Jeff Barr - Horror/SciFi/Fantasy Pulp Fiction Writer, Coder, Hacker, Musician » Reading

The Strain – Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan

Jeff — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 00:51:20 +0000

The Strain - Guillermo del Toro / Chuck Hogan

This is a great book – one o0f the few books I can say that I got about 200 pages in, and wasn’t completely bored, even though it was mostly setup until that point. There are a few moments of sloppy writing in the book, but they were very short moments, and far between. This kind of reads like a machine wrote it according to a checklist. Conflict? Vampires, check. Romance? Check. Pathos? Kids get killed right off the bat, check.
Not to take anything away from it – that’s like saying a movie was made according to the Michael Bay checklist – some people don’t dig it,but there’s a reason those movies are so popular. I am a fan of both Micheal Bay and The Strain. I’m about halfway through the sequel (The Fall), which is actually better than the original.

Update: The Fall, the second book in the trilogy, was great. Definitely left me wanting the third book (The Night Eternal), which is scheduled for release in 2011.

No Doors, No Windows: A Novel – Joe Schreiber

Jeff — Fri, 14 May 2010 08:15:53 +0000

No Doors, No Windows: A Novel is a lot different than Joe Schreiber’s other 2 novels – Chasing the Dead and Eat the Dark. Those were very action-oriented, mostly plot with some Stephen King-esque nods to character development. No Doors, No Windows: A Novel is quiet, slow, and small-town mystic atmospheric, also reminiscent of King. It also reminds me of Straub’s Ghost Story and A Winter Haunting by Dan Simmons. No Doors No Windows is especially enjoyable is you enjoy Gothic-ish modern ghost stories.

2 Great Scary Stories

Jeff — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 06:54:01 +0000

Two really great horror stories that do what good horror does so well: makes you think about dark places, and then, slow and majestic and horrifying, takes you there.

Going the Jerusalem Mile – Chaz Brenchley
This story is as obsidious as it is insidious. My wife and I share a peculiar approach to religion: it scares the bejezus (excuse me, that’s my pun you’re stepping on) out of us. The only horror movies that scare her involve religion. Religion frightens me the way a shadow would – it’s presence at the best of times is unnerving; but if it moved toward me, I’d have a heart attack. This is a story about religion, obsession, and it’s final perfect form: worship.

The Machine of a Religious Man – Ralph Robert Moore
The voice and characterization in this story turn something simple into something just plain ole sad. Nothing worse than plain ole sadness.

Both can be found in ‘The Years Best Fantasy and Horror 2006‘, and likely a few other places as well.