite how it's achieved. When he calls Charlie for help, everyone on the bus regrets the decision sooner rather than later.

The story is brilliantly creepy. The characters are well drawn (in all definitions of the phrase) whether they're likeable or not.  We have two characters deserving of sympathy and several others we should rightly be scared of.  Who if any of them will survive? 

There's a demonic feel to the artwork which perfectly suits the subject matter.  Charlie Manx might  not be exactly what I imagined reading NOS4A2 but he's superbly realised here.  The devil children are pretty bloody scary creations.  The moon in Christmasland is one of the weirdest and most disturbing things I've seen in a graphic novel.   

From a visual point of view, the only disappointment is the double page spread with the maze, which, because this volume is very thick, we lose all the detail in the center of the picture.  Obviously this wouldn't have been a problem when the comic was released as a comic.

The script is right up there with the best that Hill has produced. 

This is a hellish difficult book to find at a reasonable price.  I got very lucky after months of searching to find it on eBay for cover price plus postage and I leaped at the chance (and that was still pricey - but this is a gorgeous looking hardback edition with nearly 200 pages of beautifully reproduced artwork and a damned good story). It might even be worth it to a Hill completist to shell out the big bucks for it. It's pretty much out of print, and the people who have copies seem to not want to let them go - and that should tell you something about the quality.

Best thing I've read so far this year. I admit that that would mean more if it wasn't just two weeks in and book number 3, but I suspect this could be a highlight of the year regardless.

So great book - good luck getting a physical copy. People who read on kindles might find it easier.

Number 2 - The Thursday Murder Club - Richard Osman

 This book has attracted a lot of attention and sold millions so it has to have something going for it.  Richard Osman is one of those faces you can't seem to get away from lately on tv, whether it's a show that he hosts or guest spotting on other celebrity shows.  It was only a matter of time before he put out a book.

Most celeb books turn out quite average overall, but the man giant that is Mr Osman is known for his brains as well as his height 

Side note - I genuinely was a contestant (with my mum) on Pointless a couple of years back, just before I started writing this blog. Before filming, Richard and Xander come over and talk to the contestants. I'm not particularly tall, but I'm not short either.  When Richard Osman came over to shake my hand I was on eye level with his nipples (which were covered by his suit obviously). He's easily the tallest guy I've ever met. He seemed very nice as well.  

Are his writing talents as towering as his physicality?

It has 50 separate reviews either on the cover or the first two pages. That's overkill surely. The fact that I agree with the majority is irrelevant. 

This is a very good and very funny (in places) crime thriller. The members of the murder club are nicely drawn (although the two men are kind of sidelined and the women do most of the heavy lifting in the case) and the supporting cast are equally good.

There's some great misdirection going on and plenty of twists and turns. However it does rely too much on withholding information from the reader to prevent the mystery fans from having any real chance at working it out. The final reveal was somewhat disappointing to me in the way it was done. I can't say more because - spoilers obviously.

I expected to read this in his voice.  It often happens when you know what the writer sounds like, but in this case that didn't happen at any point.  In fact the different characters' voices are well delineated and have their own distinct rhythms.

It certainly kept me amused and intrigued as to what would happen next.  It's much better than average, especially considering it's a debut novel.  The except from the second book looks very intriguing too.

Cosy crime novels like this aren't my usual thing.  I normally go for the grittier side of things. So, I'm not sure it's a classic, but its a damned good fun read.

In case anyone was wondering, Me and my mum didn't win on Pointless but we didn't show ourselves up and I even got two separate "Well played Marc" comments from Richard. 

Number 1 - The Dogs - Robert Calder

 

Thought I'd start the year with something better than Slob - which pretty much meant any other book I own...

I went for this subtle looking affair. Not sure when or where I got it, but it's been on my TBR for a while. 

I will start by saying it's a marked improvement on Slob.  Robert Calder apparently knows how to string a few sentences together which is an instant win in comparison.

This is basically Jaws with a pack of dogs instead of a shark.  Small town America, university lecturer finds an abandoned puppy in a service station and takes it home.  A hundred miles away, An experimental lab breeding attack dogs realise they're missing a pup from a highly valued litter.  Through some time bending narrative techniques, we find out how it found its way to the town of Covington.

A couple of years later, after an attack that strikes too close to home for Bauer, our central protagonist, the dog runs off into the mountains and joins a pack. From this point on, anyone who crosses their path is not safe.

I'm not going to say this is a work of art or brilliant in any capacity.  It fills time in quite happily, but I'm guessing i won't remember much about this book in a few weeks time. the writing is ok for the most part, but the sex scenes are excruciating. 

He also has an issue with his characters on the various sub plots never intersecting. if you want a character who's only purpose to the story is to die a horrible death, you should spend one chapter at most on them. Otherwise, you're leading the reader down an unsatisfying path.  If a character appears in 4 separate chapters, he goddamn needs to contribute to the storyline more than just being ripped to shreds in his final appearance. He needs to interact with the other characters, not just wander about in his own little story entirely distanced from the everyone else before dying.

This is particularly true if you use this character for what, even in the 80s when this was written, would have been an intensely triggering sequence in the book for a lot of readers. See last paragraph for more detail on this.  If you want to avoid spoilers, don't read the last paragraph.

Side note - i love the rats by James Herbert (and many other early Jmaes herbert books).  I like to see shreddies in a book - characters who pop in for a chapter and die horribly. But they should only appear for the length of time it takes to get to know and like them. If they're not going to interact with your lead cast, don't give them too many pages. if they're only there to die in a set piece, get on with it and kill them.

There are threads left dangling which are fairly irritating.  Bauer's marriage subplot is left hanging. the student he's unprofessionally friendly with just kind of fades out of the narrative. His other relationship plot is somewhat cringeworthy in every aspect (and that's not the one with the really bad sex scenes).

 Overall this is a competently written little potboiler.  You don't really feel sympathy for any of the characters or the dogs but it's entertaining enough that I wanted to get to the end.

a 4 or 5 out of 10.  As the back cover says, this is more tightly written than Jaws.  it is indeed a better book than Jaws. but that's not difficult. 

Spoilers - This book does contain graphic descriptions of dogfighting, including an 9 page chapter describing a meeting, most of which is one fight in gruesome detail.  I spotted the irony in the description of the death of the human character in that scene and the description of the injuries described in that chapter, but it still seems to be a character and scene inserted for no reason except to be edgy.  That character could have been removed from the book except for his final two pages without impacting the plot in the slightest.

Number 106 - Slob - Rex Miller

 

The last book started in 2021 - first finished this year.  What a sad way to end/start the year.

After 105 books with very few real stinkers, I have to pick this one off the shelf because it looked short enough to finish

I hadn't counted on it being such a difficult read. 

it's truly one of those books that when you put it down you can't pick it up again.

I don't know if I managed to find some kind of unedited and unformatted first draft but this was littered with grammar and formatting errors. Capital letters are used throughout where italics would make the point much better without shouting at the reader.  One page has a third of  the lines ending only halfway across the page, despite the 

sentences not actually

finishing at the end

of those lines, whole 

paragraphs that just weren't

formatted in the slightest.

If that wasn't bad enough, the book is overwritten to the point of parody. I don't know if Miller was aiming at a so bad it's funny prose, but he only managed the first part of the phrase if he was.

The plot, if I give it that much dignity, is a serial killer loose on and under the streets of Chicago. Known as either Chaingang or Daniel Edward Flowers Bunkowski, he's a 450lb monster, who, depending on the needs of the plot, either stinks so badly that people know he's there by the smell minutes before they see him, or he's able to quietly sneak up on them, He's simultaneously a genius and retarded and he's apparently killed more people than anyone else on the face of the planet.

Against him is the cop Jack Eichord.  Eichord is introduced in a chapter that starts with first person narrative. Miller gets bored of the first person voice after a few pages and slips back into the fourth-wall breaking omniscient third person that had been used in previous chapters and is used for the rest of the book.

Eichord is an ex-alcoholic and apparently a great detective.  Not that he does much detecting in this book.  he spends most of his time in a cringeworthy romance with the widow of one of Chaingang's first victims in Chicago. 

The chapters written from Chaingang's POV are written in a stream of consciousness that reads like a very slightly more literate version of Nickolaus Pacione (if you don't know who he is, google some of his writing - but probably best for your sanity if you don't. Suffice to say it's very very very bad indeed).  Even the Eichord chapters were scattered with casual racism and similarly dodgy material - one of his chapters begins in a bar with three pages of fellow cops trading racist jokes.

Most of the on the page killings are gratuitously misogynistic and rapey. If he kills a man, it's described very briefly. When women die, we're treated to torture, mutilation and rape first, all in the horribly overwritten style.

This is a writer trying his hardest to shock by writing gore and torture and generally just being edgy with no thought to how to frame a narrative or indeed a readable sentence.

I was very close to calling this my first DNF since I started this blog. I'm almost disappointed that I didn't . I'll leave you with a sample of his deathless prose, this describes the last moments of one of the many very poorly characterised shreddies.

Still and all, wouldn't that be the last straw? To be mugged out here on the street during his constitutional. Dying of goddamn cancer and get mugged. More than a body could stand. He decided to head back to the apartment and about that time a bright silver thing sliced out at him slashing out of nowhere and the phrase "nuncuperative will and testament" darted past his consciousness as he tried to curse this thing but the blood from his severed throat stopped this last obloquy of thought in a bright red, surprisingly hot spurt as his heart pumped valiantly pumping his life force out into the darkened street. 

Number 105 - I Saw Zombies Eating Santa Claus - SG Browne

 

My Christmas read this year is this rather good follow up to Breathers.

Breathers is a horror comedy novel about a newly revived dead man working through the issues with his zombification.  It's that rare breed of horror comedy that deserves both words in the genre description.  It's unpleasant enough and disturbing enough to qualify for horror and funny enough to work as a comedy.

Happily, this sequel continues the trend.

It opens with Andy waking up on a pile of dead zombies with a bullet hole in his skull and wearing a Santa outfit. 

We then jump back a few days (it says three but I'm not sure the timescale is entirely accurate - however I don't care) to his captivity in an experimental lab and work forward to find out how he ended up with the perforated head-bone.

Andy is a congenial narrator.  The humour never feels forced and the running gag of "If you haven't experienced x,y,z you wouldn't understand" is particularly funny.

As with the first book, the comedy and gore are interspersed with more tender and erm, human,,, moments.

My biggest complaint with this book is that every time I look at that cover, I get an earworm of THAT song but with the lyrics changed.  I hate the song this title riffs from. I don't want it in my head even with funnier lyrics.

It's a fast, easy read, laugh out loud funny in places, gruesome in others.  Perfect Christmas reading.

Number 104 - The Swallowed Man - Edward Carey

 

After reading Heap House a few books ago, I went online and bought several more Edward Carey novels. I will return to the world of the Iremongers early in the new year, but this book caught my eye for a more immediate read - mainly for it's relatively short length and the Max Porter quote.

It tells the story of Gepetto (yes, that Gepetto) trying to eke out his remaining life after being swallowed my the giant sea creature. It starts with a brief retelling of the more famous story of Pinocchio from Gepetto's point of view and explaining how he came to be where he is before embarking on less familiar fare.

To be fair, even his retelling of Pinocchio feels fresh since it's not from the usual viewpoint.

By some miracle, Gepetto has managed to land inside a ship previously swallowed by the shark/sea creature.  The ship is reasonably sturdy, but, just as importantly, it contains candles, food and the captain's logbook and ink where our narrator writes his weird history.

After the familiar story, we learn about Gepetto's early life and loves. We also learn how he tries to survive the loneliness of his captivity in the stomach of the creature. However, his supply of candles is running low, as is his food, and something is scuttling in the recesses of the ship.

The prose is scattered with more of Carey's rather distinct artwork, and assorted strange photographs that complement the narrative perfectly. The tone of the book is as weird and wonderful as Heap House was even though this is aimed at an older demographic. He managed the almost impossible and surprised me with the final chapter of the book.

I can't recommend this too highly to those people who like a skewed take on familiar tales.  

Number 103 - Gideon Falls Vol 5 - Lemire et al

 

A return to the mind-bending worlds of Gideon Falls.

Now we have a grasp of what exactly is happening, this is getting more nightmarish and gripping.

The artwork continues to astound and the plot is getting twistier and twistier.  The cliffhanger ending is almost unfair.  it means i have to get the 6th and final volume much sooner rather than later...

It would be difficult to say much about what's happening without being very spoilerific for the previous 4 volumes.  Plus without a good understanding of what's gone before I'm not sure anything I say about the story here would make sense.

Suffice to say the Smiling Man is a truly scary villain and it's obvious why this series won as many awards as it did.

It takes talent to drag together as many disparate plot threads into a cohesive story in the way Lemire has done here. Sorentino's art helps build the atmosphere and general air of weirdness brilliantly as well as introducing me to narrative techniques only possible in a visual medium like comic books.

Seek these out and read them immediately.  

Number 102 - I am the Tiger - John Ajvide Lindqvist

 

This is part three of a triptych of books by John Lindqvist.  I'm not sure I'd call it a trilogy as such.  The first two books (I Am Behind You, and I Always find You) are only linked tangentially and whilst this book does tie them together much more tightly, the links between the previous too books are still too tenuous.

The first book was set on a caravan park where a number of vans suddenly found themselves in a strange landscape with an unending green field and a sunless sky.  

Book 2 was set in the real world and followed a young John Limdqvist as he moved to the city for the first time, trying to make his living as a magician and found himself embroiled in a supernatural cult, a strange alien slime that transports people to a heavenly new world,  and a plot to kill a prominent Swedish politician - a real event from Swedish history (the Swedish equivalent of JFK - to this day no one knows the true identity of the killer)

This book follows a washed up crime reporter who starts investigating a new crime lord on the block the mysterious X who is smuggling in huge amounts of the purest cocaine whilst simultaneously persuading existing crime lords to commit suicide.  We also follow his nephew, a teenager who's been selling his ADHD medicine since he was 13 and who is offered the chance to get in on the ground floor selling ridiculously cheap and pure cocaine...

For the first 150 pages or so, this reads like a crime thriller, with very few hints of the supernatural (other than subtle hints as to the cause of the spate of suicides). Even when the supernatural becomes evident, the focus is still very much on the human cost of the crime in progress and the dual viewpoints on the cocaine ring, the rising star in the organisation and his uncle investigating.

The story rattles along at a cracking pace for the most part.  There is one sub-plot regarding Tommy's living arrangements that slows things down in the middle section, but not enough to be a real issue. There are also hints about Tommy's dog being in some way special that never amount to anything. Thinking about it now, it's a little bit irritating how much time he spent on a plot thread as strange as that that went nowhere.

Like Gary McMahon's excellent Concrete Grove, this book builds up a convincing picture of a run down estate and a local boss who is much more than he seems.  There are probably more thematic similarities to Concrete Grove in this book than there are to the first two parts of his own trilogy. However this book isn't quite as scary or freaky as Concrete Grove.  It's far more grounded in reality and doesn't play the supernatural up as much as it could have done. 

The ending was unexpected to say the least, despite the fact that, in hindsight, the clues have all been laid out clearly.  Lindqvist certainly earns a few extra points for that. 

You need to read the first two books to appreciate this one properly.  Some detail could be confusing otherwise. It ties the previous two books in fairly cleverly, but I may need to reread the series again to see how accurate the links are. I'm not sure if the link to book 1 is forced or if my memory is faulty. I won't mind, they're all really good books, at least as good as an average Stephen King. 

There are Easter eggs for his other novels too. Little Star is referenced at one point for definite and some of the background events seem familiar too.

Overall, this is a damned good read, but not perfect.  It could have lost a subplot or two on the way and possibly been that much tighter a narrative but it's never less than very readable indeed and some of the set pieces are genuinely frightening. When he does play up the supernatural, the novel takes off and I think I maybe wanted more of that than Tommy's domestic life. It still kept me enthralled all the way through and delivered some great shocks.  It's done what it's supposed to and then some.

Number 101 - Buddha Boy - Kathe Koja

 

The very definition of a cheat read - i finished this in one sitting.

Kathe Koja excels in these YA novellas at introducing us to the social outcasts of high school society. In this book, it's the Buddha Boy of the titles - aka Michael martin - aka Jinsen.

He's just transferred into Edward Rucher High School and he does NOT fit in. He dresses wrong. He begs for money in the cafeteria. He acts weirdly and doesn't respond the way he should.  That includes showing not respect/fear to the school bullies which makes him number 1 target.

The narrator of the book, Justin, is forced to partner with Jinsen on a school project where he discovers that Jinsen is an amazing artist. From that grudging moment of respect, a tale of friendship against the odds builds rapidly.

The story is told in Koja's unmistakable stream of consciousness style of writing. It's a compelling read, as evidenced by the fact that I read it in one two hour sitting. 

She delivers a great message about acceptance of people who seem different, about getting to know people rather than writing them off as freaks. Jinsen's back-story, when it's revealed, feels genuinely tragic and his recovery uplifting.

My only disappointment with the book is that, being told in flashback, I hoped to find out more at the end about what happened next, just an epilogue chapter to say what the characters achieved and if the friendships continued or fizzled with distance. Even that is just a personal feeling of disappointment because I wanted more, rather than a flaw with the book's ending, which is suitably emotional. 

She left me wanting more... that can only be a compliment.

I have more of her full length adult novels on my shelves due a read or re-read at some point next year. She really is one of those writers who I will read anything she writes, no matter how far out of my personal comfort zone.  She can make you feel the character's deepest feelings with ease. 

Number 100 - In the wars - Dr Waheed Arian

 

Number 100 for the year! This was my book group read and the second autobiography in a row. I did a bit more research and Chump Change is almost certainly a fictionalised autobiography.

However, whereas Chump Change was a warts and all decent to his lowest point with a glimmer of hope at the end, this one takes almost the opposite path.  This one starts with his horrendous childhood and takes us through his pathway out of poverty and danger and to his current status as head of a prestigious charity and a doctor in the NHS.

The opening sections of the book were certainly the most interesting. His childhood in Afghanistan with breaks as a refugee in Pakistan before moving to the UK was filled with drama and incidents. He (or his ghostwriter) paints a vivid picture of the precariousness of existence in Kabul. 

Once he reaches Britain, his fortunes changed very much for the better.  He manages to enroll in a college while holding down two jobs  to get his A-levels before he is accepted into Cambridge University for his medical degree.

His work ethic puts most of the rest of the world to shame. He comes over as a truly remarkable man in every way.

This is where the cynic in me wonders what has been left out of the story. This is the only autobiography I've ever read where the author doesn't reveal even a single wart. The book reads in the end like an advert for his charity (which from the last two chapters, that's exactly why he wrote it) so I can understand that he doesn't want to show himself in a bad light at any point.  This book isn't warts and all. it's a plea to donate to his -very worthy indeed- charity. 

All in all it's a very interesting book, engagingly told. It shines a light on life experiences in war zones, the lengths people have to go to to escape, and the confusion and problems encountered trying to set up a new life in a totally different culture. 

If it was fiction I'd be complaining that the protagonist is too perfect. Was it really nothing more than youthful naivety when he didn't realise the "travel agency" that sent him to the UK wasn't completely on the level - despite fake passports etc?  Please let us see that you have some human failings other than mildly amusing cultural and lingual misunderstandings at university. 

It feels awkward admitting that I kind of feel that way about this even though it's non-fiction. However, I expect unfettered honesty from the author of one of these books, so I should be honest in my review. I am cynical by nature and struggle to believe that people can be this flawless. I want to see the whole person when I read an autobiography, not just the good bits.  Although maybe he's just a better person than me and deep inside I'm jealous. 

The work he's done is amazing. he's achieved more than I ever will in my life. He passed on a guaranteed consultancy post to concentrate on the charity work. Even if he hasn't shown us any warts, he's still a remarkable man doing great work. His charity deserves all our support, it's doing great work and actually improving things on the ground in places like Afghanistan. If you can support his charity Arian Telemedicine, do so.  They need every bit of help they can get. 

Number 99 - Chump Change - Dan Fante

 

Dan Fante is the son of Jon Fante.  As any people who read these reviews regularly will know, I discovered Jon Fante entirely by chance a couple of years back because I liked the title of one of his books (1933 was a bad year). he rapidly became a firm favourite of mine. 

I'm close to having read everything Jon Fante ever published and I wondered if the talent ran in the family. So I ordered this online - his books don't show up in Waterstones the way his dad's do - and I'm so glad I did.

The unflinching gaze at the underbelly of life is well and truly present in the writings of both father and son. 

This book is one of the most disturbing things I've read this year.  I find myself hoping that it is complete fiction and not based on Dan Fante's real life.

However - the lead character is Bruno Dante.  His father is Jonathan Dante -  a novelist and screenwriter dying from diabetes. We meet him in the book, lying on his deeathbed, a shriveled husk of his former self with no lower legs due to his illness, and only breathing through a sheer refusal to die just yet. Jon Fante died of diabetes - he too had lost his feet to the disease. 

 Jonathan Dante's book that is referenced in this is called Ask the Wind.  The last of the Bandini novels was Ask the Dust. There are so many similarities between Jonathan Date and Jon Fante it's impossible to surmise anything other than Dan wrote his father into this book under a very thin veil indeed.

Given that the father character IS his real life father, how much of the character of Bruno is Dan Fante?  

Bruno is not a nice man.  He's an out of control alcoholic with a mean streak a mile wide and totally self destructive.  We meet him first when he's released from rehab a few days early so his wife can take him back to LA to see his father before he dies.

What follows is a compulsive and horrifically readable account of alcoholism and a crash to the bottom. I'm not sure Dante makes one good decision at any stage of the book. We certainly can't root for him and his behaviour. We can't sympathise in the slightest.  But Fante's prose makes us understand him and empathise. We can hope that he might turn a corner somewhere, but it never seems likely. This spiral is a bad one. The only thing close to a redeeming feature is his attempts to look after the dog, and he's not even very good at doing that.

This book messed with my dreams and gave me a sleepless night. Most horror novels I read don't manage that. His depiction of broken humanity is so convincing that it hits on a deep deep level. However there are shafts of humour shining through. This isn't a misery memoir.  It's compelling in part because of the jet black humour used to illuminate the darkness.

I will certainly be tracking down more of his work.  He truly manages to carry on his father's legacy.