A new chapter is now available for "Agent Shield and Spaceman." As new team members join the Tiger Snake mission, tensions appear within the team.
Finished Ramsey Campbell's "Ancient Images," last night. Prior to this novel, I'd only read two other works of Campbells', "Influence" (which I loved) and "Nazareth Hill" (which confounded me). This most recent novel concerns the hunt for a copy of a long lost Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff movie called "Tower of Fear," which appears to be involved in a great many unexplained deaths. Ramsey's writing is consistently amazing but written with a peculiar halting quality that alternately fascinates and frustrates me. The plot of "Ancient Images," is straight forward enough - a young editor interviews the surviving cast and crew of the movie as she darts around the small towns and villages of rural England. However, there always seems to be something else going on with his writing, things left unsaid or misunderstood, imagery that suggests horrid possibilities without ever coming out and saying what's going on. I found myself stopping half way through a paragraph, realizing that I was already gliding past the good bits without ever realizing what I was reading.
Overall, I read this novel as a part of my ongoing interest in surveying cosmic horror and in tone and theme, the novel certainly fit the bill. Ultimately, although I am certainly glad to have tracked down the novel, I'm not sure if I can recommend this novel to readers not already fans of horror fiction. There is no monster that barges out into the center of the screen to shock and dismay. The novel's climax essentially happens off screen. This is a novel of dread, that creeping awareness of already knowing more than you are allowing yourself to admit.
Finished Ramsey Campbell's "Ancient Images," last night. Prior to this novel, I'd only read two other works of Campbells', "Influence" (which I loved) and "Nazareth Hill" (which confounded me). This most recent novel concerns the hunt for a copy of a long lost Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff movie called "Tower of Fear," which appears to be involved in a great many unexplained deaths. Ramsey's writing is consistently amazing but written with a peculiar halting quality that alternately fascinates and frustrates me. The plot of "Ancient Images," is straight forward enough - a young editor interviews the surviving cast and crew of the movie as she darts around the small towns and villages of rural England. However, there always seems to be something else going on with his writing, things left unsaid or misunderstood, imagery that suggests horrid possibilities without ever coming out and saying what's going on. I found myself stopping half way through a paragraph, realizing that I was already gliding past the good bits without ever realizing what I was reading.
Overall, I read this novel as a part of my ongoing interest in surveying cosmic horror and in tone and theme, the novel certainly fit the bill. Ultimately, although I am certainly glad to have tracked down the novel, I'm not sure if I can recommend this novel to readers not already fans of horror fiction. There is no monster that barges out into the center of the screen to shock and dismay. The novel's climax essentially happens off screen. This is a novel of dread, that creeping awareness of already knowing more than you are allowing yourself to admit.
Comments