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THE RECKONING by Jeff Long

March 4, 2021 by Craig DiLouie Leave a Comment

THE RECKONING is another terrific horror/thriller novel by Jeff Long, the author of my one of my favorite horror works, THE DESCENT. I recently reread it (it was originally published in 2004) and liked it even better the second time around.

Like THE DESCENT, THE RECKONING reads like Michael Crichton decided to do a horror novel, though Long is far superior to Crichton in my opinion in building strong characters. I don’t know if I’d classify it as thriller fiction with horror elements or the other way around, but who cares because either way, it works for me.

Molly, a photojournalist, travels to Cambodia to document the recovery of bones belonging to dead and missing American servicemen fighting during the Vietnam War. After a dig goes bust, she and two searchers meet a mysterious stranger, who tells them where they can find an entire lost platoon. They jump at the chance–Molly to get her story, her companions to recover the dead–and lead a team into what they discover is a lost city in the jungle. There, the ruins brood and sleep, haunted by ghosts, and Molly learns that here, the war never really ended…

Long’s is one of my favorite writers. He’s a master of producing wonder, ticking time bombs, likeable and capable heroes dealing with an escalating catastrophe, and a sort of visceral and moody horror that keeps you reading. If you haven’t checked out his work yet, I highly recommend it.

Filed Under: Books, Reviews of Other Books, The Blog

CIPHER by Kathy Koja

February 14, 2021 by Craig DiLouie Leave a Comment

Celebrated speculative fiction author Kathy Koja’s THE CIPHER has a terrific premise: after a party, Nicholas and Nakota, a dysfunctional couple, end up in the storage room of his crummy apartment building and discover a strange and utterly mysterious black hole in the floor. He’s obsessed with her, and she’s obsessed with it, while it appears to be obsessed with him, setting up a creepy and bizarre love triangle of sorts. It’s kind of like the horror version of Jonathan Lethem’s AS SHE CLIMBED ACROSS THE TABLE.

I’d never read Koja before, and she can really turn a phrase. Large parts of the book read like the stream of consciousness of a mad genius. The central conflict of the love triangle is engaging, the obsessions interesting, the core mystery of what the hell the “Funhole” is and what’s in it hooking me from the start, particularly the early crazy experiments they conduct to study it. There’s a theme somewhat teased of people filling empty lives by projecting and searching for meaning. And the horror element packs a ton of satisfying creep.

Two things didn’t work for me as a reader, however. First, only two of the characters out of what grows into a large cast are remotely likeable, and our narrator, Nicholas himself, is so negative about everything the story goes from a heroin chic to a serious downer vibe. As for Nicholas, he has no real agency despite constant attempts to gain control–mostly floundering and waffling–and none of the characters changes or grows to offer a character arc. Secondly, the second half of the book is majorly repetitive, leading to an ending that is inconclusive and lacking all the answers, which is fine, but offering no real resolution, which I found disappointing.

So all in all, I had a strange mixed reaction to this one. I loved the first half and didn’t want it to end and then grew impatient wanting the second half to be over. As a whole, it’s heavy, it’s dark, it’s creepy, and it’s periodically titillating and even beautiful, but it missed some vital elements for me that would have made it a perfect horror read. So THE CIPHER might be a love or hate read for some, though regardless of whether you love or hate it, you have to admire the singular identity Koja creates for it and the skill and craftsmanship that went into it.

Filed Under: Books, Reviews of Other Books, The Blog

DELIVERANCE by James Dickey

February 3, 2021 by Craig DiLouie 1 Comment

I’d watched DELIVERANCE as a kid and avoided it ever since as it was disturbing as hell. I had no idea it was based on a novel by James Dickey, which came my way when my friend John Dixon said I had to read it. So read it I did, and I’m glad I did.

It’s an almost iconic story now, but I’ll recap it anyway. Four middle-aged men decided to take a break from their comfortable but boring middle-class lives and go on a wilderness adventure riding a remote Georgia river. Along the way, it turns into a fight for survival against both men and the river itself, a horrific but purifying struggle that promises deliverance, one way or the other.

The story is fairly simple, but Dickey explores every piece of the visual scene and its psychic impression on Ed, the protagonist, with writing that can only be described as richly expressed. Dickey has a way of creating a visual scene that makes you feel like you’re standing there, including his portrayals of even minor characters and in particular the wilderness. Where he shines is in his explorations of fear and the courage to survive. “We were free and in hell,” Ed sums it up nicely at one point, and Dickey takes you every step of the way of this harrowing journey.

It’s one of the best novels about survival I’ve ever read, while being possibly the best about the male animal, particularly men struggling with middle-class malaise and midlife crisis and naturally seeking risk to feel truly alive again.

Filed Under: Books, The Blog

THE CHILDREN OF RED PEAK Now Available in Audiobook!

January 30, 2021 by Craig DiLouie Leave a Comment

Published by Dreamscape Media, the audiobook version of THE CHILDREN OF RED PEAK, my psychological horror novel with cosmological horror elements, is now available. It’s about a group of people who grew up in an apocalyptic cult, survived its nightmarish last days, and reunite years later to confront their past and the entity that appeared on the final night.
 
Narrated by James Patrick Cronin, the audiobook is available at booksellers likeAmazon and Audible.

Filed Under: Apocalyptic, Books, The Blog, The Children of Red Peak

MAPPING THE INTERIOR by Stephen Graham Jones

January 26, 2021 by Craig DiLouie Leave a Comment

I’d read Stephen Graham Jones’s MONGRELS and loved his earthy, so-real-it’s-comical take on werewolves. I ended up giving his novella MAPPING THE INTERIOR a try, and I’m glad I did. It’s a pretty powerful story and shows how horror does not need to be a literary end in itself but instead a lens to look at humanity or the world a new way.

The story is about a boy whose father disappeared so long ago he barely remembers him. His hardworking mother raises him and his brother Dino, who has learning difficulties. At night, the boy think he sees an apparition of what might be his father stalking the house. Is it a real haunting–his father trying to get back to his family–or only wishful thinking? And as the ghost gains strength and the boy learns who his father really was, what would he sacrifice to bring dad back?

This is a novel about a haunting, but it’s really about a boy growing up without a father and the romanticizing and idealizing children do for their parent who isn’t there. It’s about generations of men failing their children, who grow up swearing to do better only to repeat the cycle. Jones writes with a strong voice and raw style that makes his characters feel real, warts and all, including honesty about their own failings and the failings of those they love.

In short, I enjoyed this one as something a little deeper and more literary in a horror read.

Filed Under: Books, Reviews of Other Books, The Blog

DEATH SENTENCES by Kawamata Chiaki

January 26, 2021 by Craig DiLouie Leave a Comment

Kawamata Chiaki’s DEATH SENTENCES is a fascinating sci-fi story about a poem that once read, distorts time and space. It’s borderline Lovecraftian in the way Junjo Ito’s UZUMAKI is, presenting a strange and compelling mystery that had me turning pages.

In the 1980s in Japan, a secret police squad tracks down and eliminates people exposed to reading an obscure surrealist poem written in France in the 1940s. They are taking this draconian measure to stamp out the spread of an epidemic of people becoming catatonic and dying after reading a poem.

In the 1940s in America and then Paris, André Breton, leader of the surrealist movement, meets a young poet named Hu Mei, who claims to have invented a way to use words in sequence to change the reader’s perception with a nearly tangible experience. Copies of Mei’s last poem are mailed to all of his friends, starting a plague that fizzles out until the poem is rediscovered in Japan.

It’s a thinky kind of story touching on a lot of interesting themes. As with other English translations of Japanese works, the writing is kind of clinical, though, and I didn’t feel much connection to the characters. There’s so much detail, much of it unnecessary, the story develops a kind of documentary feel to it, which was fine only I ended up skimming in places.

Despite all that, I have to say I really liked this one for its originality and engaging mystery. The story’s ideas elevate it quite a bit into something unique, and though I had some troubles with the execution, I’d love to see more of this kind of thing in genre fiction.

Filed Under: Books, The Blog

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