Simon Clark is always able to get right into the heads of his young protagonists. there's such an ease there, and a realism; it's a treat to read. BasSimon Clark is always able to get right into the heads of his young protagonists. there's such an ease there, and a realism; it's a treat to read. Bastion is a novella that has a lot for its readers to contemplate, but provides very little answers. usually I appreciate ambiguity, but this one feels like a lengthy intro to a much longer novel and I was a trifle annoyed by the total lack of reasons why. still, the questions intrigue: why are these boys waking up into a world of warfare, within what looks like a giant warehouse with deadly greenery growing out of concrete and a variety of murderous alien threats? why are the girls waking up into an indoor farming community, their sole purpose to raise crops and slaughter livestock and provide food for the boys? why do the boys lose their memories and why do the girls keep theirs? why are their ages strictly 10-16 and are these kids even aging? where the heck are they all, in some other dimension or another planet or or or? who did this to them? and hey why not... what is the nature of gender... what is the nature of war... is the entire story a literalization of how war consumes the young most of all? so many questions....more
"The pumping engine had taken over..." The pumping engine that is life has ignited a new and appalling fecundity in dying, moldering things. The pumpi"The pumping engine had taken over..." The pumping engine that is life has ignited a new and appalling fecundity in dying, moldering things. The pumping engine that is death has created new forms for those held in its grasp, dead but now moving things. The pumping engine that is an ancient god, returned to its place of worship and sacrifice, ready to give these seaside villagers all that they dream and fear, in a ritual that is transactional, a power exchange between divine and mortal. The pumping engine that is the protagonist, a young father, his ambitions in overdrive, his sexuality accelerating as well, making a single meshing, pounding being of man and wife. The pumping engine that is the author Simon Clark, getting his career started with this first novel, his machinery already in working order, all of the recognizable parts and pieces - the empathy, the casually evocative prose, the excitingly bizarre ideas, pacing that moves from deliberate to jagged - already all assembled, his vehicle running smoothly from start to finish.
synopsis: ambitious band goes to a remote Yorkshire mansion to put together their first demo. scary shenanigans ensue.
not much to say about this one esynopsis: ambitious band goes to a remote Yorkshire mansion to put together their first demo. scary shenanigans ensue.
not much to say about this one except that I quite liked it. it is basically a classic haunted house tale given some intriguing flourishes (a house that can physically bring people back against their will, people dreaming about their eventual deaths) and some modern trappings (favorite bit: at one point the band uses THE POWER OF ROCK 'N' ROLL to fight the mansion's evil - and it's not even corny when it happens). Simon Clark can be hit or miss and in this one he hits. when he's on, he's on, and The Tower has excellent pacing, a wonderfully creepy and atmospheric setting, and a snappy but not superficial tone. characters are quickly and sharply etched, and some are given a surprising amount of depth - in particular the first victim's fascinating backstory and amusing perspective on the situation at hand. best of all is the fantastic character of the dog, who SPOILER of course saves the day and best of all, lives!
favorite Clark novel so far: Blood Crazy. if you like horror, you should really do yourself a solid and check it out.
to beef up this so-called review, here are some seasonal images that I found quite heartwarming:
back in 1995, Simon Clark wrote a nifty post-apocalyptic novel called Blood Crazy, featuring the adventures of a young man in England as he meets otheback in 1995, Simon Clark wrote a nifty post-apocalyptic novel called Blood Crazy, featuring the adventures of a young man in England as he meets other survivors and evades groups of murderous not-quite-zombies. I loved it. seven years later, Clark wrote Stranger, an irritating post-apocalyptic novel featuring the adventures of a young man in America as he meets other survivors and evades groups of murderous not-quite-zombies. well I suppose it is true that every writer revisits the themes and stories that define them as a writer, so I wasn't particularly annoyed at seeing the old story given new clothes. nor did I mind its lack of focus; that worked perfectly fine in Blood Crazy and I don't think its presence in Stranger is all that problematic. there's an excitement in randomness and not quite knowing where a story will be going, even if that unpredictability is due to lack of focus. what frustrated me about the novel was that it felt like it was written during one long weekend. a clumsy novel.
perhaps the switch to America served Clark badly. he has no grasp of how Americans talk. for example, few 10-year olds casually use the word "lovely" and use of the word "niggardly" is fairly rare (for obvious reasons). but I don't think it was just the problems with American vernacular because there was so much that was off throughout the entire novel in how the characters thought, spoke, and related to each other. people laughing at jokes that made no sense. a monstrous villain's oddly-timed rant about how he was bullied as a teen. the hero wondering about "mating" with a romantic interest and later flirting with her by saying she has to live so she can give him children. huh? an execution about a third of the way through the book bothered me not just because of its ridiculous brutality but because it was a genuinely ridiculous way to kill a person.
fortunately the novel wasn't a waste of time. I did like the oddly erratic approach to storytelling and Clark knows a thing or two about pacing. a book that features a youthful hero who flies into an uncontrollable murderous haze whenever someone infected is near him made for some surprising scenes. and Clark still has some creative juices. I would say that a room-sized jell-o mold apparently made of blood and other fluids and that contains malevolent floating body parts is certainly creative....more
it seems as if this quasi-young adult, sorta post-apocalyptic, kinda zombie-horror, new-fangled Lord of the Flies type novel published in 1995 is someit seems as if this quasi-young adult, sorta post-apocalyptic, kinda zombie-horror, new-fangled Lord of the Flies type novel published in 1995 is somewhat of a cult classic. i think it completely deserves that status and wish it were even more well-known. i have rarely seen it referenced, but given how it straddles different sorts of subgenres, i suppose that is understandable. still, it deserves more attention. at the very least, if you are a fan of any of those subgenres i mentioned, this should be considered as particularly interesting reading material.
one day in April, 17-year old Nick Aten ("yeah, it rhymes with Satan") learns to his extreme surprise and displeasure that everyone age 20 and over has had their mind switched over to something more sinister, more herd-like. in essence, adults have become bloodthirsty, zombie-like beings with minimal intelligence and whose main priority appears to be to capture and quickly, brutally, horribly kill their own children. lesser priorities for these transformed adults is the killing of any other children that may cross their path and the building of odd geometric patterns that they form out of their children's belongings, their children's bodies, and their own dying bodies as well. but above all, their main mission remains to kill their own kids - to the point of tracking them down and hunting them with some kind of uncanny homing instinct.
Nick starts out in a kind of state of shock (rather understandable) but quickly learns to survive, picking up and protecting a few fellow kids on the way, including the obligatory love interest. he is an amiable and amusingly laddish protagonist: recently graduated, with some skills in the fixing of cars, but whose main priorities in life are hanging out, drinking lots of beer, contemplating girls, and planning further engagements with his ongoing rival Tug Slatter within their suburb of Doncaster. the first quarter of the book details Nick & company's sometimes panicky, sometimes steady-handed attempts to drive around and figure things out. the rest of the novel becomes a study in contrasting ways to build communities, as Nick finds himself an increasingly important part of several different kid communes, each of which has reacted to the global disaster in different ways.
the writing is plain, unadorned, at times crude. Clark's greatest skill may be in simply making this all seem real - i did not have to carefully suspend disbelief to enjoy it. despite the atrocities being committed and the horrible ways that kids die, this is not the kind of novel that goes into graphic detail about those kinds of things - visceral, splattery horror elements are rather slight; brief descriptions are the norm. sadistic and rapey behavior from some particularly bad kids are noted and reacted against by the young heroes, but they are not dwelt upon by the author in a leering way. mainly Blood Crazy is a fast-paced page-turner, one of those books that you may find yourself skipping ahead a bit to see if any characters die or if anything especially terrible will happen next, if you are the sort of reader who worries about that kind of thing (i certainly am).
the explanation of why this is all happened to the adults is, for me, what lifts this novel into 4-star material. there is a rather mind-blowing rationale for it all, one that includes the idea that God is simply a projection of our unconscious, in some ways a Jungian symbol that we are all genetically predisposed to believe in. i did not expect to read that in this book! the explanation/revelation occurs during an info-dump that is over 25 pages long. from reviews i've read, this sequence is intolerable to many readers. Clark does try to tart up the dryness of this passage by having it delivered during a sexy massage ("Now turn over, I'll do your front"..."You know I'm getting as much pleasure from this as you are") by a sweet young lady who had just spent the previous few days drugging up our hero and pretty much raping him night after night (upon learning this, Nick is at first irritated but then basically shrugs it off - he has bigger things to worry about). to me, this entire sequence was completely absorbing. it reminded me of the themes and interests of criminally-underrated author Colin Wilson, particularly in his novels The Mind Parasites and The Space Vampires (basis of the laughable movie Lifeforce), and his excellent young adult Spider World series. any info dump that reminds me of Colin Wilson is a good thing. and any info dump that actually expands my mind and challenges my preconceptions of evolution is an even better thing....more
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