Tag Archives: horror

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Book Review: Human Remains, by Peter Milligan

I accepted a review copy of the graphic novel Human Remains through Rockstar Book Tours. It’s by Peter Milligan (Author), Adrian F. Wassel (Editor), Sally Cantirino (Illustrator), Dearbhla Kelly (Colorist), and Andworld Design (Letterer) and has also been featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight.,

Live. Laugh. Love. Scream.
DIE.
Dax and Bisa love each other. But in this new and terrifying world, love is dangerous. Feeling anything is dangerous. Love. Hate. Joy. Fear.  Any of these in strong doses will bring a swift death. Earth has a new and terrible invader—monsters that smell the scent of emotion, salivate over the prey, and hunt the very feelings that make us human. A shocking tale of pent-up emotions and forced composure in the face of unspeakable horror…

my review

It took me a little while to digest Human Remains. I finished with a feeling of, “Welp, that’s a thing I’ve read now.” I don’t know that I could have even said if it all came around to a salient point or not. However, as I sat on the experience a little while and thought on it, I decided that it did. (Of course, it did.)

It’s gory and touches on any number of heavy, trauma-inducing subjects. (I think a trigger warning wouldn’t be out of place for this one.) But watching as the characters slowly move from shocked and horrified to numb and blasé in the face of countless deaths is poignant. (Can I say a book with roughly 2 million panels of humans being violently dismembered was poignant?) But what does it mean to be human, how much will we give up to remain human, how much can we change and still be human are all important and thought-provoking questions this graphic novel seeks to answer.

I did think it took a long time to come around to those points and a few of the devices used to make them were a little ham-handed. But all in all I’ll call this one a success.

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Other Reviews:

Mallory Books: Human Remains

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Book Review: The Brother’s Curse, by Christine M. Germain

I accepted a review copy of Christine M. Germain‘s The Brother’s Curse through R & R Tours during its book tour. It was also featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight. You can hop over there for author information and a giveaway.

Christine Germain ebook

A year after the brutal death of her parents, Crystal Francois moves back home to the eerie small town of Lakeview Falls. When one of her neighbors goes away abruptly leaving his home to be watched by a young man named Jason Warwick, Crystal finds herself falling for him instantly because of his charming ways and dashing good looks.

Two weeks before her 25th birthday, she receives a rare antique purple amethyst stone necklace that is left for her by her late mother; A necklace with a deadly past and horrible consequences when being worn. She finds out that wearing the necklace causes her and her friends to be the target for two sadistic tyrannical evil 18th-century old Shapeshifter brothers who will not stop till they find her and retrieve the chariot stone necklace that holds their father and 24 demonic Shapeshifters captive.

When young men from town go missing, and bodies showing up eaten or skinned alive. Lakeview Falls is on high alert. It doesn’t take long for Crystal to discover that the new guy in town isn’t who he claims to be or if he is even human.

my review

It brings me no joy to give a book a poor review, especially a book by a new author. And I’ll say up from that this book has many good reviews. I appear to be in the minority here. But the simple fact of the matter is that I do not think that this book was ready for publication. I think it has an interesting premise and cast of characters, but it needed to pass through the hands of both a copy and developmental editor before publication.

What’s more, while I very much appreciated the diversity in the cast, there is some stereotyping going on, and—personal opinion here—I’d have rethought the present tense narrative. Put simply, the book is rough and to try to name all the ways would feel like an attack. So, I’m going to leave it at ‘the book needed significantly more editing than it appears to have received.’

However, I do want to reiterate that I think it has an interesting kernel of an idea, and I appreciate that it’s the men who are largely the nameless victims. That might seem an odd thing to comment on. But if you really stop and think about all the books you’ve read, we consistently culturally paint women in the victim role. And, unless you are making a concerted effort to avoid it, that shows in the media we all consume. I appreciate that Germain flipped the tables here.

Lastly—as just an FYI—this is dually listed under the paranormal and horror genres. I would call it much more horror than paranormal.

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Other Reviews:

https://gavingardinerhorror.com/non-fiction/book-reviews/the-brothers-curse/

 

Book Review of NOS4A2, by Joe Hill

I borrowed an audio copy of Joe Hill‘s NOS4A2 through the local library.

Description from Goodreads:

Victoria McQueen has a secret gift for finding things: a misplaced bracelet, a missing photograph, answers to unanswerable questions. On her Raleigh Tuff Burner bike, she makes her way to a rickety covered bridge that, within moments, takes her wherever she needs to go, whether it’s across Massachusetts or across the country.

Charles Talent Manx has a way with children. He likes to take them for rides in his 1938 Rolls-Royce Wraith with the NOS4A2 vanity plate. With his old car, he can slip right out of the everyday world, and onto the hidden roads that transport them to an astonishing – and terrifying – playground of amusements he calls “Christmasland.”

Then, one day, Vic goes looking for trouble—and finds Manx. That was a lifetime ago. Now Vic, the only kid to ever escape Manx’s unmitigated evil, is all grown up and desperate to forget. But Charlie Manx never stopped thinking about Victoria McQueen. He’s on the road again and he’s picked up a new passenger: Vic’s own son. 

Review:

I’m surprised that I don’t have more to say on this one. But, having finished it, I’m just kind of like, “OK, I’m done.” I have no strong feelings either direction. I didn’t hate it and I didn’t love it. I was disappointed in the lack of what I would consider a happy ending, though it did mostly wrap up. And I 100% appreciated having a positively represented fat man who was lovable and loved. Lou was absolutely my favorite character. (Though the fact that he lost all his weight in the end compromised the fat representation a little bit. Not completely though. He was fat the whole time he was heroic and wonderful.)

This was my first Joe Hill book and I didn’t remember that he’s Stephen’s King son when I picked the book up. I thought his writing very like his fathers and was a little surprised to find him referencing some of Kings work in the book. It was odd.

The narrator (Kate Mulgrew) did a great job with the exception of the times she stopped for dramatic pauses before finishing sentences. “He walked into the……kitchen.” That seriously got on my nerves. All in all, it was pretty good but didn’t blow my socks off.