Once more, I’ve slackened off a bit in my reviewing duties. So instead of reading one review this time ’round, you’re going to cram six of the buggers into your eyeballs.
Talk about value for money! But that’s not all! There’ll be surveyors, pandemics, pugilistic pain, shoals of teen suicides, bad TARDIS houses, Nazi-influenced ‘shrooms and, er, Simon Callow.
Never let it be said I don’t offer value for money! Let’s get on with it.
(more…)The end of the year is coming up fast. By which I mean to say that at time of writing it’s tomorrow.
So I figured I should really get off my arse and review some of the books I’ve consumed in the time since I last posted.
(Which is, as ever, far too long ago.)
They probably won’t be too long, but still… here we go.
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Revival by Stephen King
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
So, I’m back on the King train. I’d fallen off it when I was in my early 20s – I feel his readership is probably most vehement about keeping up in its teens, as I was – and it had been years. I read From A Buick 8 some time ago and really enjoyed it. Since then, though, there’s been thirteen-odd books – four (including one out later this year) since the time Revival was written.
It’s hard to keep up, is what I’m saying. Also, I’m not sure I’d pick Revival as the book to jump back in on. (more…)
Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I’ve been reading Stephen King for years – doesn’t everyone begin reading his stuff in their teens? – but haven’t had much to do with anything he’d written lately, other than On Writing. So it was interesting to see what his fiction was like these days.
Of course, this isn’t much like most of King’s other work – or at least, his stereotypical horror output. For starters, it’s not horrific: it’s a cop drama. Retired cop drama, to be specific. With Mr. Mercedes, the first in an as-yet-unnamed trilogy, he’s started telling the story of Bill Hodges, an unlikely hero and even less likely Lothario.
King tips his hat to James M. Cain at the start of the book, and it’s easy to see (more…)
Yeah nah. 