[books 2007] Clive Barker, Kate Mosse, dodgy French philosophy

[inulro]

73. Mister B Gone by Clive Barker
Advertised as Barker's "return to horror", but it's closer to farce. The story of a demon who is fished out of hell and teams up with another demon to cause carnage for a couple of centuries on earth, before being imprisoned in a book. First person narrative on the part of the demon. Parts of it are laugh out loud funny, but mostly it's preditable, and the Big Secret Knowledge that gets Mister B imprisoned takes letdown to whole new levels.

I wasn't too sure about this so I got it from the library, and I'm glad I did. At least there's not much of it. I take back all of the less than positive things I said about Abarat the other week. Mr Barker Can Do Better.

74.Sepulchre by Kate Mosse
Also got this from the library because I didn't like Labyrinth as much as I thought I would. This, however, was more of a "go away I'm reading" number. The structure is similar to Labyrinth (two strands in different time periods), but much more gripping and suspenseful right from the beginning. There's a seriously unhinged and scary villain, some spooky stuff, and the two stories mesh well together.

Highly recommended.

75. The Outsider by Albert Camus
This month's Bibliogoths number. I wasn't that impressed when I was a 21-year-old nihilst punk, so you can imagine how well it went over now. At least the new translation makes easier going of it.

Comments

[naturalbornkaos.livejournal.com]

I avoided Kate Mosse because she looked like Da Vinci Code style stuff but your review intrigues me!

I haven't read a Clive Barker for years. He kinda stopped being interesting to me after "Cabal". :(

[inulro.livejournal.com]

Labyrinth was described as "the thinking person's DaVinci Code" and it could be seen that way, but it's in another league altogether. I didn't like it that much, but Sepulchre was really compelling.

[moral-vacuum.livejournal.com]

Clive Barker was fine when people still dared to edit him. Unfortunately he got to that untouchable stage, and that way self indulgent pretentious wank lies.

[gothwin.livejournal.com]

Not read any Barker since Imajica - although I have most of the books since then sitting in my "to be read" mountain. Abarat seems to be the best of the recent bunch from what I can gather.